My Own Revolution Page 8

  There’s a silence, long and deep, until Karel says, “Guess we won’t see you around next year.”

  “Guess not.” I throw down the stick and lean back against a tree trunk. “Guess not.”

  “Do you want to take the Beatles single for a while?” Emil asks, pulling a cigarette from his satchel.

  “Thanks, but no. I don’t have a record player.”

  “Plus Patrik can’t risk getting caught with something like a record,” Karel says.

  I look upon my band of loyal men — Emil striking a match, Karel doodling with the stick I threw down. Like Janosik, I won’t take this lying down. “My father and I are going to Bratislava tomorrow to pick up a boat,” I tell them. “We’re going to Yugoslavia.”

  “You’re going on vacation at a time like this?” Karel asks.

  I don’t say a single word. A long look is enough.

  Emil moves the flame toward his cigarette, then stops. “Oh,” he says, letting the match burn out.

  “I get it,” Karel says.

  “This may be our only real good-bye,” I say.

  Emil puts the cigarette into his pocket and tucks it safely out of sight, taking longer than he needs to. Then he holds out his hand, palm down. Karel places his on top, and I put my hand over Karel’s. Three layers of our hands. This used to be our ritual before going into battle for Janosik. Under my palm, I feel the pulsing warmth of Karel’s skin. “I’ll write to you guys,” I say. “I’ll find a way.”

  “Sure,” says Emil.

  “Sure thing,” says Karel.

  But we all know that mail is a very iffy proposition between America and here.

  After I leave them, I wander through Cherub Pee Park, moving toward the exact spot where Danika told me no. Shadows shift across the flagstones, and I think again of being a miner. Most of my life will be spent underground, in darkness. I’ll enjoy this kind of sunshine only on weekends. If there are weekends. . . .

  Then I look up and see them. Sitting on the fountain where Danika and I sat. But instead of having a confusing conversation, they’re kissing. Bozek has one hand on Danika’s smooth cheek. Behind them, the stone cherub pees on and on without stopping.

  My heart pedals furiously. Forward. Backward. I want to run away, pretend I’ve seen nothing. I want to run toward them, tear them away from each other.

  I march across the flagstones, scattering a group of ducks. My shadow falls across the love of my life and this . . . this thief. Their arms drop and they stare up at me, blinking.

  “What is it, Patrik?” Danika asks. “You look so . . .”

  I interrupt her: “You know what it is.”

  She turns her face away from Bozek. The police station? she mouths silently, exaggerating the words.

  Bozek knits his eyebrows and tugs on his red scarf.

  I step closer, my heart tumbling in circles. “I’ve loved you all my life. That’s what.” I bite the inside of my cheek, forbidding myself to cry.

  “Oh!” Danika says, her voice breathy.

  I want to seize her, press my lips to hers.

  Bozek scuffs at a weed with the tip of his shoe. “I didn’t know. . . . I had no idea. . . .”

  “You didn’t know that Danika and I were practically sweethearts before you came along? If you’d never come to Trencin, we’d be fine!” I glare at the cherub.

  “Patrik!” Danika cries.

  Bozek takes her hand and grips it hard. “You said that you and Patrik were good friends. Very good friends. But that was all.”

  The skin by Danika’s left eye twitches.

  “You got Danika interested in the party so she’d like you better,” I accuse.

  “Me?” Bozek touches his chest with one fingertip. He stands up, shielding his eyes against the lowering sun. I see that his American jeans are a little too short. “That had nothing to do with me. Danika’s father was already set to join.”

  I sit down on the edge of a fountain, away from Danika. Away from both of them. Bozek is right. I lean my elbows on my legs and drop my head.

  In the long pause, the ducks return, lowering their beaks to nibble the grass.

  “I’m going to become a miner,” I suddenly blurt out. I don’t mean to say this — the words just come.

  Danika asks, “What, Patrik? What did you say?”

  “Next year I’m going to a different school. To become an apprentice.”

  “A miner school?”

  “Was that your idea?” Bozek asks.

  “Yes, and of course not.”

