River in the Sea (20 page)

No one answered her. “What else can we do?” Leen pressed.

“It’s not that easy,” Tine said.

Mem said, “There are other ways.”

“I know it’s not easy,” Leen said, ignoring Mem. She didn’t want anyone to see the sores, didn’t want anyone to ask what they were, how she got them.

“When was the last time we got our rations?” Tine whispered. She quickly licked the last bit of butter off her knife.

“They haven’t filled the rations in a long time.” Leen remembered her ration card. This much butter, this much flour, this much for adults, this much for children. Then the first cuts were announced and Mem put the cards in a drawer. It was a matter of pride for their family, for most in Friesland, to go willingly without the meager allotments. Not when they could grow their own or trade with the merchant ships that parked along the coastline, moored in the ocean floor so hard it was walkable during low tide. 

“Can’t we trade? Aren’t the ships still coming? Maybe Issac could go out,” Leen offered.

“I haven’t seen the ships in months,” Tine said, rising and reaching to take both of their plates. “Don’t worry, leave it to me. I’m sure it can’t be that much trouble to get a little fruit. Go now, you really shouldn’t be late.”

Leen left. She couldn’t blame Tine for wanting to avoid Issac. Leen barely spoke to him, and he to her, not even to pass a food dish at the supper table, even when her stomach demanded more. But maybe in this case, they ought to make an exception. After all, it was Issac who was supposed to look after these matters in Pater’s absence. But Leen was not going to nominate herself to remind him of it. Surely handling this problem did not qualify as trouble or drawing attention to themselves. She briefly thought of Jakob in his uniform, then quickly turned her thoughts to other matters.

“Ik wol mear
,” Renske said. She pressed her hands on the cold glass of milk and then held them against her cheeks. They were as red as the empty jar of beets, the inside of the glass stained a deep fuchsia, the only color of its kind in the house, that and the De Graaf children’s inflamed faces. Renske scratched at the sores until they oozed and scabbed over, only to pick the new scab off again, even though Tine told her she was going to look like a pickled fish head if she wasn’t careful. The same pustules collected at the bottom corners of Issac’s mouth, forming a ruby frown, the counterpart to Renske’s painted smile. “I still have room in my stomach,” Renske whined.

“Come now, you haven’t let your food settle,” Tine said. She scanned the table and picked up the butter dish. “Here.”

“But I already ate the bread!”

“Listen to your sister,” Mem said. She stroked Renske’s face. “They’ll go away,
leafe.
Mem has some special medicine.”

Renske nodded. “I think I will still be hungry,” she said, verging on tears.

Leen couldn’t stand it. Her baby sister needed more food. Of course Tine was trying to be careful; in lean times you must. But at least give enough for Renske. She was still growing. “We must have more
druggevisk
,” Leen said, pushing her chair from the table.

“Leen, wait!” Tine cried.

Leen ignored her. She didn’t want to admit it but she was hungry too. The torn strips of dried fish wouldn’t sate her, but at least she and Renske could suck on torn bits of papery skin to extract the traces of salt. She, too, was tired of butter. It was plain and cloying and piled on everything, pure fat, pure fuel. Bacon grease was saved too, and melted and drizzled over bread, but Leen hadn’t eaten bacon at home for two weeks now; the last time she’d eaten it was at the Deinum’s. 

She grabbed the lantern kept by the cellar steps and began to climb down.

“Come back,” Tine said, right behind her. “We haven’t read the Bible yet.”

“When was the last time we read the Bible?” Leen called out. Holding the coughing lantern, she searched the shelves for the fish. It was always easy to find because of the sharp, brine–y scent hitting the nose as citric and sour. Pater used to cure his own, bringing home a string of flat, plump flounder. She remembered how he would gut them outside, sitting on a bucket with another between his knees, splitting the fish one after another while she, Issac, and Wopke coated them in a thick layer of salt and strung them up on rough twine. 

Her memory quickly died as she turned up the lamp. She searched the shelves, the bottoms lit by the flame, the rest blank, cast in deep shadow. She moved a few jars of canned beans. From behind her Tine whimpered. Leen put her palm on a shelf, patting the shadows lest one miraculously become a paper packet of the fish. “Tine, where is it all?” She moved the lantern up, down, across each shelf. “We keep the meat in the dugout, that’s where the hog is, right? It keeps better out there, we keep it there.” Leen turned around. Her chest seized.

“Please,” Tine whispered, “we cannot tell Mem.”

