ICE DREAMS
BY TONI NEALIE
Andriy, gutting fish on the deck for Vira to fry for dinner, hears a plane’s fragmented rumble before he can pinpoint its source. He recognizes the sound of the jet descending into a landing path close to his house, typical for this time of year, when the wind gusts from the west.
As the echo reverberates from the cloud cover to his spine, Andriy considers the possibility of flight, of freedom. It’s not much more than a flicker these days, the reflex of a drowning man trying to lift his head even though he knows the current has won him already. He struggles to recall the terror and wonder of his first plane trip, years earlier. Marveling at the model landscape below, the roofs and lights slowly coming into focus, he panicked as the craft screamed and shuddered at touchdown. Eight years ago already, the days growing shorter again and the evenings damp.
At seasons’ change, he feels a pang, an aching awareness like a phantom limb. Autumn in this green, wet landscape drives up memories of another land, of beeches turning gold, their pale bark peeling. In his native Ukraine, stark branches and silver trunks against white sky and snow in the winter months signaled respite from his busy engineering practice. Once on a project in the northeast, the temperature plunged before his team finished surveying a bridge site. He muffled his head, ears, and nose, but still the wind pecked like a thousand tundra swans. His brother Pavlo used to tease him about his fear of swans. When their mother was preg- nant with Andriy, a swan guarding her nest came after the woman and pecked her coat, causing her son’s phobia. So the story went.
Later in the office celebrating the job’s end, there was warmth be- tween the men, a camaraderie spliced from vodka and extremity. Here, in his new home, Andriy is never sufficiently cold to stay indoors on a work- day. He labors out in the rain and hail, knee-deep in shit whenever a customer needs a plumber. His back aches insistently, elbows and knees swell in the damp. He longs for real cold, the sort that keeps you indoors by the fire, with a story in the telling, a talkative crowd, and a bottle on hand.
“Andriy, my dear, have you made the fish ready yet?” Vira calls. “I need to have everything ready before Vasyl and Galyna arrive.”
“Tak, tak,” he calls back, quickening his pace. He scrapes the remaining scales into a yellow plastic bucket. Yes, yes. Always yes, these days. He rinses the snapper in a bowl until the water streaks red, then lays the fish on a bed of crushed ice. The sharp crystals shine bright under the low sun breaking through the clouds. Like the frozen droplets sparkling on the hedge back home. Andriy shakes his head to clear the thoughts. What was wrong with him? Back home, he wouldn’t be cleaning a big fish caught from a boat on the ocean, that’s for sure. More likely standing in reeds around a murky lake, warmed by Pavlo’s home-brewed samohonka, waiting for a bite on his line. They’d be roaring at his brother’s tall tales, or arguing about the president or land reforms or which contender would win the Super Cup. Breathing on their hands to warm them, they’d re-bait hooks and pass the bottle back and forth. If they were lucky, they’d catch a few small pike. Then a scrub at the bathhouse, home to Pavlo’s to test his latest batch of moonshine, the day ending in a pleasant haze. Now Andriy fishes at dawn with plumber mate Brian. They haul in enough fish to feed several families, but Andriy tires of Brian’s crude stories about his sexual exploits. The beer is watery and insipid. It’s just not the same as fishing with his brother.
Grimacing, he stretches his legs and rises slowly from his squat on the cedar deck. A car door slams shut and Vira calls out.
“Pryvit, pryvit, my darling.” Her voice murmurs with a gentleness reserved especially for Vasyl, their youngest.
Then, “Andriy, Andriy!” A command. Not harsh exactly, but direct, without the indulgence rationed for their children.
He tips the bowl with his boot, spilling the bloody water across the unmown grass, and ambles in with the plate of fish in one hand, the empty bowl in the other. Smiling and ducking his head at Vasyl and Galyna as he passes them in the hallway, he quickly puts the fish on the kitchen counter and heads to the bathroom to wash his hands.
“Vasyl, my big strong boy,” Vira purrs. “You’re so clever to pass your exams. You make your mother proud. So clever. Galyna, my darling. You look beautiful. Your hair is so thick and full!”
Vasyl laps up his mother’s attention and Galyna prickles. Andriy strolls into the living room in time for the bickering to begin.
“Mum! Why is Vasyl always the clever one and I’m still the princess? I’m the one with the master’s and the good job.”
“Yes, my darling, I don’t doubt it, but you are the oldest. I always expect the best from you. Vasyl, he was still young when we moved. That difficult age, so awkward. No English. I’m proud that he will be an engineer like us. Like we were.”
Andriy embraces his son in a full-bodied hug, then claps him on the back. Now he has to reach up to rub Vasyl’s dark hair. He slings an arm around his daughter’s shoulder and squeezes it.
“How is that husband of yours? Busy, busy? We don’t see him much these days.”
He notes Galyna’s mouth tighten and her eyes cool.
“Don’t be pestering the poor girl the minute she walks in the door, “ Vira interjects. “Dean works hard, out on the road.”
Andriy walks back into the kitchen and takes a bottle from the freezer. He pours a capful of clear liquid and throws it into his mouth. He started his solitary drinking when he migrated, to take the chill from his soul and soften the sharp edges of memory. He exhales slowly, pours more into a tumbler and heads with it towards a recliner chair. Slumping into its plush upholstery, he puts his feet up and watches silently as his family huddles about the dining table. The three of them pore over Vasyl’s exam results and letters of recommendation from his professors, their bodies touching and their voices excited.
Vira is always enthusiastic about her children’s achievements, or anyone else’s for that matter. Andriy admires that. The children take after her. Even Galyna with her show of staunchness cannot sustain her sibling rivalry for long. She mirrors her mother, stroking Vasyl’s back as they chat together.
No matter how tough things are, Vira seeks the positive. Her attitude bubbles up like a spring. When they sold their apartment, Andriy was doubtful, but Vira looked only forward, as if the past barely existed. With a suitcase each and $5000 in cash, they left all they knew. He felt at sea, numbed by a foreign language and distance. Vira took charge. She guided him and the children into their fresh life.
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Toni Nealie is the author of The Miles Between Me, an essay collection about borders, homeland, dispersal, heritage, and family, published by Curbside Splendor. Her essays have appeared in BELT, Guernica, Hobart, the Offing, the Rumpus, the Prague Revue, Entropy, Midwestern Gothic, Essay Daily, Chicago Quarterly Review, and elsewhere. Her work has been nominated for a Pushcart Prize and shortlisted for a Chicago Review of Books nonfiction award. Originally from New Zealand, she teaches and writes in Chicago, and is Literary Editor of Newcity.