Home Is Nearby Read online

  HOME IS NEARBY

  HOME IS NEARBY

  Magdalena McGuire

  For Anton and Miro,

  my loves

  Acknowledgments

  It takes a village to write a book. This is especially true when you decide to produce a book and a baby at the same time, and I’m profoundly grateful to my family and friends for their support and encouragement on both fronts. Particular thanks go to Grazyna McGuire (Babcia) and Glenis Allen (Nana) for taking time out of their lives to fly to Melbourne and look after baby Miro so I could work on my novel.

  For their input into the manuscript, I am deeply indebted to Chandani Lokuge, Marko Pavlyshyn, Grazyna McGuire, Kerrin O’Sullivan, Sue Robertson, Angela Savage, Kali Napier, Karen Lee, Laurie Steed, the Writers Victoria Short Story Clinic, Julie Twohig, Ruth Clare, Elisabeth Hanscombe, Anton Allen, Baden Allen and Rachel Singleton.

  For providing advice on matters relating to art and/or history, thanks go to Lis Johnson, Tony Hulbert, Peter Anderson, James Tizzard and Marek Będkowski.

  It would not have been possible for me to write this manuscript without the assistance of a Research Training Program scholarship. In this respect, I am indebted to Chandani Lokuge for taking a chance on me and championing my transition from law to creative writing. Thanks also go to Monash University for providing a stimulating environment in which to learn.

  I am grateful to the wonderful people at Impress Books, particularly Rachel Singleton, for helping me realise my dream of publishing a novel.

  By far my greatest thanks go to Anton Allen, whose wisdom and support make everything possible.

  A note on Polish pronunciation

  Readers can be rest assured that pronunciation, in Polish, tends to be consistent (unlike English, which has many exceptions). For this reason, the pronunciation of Polish words is not as formidable as one may think.

  In the Polish alphabet, certain letters are conditioned by accents:

  ą on, as in long (nasal)

  ć ch, as in cheek

  ę en, as in sense (nasal)

  ł w, as in wet

  ń ny, as in onion

  ó u, as in push

  ś sh, as in sheep

  ź zh, ‘g’ as in Niger (soft)

  ż zh, ‘s’ as in pleasure (hard)

  Special letter combinations include:

  ch h, as in Loch Ness

  cz ch, as in chip

  dz ds, as in cads

  sz sh, as in shoe

  rz s, as in measure (hard)

  The characters’ names are pronounced as follows:

  Ania – Ah-nya

  Dominik – Dom-ee-nik

  Małgorzata – Mau-go-zha-ta

  Krzysio – Krshi-shyo

  Polish surnames can have different forms for the genders. Skowrońska is the female surname and Skowroński is the same surname for a male.

  Pan and Pani are the basic honorific styles used in Polish to refer to a man or woman respectively. Państwo is used to address a group of men and women.

  One leaves Poland today with the impression that the most beautiful flowers sometimes bloom on the edge of the abyss.

  Czesław Miłosz, 1981

  ‘Sculpture’, a fourteenth century word from the Latin sculpere, means to carve, cut, cleave.

  Martin Herbert, ‘The Broken Arm’,

  Thinking is Making

  Poland, December 1981

  It was eleven days before Christmas and an orange-tailed carp swam in the bathtub, opening and closing the slick tunnel of its mouth. It gulped at my fingers, releasing a stream of bubbles which vanished in the murky water. I withdrew my hand, shaking it dry. The fish returned to circling the tub. Its fins were translucent and stumped, as though someone had cut off the ends.

  I joined my friends at the kitchen table. Seven floors below us, tanks were lined up on the streets. Soldiers gathered by in green uniforms and fur-trimmed caps. They held out their hands to cages of burning coal.

  Martial law was for our own good, the government said. They said we all had to make sacrifices. And we would all be safer as a result.

  ‘Bullshit,’ Dominik said. ‘This is complete bullshit.’ He darted between the laminex table and the bench, rearranging newspapers and books, the cracked cup we used as an ashtray. He stopped at the window, pulled back the curtain and scrutinised the dark street. When I rested my hand on his back he twitched under my palm like one of Father’s rabbits as I tried to pull it out of the hutch.