  Awkwardly, Danika slides closer to me, the fabric of her skirt catching on the stone fountain. “Tell me this isn’t true, Patrik. Tell me you’re just joking.”

  “It’s . . .” Now I can’t help the tears. Like the words, they flow out of me. I wipe my eyes on my sleeves. “You already knew.” I manage at last.

  “Of course I didn’t,” she says, shaking her head. “I knew about the police station but not the rest. How would I?”

  “From your father.”

  She looks puzzled, then shakes her head again. “He didn’t tell me.”

  “A miner. That’s a bummer,” says Bozek softly. “A real bummer.”

  Danika moves still nearer. Placing her hand over mine, she says, “I didn’t think . . .”

  “You didn’t think the party would send kids to be miners? Is that it? You didn’t think . . .” I stand up and the ducks take off, beating the air with their brown wings.

  As Tati and I leave for Bratislava, towing a trailer that used to be a farm cart, the men with the walkie-talkies patrol the street in front of our building. This time, Danika’s father is out there, too, and they’re all talking together.

  “Who are those men?” Tati asks.

  “They’ve been watching us.”

  “Why is Mr. Holub with them?” he asks, peering into the rearview mirror.

  “Dunno. . . .”

  Tati drums his fingers on the steering wheel. But the men make no move to follow us. Even when we drive out of town, no one chases us down. No one stops us. The flat two-lane road of the countryside begins to wind through villages, then past enormous collective farms. I roll down the window and take a deep breath of the river grasses. Soon I won’t see this again. I’ll be far away. Where, I don’t know.

  When we camped in Yugoslavia, I met a boy my age who was also vacationing there from Czechoslovakia. His family had a bright-red boat called the Wave Rider. We rode bikes together and skipped stones across the water toward Italy. One morning, the Yugoslav patrol boats raced toward shore, white foam frothing behind them. They were bringing in the Wave Rider. Alexej and his family sat with bowed heads, two uniformed Yugoslav guards at the helm.

  “Alexej!” I called out.

  He didn’t look at me. In fact, he turned his head away. The Wave Rider scraped the cement ramp. One by one, each member of the family got out, wading the last few feet: the father and mother, Alexej and his two little brothers. Flecks of red paint drifted in the water.

  Without a word, the guards handcuffed the parents. Then they marched the whole family — those of us watching had to step aside — to a police van puffing tailpipe exhaust.

  At noon, Tati stops the car to eat the picnic lunch Mami packed. There’s cold sausage, some bread, a tomato and pear for each of us. In the distance, the Bratislava castle rises above the city. Unlike ours in Trencin, it doesn’t teeter on a precipice, but perches comfortably on its hilltop.

  I watch the cars on the road. A dirty white VW goes by. I squint, looking for rust.

  “Let’s fetch our boat, Patrik,” says Tati as we finish up. “Let’s get it over with.” He lifts the lid of the picnic basket, and we pack everything back in.

  We enter the town and drive through the steep gray canyons of Soviet apartment buildings.

  “See how the statues of Stalin are all gone?” Tati asks.

  “Guess so. I never saw them.”

  “Ever since he killed millions of people after the Second
World War, he’s been pretty unpopular.” Tati laughs, but not as if he thinks anything is funny.

  There are still plenty of Lenin statues. All waiting to be pissed upon.

  Red-painted slogans scream: Workers of the World, Unite! and Down with the Bourgeoisie! There’s also a small handwritten scrawl: Freedom from the Russian occupation. Now!

  Finally we drive into the old medieval town, with its pale tan buildings and soft curving walls. The flags of Russia and Czechoslovakia hang from the buildings. I hold up my camera and pretend to shoot photos, though I’m still out of film. Maybe Tati will stop so I can buy some. But later. Right now we have to get the boat.

  I look for signs of all that Bozek brags about, but see only a tattered poster advertising a local band. I spot just one man wearing blue jeans.

  Tati consults his handwritten directions to the state-run store, the tuzex. He hands me the slip of paper, and, as he drives, I read aloud: “‘Left here, go straight, look for the gas station on the corner.’”

