The bottle of milk

The bottle of milk

Ukraine, Kyiv, 1978

Maria Kirchner had been in the queue for food at the grocery in her quarter of the city since dawn. She had been up at five and dragged her tired legs up the steep streets of Kiev to the shop, which only opened at half past eight. She was wearing a grey jacket, a white polo-neck sweater, a red cap, and the only pair of boots she possessed. Night was beginning to fade in violet tones and the snow on the roofs struck a contrast with the grey façades. The yellow light of the few streetlamps that worked seemed to shrivel with cold. The city would only thaw around noon. But at that hour men and women were already rushing to factories and government offices, setting in motion a transport system consisting of trains, buses, and a few private cars.

When Maria arrived there were ninety-six people in front of her, all with cross faces, shivering with cold and with breath steaming from their nostrils, none of them uttering a word of greeting to whoever joined them. She took her place without greeting anyone either, treating the others as enemies who meant to rob her of the bread and milk she needed to feed Lia, her thirteen-year-old daughter. The line of hungry citizens awaiting their turn to be fed by the Party restrained the urge to pillage the store and the desire to steal the food ration cards from the nearest citizen. The prospect of a sentence in a labour camp dissuaded everyone.

Suddenly she heard shouts:

‘Thief, you stole my ration cards,’ the older woman yelled.

‘Get off me, you loony,’ shouted the other.

The younger woman was tall and pretty while the other was squat, with lumpy features. Both had glaring eyes, snarling lips and throats dilated by blue veins. Maria thought the first was a student or a secretary, while she categorised the second as a factory worker or cleaner. Such scenes she had witnessed many times, involving women of all ages and walks of life, sometimes because of a real theft and sometimes simply as a pretext for taking someone’s food.

The younger women grabbed the older one’s hair and yanked it; the older one got her hands around the other’s neck and started to strangle her; their faces reddened and the howls of the two enraged beasts split the air; the two bodies began to merge, so that the torso of one seemed to have the head of the other, and their limbs entwined like snakes; now the two were one, a single frantic creature that flailed in all directions, disrupting the queue; then they lost their balance, fell and rolled in the snow, and the older woman managed to get her right arm free, opened her calloused claw, curved her fingers and flung the yellow nails at her opponent’s face; the crone’s nails pierced the apple-like face of the young woman and tore her flesh down to her jaw; the victim bellowed as smoking blood ran down her cheek and soaked her clothes; the older woman let out a triumphant roar, stood up, snatched the shopping bag of the other and ran off. The younger stayed shaking on the ground, disfigured, but no one helped her. A police car arrived and out got two officers who grabbed her, forced her into the vehicle and took her away.

A white molehill with red stains was all that was left of the incident.

Not long afterwards, a woman called Ruth joined the queue, who lived in the same street as Maria. Although they were not friends, they knew one another and greeted one another when they met in public places, but there, in that situation where the instinct for survival was uppermost, neither acknowledged the other. The neighbour positioned herself just two metres behind her and put her empty bag on the pavement.

At last, an hour later, it was Maria’s turn to be served. The grocery was a dark place that smelled of flour and soap. Instead of a door, there was a lobby with a greasy floor and a cracked marble counter behind which two assistants with grey uniforms and surly faces inspected the ration cards and handed over the corresponding items of food. With her head held low, Maria slowly approached the assistant who had called her. The citizens’ veneration for these workers was similar to that they held for police officers or judges, since, if for any reason the assistants became annoyed with anyone, they could supply them with less food, or spoiled food, or even pretend that the requested item was sold out. And any protests would only worsen the situation.

‘Bread and milk, please,’ said Maria.

The assistant was a middle-aged man with sleepy eyes. He turned his back on her and headed for the inside of the store. Presently he returned with two loaves under his arm but no milk. Maria gave him a pleading look, in the hope of an explanation which was not offered. 

           ‘The milk, the milk’s missing,’ Maria murmured.

           The assistant bit his lip and sighed. ‘There’s no milk.’

           ‘How come there’s no milk? Just two days ago there was.’

           ‘Sabotage. Enemy agents have managed to sabotage the agricultural production. Didn’t you know?’ He raised his voice as he asked.

           Maria lowered her gaze and swallowed. ‘Yes, I knew, of course I did…’

           ‘Then why did you ask? Are you making an insinuation about the Party’s competence?’

           ‘No, not at all. Sorry.’

           ‘Next!’ shouted the assistant.

           Maria grabbed her loaves, shoved them in her bag and left. As she passed the queue, tears ran down her face. A few people looked as if they felt sorry for her, while others stared at her with scorn, but most ignored her. 