  Dominik lifted the telephone off the hook and pressed it to his ear. ‘Still dead.’

  At the table, Krzysio massaged his temples and then checked his watch. His movements were unhurried, smoothing the edges of my fear. ‘Well, folks. One hour till curfew.’

  Yesterday we learned there was a new set of rules we had to live by. From the stroke of midnight there were to be no public gatherings, no travel between cities without permits. No one was allowed on the streets after ten at night. So now the four of us were holed up in Małgorzata’s apartment, trying to figure out what it all meant. This was the first time I would be spending Christmas without Father. The thought of being apart from him unnerved me almost as much as the news of what was happening to Poland.

  Dominik ran a hand through his hair. The ends stood up, electric. ‘Let’s go out. Show them we’re not afraid.’

  ‘And get arrested?’ I dragged a jar of honey wine across the table and poured it into cups. Pools of amber liquid glowed by the lamplight. ‘Here.’ I handed one to Dominik, then Krzysio and Małgorzata. I took a sip and savoured the sweetness that came before the burn.

  Małgorzata dipped her hand into the chest-pocket of her overalls and pulled out some hashish. ‘If they treat us like naughty children, that’s exactly how we’ll act.’ A wave of dark hair fell over her cheek as she rolled a joint and dabbed it on her tongue to seal it.

  Dominik threw himself on a chair. ‘This improves things.’

  When Małgorzata passed him the joint, their fingers touched.

  ‘Na zdrowie,’ Krzysio said. His words released a white cloud from his mouth.

  I held up the joint in return, ‘To your health.’ I filled my lungs with the dank smoke and counted to ten before breathing out. There was a haze in the kitchen. By the time we rolled a second joint, all the hard edges were soft.

  Next to us in the living room, the television was on. All the regular programs had been taken off air and we were stuck with a recording, on loop, of the grey-faced General Jaruzelski reading from a piece of paper.

  Great is the burden of responsibility that falls on me at this dramatic moment in Polish history. I announce that today a Military Council of National Salvation was formed. This is the last chance to pull the country out of crisis and save it from disintegration.

  A spasm in his upper lip as he intoned, ‘Let no one count on weakness or hesitation.’

  ‘God, he’s like a cadaver,’ Małgorzata said. ‘Couldn’t they pick someone more charismatic to send us to the gallows?’

  The announcement faded to black and after a brief pause, started once more: Great is the burden of responsibility that falls on me …

  Dominik took two strides to the living room and punched his fist against the television to switch it off. ‘There’s no point in listening to that junk.’

  He was right. For the real news we had to rely on word of mouth and the underground press. Already we’d heard that hundreds of people – maybe even thousands – had been arrested the night before. At midnight, militiamen had knocked on their doors and taken them away.

  Krzysio flicked through Małgorzata’s tapes, the plastic covers knocking gently together. He selected one by Deadlock. ‘Now these are some great performers. Jaruzelski could learn something.
’

  My laugh was too high; the sound pressed against my bladder, my bones. Melting limbs made their way to the bathroom. As I left, Dominik turned up the sound. ‘Let’s be real. No one’s sleeping tonight.’

  The frenetic sounds of Deadlock followed me to the bathroom. Laughing silently, I stretched out my arms and spun around, wobbling to a stop when I noticed the doleful pair of eyes. Though we ate carp every Christmas, the thought of millions of fish floating in bathtubs and buckets, waiting to be killed, was unsettling. I leaned over the tub, dangling in the line of my plait. The fish gaped in the shallow water. It came to me that what I needed to remember from this night wasn’t the tanks or the thin-lipped General. It was this.

  I forced my legs to take me back to the kitchen, where I picked up my satchel.

  ‘You okay, Ania?’ Dominik asked. I gave him a wave of assent.

  Inside the bathroom, I took out my drawing pad. The chipped tiles dug into my knees as I sketched a fish, which soon assumed Dominik’s features: his unruly hair and ironic smile, the strong lines of his cheeks. I startled when a set of hands clamped heavy on my shoulders.