“What can’t we tell Mem,” Leen said, emotion flooding her voice. “How can we be out? How did we run out?”

“Leentje! Quiet! Please,” Tine pleaded, grasping Leen’s hands. “What is there is there. That pig? Maybe three, four more dinners if I stretch it. We have enough potatoes for the week. You see the beans, all from last year. It’s too early to plant, it’ll be months before we have fresh. That’s it. That’s all.” She spoke in a frantic whisper. “Please, don’t tell Mem. Don’t tell Issac. I didn’t know what to do.” She squeezed Leen’s hands. “Please. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“How,” Leen said, looking at the barren shelves once more. Her pulse beat in her face, inside the sores. “Why didn’t you tell me? You must have known. You’re here every day…” Even a month ago Renske had been hungry. But Leen had thought she’d just wanted dessert, all those times she begged for
panne
. “No,” Leen said, shaking her head. “No, no, no!”

“I thought Pater would be back by now. It was always getting better, the end is so close. I tried to stretch it. I was never wasteful. I never snuck anything for myself, not ever! Every day you tell me how it’s going to end.” She was crying hard now. 

“Don’t blame it on me!” Leen hissed. “Tine, you are down here every day!” She bent over and squeezed her hands over her head, feeling like she might throw up.

“I know, I know,” Tine sobbed. “But I couldn’t ask Mem. You see how she is. And Issac, he will be so angry. You don’t know…” Upstairs a chair scraped against the floor. Tine was uncontrollable now. But Leen was too panicked to cry. 

“Don’t let them come down here,” Tine whispered. Spit gathered at the corners of her mouth. “Promise me you won’t tell.”

Leen looked at her sister. Suddenly she understood Tine, wanting so bad for it to be better that she let it get worse. Her crying now was the release, the relief of the revelation. Seeing this kept Leen distant, kept her thinking, kept the dread from taking over. She felt something new inside her, iron gathering into a core, a new kind of steeliness.

“I will take care of it,” Leen said. She grabbed a jar of beans. “Our sister is hungry. She needs to eat. Come, let’s fix these for her.”

Tine reached for the jar. “Leave it. Please.”

“I said, I will take care of it,” Leen said, turning so Tine’s fingers grasped only air. Leen opened the jar with a single twist, the broken pressure escaping in a hiss, the vegetal smell of summer and dirt filling her nostrils. “No one goes hungry in Friesland. They send people here to eat. This, this is ridiculous.” She’d never used that word before, not in a way where she truly understood the meaning. 

“You haven’t promised me yet,” Tine said, grabbing Leen’s hand once more. Her face looked spongy, like over–risen bread, her pale skin puffed up with nothing but air. One move, the slightest hit, and she would fall.

“They’ll never have to know,” Leen said.

Just before it was time to rise, Leen opened her eyes to see Mem creeping into the room, an orange kerchief gathered around a pointing finger, dark at the tip. “What are you doing?” Leen mumbled.

“Shh, Renske first,” Mem said. She sat down on the edge of the bed, the mattress barely shifting under her weight. She reached past Leen, the fabric close to Leen’s face, and when the scent filled her nose Leen was suddenly awake. “
Ver skrikelik
!” she said, sitting up. “What is that?”

“Quiet,” Mem said. “Renske, sit up,
poppie
.” She daubed the orange cloth on Renske’s cheeks.

Renske’s eyes sprang open and she pushed Mem’s hand away. “Stop it! Stop it! It’s
pisje
!”

“No, it’s not,” Mem said. “I swear it.
Komme
,” she commanded, but her voice was weak and she shrank back, defying her own order.

Leen leaned past Mem and lit the bedside lantern. She leaned close to the kerchief and immediately backed away. Renske was right. The kerchief was dipped in morning urine, yellow and pungent.

“It’s the only way to get these sores cleared up,” Mem pleaded.

“How do you know this?” Leen asked.

“There have been shortages before, when I was young. Renske, come here.”

But Renske escaped Mem’s feeble reach. She crawled off the bed and then fled the room.

“I didn’t like it either,” Mem sighed. Before she would’ve stood up, her step long and her arm quick as she caught her naughty child’s collar. But today she was easily overcome. 

Tine sat up. She hadn’t spoken yet. “Give it to me.” She took the kerchief and closed her eyes and rubbed it on her temples.

“There’s one on your cheek,” Leen whispered. “The right one.”

