Short Story: A Small Victory

Short Story: A Small Victory

Adam worked lather into a thick layer around his face and neck. The sharp soapy odour of shaving cream mingled with the steamy air. He worked quickly, feeling the razor bite, pausing only to rinse the blade when it clogged with hair.

He wiped the steam with his hand and stared at the face in the mirror. The years had ground away at his features and left heavy lines etched into his forehead. He tried to smile at his reflection and saw grey stumps of teeth.

The sudden pounding had woken him. He stumbled to the window and looked out.

‘What is it?’ Katarina asked.

Adam’s skin prickled as his eyes adjusted to the scene below. Soldiers were smashing the door with rifle butts. Their guns gleamed in the moonlight as they hammered. He watched transfixed, bladder suddenly full.

Adam put his newspaper down and watched people bustling around him. Gallovia had changed so much. The colours were less muted than he remembered, the clothes less drab. He had looked in astonishment at people chattering on portable telephones – everyone seemed to have one! A teenager had hurtled by on a skateboard almost knocking him down. The boy had barely acknowledged him, deaf to all protest thanks to his tiny white headphones. When Adam had first entered the café, the young man behind the counter seemed surprised when he had asked for a simple black coffee. He had wondered why, until he noticed the blackboard covered with a bewildering array of flavours.

He scanned the square again, it felt as if someone was raking fingernails inside his stomach.

He heard the sound of heavy boots thudding up the stairs. Two soldiers charged into the room with rifles raised and dragged them out onto the landing. As they handcuffed him, Adam realised his legs were wet. They brought Elsa from her room to join them. She clung to her mother’s nightdress.

‘Adam Horacek, you are charged with conspiracy to overthrow the government. You are hereby placed under arrest by order of the President.’ He motioned to his men, ‘Take him outside.’

‘No!’ Elsa yelled. ‘Papa, what's happening? Why are they doing this?’ she asked between sobs.

‘This must be a mistake,’ Katarina said trying to put herself between the soldiers and her husband. Her voice had a hysterical edge. ‘He is a Professor at the University, what has he ever done to anyone?’

‘It's okay,’ Adam told her. ‘It'll be okay, I promise. If I go with them we can sort this out.’

‘Enough talk. Move!’ One of the escorting soldiers tried to haul Katarina out of the way.

Katarina lunged at the soldier. There was a moment of struggle and then a thunder of gunshots. Katarina crumpled to the ground. A red flower bloomed on her nightdress.

Adam sank awkwardly next to her, watching the soldiers argue about what had just happened. He looked at the blood smeared all over his hands and then at the soldier who had shot Katarina. He felt his legs tense: ready to propel him upwards.

‘Mama!’ Elsa screamed. The soldiers were caught off-guard as Elsa rushed past them, trying to reach her mother. Finally, one of the men recovered his wits, reversed his rifle, and struck the girl hard between her shoulders, sending her sprawling to the floor.

A hand on his shoulder startled him. His cup clattered across the table, spilling coffee all over the paper. He turned to face a red-haired young woman.

For a moment, the breath caught in his throat. There was no mistaking the family resemblance. She looked so much like her mother when they had first met.

‘Papa? It is you isn’t it?’ She looked him up and down.

‘Elsa. You scared me half to death.’ He half stood up and flapped around with a handkerchief, trying to blot the pools of lukewarm coffee.

Her cheeks flushed as she watched him. ‘I’m so sorry; I didn’t mean to startle you. I’m so stupid! I shouldn’t have come from behind you like that.’

Seeing her discomfort, Adam stood up and buried his face in her shoulder, smelling her perfume and the fresh scent of her hair.

‘It’s good to see you again, Papa,’ she said.

He blinked, finding his eyes suddenly moist.

‘It’s ok,’ he told her. ‘Everything is ok now you’re here.’

As they broke their embrace, he waved his sodden handkerchief at Elsa, struggling to find words. ‘Sit, sit, please,’ he finally managed. His empty coffee cup chattered against the saucer as he sat down.

Elsa wiped her face with her sleeve. She reached over and cupped his hands in her own. Her warmth spread up his arms. ‘I’ll get some more coffee.’

‘Tell us the names of your co-conspirators.’

‘I have no co-conspirators. I am not involved in any conspiracy.’

‘Who were your contacts within the organisation?’

‘I have no contacts. I am a university professor. I teach English literature.’

‘And when did you first become involved in counter-revolutionary activities?’

‘I am not involved in counter-revolution.’

‘Do you have links to other illegal organisations?’

They would sometimes produce a confession for him to sign, sliding it across the table, patiently tapping the bottom of the paper with a pen.

‘Sign and all this can be over.’

He would read the document to humour his captors then push it back over the table ‘I will not sign this.’ Then the questions would begin again.