  ‘What are you doing?’ Dominik crouched by my side.

  Biting back my laugh, I tore out the page and handed it to him. The title of the picture was scribbled at the top, Portrait of Dominik as a Carp. I held my breath while Dominik assumed a serious expression: narrow eyes, slight frown.

  ‘You’ve captured a good likeness.’ He tilted his head to the side. ‘So Ania, are you going to serve me on a platter on Christmas Eve?’

  ‘I’m sure you’d be delicious.’

  ‘Cheeky girl.’ Still holding the picture, Dominik scooped me up and dangled me over the bath. ‘Do you really think I look like a fish?’ He lowered me to the water. ‘Do you?’

  As I screeched, the picture floated to the bath. Ink bled into the water.

  ‘Now you’ve seen what your fish-man is capable of …’ Dominik carried me to the kitchen, my heart thumping against his chest.

  ‘Ten o’clock.’ Krzysio interlaced his fingers and he stretched his arms before letting them collapse by his sides.

  We stepped onto the balcony. The smell of burning coal cut through the air. People in the opposite apartment block were flashing their lights on and off, on and off. Some blew whistles. Others simply stood on their balconies or at their windows. Dominik cupped his hands around his mouth and yelled, ‘We’re still here!’ He wrapped his arms around me, shielding me from the cut of the wind.

  In the opposite apartment, two storeys above us, a man in a dressing gown waddled onto his balcony, carrying something bulky in his arms. A television. ‘Enough!’ he shouted. ‘They’re playing that clown over and over and I’ve had enough.’

  ‘That’s a fair reaction to Jaruzelski,’ Małgorzata said. She huddled closer to Krzysio and warmed her hands in his.

  The man heaved the television onto the iron rail of his balcony, nearly tripping as he did. The television wobbled before he pushed it over the edge. There was a sharp explosion when it hit the ground. The streetlight cast a glow on the broken glass.

  ‘That’s what I think of their lies!’ the man yelled.

  From another apartment, someone called back, ‘Okay fine, but don’t come running to us when you want to watch the football!’ Laughter in the cold night.

  Shortly after, three militiamen rushed down the street, rifles slung across their shoulders. One crouched by the broken television. He stood and pointed at the apartment block opposite us, then at ours. The other two men raced off, ready to search the flats.

  ‘Party’s over.’ Krzysio kicked a bit of ice from the balcony and we went back in.

  ‘We need to get rid of this.’ Małgorzata slipped the remaining hashish under a piece of lino on the kitchen floor. She turned down the cassette player and the scream of the punk music drained to a whisper. No one spoke as we waited for the knock on the door.

  Fire

  1

  Poland, September 1980

  In the early afternoon, Father and I crouched by Mother’s side, clearing the golden leaves at her feet. We had come from church, where we’d listened to the sermon with plastic fertiliser bags rustling in the pockets of our coats. I held one open now, scraping leaves into its belly as Father updated Mother on the village news. He told her about the latest feud between neighbours after one accused the other of being a slattern who hung her underwear on the front line for all the world to see, about the local boy who was engaged to an American woman ten years his senior, and the rabbit Father had traded for real cigarettes with the priest. (The French ones have flavour. Not like the sawdust they pass off as tobacco here.) I had my own news, though Father didn’t know it.

  He reached across the granite for a portrait of the Virgin Mary, her hands clasped beneath her burning heart.

  ‘Let me do that,’ I said. With my sleeve, I polished the frame, its silver colouring edged with rust. I replaced it and then traced the inscription Father had carved on Mother’s headstone: Peace is thine/Remembrance is ours. Yet I had no memories of a time when she was alive. All my recollections came from photos, from the stories Father told, or here in the cemetery. I remembered how she looked in springtime, when I laid globeflowers and branches studded with berries across her granite shoulders. In winter, when she wore a cape of white. And on autumn afternoons like this, when the birch trees formed cradles above her head.

  Nearby, a statue of Jesus looked at me despairingly, a crown of thorns piercing his head. I patted the letter in the pocket of my coat. Now was the time to do this. Holding the letter out to Father, I said, ‘This came the other day.’

