Fireplace

"I do not forgive you." He knew.

‘To die with boots on is the greatest glory’, Abrasha told himself.

There was nothing to see in this silent night, with eyes shut he felt the snow of Berlin sting him, and how different it was from the cotton like snow of Salekhard. There was nothing to hear except the distant flare of bullets and the hushed rustling of German civillians away from the Red Army.

His foggy breath would soon turn cold—cold like the snow of Berlin.

Cold and unforgiving.

Unforgiving for the way it had bit down his shot leg, numbing him to the metal in his muscle. She must’ve bit him in retaliation. The motherland fought back for her children. Soon she will freeze the oozing holes on his side and rib too. So beautiful… the snow of Salekhard, him and his friends playing in the snow, laughing… coughing blood, rustling through the snow gets louder, louder, louder through the snow of Berlin.

"Can you hear me?" Her voice broke through the fog in his mind. He wanted to look at her, to lie beside her again. "Hey! You’re conscious, you can hear me!"

She came for him? How sweet.

But when he looked at her face clearly, it wasn’t Nyarka. Plump cheeks, short brown hair—she wasn’t Nyarka.

“Who’re you?” He whispered.

She didn’t answer, only prodded at his injuries. What a disgrace to be saved by a German girl with broken Russian. Who was she? A soldier? An agent? Abrasha remembered all the torture training, he won’t give any information.

“You can be saved. Can you stand? My house is close by.” She spoke with a great deal of care.

What a strange place home was.

A strange, warm, distant place, an illusion that could make a soldier forget honour, glory and the motherland. “I can walk with some assistance.” His good leg still worked, and the bad one could drag itself thinking of home.

"Good." The strong girl hauled him up by his armpits and dragged him down a few lanes. Abrasha wondered, if his men could see him now, being helped by a German girl, would they call him a traitor? But who are they to proclaim him a traitor when they’ve helped themselves with plenty of German women too? He had been too tired to speak, so he just thought. Thoughts are a nice distraction.

The next thing he felt was falling again, but it wasn’t snow this time. There were no hidden pebbles, just softness, a distant warmth melting away the irritation from his sinus, fire popping and crackling, tapping of shoes along the wood, painting on the ceiling.

It was a nice home.

The girl kneeled beside him, rich golden glow on her face, such big brown… or hazel eyes, who knows. “I’m going to take your bullets out.” She said, opening a suitcase, followed by the buttons of his great coat, jacket, then shirt. “Two on the oblique and one past ribs. Any other bullets?” Leaning to his ear level she has asked.

“Leg…” He groaned, “right calf.”

Rolling up his pants to the knee she examined the frozen wound. “I’ll take it out stay still.” And there came the sting of antiseptic—unalarmed, its pungency seizing any comfort the ashy smell of the hearth had given.

“It will be painful but don’t move much. You’re a soldier.” Shoes tapped away to somewhere again and water ran down a faucet.

The soreness of his muscles, coldness of his skin and throbbing of his head came crashing down together in that moment, indeed, the privilege of a roof over one’s head could soften any man. This peculiar enemy’s house was taunting him with its unreachable warmth. His teeth were chattering, his fingernails blue, and freezing toes painfully packed in his boots.

What was the fireplace even for, then?

Why was she helping him? Who else was in this house? He won’t give her any information, not that he had any that mattered. Abrasha knew he was being saved to be killed later, but it didn’t matter. The pain of getting bullets removed, it wouldn’t matter, and it wouldn’t matter if she did not return.

Something cold had started to spread in his stomach, it must be death. He has heard enough of death being cold. Death’s cold grip was on his belly, its claws tearing open his wound and prodding his insides with metal. “Don’t move. I know the anaesthesia didn’t work properly” No, it was her inexperienced tweezers stabbing his insides for the bullet. Concentrated, but desperate. “You didn’t feel anything on your leg because it was already numb, but I don’t think-” She went on about his leg, only the Lord understood what she said.

A tick. Metal against metal.

The torment got over only when his muscles spat out the bullet. But it was to be repeated twice more. Although he couldn’t feel much in his dream-like state. He had slipped in and out of sleep, and the pain had faded to a dull hum in the background, one with the cracking of firewood.

The stitching—God, the stitching was the worst.

Her movements were frantic but careful. There was uncertainty in every suture, a doubt in her skills. Abrasha didn’t shy away from voicing the strained, guttural cries that escaped him with every stitch tearing through his flesh repeatedly, for a time that never came to an end.

His torturer had stomped to somewhere again only to come back and kneel down beside him. He braced himself for more needle and thread, but that never came.

"Drink," she said, her voice soft. He didn’t protest. She lifted his head, supporting the trembling neck, and made him drink the sugary-salty water. She murmured something about 'glucose' and 'energy', but it didn’t matter. Nothing mattered except the pain, the cold, and the warmth of the fire that never seemed to reach him.

