My Own Revolution Read online

  He lingers. He’s no doubt looking for something suspicious. Like my photo of the painted-out letters. Maybe he suspects that Danika is here.

  “Do you have something else to give us?” I ask.

  He shrugs.

  Thwack, I close the door on him. I open it again and look out. But he’s already at old Mr. and Mrs. Smutny’s door.

  “I hate to think of who made these,” says Mami, stretching out the flags.

  “Who?” Bela wants to know.

  “Prisoners,” Mami answers. “And not even criminals. Ordinary people. Anyone who says boo to the state.”

  “That’s sad,” Bela says, taking the flower out of her hair and adding it to the others.

  “It is indeed,” Mami agrees. “Help me, Patrik. Let’s get these flags hung.”

  “Be sure to go today, Patrik. Don’t hide out. And sing. Don’t just mouth the words,” Tati advises me. “It’s hard to stomach, I know . . . but for the sake of all of us . . .” He straightens my red scarf, making sure it lies neatly. “There will be a lot of secret agents milling about,” he says. “Ready to pounce on anyone who doesn’t look enthused.”

  “I promise to look enthused,” I assure him. Babicak will certainly have his eye on me.

  Out in the street, the crowd has already gathered. Lining up are the steelworkers, with Danika’s father and Emil’s parents among them, the workers from the local spa, those who bottle the spa’s water, the professors from the university, the Communist militia, Tati and the other psychiatrists of Western Slovakia, and the doctors from the hospital. But not Dr. Csider, who told one too many jokes.

  Tractors decked out with red flags have arrived from the collective farms. If I knew Eduard Bagin by sight, I’d look for him. Party members carry more red flags, raising the poles high. Women in Slovakian dancing costumes look ready to lift their embroidered skirts, kick up their legs, and prance.

  High above the crowd float big photo portraits of famous Communists: Lenin, Karl Marx, Fidel Castro, and Lumumba of the Congo. The giant faces stare down on us, watching. Watching for those who might pee on them.

  Secret agents are certainly mixed into the crowd. Rumor has it that for every two people, there’s one agent. We never know who. As Mami likes to say, it could be the butcher, the baker, the candlestick maker.

  Three police vans, their windows blacked out, are parked at the corner.

  At school, Mami leads Bela by the hand, helping her find a spot at the front of the parade. The younger kids are dressed in their white shirts, the older in blue. Of course, all of us sport the pointy red scarves. Mami blows a kiss to Bela, then hurries off to find the other nurses.

  Mr. Babicak, Mr. Noll, Mrs. Jakim, and the other teachers stand with clipboards and pens. The principal calls out names, and we take our places in formation. I’m next to Bozek. He stands serious, his haircut shorter than before. For this special day, he’s wearing a pair of blue jeans. I move toward the boy on my left.

  Through a gap in the buildings, I see a caravan of Gypsy wagons winding along a distant hillside. They don’t have to march in this stupid parade but are making their own. Even the Communist Party has no hold over them. Outside of proper society, people say.

  A shifty, restless feeling grows among us. Some of us are eager to begin the celebration; others want to get it done with. It’s hard to know who feels what.

  Four boys and four girls carry the banners that stretch the width of the street. When Mr. Babicak finally blows the whistle, they unfurl and we set off.

  The parade has begun. We’re a few steps closer to the end.

  As the parade moves out of range of the teachers’ control, some of us break formation, edging nearer to friends. I sidle close to Emil and Karel. Together we march behind a flag with dangling red fringe.

  On each street corner, bands play the Communist anthem, “The Internationale.” “Arise, ye workers from your slumber . . .” Loudspeakers blare: “Soviet Union forever!” We wave — we have to wave — at those lining the streets, mostly the mothers. Although they have no official group to march with, they have to be here.

  Since I also have to be here, I wish I was at least marching with Danika. If she was my girlfriend, I could put up with this. Just as I think that, I catch sight of her. She’s not far ahead.

  She’s walking with Bozek. Two good Commies marching together. So it’s come to this. I bite the inside of my cheek on one side, then the other.

