Diaspora, Part 2

[skull_bearer]

Diaspora 2 

            The trip over is rough, once they hit the Atlantic the ship starts rocking threateningly and doesn't stop until they sail into New York harbour.

            Erik doesn't really mind, he's not seasick. He's not really hungry either, and makes do with small snacks begged from the galley. It's almost fun, and Erik finds that when the floor is starting to slope he can make his mind to this thing that keeps him from losing his balance, as though he's stuck to the floor. He wonders if this is what people mean by getting their sea legs.

            If so then he's the only one on the ship whose gotten them so quickly, which makes him feel quite proud. He even dares to go out of deck when the storm's stopped and the sea isn't quite so rough. It's completely freezing and when Erik touches the railing he quickly snatches his hands off, afraid he'll leave skin. There's nothing but grey sea for miles, which is all they've seen since they left the final port of Southampton four days ago, and it'll be another day before they'll reach the other side.

            The walkway towards the prow is too crowded with sea-sick passengers desperate for a little fresh air in the hopes of being a little less sick, so Erik turns and heads to the rear. There's no one there because the smoke from the funnels is quite thick and the air smells of burning coal. Erik hooks his arms over the side, looking down at the churning water below. It's peaceful, which is strange because he's right above the engines and the thunder and shaking is worse than ever, but it's nice all the same, like being on top of some great but friendly beast.

            A seagull swoops down and lands on the water, bouncing from the waves the ship is making. Erik wonders if it'll stay with the ship or if it will fly back to Europe. He rather envies the bird that choice. It's Shabbat and today everyone would be getting ready to go to the Temple, with great-grandmother being pushes along in her wheeled chair, snapping and ordering everyone around. He thinks of grandfather and now it's his turn to feel sick. He hasn't shown anyone the chess set, partially because he doesn't have anyone to play it with, and he's afraid he'll lose some pieces, and partially because it's clearly really expensive and he suspects he's not supposed to have it. He doesn't want to have it taken away. So he buried it under a pile of clothes and hopes no one finds it. He's having nightmares about someone finding it.

            There's a bit of an attempt at keeping the Shabbat back in their rooms, sitting around but mostly Erik feels a bit silly sitting there on the floor of their cabin, without a Rabbi or, well, anything.

            Then everything gets just that bit worse.

            "Are you satisfied now Maria?" It's Father and it's said in the tone they'd all come to dread.

            "Do you think I'm happy about this?" his mother's been quite badly seasick, and is not taking it well. "Do you think I had a choice?"

            "A choice? I wasn't aware someone was holding a gun to your head! It's fine for you Maria, this is your family!"

            "My family..." His mother's lips are white. Erik wants to crawl into the bowls of the ship, inside the engines, close them around him until none of this is happening. "Your family as well, Elias."

            "My family is back home! They're yours! Take them! I should never have left!" And then the worst and briefest row in history ends with a slammed door and such horrible silence that even the engines are deafened by it.

            Misha breaks the silence with a soft cry, and mother hugs her, then Mika too, and finally everyone just piles in close together as though if they move so much as an inch away, the rest of their little group will also break apart.

            Erik pulls his kippah off, it always drags in his hair. Elsa puts an arm around him, and Moshe buries his head in his side. He tries just not to be here, to send his mind down into the ship and the engines where everything's too noisy to be so horrible. Mother's crying, and so are the twins and Moshe and probably Erik is too, but no one's making any noise.

            Elsa squeezes his shoulder. "He didn't mean it." Her words fall flat.

            Mother looks up from comforting the twins. "No, of course he didn't. You know your father's temper." She takes a deep breath, "He loves you all very much, he's just angry. It's hard for him to leave the rest of the family."

            "I don't see why he should." It's Misha, and her face is scowled up under her tears. "We don't get to say stuff like that, even when Erik gets mad he never gets to say stuff like that."

            Erik opens his mouth furiously to say that he has never behaved like that and never wanted her for a sister anyway- 

            "Enough. I'm not having you getting into a fight. Now of all times." Mother's voice is low, and they're all immediately silent. "Just go to your rooms. I will go and have a word with your father."