           Maria began her journey home. The sun was starting to warm the city, but its rays did not warm her body. Her feet were frozen and her paces dragged. Her boots scraped the cement of the pavements as if they wanted to act as brakes. The other pedestrians moved fast and ended up bumping into her to get the nuisance out of their way; one or two passers-by cursed or insulted her. Maria did not even see them, or hear them. Her eyes registered the crowd around her, the buildings and the cars in the streets, the simmering noises of the city and the coarse remarks directed at her reached her ears, and her nose smelled the bodies and machines. However, all this sensory information collided against a wall she had raised in order to concentrate on her problem: how to explain to Lia that she had not brought the promised milk.

           It would not be the first time that she came home nearly empty-handed. Lia was used to disappointment, she had already begun to understand what sort of society she lived in, she did not even complain, but even so, every time it happened, an earthquake of guilt, shame and disgust tore Maria apart. Now she was trying to rebuild herself from the rubble so that she could reason clearly. Unfortunately, as the problem she was trying to solve was the cause of her desolation, the more she thought about it the worse she felt. The few possibilities she had of fixing it failed to encourage her: stealing, prostituting herself, or becoming the lover of a Party official—each of these made her feel like vomiting all the milk in the world. Even so, for the sake of Lia, maybe she had no alternative left but to choke on her own vomit. Plenty of women as respectable as her had done it, and one friend who was a convert to the new laws of survival told her that it was only hard the first time, then you got used to it, after a while it became normal, a routine like any other, and sometimes, when the comrade for whom you opened your legs was nice, you even ended up liking it.

           Maria leant against a wall, opened her mouth and let her gastric juices fall.

           When she got home, she found Lia at the kitchen table, doing her homework. She had eaten a crust of bread from the previous day and drunk a cup of tea. Lia raised her head and no sooner did she see her mother’s face than she understood everything. As usual, she tried to lessen her pain and save her from embarrassment.

           ‘Never mind, mum, today I don’t even feel like drinking milk.’

           Maria tried to smile but her lips would not obey and, instead of describing an upward curve, rumpled and twisted. Then her breathing was disrupted by sobs and at last tears fell. Lia got up and hugged her.

‘Don’t cry, mum. It’s not your fault. The saboteurs are destroying our economy to delay the revolution. We were just talking about that in school yesterday. Our teacher said we must be prepared to make sacrifices. But victory is certain.’

Maria stopped crying, disengaged herself gently from her daughter, and looked at her again. Would she ever be able to speak to her without fear? Would she ever be able to tell her what was going on without exposing her to the danger of reprisals? She had told her that her father had been sent by the Party to do important work in another city, and she did not know when he would be back, but she had never thought that Lia believed it. What might they have told her about the matter in school, if they had told her anything?

She was thinking about this when she heard a knock on the door. It’s the old man from the grocery queue who’s come to arrest me. He must have heard her complaints about the milk shortage and informed his colleagues in the police. They had probably been following her for some time and just waiting for a slip from her so that they could send her to a re-education camp. A lot of public projects were underway and they needed new hands to finish the work. And what about Lia? What would happen to her if they took Maria? Doubtless they would put her in an orphanage, where she would suffer even more hunger and maltreatment. Maria had heard rumours of girls being forced to prostitute themselves with foreign diplomats or commissars of the people; and worse still, some had preferred suicide. Maria looked everywhere quickly, as if there might be a secret passage in her kitchen from which she could escape, or for some hideaway where they might be safe, a magical place where they could live.

The blows on the door redoubled in force, impatient now.

Maria resigned herself to her fate. She would go wherever they sent her, do whatever they ordered her, confess whatever they wanted her to say, and swear eternal love for the Party if that could help her lessen the suffering of her daughter. She had heard that the children of criminals who behaved well got special treatment. Some even finished their university studies and became Party officials. Maybe Lia would escape unharmed, she was so brave and strong.

She hugged her daughter once more and, like a person under sentence who has made his confession and heads without fear for the scaffold, she moved into the entrance hallway. For the third time she listened to the knocking, which was softer now, but she knew the kind of mind games they played to confuse their victims, to give them an illusion that they were safe so that prison would prove even more painful. Before she opened the door she glanced at one of her husband’s paintings – a street scene in vivid colours, which foregrounded two women and a child in a hat. It might be the last time she would see it. Only then did she raise her hand to the door handle.

Her mouth gaped in astonishment. She wanted to speak but she could not utter a syllable.

Ruth said nothing either, as if no appropriate words existed for the occasion. Nor did her grey eyes express any emotion. On the other hand her breathing seemed to have sucked all the air around her. Then she raised her right arm, handed over the shopping bag and turned her back. Maria stood and watched her leave, beating down the snow with her energetic steps, and only when her neighbour had turned the corner was Maria capable of looking into her bag. Her eyes widened, her hands shook, and laughter and tears came simultaneously.

Inside the bag was a bottle of milk.

*