Blue Skies, Convenient Lies

Luka cried as he stepped out into the sunlight. He cried for two reasons: the first was because the sunshine felt deliciously warm upon his skin. It was summer now, and fresh wind blew in from the west, playfully toying at the loose threads of the rags he wore. The second reason he cried was because it was better to get the tears out now rather than in that dank and humid room he was being shepherded to.

Luka was savagely shoved forward by a calloused hand. Behind him were two men, both in navy blue uniforms and wearing short-billed hats. In their hands were hard rubber truncheons. One of the men urged him forward with a quick flick of his wrist, sending the tassel at the end of the truncheon bouncing around. Luka began his long walk to the interrogation room.

This was part of the torture. Luka had been told that when a prisoner was brought out of those crowded cells to be questioned, one of the simplest strategies was to build dread within him before he reached his destination. Some prisoners broke down in tears upon crossing the threshold, and no further effort was needed.

Luka chose instead to look at the sky and think about when he had last seen a sky as beautiful and richly blue as this one. He had seen it before, some time long ago when he was a child. Luka chuckled as he considered that phrase, “long ago.” Luka was thirty-one years old. His childhood was not that far behind him, especially when he considered the age of some of his fellow prisoners. Yet somehow it felt more distant than it was, and more special than it had been. Luka was hit in the back of the knee by one of the truncheons and sank under the pain. He was lifted by the scruff of his rags and shoved forward again. A barking order let him know that he must increase his pace.

Luka dove back into his thoughts and searched for the sky that seemed so similar to the one he was looking at now. Then he found it, and it encompassed him completely like cool water after a high dive.

*

It had been a summer fifteen years ago in his hometown, some time in July maybe. It was early in the afternoon and Luka had been sitting under a small maple tree adjacent to a potato field on the outskirts of town. It was where he went when he needed to get away from his family. He was packing a small corn cob pipe he had made himself with tobacco he had stolen from his father. He was forbidden from smoking by his family. His father thought he was still too young for it and his mother worried about staining his teeth. Luka felt manly when he smoked. He liked to take deep draws from the pipe before blowing them out of his nose like a dragon. He had also discovered, after two or three visits to this tree, that smoking also seemed to help him think. So the job of the tree was three fold; he went here to escape his family, he went here to think and smoke, and Luka heard his third reason for coming calling his name.

He turned his head and saw Anise.

“Oi!Oye! Hey!”

Luka smiled and beckoned her over to him with one hand while excitedly puffing on his pipe. When Anise arrived she sat down next to him, sweeping the grass with her hand. Today she was wearing slacks that were a rich beige along with a matching collared shirt that had far too many buttons undone. Luka drew more quick puffs from his pipe letting the smoke build a cloud in front of his face. He thought maybe it would be just thick enough to hide his examination of Anise’s neck.

“Can I have a puff before you smoke it all,” Anise asked him.

Luka handed the pipe to her and watched as she placed the stem in the middle of her bottom lip and closed her mouth gently around it. She took a long draw and then lowered the pipe. She looked thoughtfully off into the distance, seemingly unaware of Luka staring at her. Then she let a long wisp of smoke escape her mouth. She turned and handed the pipe back to Luka.

“Disgusting,” she laughed, “I don’t know why you like this stuff.”

Luka grinned and snatched the pipe from her hand, shaking out the burnt tobacco and packing it away in a jacket pocket.

“What would you like to do today,” Anise asked him.

Luka rubbed his chin and considered what they could do. It was going to be far too hot to go walking anywhere, he did not want to leave the shade of the tree even now. Just sitting here some more would be a shame on a day as fine as this one. He wanted to do something special for Anise. A plan began to form in his mind. He asked Anise if she liked fresh baked bread and she nodded her head, yes. He asked her if she also enjoyed freshly made jam as well, and she said, “of course!”

Luka needed to ask her just one more thing.

“Yes, I can make lemonade, what are you up to?”

Luka explained his plan.

“I like that idea,” Anise said, “Let’s meet back here around… six then?

Luka agreed. He watched her as she stood up and dusted off her slacks before walking off into the town. Luka smiled after her, partly because he found her walk so buoyant and graceful, and partly because he was proud of his work. He had set up a very pleasant situation for them to be in, and even got Anise to do some of the work herself. All that was left was to work on his end of the preparation, and work on his nerves at the same time. He hoped acquiring the food would be the hardest part.

In town Luka ran to his aunt's house first to beg her for a jar of her jam. It was very good stuff, made from strawberries she grew in her yard. When he arrived his aunt very nearly threw him out for the last time he stole from her.

“Give me the money you owe me from last time and I may consider letting you buy a second jar,” she scolded.

Luka begged and pleaded to slowly soften her up, but he could see she was in an unmerciful mood today. It must have been the heat. Eventually every excuse and every apology was used, and there was nothing left that Luka could say. His aunt did not look close to breaking. He resorted to the truth. He told her it was for Anise. His Aunt’s mouth twitched. He mentioned it was for a picnic and he saw her eyes lose a little of their edge. She loved gossip.

Luka left with a generous jar of Jam in his coat pockets. His next stop was his own home. When he arrived he did not enter through the front door, but instead circled around the side of the house to where the kitchen was. Just like he expected the kitchen window was open and his mother had placed a fresh loaf of bread on the sill to cool.

Luka peered over the loaf into the kitchen and saw his mother cleaning up the table on the opposite end of the room. He could hear her quietly humming to herself like she only did on certain occasions when she did not have any worries. Her face was serene and it hurt Luka to do what he was going to do, but there was no other option. She would not give up this bread to Luka, no matter what he said, and he needed it desperately. He needed everything to be perfect.