            Erik can't get out of the door fast enough. He and Elsa and Moshe pile in and end up on the floor again, in their room this time. His brother is still shaking and there's a damp place on Erik's shirt where he'd been crying into it. Elsa's pale but she tries to smile.

"Buck up you two, you know Father didn't mean it."

            "He looked like he meant it." Erik's throat feels rusty and he'd crushed the kippah into a lump of cloth. Father had been the one to give it to him.

            "Father's an ass," She shakes his shoulder. "You remember the Grandmother rows, when there was all that stuff about aunt Rachel, and Father said mother was the sister to a scarlet woman and he never wanted to see her again?"

            Erik gives a weak smile. That separation lasted all of six hours before Father was begging forgiveness. Mother hadn't even had time to finish packing.

            "He'll come back and he'll be sorry. Just you wait." 

            There's a long silence, Moshe still looks uncertain, and Erik makes his decision. He walks over to his locker. "Grandfather gave me something when we left. But you can't tell anyone."

            Moshe blinks, surprised out of his moping. "What?"

            Elsa frowns at him. "Really don't tell anyone." Erik insists. He knows she won't tell. The last time he begged her to keep a secret was the day he wanted to borrow his uncle's binoculars and climb onto the school roof to watch the stars. She came with him and brought a bunch of friends and they stayed there all night. She owes him.

            The chess set elicits gasps and Erik carefully unpacks it on the floor, wincing whenever a wave makes the ship rock.

            "Grandfather gave it to you?" Elsa sounds vaguely horrified.

            Erik glares, it's not as though he's Moshe or the twins. He can look after things. "I'm not going to-"

            "No, not that. But it's really old. And really expensive. I wasn't ever allowed to touch it, and after the twins were born I never saw it." She looks down, picking up a tiny knight. The horse's mane is so detailed Erik thinks he can see each individual strand. "He must be really scared." She continues. "He must really think the Germans are going to invade, if he sent it away with you."

            Erik growls, "Maybe he just wanted to give it to me." he snaps, "Maybe he-"

            "Oh please don't fight. "Moshe is looking at them beggingly. "Not now."

            Erik subsides with a growl, and picks up another piece, a tiny bishop with hooked staff and mitre, it looks vaguely cross. Erik sighs and puts it in its starting position. "Do you want a game? I'll teach you."

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            Father calls them back to apologies to them all by dinner time, but the air feels like grandmother's lace, like the first wrong move will tear it and bring the rows back. Erik picks at his meal miserably, he's not the only one doing so, but for him it's got nothing to with the rocky weather.  

            They're all silent. It's the first time this has happened. Usually after rows everything calms down and it's like summer after a thunderstorm: tension released and calm restored. They creep out, trying not to look at anyone, and hurry back to their rooms.

            Erik decides he hates silence.

            He wakes up when it's still dark, although this time of the year it doesn't mean much. His stomach gnaws at him, he barely ate last night.

            Erik gets out of bed and grabs his clothes to get dressed in the shared bathroom to avoid waking anyone. He can't bear the silence in the cabins any more.

            The ship's clock reads 6.33, early, but breakfast will be served in half an hour and Erik wanders down the deserted hallways. All thick carpets and wood panelling. Erik yawns, trying to ignore how hungry he is. He opens to door to the deck and huddles on himself in the sudden cutting wind. It's even colder than yesterday and the deck is clogged with a thin coating of snow. The sky is ink black apart from a slight lightening in the East.

            There's the glimmering of  lights on the horizon. A line of light like silver that they're heading straight towards. Erik stares at it for a few minutes. This is where they are going. This is America. This is the New World. Where they sit on girders miles above the ground and build skyscrapers. This is the place that made father disown them to their faces.     

            Erik turns his back on it, and walks towards the rear of the ship and the comforting roar of the engines. Maybe he'll wait and watch the sun come up in the East. Over Poland. It's probably already dawn back there. They could have been back home, and mother would have been making them breakfast, trying to bundle them up before it was time for school. There would snow there. Proper snow, not this salt-rotten stuff. They'd throw snowballs at each other and chase each other to school, hoping it would be closed if the fall was too heavy so they could hide out in the woods before mother found out and had father school them instead. Father who'd give them problems that were either too hard or stupidly east until the twins mobbed him. Father who'd rub snow in Erik's hair and rattle on about how each snowflake was unique. Father who'd laugh.