  “Don’t look,” says Karel. “Don’t get yourself upset.”

  He’s right. I shouldn’t look. Not with that black mark on my record.

  Emil presses something small into my hand. I open my fingers to his plastic cigarette lighter.

  Walking on tiptoe, I see that those two are not only marching together. They’re holding hands.

  Karel points at the red fringe on the flag ahead of us.

  I glance toward the giant faces of famous Communists. All but one — Lumumba — are facing away. I flick the tiny wheel of the lighter. It takes a few seconds for the fringe to catch. I hold the lighter steady, my thumb firm. Finally, the fire ripples along.

  Karel and Emil dash off, but I stick around. I raise my camera to the flag on fire and shoot, capturing the glorious moment.

  The man holding the flag touches the back of his neck. He whips the flag around and drops it to the ground. He stamps out the flames.

  A bunch of people stare, one shouts, and then the parade goes on, the man carrying the blackened flag in his arms.

  I move away, looking around for anyone who might know me. That man over there — is he the one from the castle, the one with the beige jacket and the VW Beetle? Now he’s wearing a dark-blue jacket, so it’s hard to be sure.

  The parade makes a turn onto a side street where no one’s watching. The marching bands play a few more bars of melody and fall silent. Thank God the marching peters out.

  I run across Mr. Ninzik, who is not with any group. He hasn’t been sent to the wastelands of Siberia after all. He’s not shoveling rocks and ice. At least not yet. “Mr. Ninzik!” I call.

  He looks around, hands shoved deep into his pockets.

  “Mr. Ninzik!” I wave. I want to tell him that I’ve just acted against the state. I’ve rebelled. In the name of Adam Uherco and of all of us. “Mr. Ninzik!”

  He smiles briefly. When I get right up to him, he says, his mouth barely moving, “Don’t be seen with me, Patrik. It won’t be good for you.”

  So I look at the ground, then past him. I pretend I’ve never met him before. Lighting the flag on fire was stupid. It didn’t do anyone any good. It was all for myself. Striking a match wasn’t like whatever Mr. Ninzik probably did to get himself kicked out of the school.

  I walk away. When I look again, Mr. Ninzik is gone.

  I turn to see Danika walking alongside a float with flowers arranged to form a gigantic hammer and sickle. Bozek marches beside her.

  The float stops, and Bozek begins to lift the little kids down. Danika takes each one by the hand and finds the right mother. Bozek lifts. Danika delivers. The two make a good team.

  I grab a hunk of flowers off a float that’s stopped near me. I grab another hunk. I make a big hole in the hammer and sickle. I mash the petals, then throw the handfuls down. I’m tearing at more flowers when a mother asks, “What are you doing, young man?”

  “Nothing,” I answer, grinding the flowers under my shoe. “I’m doing nothing.”

  Bela wants white icing for the cookies, but Mami tells her there’s no extra sugar.

  “Even if you stood in line for it?” Bela asks.

  “Not even if I stood for hours and hours.”

  Karel, Emil, and I are sitting on the couch, watching a Charlie Chaplin movie for the hundredth time.

  “How can that guy be a party member?” Karel asks. He’s been tinkering with a tiny train engine, trying to straighten the wheels.

  “He’s too goofy for it,” Emil says.

  “And yet . . .”


  Karel and Emil have had this discussion about a hundred times before.

  Bela comes in, licking batter off a big spoon. While Charlie Chaplin studies himself in the many mirrors, she runs around bowlegged, holding a pretend hat, copying him.

  “Bela, get out of here.” I swipe at her imaginary hat.

  “It’s my house, too.”

  “Go away.”

  She sticks her tongue out.

  I smell the cookies baking, a sweet stickiness spreading through the apartment.

  When Bela leaves, I whisper, “Danika has a big secret.”

  “What’s that?” Karel asks, leaning forward, the small engine in one hand.

  I look to the windows for peering faces. I listen to make sure that Bela is safely back in the kitchen, chattering to Mami. I beckon my friends even closer. “Her father’s joining the party.”

  Emil whistles.

  Karel sucks in air, then says, “Now Mr. Holub will be watching us.”

