The Lullaby of Polish Girls Read Free

everything is connected, but feels disjointed nonetheless. Though her appointment at the Polish embassy was preplanned, the actual departure was hasty—a last-minute call to the travel agency, a haphazardly packed suitcase—and now, four weeks later, she’s still not sure how she made it out.
    Her father met her at the Detroit airport, bouncing on his heels.
    “Kamilka! Oh, Kamilka! What did you do to your hair?”
    Kamila stepped back from her father, who had aged considerably in five years, whose frame was now as thin as ever, but enhanced by a surprisingly corpulent gut. She touched her black bangs self-consciously.
    “I dyed it. You didn’t notice in the pictures?”
    “Oh, but it’s not what I expected in real life,
córeczko
. And your nose … it looks nice, Kamilka. But I expected my little girl, with that great big orange mop and those white strappy sandals on your feet.”
    “I was ten when you bought me those shoes,
Tato
. I wasn’t ten whenyou left. Now, quit crying, please, and take me home.” Włodek obliged, glancing sideways at his prodigal daughter every few seconds. Back in his fold for less than ten minutes, and Kamila was already growing irritated.
    Somehow, she settled in quickly. Her parents had cleaned out the sewing room and bought a blow-up mattress for their daughter to sleep on. “For weeks or forever, Kamilka, it’s up to you,” her father said, his gray eyes glistening. She had a desk, a closet, and a phone, and that’s all she needed. They hadn’t asked yet why her husband, who looked so dapper in the wedding album the newlyweds had mailed them five years ago, had not come with her.
    The Polish enclave of Wyandotte was seven square miles small and made Kielce seem like a metropolis, but its size didn’t matter to Kamila. She hadn’t come to America to sightsee. Her plan was to distance herself from recent events and to make money so that she could go back to Poland clad in Ann Taylor and Banana Republic from head to toe, showing off the fabulous look that American women have perfected—chic nonchalance. To earn money she took on babysitting and a cashier shift at a local
masarnia
—a deli that paid under the table. The dollars accumulated quickly, fistfuls of crumpled Andrew Jacksons that she stuffed in her dresser, but, despite the money, Kamila was wilting.
    Today was a snow day and the streets were full of suburban teens. The most formidable nation in the world closed up shop when it snowed. Solemn news reporters urged residents to stock up on canned soup and bottled water. It was so pathetic. And on the streets, hooligans flew past, outfitted in ridiculous coats that brought to mind blowfish, throwing snowballs and shouting mindless obscenities.
    Now, Kamila sits upstairs at her desk, hands folded, staring down at her old typewriter, the one she lugged through three airports because she’d been afraid to check it in Warsaw. The one her grandmother bought her when Kamila was thirteen and confessed her dream of becoming a famous writer. Kamila could leave her job at the pharmacy, she could leave her husband, but there was no way in hell she was leaving her typewriter.
    She hasn’t written a letter in a long time, not like this, not one thatwasn’t sent via email. But her parents, for all their newfangled American ways, have opted out of getting a computer. “There’s no art to it, Kamilka,” her father explained. “I’d rather read letters from home and watch the nightly news, in the good old-fashioned way.” So Kamila walks into town and sits for hours at an Internet café on Biddle Avenue anytime she wants to check her inbox and scan silly sites about American celebrities until her brain goes numb. The Internet café, however, isn’t an option for the deed at hand. No way was Kamila going to write what she had to write in a public place; there were roaming eyes everywhere, especially in this community, where the Poles rubbed their noses in everyone’s business