Finally, they would take him back to his cell, head numb with repetition. He would slump down on his cot feeling his eyelids droop. After a few days, he had found it difficult to string coherent thoughts together. He started to believe that if he could just close his eyes for a little while, he could clear his muddled thoughts.

At some point, the light would wink out. He would close his eyes for a short time. A buzzer would sound – like wasps in a jar and he would be marched into the interrogation room again.

Elsa had returned with more coffee and a small plate of sandwiches. Adam had to fight the urge to stuff them under his shirt.

As they ate, he tried to describe life in the camp.

‘In many ways I was lucky; one of the other prisoners took me under his wing.’ Adam smiled. ‘Lev was a master of small acts of resistance.’

‘Like what?’

‘He pissed in the guard’s soup when he was on kitchen duty. He said small victories were the key to survival.’

Elsa laughed.

‘How did you manage to keep going every day?’

‘It’s not easy. They try so hard to take away everything you have and drag you down into the dirt. Eventually you have nothing external left and you have to fight as hard as you can to hold on to what you have inside.’

‘I’m not sure I understand?’

‘I mean you kept me alive in there Elsa, you and your poor mother. You were my one reminder of a better place that still existed far beyond the wire.’

The tiles were slick. He struggled to keep his balance as the guards shoved him into the stall.

‘Water on!’

The blast was like a huge icy fist. The impact robbed him of breath. The water roared and stung his flesh. He twisted and turned, trying to absorb the force. A guard thrust a brush at him. Adam yelped as the sharp bristles dug into his skin.

The water stopped. One of the guards threw a scrap of towel at him as he stood shivering and dripping onto the tiles.

‘Dry yourself off. Be quick about it.’

He rubbed his body with the towel, feeling his skin burn. When he was finished, they marched him, still naked, out of the shower block. His feet slapped on the cold cement floor in step with the clack of their boots. They stopped at a blank wall with a square opening cut into it. A bored looking man stood in the centre of the square. Behind him stretched long rows of shelves stacked from floor to ceiling.

The man placed a bundle of clothing on the counter.

‘Get dressed, maggot,’ the guard told him.

The jacket and trousers fit loosely over his frame. Dark blue stripes ran down the length of both items. The slip-on shoes were much too large. They slid around on his bare feet and chafed at his ankles.

He was marched away, slipping and scuffling, through another series of corridors until they reached a steel door studded with rivets. Beside the door, a man stood dressed in a uniform like his own. He had eyes that were careful not to stop too long on anyone.

‘Trustee 7068, reporting, Sirs.’

‘Escort this prisoner to “A” block.’

‘Yes Sir.’

The steel door slid open with glacial slowness. For the first time in an age, Adam could see daylight. It formed a glowing aura around the door.

‘Follow me,’ the Trustee told him.

‘You’ll be housed in the political wing across there,’ he said, pointing at the collection of low concrete boxes on the far side of the yard. ‘It’s not great but it’s better than “regular” criminals get in this place. My name is Lev.’

‘Adam. How long have you been here?’

‘Five years.’

‘What did you do to deserve that?’

‘It’s not really that important.’

They stopped outside one of the cells. ‘Ah, here we are; home sweet home.’

The cell contained two cots and an open toilet. At one end was a small window that let in narrow strips of light.

‘You’re not sharing with anyone at the moment,’ Lev told him as he inspected the window, it had metal slats to restrict the sunlight and block the view to the prison yard. ‘Don’t get too used to it though - there are always plenty of new arrivals.’ Adam turned back again to face him.

‘I’d better leave you to make yourself at home and return to my vitally important work in the kitchens.’ He turned to leave and stopped.

‘You really want to know how I ended up here?’

‘Yes.’

‘Would you believe I was a comedian?’

‘What?’

‘I was a stand-up comedian. I used to do routines making fun of the party.’ He shrugged. ‘It turned out the judge at my tribunal didn’t have much of a sense of humour.’ He shook his head. ‘What about you? What are you in for?’

Adam shrugged. ‘I’m still not sure.’

Lev flashed him a wry smile. ‘I hear that a lot in this place.’

‘How are you finding being back?’ Elsa asked.

‘I’m still adjusting.’

‘How do you mean?’

‘It’s the little things,’ he told her. ‘The smell of a cigarette, the scrape of a chair on the floor – a door slams somewhere and suddenly I’m back in the camp. My doctor had to prescribe me pills because I wasn’t sleeping.’

‘Do they help?’

Adam shook his head. ‘I flushed the pills down the toilet. Sleep takes me back there too – I think that’s why I’ve been avoiding it. That camp is the last place anyone would want to visit in a dream.’