Luka reached over the loaf and felt around on the counter until he had found a tablecloth. He pulled it slowly from its spot on the counter and squeezed his eyes shut, praying some piece of silverware would not fall clattering to the ground. He draped the cloth over the hot bread, then carefully lifted it by either side and folded the cloth under the bottom of the bread. He slowly pulled it towards him and then curled his entire body over it, sinking below the window. He waited for a few moments, almost wishing his mother would notice it’s absence. She did not, and with nothing else stopping him Luka silently apologized to his mother and scampered away. His heart beat violently as he ran, not because of his theft, but because the only place left to go was back to the maple tree.

*

Luka sat with his back against the maple tree looking up at the sky as the sun began to turn it a deeper gold. Sunset was not here yet, but it was coming soon. It was a perfect looking sky; it was not cloudless, because a sky with no clouds was uninteresting. It was a rich ocean blue that grew hazy as it stretched towards the horizon. The clouds stretched along with it in long jagged tracts that caught the sunshine in its many crags and crevices. It was perfect. The moment was as perfect as Luka could hope for.

He turned to Anise and saw she was looking at the sky too. The remnants of their picnic were spread out around them on a blanket she had brought. Luka took a deep breath and then called her name softly. Anise turned to him and there was that same sunshine glowing in her eyes. Luka asked his question to her softly and watched as eyebrows knitted together. That was all it took. That gesture made Luka wish he had never said anything at all. He wished he could have just kept the moment perfect.

Anise could not answer the way Luka wanted her to. She explained that next year there would be an incredible distance between them. Whatever was not killed by that distance would be struck dead by the passage of time. There was no helping it.

“But,” Anise said softly, “we have the rest of the year left. I don’t want it to be ruined. I want us to act as if I’m not leaving, that we will be together for much longer. Even if we just pretend.”

Luka looked down at the blanket in front of him. He blinked back small tears that were forming in his eyes. He was sixteen years old, and this would be the most crushing thing he would face for some time. In this moment he needed some kind of silver lining. He wanted pity. He took the comfort that Anise offered. Luka nodded his assent.

*

Luka was forced into a wooden chair inside a dark, humid room. It was lit up by various lanterns hanging from wooden rafters. There were windows, but the curtains were drawn shut so that only small wisps of sunlight entered the room. Sitting opposite luka, behind a shabby looking wooden table, was a group of three men. On either side were two more men dressed in navy with short-billed caps. Sitting on a chair between them was a stocky looking man in a tan uniform. He wore the peaked hat of an officer, but he wore his uniform loosely. The buttons of his tan shirt were undone almost down to his stomach, and his officer's hat was haphazardly shifted to one side. From his mouth hung a cigarette and when Luka looked into his eyes there seemed to be an endless void where a person had once been.

The officer sat staring at him for several minutes without saying a word. Luka knew that this was another tactic to put fear into him, but the realization of this did not put him at ease. His chest tightened as he waited. Fifteen minutes went by and nothing moved except for the occasional bit of ash falling from the officer’s cigarette. Then Luka heard a noise behind him and he flinched, ready to be beaten or shot. When he opened his eyes again he saw a lit cigarette being held in front of him. One of the men who had brought him up here was holding it out from behind Luka. Luka stared at it for several seconds before the man grew impatient and placed it in Luka’s hand. The man then grabbed Luka by his knobby wrist and pulled it towards his face violently, causing Luka to nearly break his own nose. Luka understood and placed the cigarette in his mouth. The officer kept staring at him. Luka took a long draw from the cigarette and blew two geysers from his nostrils. The taste was acrid and unpleasant.

The officer reached under the table and pulled out an envelope of papers and a single document. He carefully opened the envelope and placed several papers in front of Luka. They were pieces of fiction. They were fabrications, lies, crimes that he had never done and groups he had never heard of. Then the officer placed down the document on top of the rest. This document was the important one. Luka did not pay attention to the words written on it, but he saw the blank space at the bottom for a signature. If he signed this piece of paper, every lie underneath it would become true. The officer spoke for the first time.

“I don’t know what impression the others might have given you about us,” he started slowly, “and I do not care. You will sign this document. It will either be now or many years later, but you will sign this document. We do not need your signature. You will be found guilty in a court of law. You will sign this document, because otherwise you will stay here until you do.”

The officer paused to let his words sink in.

“Things get much easier once you sign it, the next prison will be like heaven in comparison” he finished.

Luka stared at the paper without seeing it. He was no longer in the room, he was somewhere else again. He was thinking about that summer fifteen years ago.

When he came back Luka looked at the paper, and then addressed the officer.

“I won’t indulge you,” he said with a tight voice. “You can do whatever you will do, but I won’t endorse this, I won’t put my name on it. I refuse to pretend.”

The Officer gathered up the papers from the desk as soon as Luka said this and placed them aside. The men on either side of Luka lifted him out of his chair. The officer took his cap off of his head and wiped away sweat that dripped down his brow. They had expected this answer.

*

Luka was tossed out of the room head first. He hit the ground hard, but he was too weak to moan in pain. In a hazy distance he was told to stand up. He felt the rubber truncheon against his back, but it did not feel like much of anything now. He felt more blows on his body and Luka knew if he did not stand up they would kill him right there.

Slowly he rose to his knees. He expected more brutal hits from the truncheons, but he felt nothing. Shakily, Luka got both of his feet under him and stood up. Then he felt the sunshine. Summer. Rich blue sky. Luka began to laugh. He laughed for two reasons: the first was because the sunshine felt incredibly warm upon his skin. The second reason was because he had overcome fifteen years of regret.