  Another white VW. But that means nothing. Beetles are everywhere. I see a blue one. A brown one.

  At last we arrive. The tuzex is a plain, flat-looking storefront with small windows. Tati parks the car and trailer, and we walk up to the entrance.

  A small man with very red lips sits blocking the doorway. When our shadows fall across him, he looks up. “What are you here to buy?” he asks Tati.

  “A fiberglass boat. I called ahead to order it.”

  “The purpose of this boat?” The man purses his lips.

  I fasten the bottom button of my shirt.

  “It’s just for recreation,” Tati answers. “My family is going on vacation.”

  “And where are your bons for such a big purchase?”

  Tati takes out his wallet and displays the special currency inside.

  “And where did you get so many bons?”

  From the inside pocket of his jacket, Tati takes the letter from the hospital. He unfolds it carefully and hands it to the man.

  The man purses his lips again, reading about the paper published in the West. At last he reluctantly waves us inside.

  We enter into a heaven. The store is filled with fragrant coffees, gold-wrapped chocolates, imported cheeses, and nice clothes. While Tati goes into the little office in the back, I examine the reel-to-reel tape recorders. I look at the transistor radios that have all been fixed in the factory to prevent anyone from getting the Voice of America.

  I look at the recorders again, running my fingertip over the big spools of brown recording tape. With one of these, I could record Emil’s Beatles music for myself. What is taking Tati so long? Is there a problem? Maybe there’s no boat available. Maybe it’s like my film. No boat to be found. Maybe we’ve come all this way for nothing.

  Or maybe someone has discovered the real reason Tati wants the boat.

  I walk back over to the radios, examining them as if I were a serious buyer. In Yugoslavia we’ll pretend to be just normal campers, like we were before. We’ll take our boat out every day, as if for fun. We’ll make campfires and gaze at the distant freedom of Italy, straining to make out the lights on the shore.

  When we camped there, a woman set out swimming. She was towing her little daughter in an inner tube. The two got smaller and smaller until we couldn’t see them at all, even with binoculars. We never saw either of them again.

  Tati finally does return, flourishing a piece of tan paper. It says he has paid for a boat and gives the Bratislava address where we are to get it. Beside the address, the man in the office has scribbled directions.

  Back in the car, I again read off directions while Tati drives: “‘Right here, around the bend . . .’”

  We pass a little store that might sell film, but I say nothing.

  Finally we arrive outside town at a big parking lot. Beyond the barbed-wire fence, I see cars, trucks, boats, and trailers.

  At the guard hut, a soldier looks over Tati’s tan paper. Then he picks up the phone.

  “Who’s he calling?” I whisper to Tati.

  “Probably the tuzex. To make sure we didn’t counterfeit the bill of sale.”

  The man comes out, climbs into our backseat, and instructs: “Go on through the gate. . . . Turn here. . . . Now here.”

  The trailer bumps along behind, clattering over the rutty dirt lot.

  Finally, we pull up beside a turquoise boat, gleaming with newness. There’s a name painted along the side: The Fancy Free. The name makes me smile.

  The three of us climb out, banging shut the Fiat’s doors.

  While Tati and the soldier look back and forth between the paperwork and the boat itself, I stroke the hull’s glossy surface. I pat the bulk of the East German engine.

  “We’re going on a trip to Yugoslavia,” Tati explains to the soldier.

  Even now, if this man were to have suspicions, he could just call someone. The boat’s name suddenly seems to give everything away. It’s as if someone gave us a boat with this name on purpose.

  “Here, Patrik, help me,” Tati says.

  We winch the boat onto the trailer, the soldier helping. We secure it on with long cables.

  When we drop the soldier at his hut, we all shake hands. And then we are out the gate with our prize.

  “The name!” I say when we’re back on the road.

  Tati slaps the steering wheel and laughs.

  “It’s not funny,” I say. “Do you think that soldier guessed?”

  “Who knows?” Tati glances in the rearview mirror. As he drives, I feel the tug of the boat behind us.

  This time I see the car for sure. I see the rust.