He had been coming back from exercise. The comedian had been leaving the kitchen block in a hurry. He looked over his shoulder and Adam followed his gaze. There was a commotion going on. He took a few more steps and stumbled into Adam, hesitated for a moment and reached inside his shirt to reveal a half loaf of bread and other small scraps of food tucked inside.

‘Give them to me,’ Adam whispered. His mouth tasted of copper. He could hear shouting from the kitchen block. ‘No time to argue – trust me.’

Lev reached inside his shirt again. Adam shoved the contraband inside his thin jacket and carried on walking.

‘You there! Stop!’ The other prisoners began to scatter leaving a vacant space around Lev. Adam sidestepped to merge with them.

Lev flinched. Took a deep breath and turned.

‘Yes Sir?’

A red-faced guard came stomping over to him. ‘Don’t play fucking dumb with me. Where is it?

‘Where is what, Sir?’

‘The food you stole from the kitchen.’

‘I don’t have any food.’

The guard grabbed Lev by his lapels and ripped his shirt open to reveal a grubby vest.

‘What happened to him?’

Adam’s smile faded. ‘His little boy had an operation and something went wrong…’

Elsa shook her head.

‘After that, he… He started to look…. I’m sorry; sometimes it feels like so many words have been stolen from my head.’ He snapped his fingers as the word finally came to him. ‘Disconnected – that’s how he looked, as if someone had started to unplug all of his wires. Eventually, he went into the infirmary one day and never came out again. After that I was on my own.’

A guard banged on the iron door. Adam opened his eyes allowing the grey morning light in, threw aside his rough blanket, and stepped out onto the cold stone floor. After the best part of eight years, he still recoiled at the sensation. He pulled on his clothes aware of the guard watching him through the spy-hole. The narrow slot in the bottom of his door opened and a tray slid through. He sipped at the thin gruel, trying to scrape every molecule from the bowl with his spoon, using the coarse black bread to mop up any remaining dregs. By the time he was done, the chipped tin cup of hot water had cooled enough to drink.

After breakfast, they took him to the exercise yard with the other prisoners. He counted the steps, as he did every day, to try to make the time pass more quickly. Wire mesh ran across the tops of the high walls. It was like being at the bottom of a well. He couldn’t remember the last time he had seen sunlight through the mesh.

Exercise over; it was back to his cell to begin work. The guards pushed a pile of hemp through the slot. His job was to knot the fibre into cargo nets. He began by sorting the hemp into a new pile, moving with calculated slowness. Prisoners who met the eight nets a day target got reward certificates to spend on sugar or fat from the prison store. Adam had never made more than one net a day. It was his small victory.

There was a short pause around mid-morning. More black bread, a couple of small boiled potatoes and another cup of hot water. He continued his pantomime until suppertime, managing to complete his net just before his meal arrived. He looked at the large pile of unused hemp and felt a small glow of satisfaction.

At 9pm, the overhead bulb switched off. The light by the door continued to burn. Adam had learned to ignore its faint buzzing sound. As he drifted off to sleep, he tried to call up the faces of Katarina and Elsa. Sometimes he found he could only summon fragments: Katarina’s eyes but not the shape of her lips, Elsa’s hair but not her face. He was worried that one day they might start to disappear as if they were old photographs left in the sun.

‘Papa?’

‘Huh?’

‘I was speaking to you but you were miles away.’

‘My attention wanders sometimes. Old age,’ he shrugged.

‘Poor Papa, you’re not that old. You’ve been through so much though. More than anyone should.’

‘At least I came back, Elsa. Thousands didn’t. If it wasn’t the work or the starvation diet there was always disease and despair waiting in the wings.’

‘But you made it to the other side.’

‘I did.’

Adam stared out of the window. The distant trees were merging into the shadows. He was waiting for the sound of the guard’s footsteps to move off down the corridor. In his hands, he held a slender rope made from stolen hemp hidden in the hollow frame of his bed. He moved quickly, looping one end of the rope over the water pipe and securing it with a sharp tug. He stood on the toilet and placed the noose around his neck feeling the rough fibres scratch his skin as he pulled it snug.

He closed his eyes and jumped.

‘Best not to dwell on the past,’ Adam said. ‘Will you be returning to University now that things are getting back to normal?’

‘I don’t know yet. With everything that has happened, university doesn’t seem that important any more. Auntie Mila thinks I’m crazy of course. Secretly I think she just wants me to find a nice eligible doctor there and settle down.’

Adam laughed. ‘Mila just wants you to be respectable like her instead of a broken down old lag like your father.’

Elsa smiled at him. ‘Oh stop it Papa. You can still go back to teaching once you are fit again.’

Adam fingered his collar, feeling the scar hidden just out of sight. Some things were better left unsaid he thought. He poured a fresh coffee and raised his cup.

‘To our future,’ he said.