  “Danika will rat us out,” Emil says.

  I wish I could assure them she never would.

  Karel asks, “Do your parents know?”

  I hold a finger to my lips. “They mustn’t find out. If they knew, they’d never let Danika come here.”

  Karel makes a show of looking around. “I don’t see her here now.”

  I punch him on the shoulder, but lightly.

  “Who wants her here, anyway?” Karel asks. “She’s tight with that Commie.”

  I punch Karel harder this time.

  “Let’s get out of here,” says Emil. “Let’s go to my house. Listen to the Beatles.”

  Karel makes a face. “And get tortured by your neighbor? How about downtown instead?” He pauses, looking from Emil to me. “We can chat up some stray pie,” he adds in English. Having learned this phrase from Emil’s older cousin, he uses it often.

  I hesitate. Ever since the flag burning, I’ve been nervous about going out. What if people from the parade recognize me? What if they call the police? This boy committed a dastardly deed. . . .

  But my two friends are already headed for the door. Not wanting to be left behind like the little red engine Karel set down on the table, I follow.

  Mami calls out, “Cookies will be ready in a minute.”

  I pause. A warm cookie would be nice. But Emil and Karel are already pounding down the stairs. “Later,” I answer. “Later they’ll taste great.”

  Two men I’ve never seen are standing near the building. One is talking into a walkie-talkie.

  The bus is leaving the corner, so we run down the walkway and along the street. Emil knocks hard on the closed doors, and, with a sour expression, the driver opens up. We climb aboard and plunk a few coins into the slot. Then we stamp our way to the back seats, where the smokers hang out, where kids make out, and where the seats are higher.

  As the bus pulls forward, I look through the back window to see that the two men are both focusing on the bus. For a second, I lock eyes with one of them. He knows. Surely he knows about me.

  The bus rolls through town, picking up passengers, letting them off. I snap photos of people, pigeons, streetcars, hiding my face behind the bulky black camera.

  At the center of town, where the streets narrow, where the mushroom-colored buildings poke their red roofs into the sky, we get off. As the accordion doors open and I descend the metal steps, I look around. Who on this crowded street might be an enemy? But no one looks my way. I follow Emil and Karel passing a collective, where women hunch over sewing machines, and a state-run store selling radios and chocolates.

  A crowd has gathered. We move closer until Karel mutters, “Thunderbird.” Emil and Karel climb the base of a lamppost while I stay down, peeking through people at the ice-blue car with the tiny, round porthole. Low to the ground, sleek as a wet otter, it must go really fast. This is what people drive in America.

  “Come,” Karel calls to me. “The view is great.”

  I glance around again. No one’s paying attention to me. I climb up to stare down at the gleaming roof of the blue Thunderbird.

  Suddenly I see Bozek and Danika in the crowd below. Danika and Bozek. Weaving in and out, headed for the Thunderbird. They’re not just holding hands. They have each other by the waists.

  “Hell,” I mutter, knotting up my fists.

  “Let’s go this way,” Karel says. Pulling on my arm, he yanks me off my perch. He leads me toward a side street.

  “Don’t.” I free my arm. “I can take it.”

  “In here,” says Emil, pushing me into a doorway. It’s a tavern filled with the sounds of Beach Boys music — a song about girls in the faraway state of California. Soldiers in stiff brown uniforms are dancing with young women. A mirrored ball twirls on the ceiling, casting sparkly lights along the floor, the bar stools, the faces of the dancers.

  I want to get back out to the street, take another look, but my friends block the way. From here I can see the bartender polishing a glass with a white towel. It’s not his job to kick out thirteen-year-olds.

  “There’s lots of girls in here,” says Karel. “Take your pick. Forget Danika.”

  He’s right. There are a couple of pretty girls. One is even wearing a miniskirt.

  We move into the crowd. We stay far from the eyes of the bartender, who’s chatting up the woman in the miniskirt. Now the Beach Boys are singing about surfing. The floor vibrates with the beat. If I ever get to the U.S.A., I’ll surf in Scranton, Pennsylvania. I picture Danika dressed in a bikini. I picture us surfing together.