            Erik hugs the railing until the sun rises and he's so cold his joints feel frozen. The engines purr on beneath him, a quiet repetition of you're not alone that stifles any tears and makes Erik swallow and turn back to look at their approaching destination.

            He's not the only one out by that point. People are starting to crowd the deck, staring out over the sea towards New York.

            The newly risen sun picks out the details of the distant skyscrapers. In the distance, they look God placed chess pieces on the horizon. Erik decides that one's a rook, and that one's a bishop and that one - Erik feels himself start to smile despite everything. That one, the huge one towering over everything which was built by fearless men who ate their lunch with the birds, is a king.

            And like a piece already taken, sitting out in the middle of the harbour, is the queen. Erik blinks at the huge statue on its pedestal. It's almost too big to be real, like someone pasted a picture on the side of the world.

            A murmur passes through the crowd, husbands turning to wives, fathers lifting children, siblings nudging each other. The State of Liberty.

            Erik can't look away from it, even for the Empire State building. They close on it and it towers above the ship and Erik can hear it. He can hear it inside his head, behind his teeth, in the darkness behind his eyes. It's a warm hum, and it's almost as though it's welcoming them. Erik is sure he can hear the ship hum back. Good to be here.

            "Erik!"

            Erik spins around. His mother and father are behind him. Mother's holding the baby, father several packed bag.

            "I told you he'd be here." His father snaps. "Erik get your things, we'll be docking soon."

            "In this crowd? You won't even look out for your own son now-"

            "And thanks to your fears, we'll be lucky to get everything packed in time-"

            Erik runs. he's been doing a lot of that lately.

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            Erik manages to snatch some breakfast after throwing his things into his bag (the chess set is wrapped in his pyjamas and buried amidst socks). Then goes to stand next to his family on deck. The baby is crying and mother's trying to do a head count as the twins run around leaping up on the railings to look at the approaching docks. Erik sits beside his bag and tries to be invisible as his father drags the twins back to their spot. Normally he's be gratified to see them getting a well-deserved yelling, but today he just wants to curl up and be elsewhere.

            The skyscrapers are towering above them now. If they're bishops and rooks, Erik doesn't like to think what they are, less than pawns on a chessboard the size of a city. It takes him a moment to realise that they're humming too. A deeper, duller sound that the Statue of Liberty, just on the edge of hearing. It should be annoying but it's not. It's nice, and feels like home.

            They disembark down a narrow gangway.  First mother and the baby, then the cousins and Rachel, then the twins, all but fighting to get onto dry land. Erik comes down next, hugging his precious bag, afraid he'd somehow drop it into the sea and lose it. Then Moshe, Else, and finally father.

            The dock is grimy with oil and smells of diesel and metal (did metal have a smell?). Many people are waiting for the ship's passengers, with cards reading 'Mr Smith', 'Mrs Rosenburg and family', 'Clara'. The ones holding the 'Clara' board go wild when a little old lady comes down the gangplank, racing forward to hug her.

            There's no one waiting for them. And it hits Erik that they don't have a house here. It's getting on for afternoon now, and nights come quickly this time of year. Soon it'll be night and they won't have anywhere to sleep. Will they have to sleep in the streets?

            He isn't the only one to have thought of it. One of his cousins (he can never remember their names), starts tugging at his father's coat. Misha looks around and her lower lip trembles - although how her fake tears can help them now who knows, Erik thinks viciously. She hasn't shed an honest tear in her life - and father is looking at mother with that look again. The look that promises another argument.

            But for once, it doesn't come. Mother walks towards the street, where more cars than Erik knew existed cover the pavement. They scramble after her.

            "Taxi!" Mother's English is the best out of all of them. "We need a hotel!"

