The Sunlit Night (16 page)

“‘… Thither shall come the sons of Thor, Modi, and Magni,’” Haldor was saying, “‘bringing with them their father’s mallet Mjölnir. They will all sit down together and converse, talking about things that happened in the past, about the Midgard Serpent and the wolf Fenrir. Their food will be the morning dews, and from these men will come so great a stock that the whole world will be peopled.’”

Olyana looked up—she had been staring down at her own breasts, touching her fingertips together. She turned out now over the water, toward the sun perched on the horizon line, soon to start rising again.

“‘The sun will have borne a daughter no less lovely than herself,’” Haldor read, “‘and she will follow the paths of her mother, as it says here …’”

And Haldor read to the end of the fifty-third chapter, and Yasha wondered whether Haldor had seen his mother look out over the water, and whether the ceremony was for his father or for her. Sigbjørn’s head was still bowed in grace, and Frances had clasped her hands behind her back, a tiny soldier, contributing her best seriousness and her best sympathy. Yasha had no requests to make, no changes to make to this ceremony. Whether his mother was mourning, or hopeful, or bored, or empty-headed did not matter to Yasha, because it hadn’t mattered for the last ten years, not as much as the bakery or feeding Septimos had mattered. Yasha had let Septimos go; his mother had long ago let her family go; and Yasha himself, he felt with dread excitement, had been let go, now that Papa had gone.

Then came the sound of sand hitting the casket—Sigbjørn had gotten hold of the red-handled shovel and had begun to fill in the hole. Yasha forgot all his peace at the sound of the sand and his mother’s voice.

“What are we doing?” she asked, which seemed to be the only question she had asked all night.

“It is only the first bit of sand,” Haldor said, closing his book. “We must begin to fill in the grave, such that your husband is buried by dawn.”

“He’s not her husband,” Yasha said.

“What?” said his mother.

“No?” asked Haldor.

“He’s not your husband!” Yasha shouted. “You’re somebody’s girlfriend.” He turned to Haldor and said, “She lives with a man, in Tribeca.” He looked at his uncle, and then back at his mother, and then down into the hole. “I am his son,” Yasha said. “And that’s all.”

“You are also
her
son,” said Sigbjørn, pointing the shovel at Olyana.

“You
are
his mother, aren’t you?” said Haldor.

Olyana ran her hands through her hair and said, “I am Yakov’s mother. Vassily was my husband. The rest is only about cats and apartments.” She made a flicking gesture with one hand. “Let me bury him.”

Haldor whispered, “Dear Olyana,” but she snatched the shovel from Sigbjørn’s hand. Haldor, now defenseless, touched at his beard absentmindedly. Sigbjørn dropped to the ground and sat, holding his knees to his chest. Nobody knew what was wrong with him. He was not, in any case, attempting to retrieve the shovel from Yasha’s mother. Olyana stood with all her limbs spread apart, the red handle clutched in one fist. Frances kept her own hands behind her back, her hair covering her face. It did not seem possible to Yasha that they could both be called women.

Things had been moving very, very fast, Yasha thought, while everybody remained silent. It had begun the day his mother appeared on Oriental Boulevard. He’d chased her, they’d run a good distance toward Brighton Beach, and it seemed they hadn’t stopped running. Yasha had run off with his father to Russia, his father’s heart had run out, and they had all run up here to the damn North Pole, where he’d found the first girl he really—

“What’s wrong, Mrs. Gregoriov?” Frances asked.

That is what happened, Yasha thought, as her voice confirmed it.

Olyana lowered her shovel, but not completely to the ground. “I cannot remember the blessing,” she said, and then lowered the shovel completely.

The word
blessing
startled Haldor. He flipped furiously through his tiny book.

“There is a prayer we should say. I learned it for my father’s funeral and I do not remember how to say it. I do not remember how to say it!”

Haldor left his position at the head of the grave and walked around to Olyana. He gently freed the red handle from her fist. Frances came over and stood between them. Everybody was on one side of the grave now, except Yasha, who stood directly opposite, looking very tall and gangly against the open beach.

Olyana turned to Frances and said, “You’re Jewish.”

