Hurricane

From below, the building looked like an assembly of one-eye bandits; most of the seventy-two broken windows were still patched with plywood. Several pieces of canopy fabric hung from the naked frames. The grounds were pockmarked with holes left by palms and ferns torn by the hurricane. Severed fronds were piled high in a sectioned-off corner.

Henry, the oldest person in the building, who’d celebrated a hundred earlier that year, was coming our way from the beach, walking energetically. His skin was sunburned to dark chocolate, making his blue eyes sparkle and his camp number indistinguishable. The enormous ears floated at the ends of his flattened face. The best looker of our building in his age category.

“How are you, Henry?” Misha asked.

“Today is better than yesterday and tomorrow will be better than today.”

He walked several steps, then turned around and looked me over. “Where are you from?”

“Belarus.”

“That’s nice. That’s nice. And what’s your name?”

“Masha.”

“Masha. Maria—that’s a beautiful name.” He nodded several times, relishing the sounds. A smile played on his lips, hinting at lurid scenes, lust, conquest, and love playing in his mind in the ensuing three seconds. Finally, he must’ve realized that he was on the verge of looking ridiculous, so he pulled his body away from me and wandered away.

“Tomorrow,” I said to Misha, “I’ll tell him my name is Aurora. And then, Katerina. I think he’d like that.”

“Dementia,” Misha said, “is a blessing for men of certain age. Henry gets to meet new women every day.”

Chaperon and Rose were making dry laps around the pool, his face beaming with pride. She wore tailored shorts, a beautiful silk coral blouse, and a stylish straw hat. The toenails showing through the opening of her sandals were painted in glistening coral, too. The apples of her cheeks were rouged, but the color hadn’t been blended. Chaperon either hadn’t mastered this makeup technique or followed an outdated fashion.

I had looked him up in our condo book. His name was Albert Fish. “Good day, Mr. and Mrs. Fish,” I said.

Chaperon bowed ceremoniously, then touched his wife’s hand to get her attention. She nodded on cue. The buttoned cotton shirt was tucked into his ironed shorts and the beige socks peeked through the sandals and stretched up to his ankles. I could see him in a top hat, tails and white gloves promenading somewhere on Champs-Élysées or Karntnerstrasse.

Misha touched his temple as if saluting him. “Making a victory round?”

The corners of Chaperon’s lips curved up. “Victory rounds.”

We stood for a minute talking about the weather, but the words didn’t matter: we were just happy to see them. Rose’s face was as placid as today’s ocean. She seemed to bask in her husband’s presence, whatever his name was. I’d brushed up on history to decipher her cryptic “Lucky number” comment—those destined to inhale Zyklon-B hadn’t been lucky enough to be tracked by tattoos. Her memory was as dim as our apartment after the electricity was cut off, but the emergency light in her head was still on. She hadn’t been crying for someone to help her, but to help her husband. She had seen him in grave danger, so she went out to seek other people. Unless dissuaded from his valiant efforts, Chaperon might’ve, indeed, been sucked out into the air.

We said goodbye and headed down the stairs to the beach, Misha’s relaxed swimming shorts patterned in bright flowers would’ve been the laughing stock of the entire river beach in Gomel. When we had first met there, he sported closely fitted mini-trunks over his muscular buttocks and I had been skinny enough to wear a two-piece suit.

We grasshopped over the sole-burning sand, squealing and heehawing in pain and anticipation, then waded into the cooling water and splashed each other mercilessly. Sun rays struck the flying droplets, making rainbows play inside them.

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