            Erik has spent rather more time on his English recently, and it wasn't bad before, so he can follow most of the next exchange. Mother enquires as to an affordable hotel, the taxi driver gives a few suggestions, and they bundle into four cabs with directions to the Union Hotel.

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            Breakfast is cornflakes. Erik looks at the box, trying to read the writing on it as the others eat. Mother had been out all of yesterday and the day before with their uncle, aunt, father and Rachel, trying to find a house. They'd been left behind in the hotel under the eyes of their older cousins and Else. It was an anticlimactic end to their journey. They weren't even allowed out to see this new land they've come to. Erik spent his time staring out of the window from the second-floor common room and, when he discovered one of the older patrons liked to play chess, playing one game after another and losing every one.

            He's bored. Bored beyond his senses, he's tried to talk to the smiling old man, but the man's accent's so thick Erik can barely understand it. They've been here two days and while the hotel is quite nice- small but comfy, with wood panelling and cushions everywhere, and everything smoky from the constant cigarettes- it's too cramped. The twins stole his box of things yesterday and threatened to drop them down the drain outside unless Erik obeyed their every command. Thankfully that was the point mother came back in for lunch and he got his box back and the twins got a scolding. Everyone's on edge, and this morning mother left so early no one knows where she went.

            He's just considering if he wants another bowl when the door to the dining area opens and his mother comes in, it's snowing outside and flecks of white are melting in his dark hair, and her face is flushed, but she's smiling triumphantly. "I've got us a place."

            There's an excited babble and jangle of spoons on plates, half the family standing up and demanding answers. The rest of the hotel is staring at them, not having understood the Polish. One of the men snorts 'Bloody foreigners' and Erik glowers. This is a hotel, of course they're foreigners.

            "When do we view it." Erik's father is already pulling his coat on.

            "There's no need, I got it already."

            "You what!" No, not another one, not here, with everyone staring. Erik wants to sink under the table.

            "It was that or see it go to some slant-eyed biddy from god knows where, I had to make the bid there, Elias."

            And thank you, thank you god, Erik's father subsides, growling. His mother sighs, "It's not huge, and I don't think it'll be big enough for all of us. But it'll hold us for as long as it takes Markus and his family" - Erik's uncle- "To find their own."

            There are a lot of begrudging nods. Father is still looking furious. Mother sighs again. "It was the best one we'd seen so far." She says to him, softer. "Big enough, central enough and cheap enough. It's more than we expected but it's ours now. You saw the prices Elias."

            "I just hope it hasn't got damp or termites, or god knows what."

            It's overwhelming to be outside again, after three days cooped up in the hotel. The air is sharp with snow and flakes are slowly drifting down. The cars and taxis are already covered in it and Erik sees a group of men sweeping the snow off the pavements. He stops and stares, the men had the darkest skin he's ever seen. One of them catches his eye and grins, showing shockingly white teeth. Erik smiles back.

            "Come on Erik!" His father grabs him by the arm, "And don't stare," he adds, bundling him into a taxi.

            Erik can't stop smiling, even though he's making the journey wedged between the twins. This is a city, a big city, even bigger than Warsaw. It's going to be exciting here, with all sorts of strange and wonderful things, like statues the size of skyscrapers, and buildings which sing to you, and people from every corner of the world.

            It's going to be amazing.

Comments

[lu-tbc.livejournal.com]

Guhhhh!
I'm squirming in my seat by the sheer awesomeness of this story!

I love how you manage to catch all those little emotions that manage to give these characters such depth!
The need for Erik to go back to their country, completely understandable given that they're leaving the only home they've known all their lives for the complete unkown... the fights his mother has with his father...
His annoyance at his siblings (never fails to ammuse me!).
How aware he is of metal...

Just WOW!
I wonder if they'll start hearing news of the happenings in Europe soon... I imagine after they do, his father won't be so bitter about leaving... though, thinking about his family... *sighs*
Just thinking about this particular moment in time leaves my chest aching.

I serioualy love the layout you got going on here and can barely wait to see how it continues!!!

[nianeyna.livejournal.com]

:D This is amazing! bb erik is so adorable, I just want to smish him. And his family, bless.