“What?” said everyone.

“I am Jewish,” said Frances simply.

“Of course she is,” Olyana said to the group. “New York, brown hair, I mean, look at her!”

“Mom,”
said Yasha, who realized he’d never called her “Mom” before, only “Mama,” and not often that. “Mom” was what the kids at his high school said into their phones, after school, when they were begging for something.

“I only want to know if she knows the blessing,” Olyana said.

“What blessing?” said Frances.

“The one I said for my father.”

“Mom,”
said Yasha.

“I am certain you know it. Of course, I should know it, only we were hardly Jewish at all. We pretended not to be. It was easier that way.” She turned to Haldor with an expression that begged his pardon. “And of course my father died, so I learned the Jewish words, all nine of them or whatever it was. It was the only way we could bless him, I mean your grandfather, Yakov.”

It was impressive, Yasha thought, the way she played to her audience, getting everyone involved. She was putting on a show, and she looked frighteningly radiant, like a star.

“I know the Mourner’s Kaddish,” Frances said. “That’s all. I think you say that later. I don’t think it’s for right now.”

“How does that go?” said Olyana.

Frances said,
“Yitgadal v’yitkadash.”

“It’s not that one,” said Olyana.

Yasha said, “Let her finish.”

“No, no, it’s not that one,” his mother said, lifting one hand to block out the sun, which was getting higher and into her eyes. She squinted, and paced up and down the length of the grave. “Not that many
y
’s. It’s a short one.” She turned to Sigbjørn, who had no idea, and looked insulted by the words
short one
.

“I thought Papa wasn’t Jewish,” Yasha said. “Only you are, sort of.”

“I am,” she said, “which means you are, Yasha, dear, and we are the ones who are mourning.”

“The only Jewish thing Papa knew how to say was
mazel tov
,” Yasha said.

“He learned it at our wedding,” said his mother.

Haldor opened his book. “Perhaps—”

“The blessing is not in your book, my dear chief,” she said. “Lord,” she said, “I miss my father. I miss that man, herring and all. I miss this man.” She used her sun-blocking hand to point down at the casket. Her face was lit again, and shone as if the light came from under her skin. “I miss my son,” she said. “Look how tall he is. I can hardly believe it. Of course I am a long-legged woman, but Vassily was so short.”

Sigbjørn looked down at the casket.

“Heaven pity me,” Olyana continued. “I lose everything.”

“I don’t pity you,” Yasha said to his mother, across the grave.

Olyana was in her stride. What had happened by the Yggdrasil tree—when she had been crouched, and shocked, and nearly defeated—would not happen again. There were too many people watching this time, and her dress was thin, and she was cold, and strengthened by the cold. Yasha saw this, and braced himself.

“When I ask heaven to pity me,” his mother said, “I ask heaven, not you, Yasha, dear. Then, of course, heaven will need to pity you too, for sending your poor father off to Russia, looking for me, when you knew very well I was not there. We’ll see if heaven forgives you for that.”

Frances turned, confused, to Yasha. Yasha’s fingers cramped.

“When I call to heaven,” Haldor said, passionately raising one arm, “I am asking Baldur, and Frey, and Skirnir, Frey’s manservant—”

“I sent
myself
off to Russia,” Yasha said, “to get
away
from you.” He glared at his mother, but her expression did not change. He turned to Haldor. “We are not Vikings, Haldor,” Yasha said. “Frances, please, say the blessing you know. Stand where Haldor stands.”

Nobody argued. Frances pulled her hair off her face and gathered it at the nape of her neck in a twist that immediately came undone. The group stood evenly spaced around the hole. The circus, Yasha thought, was over, and the band of pink light that had lined the horizon was sinking, gradually, into the sea.

Frances said,
“Yitgadal v’yitkadash sh’mei raba.”

There was a pause. She whispered to Yasha, “Say
amen.
”

“Amen,”
said Yasha, with all his might.

“B’alma di v’ra chirutei v’yamlich malchutei b’chayeichon uv’yomeichon uv’chayei d’chol beit Yisrael, baagala uviz’man kariv. V’imru—”

She looked at Yasha. Yasha said,
“Amen.”