  Hell, hell, hell . . .

  Emil moves over to a girl with long carmel-colored hair and asks her something. She nods and they move onto the dance floor.

  “Your turn,” says Karel.

  I shake my head. No way.

  “Come on. You’re so tall. You look even older than we do.”

  The miniskirt girl has moved away from the bartender. She’s coming across the floor, her face not as pretty as her legs.

  Karel shoves me forward.

  When the girl gets close, I think of Danika with her arm around Bozek’s waist and utter just one word: “Dance?”

  She looks up into my face, her eyelashes laden with black makeup. Her lipstick shines pinky white. Then she says, her words a little slurred, “Sure, kid. Why not?”

  Karel stands by the wall, grinning. Emil twists with his long-haired partner.

  At that moment, the music changes from fast Beach Boys to a slow Beatles song we hardly ever hear. Paul McCartney sings about birds on a hill. I hadn’t bargained on a slow song. The girl, woman really, steps toward me. I hold up one hand to take hers, ballroom-style.

  But instead of taking the hand I offer, she slips both arms around my shoulders. Though her head comes just to my chin, I’m taken into her world of silky warmth, perfume, and beer fumes. The black light comes on, making everyone’s eyeballs glow.

  I try not to think of Danika. I try not to think of her dancing like this with Bozek. I try not to think of her whispering secrets in his ear.

  I step on my partner’s foot.

  “Ouch!” she exclaims, drawing back slightly. “What’s wrong with you?”

  I release my grip on her waist. “I’m sorry. This isn’t a good time. . . .”

  She shoves me away, her teeth glinting. “Make up your mind, kid. Next time, don’t ask until you’re sure.”

  On the way home, I go into the Foto-Kino shop to buy a roll of film. Inside, the shelves are full of bottles of chemicals for developing. Two cameras sit displayed in a glass case.

  When I ask for film, the young woman shakes her head. “There’s no film. None at all.” She pinches her eyebrows together.

  “Not even one roll?”

  “There’s no film in the whole city.”

  I slap the counter. Stupid government. Always a shortage of something. Then I lower my voice. “Not even on the black market?”

  “Not even.”

  I must have film. How else will I
get through the days? Slowly, I count out my allowance on the counter, enough for ten rolls at normal prices.

  At first, the woman looks puzzled. Then her pale fingers close around the bills, bundling them into her fist. With her head tilted down, she looks up at me, her mascara a little smeared.

  I meet those eyes without blinking. I need film.

  Without a word, the woman goes to the back room. I hear her dial the telephone. Hear her speak muffled words. She comes back out, saying, “Go to the corner. Someone will come.”

  “How will they know me?”

  “I told them you’re tall.”

  Out on the corner, I tap the light pole. Tappa-tap-tap. Standing here in the open, I feel naked. So many people driving and walking by. Any of them could say, Aha! There’s that boy. That flag burner.

  My hands itch for the feel of the small orange box. Or maybe the film won’t be inside a box. Maybe just a black canister. Black and perfectly smooth, with a coil of treasure inside.

  Tappa-tap-tap.

  I’ve stepped out of line, like Adam Uherco. I’ve made myself a target. And here I am exposed and alone, with no friends standing nearby.

  But I can’t think about that. Instead I imagine opening my camera, unwinding the end of the film, tucking it in, snapping the camera tight. With film I could record the world, feeling that special power in my hands.

  A group of young girls passes, giggling. Businessmen with briefcases. A soldier from the disco. A Gypsy stands out in her long, flowered skirt, hoop earrings, and bright kerchief. If only I had my camera. I’d capture this woman, show her to Danika later on. . . .

  People come near, but no one swerves close. No one comes to me grasping a precious roll of film.

  Tappa-tap-tap.

  I walk back to the shop. A CLOSED sign hangs in the window. I peer in, but there’s no trace of the saleswoman.

  At the corner by my building, two new men stand guard. I see the bulges of walkie-talkies in their jacket pockets. They know. They know all about me.

  “A letter arrived for you, Patrik,” says Mami when I come in from school. She holds out a slim white envelope.