  On that half-moon of beach, we’ll have to watch out for that car. We’ll have to watch out for the Yugoslav patrol boats flying their red-white-and-blue flags. We’ll have to be careful of even fellow campers. On the final morning we’ll have to leave early, before the afternoon thunderstorms scroll along the horizon.

  “What about the travel permission?” I ask Tati.

  He sighs and taps the steering wheel, saying, “One thing at a time, Patrik.”

  In the past, whenever we traveled out of the country for vacation, Tati went to the downtown office and got travel papers. But he won’t be able to do that anymore. Without that slip of paper, the Czech guards at the border will turn us back. This journey to fetch the boat will be all for nothing.

  Tati taps the steering wheel again, accidentally honking the horn. “Things will work out.”

  But things might not work out. We may never leave. Someone may figure out what we’re up to.

  At that point, would they send soldiers or only police? Would we hear sirens?

  If only I were old enough to take charge, even in a small way. “How about letting me drive, Tati?”

  “You? But you’ve never . . .”

  “I want to try. This is as good a time as any.”

  “But the boat . . .” he protests. Yet, at the spot where we stopped for lunch, Tati pulls off the road. He gets out, gesturing for me to switch places with him. The motor is still running.

  I’ve sat behind the wheel of a car before, but never with the engine turned on. I don’t know what to do with my arms and legs.

  “Push in the clutch, and move the gearshift forward and toward you,” Tati instructs.

  I do as he says, and the Fiat lurches.

  “Take it easy.”

  I move the car onto the road, into the golden late afternoon. We’re almost the only travelers headed for Trencin. This may be the last time we’ll drive into town from Bratislava. The last time I’ll see these canvas-backed trucks trudging along the farm roads, the row of neat white houses, the cows grazing against the factory smokestacks.

  But these thoughts are mere whispers. Mostly I’m focused on gripping the hard plastic steering wheel with the ridges that fit my fingers. I’m gauging the pressure of my foot on the pedal, focused on not hitting that donkey cart with its load of vegetables. As I take the curve just right, our
boat rattling behind, a delicious feeling of power surges through me. I’m bringing home The Fancy Free for all of us. If only we could snatch up Mami and Bela, if only I could drive us all the way to America . . .

  On our final morning in the campground, Tati and I will go early to the store to buy extra gas. Mami will pack a normal picnic — nothing extra to arouse suspicion. We won’t tell blabbermouth Bela a thing. The sky will be clear, the olive-green horizon of Italy beckoning like a promise.

  On the outskirts of Trencin, Tati takes the wheel again, saying, “Nice work, son. You’re a good driver.” Just then, we pass a police motorcycle parked by the side of the road.

  As we go by, the motorcycle roars into action. The siren sounds: Wawawa!

  Swearing, Tati pulls over, bringing the boat to a bumpy halt.

  I clutch the armrest.

  The officer comes to the window, the pistol on his waist at eye level. Reaching out a meaty hand, he asks to see Tati’s driver’s license. Studying the license, he asks, “Where did you get such a new boat, Mr. Chrobak?”

  “It’s Doctor. Dr. Chrobak.”

  “Doctor, then. Please answer my question, Doctor.”

  “I bought it in Bratislava. The bill of sale is right here.” Tati opens the glove compartment and pulls out the tan paper.

  After the policeman looks at the paper, he disappears, going back to the boat. Out the side window, I see him kick the trailer tires. Once he sees the name, we’ll be done for.

  Finally, the officer returns to the window. He hands back Tati’s license and the bill of sale. “All seems to be in order, Mr. Chrobak. You are free to go.”

  Tati eases back onto the road, muttering, “Close call.”

  “What could he have done?” I hold my thumb on my wrist, feeling the thud of pulse.

  “Depends on how tight the net is.”

  “They’ve cast a net?” My pulse beats harder.

  “Only time will tell,” Tati says slowly.

  I think of Mr. Holub talking to the walkie-talkie men. That’s the net. That’s how it’s cast.

  I think again of my future in the dark cave. My headlamp may go out. Smothering on darkness, I’ll have no batteries. I’ll have to scramble to find the way. Scramble and fall. I’ll batter my way with the pickax.