Oh, it didn’t matter. Just that there was something so soldierly and unhusbandly about how silently and rapaciously Alexander needed to still the cries of war.
Near tears one night, she asked him what was the matter with him—with them—and he replied, “You have become tainted with the Gulag.” And then they were interrupted by a child’s maniacal screams from down below. Already dressed, Alexander ran.
“Mama! Mama!”
Old Mrs. Brewster had trotted into his room, but she only terrified Anthony more.
“MAMA! MAMA!”
Alexander held him, but Anthony didn’t want anyone but his mother.
And when she ran in, he didn’t want her either. He hit her, he turned away from her. He was hysterical. It took her over an hour to calm him down. At four Alexander got up to go to work, and after that night Tatiana and Alexander stopped going to the camper. It stood abandoned in the clearing up the hill between the trees as they, both clothed, and in silence, with a pillow or his lips or his hand over her mouth to stifle her moaning, danced the tango of life, the tango of death, the tango of the Gulag, creaking every desperate bedspring in the twin bed across from Anthony’s restless sleeping.
They tried to come together during the day when the boy wasn’t looking. Trouble was, he was always looking. By the end of long napless Sundays, Alexander was mute with impatience and discontent.
One late Sunday afternoon Anthony was supposed to be in the front yard playing with bugs. Tatiana was supposed to be cooking dinner, Alexander was supposed to be reading the newspaper, but what he was actually doing was sitting beneath her billowing skirts on the narrow wooden chair that leaned against the wall of the kitchen, and she was standing astride him. They were panting, her legs were shaking; he was supporting her shifting weight with his hands on her hips, moving her in spasms. Near the moment of Tatiana’s greatest distress, Anthony walked into the kitchen.
“Mama?”
Tatiana’s mouth opened in a tortured O. Alexander whispered Shh. She held her breath, unable to turn around, overwhelmed by the stillness, the hardness, the fullness of him so thoroughly inside her. She dug her long nails into Alexander’s shoulders and tried not to scream, and all the while Anthony stood behind his mother.
“Anthony,” said Alexander, his voice almost calm. “Can you give us a minute? Go outside. Mommy will be right there.”
“That man, Nick, is in his yard again. He wants a cigarette.”
“Mom will be right there, bud. Go outside.”
“Mama?”
But Tatiana could not turn around, could not speak.
“Go outside, Anthony!” said Alexander.
In the short term, Anthony left, Tatiana took a breath, Alexander took her to the bedroom, barricaded the door, and resolved them, but in the long term she didn’t know what to do.
One thing they didn’t do is talk about it.
“Would you like some more bread, some more wine, Alexander?” she would ask with open hands.
“Yes, thank you, Tatiana,” he would reply with lowered head.
The Captain, the Colonel, and the Nurse
“Dad, can I come on the boat with you?” Anthony turned his face up to his father, sitting next to him at the breakfast table.
“No, bud. It’s dangerous on a lobster boat for a little boy.”
Tatiana studied them both, listening, absorbing.
“I’m not little. I’m big. And I’ll be good. I promise. I’ll help.”
“No, bud.”
Tatiana cleared her throat. “Alexander, if I come, um, I can look after Ant.”
“Jimmy’s never had a woman on his boat before, Tania. He’ll have a heart attack.”
“No, you’re right, of course. Ant, you want some more oatmeal?”
Anthony’s head remained down as he ate his breakfast.
Sometimes the wind was good, and sometimes it wasn’t. Windward, leeward, when there was no wind, it was difficult to trawl, despite Jimmy’s valiant efforts to set the sail. With just the two of them on the boat, Alexander loosened the staysail and while the sloop floated in the Atlantic, they sat and had a smoke.
Jimmy said, “Good God, man, why do you always wear that shirt down to your wrists? You must be dying of heat. Roll it up. Take it off.”
And Alexander said, “Jimmy, man, forget about my shirt, why don’t you get yourself a new boat? You’d make a heap more money. I know this was your old man’s, but do yourself a favor, invest in a fucking boat.”
“I got no money for a new boat.”
“Borrow it from a bank. They’re bending over backwards to help men get on their feet after the war. Get a fifteen-year boat mortgage. With the money you’ll make, you’ll pay it back in two years.”
Jimmy got excited. Suddenly he said, “Go halves with me.”
“What?”
“It’ll be our boat. And we’ll split the profits.”
“Jimmy, I—”
Jimmy jumped up, spilling his beer. “We’ll get another deckhand, another 12-trap trawl; we’ll get a 1300-gallon live tank. You’re right, we’ll make a heap.”
“Jimmy, wait—you have the wrong idea. We’re not staying here.” Alexander sat with the cigarette dangling from his fingers.
Jimmy became visibly upset. “Why would you be leaving? She likes it here, you keep saying so. You’re working, the boy’s doing all right. Why would you go?”
Alexander put the cigarette back in his mouth.
“You’ll have the winters off to do what you want.”
Alexander shook his head.
Jimmy raised his voice. “So why’d you get a job if you were just going to raise anchor in a month?”
“I got a job because I need work. What are we going to live on, your good graces?”
“I haven’t worked full time like this since before the war.” Jimmy spat. “What am I going to do after you leave?”
“Plenty of men are coming back now,” Alexander said. “You’ll get someone else. I’m sorry, Jim.”
Jimmy turned away and started untying the rope from the staysail. “Just great.” He didn’t look at Alexander. “But tell me, who else is going to work like you?”
That evening, as Alexander was sitting in his chair, showing Anthony how to tie a hitch knot through the marlinspike in his hands while they were waiting for Tatiana to go for their evening walk, there was shouting, and what was unusual this time was that a male voice was participating.
Tatiana came out.
“Mama, do you hear? He’s fighting back!”
“I hear, son.” She exchanged a glance with Alexander. “You two ready?”
They walked out the gate and started slowly down the road—all of them trying to hear the words instead of just the raised voices.
“Odd, no?” Alexander said. “The colonel arguing.”
“Yes,” Tatiana said in the tone of someone who was saying, isn’t it fantastic.
He glanced puzzled at her.
They strained to listen. A minute later, the mother came barreling