“Y’hei sh’mei raba m’varach l’alam ul’almei almaya. Yitbarach v’yishtabach v’yitpaar v’yitromam v’yitnasei, v’yit’hadar v’yitaleh v’yit’halal sh’mei d’Kud’sha—”

Olyana shouted,
“B’rich Hu!”
She beamed.

Frances went on.
“L’eila min kol birchata v’shirata, tushb’chata v’nechemata, daamiran b’alma. V’imru …”

At the sound of the pause, Yasha said,
“Amen.”

“Y’hei sh’lama raba min sh’maya,”
Frances said,
“v’chayim aleinu v’al kol Yisrael. V’imru—”

“Amen,”
Yasha said.

“Oseh shalom bimromav, Hu yaaseh shalom aleinu, v’al kol Yisrael. V’imru,”
Frances said, followed by a final
“Amen,”
which Yasha missed.

Olyana was delighted. “I simply don’t know how I remembered it,” she said, in the silence after the prayer. “Of course, my mother would have known it, maybe taught it to me. I haven’t forgotten it all, bless me.”

Yasha looked to Frances, attempting to communicate a gratitude he’d never felt before. Frances looked back with a sleepy, glad face.

Olyana walked around to the other side of the grave. “Your girlfriend has been a wonderful help, Yakov,” she said. “Thank you,” she said to Frances.

“Oh, no—” Frances said.

“You
have
been wonderful,” Yasha said, hoping that Frances might let the “girlfriend” part slide, or even roll with it.

“Is anybody in need of refreshments, coffee?” Haldor asked. “Cheese?”

“We are not finished with the burying,” Sigbjørn said.

Haldor opened his tiny book, and then closed it and put it away somewhere under his tunic. “Forgive me, forgive me, forgive me,” he said. “Let us dig.”

With the prayer said, and the sun rising, and the wind slowing down, it was—everyone seemed to agree—time to dig, time to bury the casket and the skins. It was cold, and the sand would undoubtedly make Papa warmer, in one way or another, whatever warmth could mean to him now. Frances left her spot at the head of the grave and motioned for Yasha to step forward.

I am still alive, Yasha thought. He picked up the yellow-handled shovel and joined Sigbjørn in shoveling sand. When the casket was no longer visible, he gave the shovel to his mother, an action that made him feel profoundly merciful. He watched her heap a few rounds and was moved, despite himself, because burying was the worst sport, and his mother performed it gracefully. Toward the end, Sigbjørn handed the shovel to Haldor. To prevent Haldor and his mother from finishing the digging together, Yasha asked Haldor for the red-handled shovel, and heaped, with his mother, the last of it.

•    •    •

They sat on the beach with the grave filled in behind them. Rocks the size of station wagons filled the shore; there weren’t many good places to sit. A few rocks had smooth tops, with lichen for padding. They all sat facing the sea. Yasha had his own boulder, and his mother had her own—a larger one way down by the water, with a slight incline, like a pool chair. Daniil got up and washed his face with a little seawater.

Yasha turned back to the now barely discernible grave. Haldor, and the blacksmith, and now Papa—they belonged here, Yasha thought. This was their place. Daniil would go back to Russia, which had always been his place. Yasha, and his mother, and Frances—they did not seem tied to the idea of
place
altogether, as far as he could tell. They were the anywhere sort, just like his cat had been.

His mother leaned back with her eyes closed, sunbathing. There was nothing left of the sunset-sunrise that had stretched out around midnight. The sky was simpler now, less theatrical, and it was strangely unsurprising to see her there, taking in the early light, saying nothing. It was as if they were all waking up, waking up their bodies, each still grappling with a question from a dream. His mother, reclining on her rock, with her body unfurled, looked unquestionably like a woman. Yasha had in some sense never understood her this way—he didn’t know if she shaved her armpits or legs, what creams she kept by the mirror, whether she slept naked or in yellow shorts, like Frances. No—his mother would not sleep in shorts. Yasha wondered if it had been a pleasure for his father to sleep beside her. He could hardly count the pleasures now divided from his father by sheepskins, wood, and his uncle’s flimsy brass nails.