The Children's War (104 page)

33

“W
ELL,
I
NEVER THOUGHT
I’d see you alive again,” Tadek joked with just a bit less than his usual degree of spite.

Peter grinned at him. “Great party, isn’t it?” he said, glancing around at the revelers who were celebrating their successful mission and safe return.

“All the better as our engagement party,” Zosia contributed as she joined them. She hugged Peter and added, “It’s all right if I tell everyone, isn’t it?”

His grin broadened.

“You’re getting married!” Tadek shouted. The crowd fell silent and stared at them in amazement. “Zosia, can we talk? Now? Please?” Tadek pleaded.

“Mommy?” Joanna called out from across the room. She abandoned her friends and began plowing through the people.

“Please, Zosia!” Tadek begged.

“Later,” Zosia replied coldly. As Tadek tugged at her arm, she repeated, “Later!”

Tadek downed the rest of his vodka in one gulp, then muttered, “ Congratulations,” and wandered off to refill his glass.

“Don’t worry about him,” Zosia said, watching him walk away. “He’ll be fine.”

“Mommy!” Joanna squealed as she threw her arms around her mother’s legs.

“Funny,” Peter responded, “worrying about him hadn’t really occurred to me.”

Joanna released her hold on her mother and threw her arms around Peter’s legs. “Daddy!” He lifted her into his arms and hugged her. “Married! Married! Will you be my father? Will you adopt me?” she asked excitedly.

“If there’s an official way of doing it, I certainly will. But you know, I already have.” He gave her a big kiss. “Now, why don’t you come with me, little one. I’m going to get your mommy a present.”

He returned to the party with the necklace he had bought in Berlin. He had not taken time to rewrap it, and despite his protestations that she should not, she read the melancholy farewell he had scribbled onto the wrapping paper. Her voice caught in her throat as she realized how close she had been to losing him, and they looked at each other with a shared knowledge of devastating loss. Then Zosia smiled and opened the gift. She declared it was absolutely wonderful and quickly fastened it around her neck and traipsed around the room for all to admire it.

As Peter remained holding Joanna, Barbara came over to him. “I’m glad you made it back,” she said shyly.

“Yeah, so am I.” He smiled at her.

“I’m sorry about . . .” She gestured toward the injuries still visible on his face.

“They’ll be gone soon enough.”

“May I?” she asked as she gently kissed his cheek. Their eyes met as she pulled back, then she quickly looked away, scanning the room as if searching for someone. Without looking at him she said, “Congratulations on your engagement.”

“Thank you.”

She finally decided she could not find whomever she was looking for in the room and brought her gaze back to his face and said softly, “It’s quite a surprise. No one expected it.”

“It’s what we both want.”

Barbara nodded noncommittally. “I guess. But please, be careful.”

Zosia returned before he could decide what to say to that. She and Barbara exchanged a glance: Barbara’s look was inscrutable, Zosia’s amused. Barbara made her excuses and walked off. Zosia watched her walk away, said, “I think you have a fan.”

“She’s a nice kid.”

“She wouldn’t appreciate you thinking of her as a kid.”

He shrugged. She was indeed a young woman, bright, pretty, experienced. She had probably already killed a dozen enemy soldiers. Still she had that youthful enthusiasm, that sure knowledge of the world that he had long ago lost. There was a lifetime of compromises and bad decisions that separated the two of them. She was a kid.

That night, as they lay in bed with Joanna sleeping between them, Zosia turned on her side, reached over her sleeping daughter, and gently stroked his face to see if he was awake.

“Hello,” he said as he felt her fingers. He hoped she did not notice that he had recoiled—it was just that her touch was so unexpected and he had nearly been asleep.

“Joanna?” Zosia whispered quietly, but there was no response from the child.

“I think she’s asleep,” he whispered. “She’s a lovely child, isn’t she?”

“Yes, she is.” Zosia sounded sad.

“What’s the matter?” he asked, worried by her tone.

“You can’t adopt her,” she replied forlornly.

“What? Why not?” He raised himself up to look at Zosia, but she had turned her face away. He felt vaguely desperate, whispered intensely, “I promised her I would!”

“You should have asked me first,” Zosia said stiffly.

He fell silent, utterly furious with her. He decided, however, not to show his anger; there was too much at stake. He gritted his teeth and said, “Look, I’m really sorry I didn’t ask you first. You saw, though, she just asked me—how could I say no?” Zosia didn’t say anything to that, so he added, “I’m sorry, I’m really sorry I didn’t get your consent before announcing it to everyone, but please Zosiu, please let me adopt her.”

“No, Peter. It’s just not possible.”

“Why not? I
said
I was sorry!” It was hard to whisper and be so angry and desperate at the same time.

“I promised Adam.”

“You what?”

“He said if anything happened to him, he didn’t mind if I remarried; in fact, he even encouraged it. But he made me promise that no one would adopt Joanna. He wanted to be sure he was not forgotten, that he remained her father.”

