The Sky Unwashed Read Online Free

with her thick makeup and wild yellow hair, she thought to herself, What a
prostytutka
.
    Zosia and Yurko met working together at the electronics section of the nuclear power plant. Yurko was Zosia’s supervisor, and they had become lovers on the long lonely nights when they should have been preoccupied with the instruments on the generators that connected to the turbines of the nuclear reactors. They married when Zosia was pregnant with Katia.
    Marusia crawled out of the bed and stiffly put on her sweater over her flannel nightgown. “Good, they stopped,” she said to herself. She knelt on the cold hardwood floor and said her morning prayers, praying especially for Zosia to mend her mean ways and be more
myla
—quieter and kinder—to Yurko.
    Katia skipped into the room. “I fed Myrrko.” Katia giggled. “I gave him all your beautiful bread.”
    “Oh you naughty one,” Marusia said, pinning the little honey-haired girl against her and kissing her head. “Would you like some breakfast yourself?”
    “Yes.” Katia began to brush Marusia’s unplaited, wavy gray hair. “
Babo?
I didn’t really give Myrrko your bread. Just a mouse.”
    “Much better, but I was saving that mouse for your dinner,
dorohen’ka
,” Marusia said. They both giggled loud enough to awake Tarasyk, who was rubbing his eyes.
    “Wake up darling, the birds are singing, the sun is shining,” Marusia sang to Tarasyk, who smiled. It was the same song she always sang for the children in the mornings.
    I N THE KITCHEN , Marusia was surprised to find Zosia ironing a dress shirt for Yurko. “So, good morning,” Marusia said. Yurko sat at the veneered wooden table in his T-shirt and his best navy blue striped trousers, drinking his black tea from a tall glass and eating leftover potatoes and sour cream. His rounded shoulders were stooped from worry, and his face was more haggard-looking from the new growth of heavy beard sprinkling his chin.
    “So,
sonechko
, you and Zosia are going to the wedding?” she asked, trying to sound casual.
    “Well, Mama, it’s hard to keep anything from you,” Yurko said, slumping further into his chair.
    “A regular
Cheka
agent,” Zosia said, and suppressed a short laugh.
    Marusia pursed her lips and ignored them. She turned her attention to preparing kasha for the children. Katia was helping her brother wash at the sink. Bosyi the dog was at his usual place, beneath the table at Yurko’s slippered feet, his tail thumping happily whenever he felt Yurko’s leg twitch. Except to the children, Marusia did not speak again until Zosia noticed the
korovai
in the larder when she went to fetch some powdered cornstarch which she used to stiffen Yurko’s shirt collar andcuffs. “Oh!
Mamo
,” she yelled. “It’s beautiful! The best one you ever made! Yurko, come in and take a look.”
    Yurko got up and went grudgingly into the larder. “Beautiful,
Mamo!
” he echoed.
    “It looks just like a soft cloud,” said Katia.
    I N APRIL OF that particular year, the days were unseasonably warm and mild. The dirt roads leading around the village were muddy because the ground had thawed too quickly from the recent hard frosts.
    The morning of Hanna’s wedding was especially tranquil except for a few billowing clouds that had at first threatened rain, but released only a quick, clean shower before the sun reappeared in all its warm brilliance. Marusia made her way to Evdokia’s home, where a large group of villagers was waiting outside in the garden for Hanna and her groom to arrive. These older villagers and some of Hanna’s friends had gathered to see the
blahoslovennia
, the traditional blessings given by the elders in the bride’s family on her wedding day. Evdokia Zenoviivna and her husband, Oleh the beekeeper, sat stoically on wooden slat chairs in front of their tidy white-washed house. They wore traditional Ukrainian folk costumes: Evdokia in her long red skirt, embroidered sash and blouse; her husband in his own