Tine kept her eyes closed, her mouth clamped tight. She moved the kerchief to her cheek. Tears collected along her eyes’ bottom rim, but Leen knew it was from the stench, not last night’s sadness.

“Your turn,” Mem said to Leen. As soon as Leen brought the wet fabric to her face she too felt her eyes well. The smell was a potent mix of sour ammonia and the dank outhouse. 

 “Wipe your eyes,” Mem said. “You’ll cry it all off. Soon the smell will fade.” 

Leen gave the kerchief back to Mem, holding it by a dry edge. “Have you slept yet?” she asked. It occurred to her that Mem might be making this up, or that it had come to her in another deceiving dream.

“I need to get this on your
lyts suster
,” Mem said, leaving the room.

Downstairs, Renske cowered underneath the kitchen table, her hands covering her face, trying to hide the fresh new sore she had opened. But when she bent over, Leen could see the smears of blood on her fingers.

“Renske, you’ll only make it worse. Let Mem put the special medicine on you,” Tine said.

“Tine and I already did it,” Leen said.

Renske looked at her knowingly. “You’re lying,” she said. “You’re just saying that to trick me.”

“It smells awful in here,” Issac said, coming in through the barn. His hair was mussed. The short, wiry strands formed two distinct clumps at the back of his head. Leen stood up. She glanced at Mem, then Tine. Neither of them spoke, nominating Leen in charge. “It’s Mem’s special medicine,” Leen said. “It’s supposed to make the sores go away.”

“It smells like piss,” Issac said incredulously. “That’s
pisje
, isn’t it?”

“We just need a little fruit,” Tine whispered. Surprised, Leen looked at her, then at Issac. But he did not pick up on Tine’s meaning. Mem reached towards his chin with the kerchief but he put his hand up. “I’ll use my own,” he said. All of them turned to look at Renske. She was still under the table but had taken her hands away from her face. A small dime–sized bubble of blood had formed where she had picked. 

“Oh, Renske,” Leen said. “You need to come out from there.” Renske shook her head. Leen felt that familiar desperation, a driving need to get the cloth on Renske’s skin. It was the same kind of desperation that drove her fingers to close too deeply around Mem’s elbow. “I’ll come get you if I have to,” Leen added. She dropped down to her knees and started to crawl in.

“Wait,” Issac commanded. “This really works?” he said to Mem. “
Pisje
?”

Mem nodded.

Issac held his hand to Mem, grimacing. “I’ll do it. Give it to me. Move, Leen.” He took the kerchief and dropped to his knees and awkwardly climbed under the table, grunting as he knocked his head. “
Skiet
,” he said. Renske giggled.

“Issac,” Tine said, “please don’t be mean to her.”

He ignored her. “I’ll let you put this on my face if you let me put it on yours,” he said to Renske. His voice was soft and he sat next to her, side by side, his head bent forward to avoid hitting it again. 

“You first,” Renske whispered.

“If you shake my hand, that means you can’t back out. You understand that, right? Because then I’ll have to chase you.”

“It’s not so bad, Renske, really,” Leen offered, trying to smooth down the rough edge of her anger. “The smell goes away.” She was only partially lying.

Issac spoke only to Renske. “Okay?” He held out his hand. She tentatively reached out, then shook it, amused at his formality. He gave her the kerchief. “All over where you see the sores.” Renske tried to wipe his face carefully, but her young hands were clumsy. Issac said nothing when she swiped the kerchief over his lips, using his shirtsleeve to quickly blot the moisture away. Then Renske handed the kerchief to him, and he swiped it over her cheeks, trying to be gentle in his own clumsy way, his fingers unaccustomed to movements such as these. He flipped the kerchief to find a dry edge to wipe away the blood first and something about this got to Leen.

“Ouch,” Renske whispered. 

“Sorry, sorry, just a little bit more,” Issac said.

“Your hair looks like you have horns,” Renske said, pointing.

He made a face at her and rubbed his hair so that all of it stood up. Renske laughed. “Time to eat,” he said. He held out the kerchief and Leen took it, no longer concerned about touching the wet parts, so he could crawl out. 

When Leen turned, Mem was gone, but Tine was there. “Thank you Issac,” she said.

“
Ja
, thank you,” Leen said. She wished she had been under the table so she could have seen what his face was like when he was gentle, tender. She almost wanted to cry. He didn’t answer them as he left the room, sneezing once, then muttering “
ver skrikelik
,” under his breath.