Damn the man’s ego! “I’m sure he didn’t mean it that way, Zosia.”

“You know the life we lead, Peter. If Adam or I talked about death, it was entirely serious; we liked to keep our affairs in order. He meant what he said.”

“I’m sure if he knew how much Joanna wanted it, he would change his mind.”

“No, that’s exactly what he was afraid of. That he would be replaced.”

“So he’d deny his daughter a chance to have a father?”

“You can still be a father to her. You just can’t make it legal. I made a solemn vow.”

“Damn! What am I going to say to Joanna?”

“You should have thought of that before you made your promise.”

Damn them both, he thought, and slumped back down into the bed. Damn their stupid egos and their genetic connection. He was Joanna’s father now, he should be allowed to say so to the world. He sighed noisily.

“I’ll tell Joanna, if you want,” Zosia’s voice came softly out of the night.

“No,” he responded, resigned, “I’ll tell her.” That her mother is a wicked old witch and her dead father a selfish egomaniac. Well, maybe not. Maybe Adam deserved this last vestige of a part of Zosia’s and Joanna’s lives. It was, after all, just a legal nicety. It wouldn’t change anything—he would still be a father to her. Being there—that was what mattered.

He lay quietly thinking of what he would say to Joanna. Perhaps if he invoked her father’s memory a bit; perhaps they really were forgetting him already. What had it been? Not even two years. “Zosia?” he asked quietly to see if she was still awake.

“Yes?” she answered with tears in her voice.

“How did Adam get taken?” He had never bothered to ask. He had, he realized, done everything he could to hurry the process of forgetting the man.

“He was teaching a class—in town. A university course. He was betrayed by a new student.”

“Teaching?”

“Yes, that was one of his passions. He taught history. We try to keep an education system going so that our population can be ready to resume control of their lives at some point in the future.” She paused. “Of course, teaching is a capital offense.”

“What happened to him?”

“Died in custody is all the records say.”

“I’m sorry, Zosiu,” he said quietly. He decided suddenly to learn more about Adam, to try to help Zosia preserve his memory. It was the least he could do. “He was on the Council, wasn’t he?”

“Oh, yes, more senior than me. Once he was gone, we elected Tadek to the Council.”

“Ah, Tadek.” The one who had given him such trouble at his trial. After all he had endured—to face that cold judgment, those unfeeling eyes. “So, I might have had an easier time at my trial if Adam had lived?”

“I doubt it.”

“What? Do you think Adam would have been keener to shoot me than Tadek?”

“I don’t know. What I do know is I got a lot of sympathy votes for your cause. Without that, it’s doubtful we would have gotten a majority in the first place, and Adam’s opinion would have been irrelevant.”

Peter did not say anything. He wished he had not asked the question.

“Or more likely,” she continued, unaware of his discomfort, or perhaps unconcerned about it, “Marysia would not have been feeling quite so sentimental and would have had Olek shoot you the minute she realized you were unimportant.”

“Unimportant,” he repeated.

“Yes, unimportant,” she agreed.

He did not fail to detect her implication. How dare he think of himself and his own pain, when Adam, marvelous Adam, had made the ultimate sacrifice. “Ah, yes,” he responded bitterly. “How stupid of me to have forgotten my place.” Worthless and unimportant and in a lifelong debt for being allowed to live. Why did it sound so damn familiar?

A long silence ensued, then softly she said, “I’m sorry, Peter. I didn’t mean it that way.”

“Yes, you did,” he replied quietly, and turned over to fall asleep.

There was a classroom. A few scattered chairs, a table, a place where he could stand and talk. Three or four students sat looking at him, waiting for him to speak. He talked about literature, about Shakespeare. The class grew noisy—he looked up and saw twenty or so students—all in neat rows of tables and chairs. He quoted from
King Lear.
He tried to use English, but German kept coming out. Someone asked if there was a line about serpent’s teeth and mad governments. No, he said, it was a hound’s tooth and Mozart. He heard a key scrape in a lock, began to tremble in terror. He looked up at his students. There were hundreds of them packed into a huge lecture hall. How could they have been so careless! Hundreds!

They were all waiting for him to say something. The rusty key scraped like a razor across his raw nerves. His limbs grew heavy with dread. He began to speak again, but his voice caught in his throat. He looked up but no one was there. He
was alone. No, not alone, for someone hit him. He sputtered as blood filled his mouth. Someone hit him again.
You self-satisfied, arrogant little worm! You think you’re so damn intelligent, don’t you!
He spit blood, choked, and coughed on his teeth as they swam loose in the blood in his mouth.

“Are you all right?” Zosia was kneeling on the floor by his side of the bed, looking at him in the dim light.

“Oh,” he moaned, then realized where he was. “Did I wake you?”

“What were you dreaming?”

He shook his head in answer, then got up out of bed. “I’m going for a walk.” Zosia stood, put her hand on his arm. “I’m . . . I didn’t mean . . .”