Panting, Helga stood up from the now unconscious, hopefully resting soldier, and in the sink with her trembling hands washed the bloodied equipment.

The human body is ugly in its naked reality. Why would anyone want to look inside it? To tear it open, to keep it gaping with forceps?

It was grotesque.

She gripped the sink, shallow gasps pulling out hitches but not tears. She breathed. Exhales longer than inhales, just like papa had taught. As long as there was oxygen in her head she couldn’t pass out—she shouldn’t pass out—not with an enemy soldier inside her house.

Her gamble was hopeless. Would a man help one if they saved their life? A man might, but the question was if an enemy soldier would.

No. He would not.

She picked up a scalpel by the sink. If she manages even a single stab to his throat in the worst-case scenario it would at least buy her time to run.

Taking two blankets to the fireplace she checked from behind if he was still unconscious. She checked the red soldier’s breath and pulse before tucking him into the blanket. Probably he’ll survive.

The girl plopped by his side on the rug pulling the blanket up to her chin.

Sleep has not come to Helga like it did a week ago, or before that. Having slept used to mean dreamlessness, complete relaxation and a moment of utter surrender to the environment, unlike now, when sleep was all but a chance to recharge before escaping again. Waking up at the sound of every gunshot, every step and every breath was not what sleep used to be. Hence in the midst of an interrupted nap she had realised when the soldier woke up. “How are you feeling?”

“Why did you save me?” She could hear him now; he was definitely feeling better.

Her gaze dropped to the rug. “You should be happy you’re alive.”

He coughed, the pain in his chest making it difficult to speak, thanks to the lofty stitches. “I’ll have you know I’ll— I’ll fight till my last breath…” he spoke through a pained draw. “For our motherland. I’ll not succumb to anything. I’m not afraid of your tortures, I’ll have you know that. But I’ll also have you know that you’re good at it.”

“Good at what?” asked Helga.

Abrasha gave a lopsided grin, waved his hand over himself, “This… your tweezer, you’re good with it.” His mockery wasn’t covert in the least.

“I’m not.” Her finger poking out from the blanket run across the patterns of the carpet, “I have stabbed into some of your nerves and muscles while taking out the bullets, your recovery will take time. I just did what I heard from my father, he was a doctor.”

Was a doctor. That explained the well-furnished house in the heart of Berlin and the fitted blouse and high-waist skirt, now soiled in grime and blood. A spoiled girl on a regular day, now an orphan in an unsafe house.

Serves right to the daughter of a favoured doctor of the regime. “What’s your name?”

“Helga”

“And how old’re you, Helga?”

“Sixteen, you?”

Sixteen, the age of dreams and romantics. It was a year before he had joined the military. It was perhaps too early for her to witness the world around. “Twenty-five, a bit older.” He smiled, “and you carried a big lad all the way here, impressive.”

Helga scrutinized his face, tracing the fine lines, he looked older than that. “Who’s there in your family?”

“Hm…” He looked up at the high ceiling of the two-storey building, his mind’s eye returning to his heart in Salekhard. “Mother, father, my Nyarka and my four-year-old child.”  One that he didn’t know was a boy or a girl.

Helga saw the light in his eyes, which was not just from the fireplace. “Must be nice” She turned her head to the ceiling as well.

“I’m…” It was convenient to apologize upon hearing someone’s loss but what was he sorry for? For doing his duty he was not.

The word sorry rotted in his mouth. Exploits he had done worse than bombing buildings and killing civilians conjuring in his mind’s eye, shrouding the soldier’s vision. “I’m sorry.” The rotten sorry fell out of his mouth out of formality.

“I do not forgive you.” He knew.

“But I am grateful. Truly.” Abrasha continued, “Thank you for saving my life when you could’ve just left me there.”

She scoffed; her voice tinged with bitterness. "I didn’t do it for you. Don’t thank me."

The soldier faced her again, her eyes were stuck on the ceiling. “I want… someone in this house.” She answered. “I don’t want to be alone here”

The girl’s face crumpled, her voice breaking “It scares me, it all scares me…Your bullets, your men, the things I’ve seen them do, you don’t know how I saved myself the other day.” She spoke in a single breath. “I was screaming like a crazy monkey I don’t know and smashed his hand with a brick again and again but he just wouldn’t let go. His wrist bled with blood! It was all blood on his hand and mine but he didn’t let go! It was all by chance! By chance that the wall he smashed me into fell down and…” she had run away then. “I won’t get the chances every day and I don’t know what to do. Please…” The red-faced girl held her blanket tighter. “Stay.”

“I’m one of them, why will my staying here do you any good?”

And she just cried; she had no answer. All she knew was that she’d do anything to be kept safe somewhere.

Her gamble was his humanity.

The soldier closed his eyes. Orange hues of the fireplace burnt through his eyelids and the amber crackled along with the girl’s cries.