  He brushed the dirt off his hands and took it. His nose made a sharp whistling sound as he breathed out. Then he smoothed the corners of his dark moustache.

  All this started as a private game of ‘what if’. When I told my teacher I was joining Father in the family trade, she encouraged me to apply for university instead. Incredibly, she thought I could make a portfolio from the little pictures I drew, the figurines I made from straw and wood. To get into art school, I didn’t need to sit any exams. I simply posted off my portfolio and forgot about it. Until the other day, when the letter of acceptance arrived.

  Father turned his attention to the stones around Mother’s grave. Each one was the size of a fist and had a smooth dark surface, like a river at dusk. He picked one up, stroked it, and then put it back down.

  ‘Wrocław isn’t so far away,’ I said. ‘Just under two hours by train. And think of all the things they have in the city. I could bring back sausages ... and cigarettes.’

  The letter rested on the foot of the grave. Father wrenched some weeds from the ground and tossed them aside. ‘You hear that?’ He ran his hand down Mother’s side. ‘Our daughter wants to leave us.’ He shook his head. ‘To go study art.’

  ‘I was lucky to get into the Academy. And it’s a generous scholarship, see?’ I held out the letter but he didn’t take it.

  ‘Sausages and cigarettes,’ he said under his breath. He kissed the headstone, crossed himself and stood up. ‘Come, słoneczko.’ No matter how old I got, Father still called me his little sun.

  We left the cemetery and I walked behind him, kicking my way through the leaves.

  2

  Inside the shed, dust motes floated golden in the dim light. Father stood at his workbench, chiselling a hunk of black granite. A dust mask hid the lower part of his face. Working quickly, he carved the perfect circle of an ‘o’. The commission was on behalf of Olgierd Obuchowski, a retired militiaman who had died of tuberculosis.

  Without pausing to remove his mask, Father said, ‘Small chisel.’ I handed it to him and he rounded off a ‘g’, releasing clouds of granite as he worked.

  On a table next to the workbench was a child-size headstone. Father had given it to me when I was small; my introduction to the family trade. That year, a boy in the class above me had stolen my pencils and as revenge I carved his name in the ston
e. The letters were crooked but prophetic. Two months later he ran across a lake of ice, a shortcut on his way to school. It was the beginning of winter and the leaden days were yet to turn clear and bright. Apparently when he reached the middle of the lake, the ice cracked. He plunged in and drowned. The thought of it made me shiver.

  ‘We should get rid of that thing,’ I said to Father, pointing at the miniature headstone.

  This time he pulled down his mask. ‘Your first masterpiece? Over my dead body.’ He grinned and raise his eyebrows emphatically. Unlike me, Father wasn’t superstitious. He maintained the headstone had nothing to do with the boy’s death.

  He wiped his brow and then rolled up his shirt sleeves, revealing the tattoo on his left forearm; a wobbly outline of a heart and dagger that he’d got during his time in the army. After replacing his mask, he selected a chisel with a diamond-shaped point. He held it in his fingers the way a conductor would a baton. With a swift, decisive motion, he lowered the chisel to the stone and hit the end with a hammer. In Father’s hands the tools became living things that danced and sang at the same time, with a chip chip, tap tap tap.

  A lamp illuminated the plane of the stone. I moved closer. ‘Can I?’

  Father stood back and handed me the chisel. I fitted a mask over my face and bit my bottom lip, the chisel hovering by the stone, the hammer at the ready. The first hit always set a jangle to my nerves. I breathed in, steadying myself, and brought the chisel down to the stone. Clink. Then another. Soon the rhythm took over and the less I thought about it, the easier it became. As though someone else was doing the carving and I was standing by their side, watching.

  ‘Olgierd’ appeared on the stone in neat, even letters. Father said, ‘Where am I going to find someone else who can carve like you?’

  We took turns chiselling ‘Obuchowski’. When we were done, Father added a scroll underneath the lettering and then looked up and said, ‘A coat.’ He tugged off his mask and pointed the chisel my way. ‘If you’re going to Wrocław, you’ll need a new coat. And some socks too. Seeing as you won’t have your old man to light you a fire at night.’