What could he even do with her? For her? He can definitely not stay back in her house protecting her, he cannot take her back to Salekhard either. For one, she’s an enemy, second, what will he take her in as? And why did he even think of that?

The spoiled girl of tousled hair and dirty clothes eventually fell asleep with tear stains on her cheeks. Did she have any other relatives? Did she have a fiancé? Could he take her to them at least?

Why should he though?

Why was another German girl different from the ones he had come across in the past week? Abrasha thought of hardening himself, giving her the same treatment him and his comrades had given other women to remind himself of who he was, but the idea made him shiver.

He was a soldier, but what about the man Nyarka adored?

Would he be the same when he’d return home… if he’d return home? Or would she be the same Nyarka she was? His daughter, or son, would be bombarded by the stories of their father’s valour and resilience while his savageness would conveniently be never talked about.

Abrasha imagined himself a veteran, thirty, forty years from now, resting in his armchair near a window. The wall in front of him would be adorned with many mighty medals, certificates and a proud group photo of his troop.

History would inevitably remember the robbery of life and dignity of the people of Berlin but no one would look at Abrasha the man and call him a murderer or rapist. He’d just be Abrasha the soldier.

The reality of the battlefield would be buried in his soul along with the man he used to be.

The man who was taking his final breaths somewhere. He could give him life by saving the girl who saved him.

She trusted him, or maybe was just too exhausted to do otherwise. She hadn’t stirred in nearly an hour. One shouldn’t be so naïve in the presence of an enemy. He wanted to get up and leave, and never see the girl again.

It was a mistake to have asked for her name. ‘Helga’. Now he’ll always wonder what happened to Helga, how he could’ve helped Helga, would Helga be alive? Did Helga make it out from the grasp of another one of his brother-in-arms? Was Helga conveniently shown dead in the records and secretly sold away? Every morbid question would come to mind, and with years piling one over other each question would become more disturbing than the last. It was a mistake asking for her name. She should’ve just remained a German girl who saved his life, one who he deserted in her house, sleeping peacefully in front of her fireplace tucked in her blanket.

Just a tear-streaked, fair face glowing warmly, haunting his memories. A face without a name.

There had to be a refugee camp where the girl could go, there had to be someone who could take care of the doctor’s child. “Helga” he called out and she didn’t wake up, he smiled. After how long had she slept like this? May she sleep this freely every night, the thought came instinctively. He leaned down a bit, “Helga?”

The girl woke up sucking a gasp, her body jerking as if to flee once more. “Easy! Easy! It’s me, just me…” Abrasha raised his hands, “good ol’ me.”  Her blood-shot eyes relaxed, the adrenaline ebbing away, “Hm?”

“How about I—” The low rumble of engines killed any bleak possibility there was. The sound grew louder, then halted abruptly.

The night patrol had arrived.

Helga’s hand flung to her mouth to muffle the sobs that finally followed her hitches.

His heart sank, Abrasha knew the sound of these sharp Russian commands all too well. “Hide” he mumbled, knowing it was futile. They will search the house.

Helga shook her head, “They’ll find me”. The sound of boots crunching through snow reached the front door. “They’re so many…” A sharp knock—no, a pounding followed to break the door. “Where to go? Where, where, where, where, where…”

Hearing her maddened rational rambling, seeing her stunned and shivering body, Abrasha could only do so much. He pulled her in by her shoulders, and startled Helga couldn’t do much but cry. “Save me, just save me from them. Just save me from that please. They’re so m—” She stiffened feeling cold metal under her ear. Tear-filled, confused eyes looked up at the soldier who held her in one arm and a pistol in second.

“Will it count as saving?” Abrasha asked, his voice breaking under the weight of his own words.

The pounding on the door grew louder. A hinge gave way.

Helga flinched, shaking. The door looked like it would break any second, a dozen Soviet soldiers would barge in and… Her eyes begged for a solution, for a way out of here, a place where being a girl won’t be dangerous. The girl of soft brown curls and plump cheeks wanted to shake her head, but she nodded. “It won’t hurt that much, right?”

“It will. But just for a while, I promise.” he whispered, biting down his quivering lip.

“What’s your name?” She asked clutching his loosened shirt, he didn’t care for his excruciating stitches either.

“Abrasha.”

“Thank you Abrasha.” Her body rattled with sobs. The man held her as close as he could, steadying his hand on the trigger.

And the door gave way just as the gun fired.

Four soldiers stormed in, rifles raised.

“Split,” the one in command ordered, walking towards the fireplace ahead. His eyes fell on the scene before him; one of his own—wounded, sitting on the rug with his back against the couch, and the lifeless body of a girl cradled in his arms, her blood soaking his uniform.

“Why didn’t you open the gate?” the officer asked, whose voice was like the snow of Berlin.

The man lifted his moist, but hollow gaze “I had been sleeping.”