Voices From Chernobyl: The Oral History of a Nuclear Disaster Read Free Page B

remember all of them. I remember an old woman janitor, who taught me: “There are sicknesses that can’t be cured. You just have to sit and watch them.”
    Early in the morning I go to the market, then to my friends’ place, where I make the soup. I have to grate everything and grind it. Someone said, “Bring me some apple juice." So I come with six half-liter cans, always for six! I race to the hospital, then I sit there until evening. In the evening, I go back across the city. How much longer could I have kept that up? After three days they told me I could stay in the dorm for medical workers, it’s on hospital grounds. God, how wonderful!
    “But there's no kitchen. How am I going to cook?”
    “You don't need to cook anymore. They can't digest the food.”
    He started to change—every day I met a brand-new person. The burns started to come to the surface. In his mouth, on his tongue, his cheeks—at first there were little lesions, and then they grew. It came off in layers—as white film . . . the color of his face ... his body . . . blue . . . red . . . gray-brown. And it's all so very mine! It’s impossible to describe! It’s impossible to write down! And even to get over. The only thing that saved me was, it happened so fast; there wasn't any time to think, there wasn’t any time to cry.
    I loved him! I had no idea how much! We’d just gotten married. When we walked down the street—he’d grab my hands and whirl me around. And kiss me, kiss me. People are walking by and smiling.
    It was a hospital for people with acute radiation poisoning. Fourteen days. In fourteen days a person dies.
    On the very first day in the dormitory they measured me with a dosimeter. My clothes, bag, purse, shoes—they were all “hot." And they took it all right away. Even my underthings. The only thing they left was my money. In exchange they gave me a hospital robe—a size 56—and some size 43 slippers. They said they'd return the clothes, maybe, or maybe they wouldn’t, since they might not be possible to “launder" at this point. That is how I looked when I came to visit him. I frightened him. “Woman, what's wrong with you?" But I was still able to make him some soup. I boiled the water in a glass jar, and then I threw pieces of chicken in there—tiny, tiny pieces. Then someone gave me her pot, I think it was the cleaning woman or the guard. Someone else gave me a cutting board, for chopping my parsley. I couldn't go to the market in my hospital robe, people would bring me the vegetables. But it was all useless, he couldn't even drink anything. He couldn't even swallow a raw egg. But I wanted to get him something tasty! As if it mattered. I ran to the post office. “Girls," I told them, “I need to call my parents in Ivano-Frankovsk right away! My husband is dying." They understood right away where I was from and who my husband was, and they connected me. My father, sister, and brother flew out that very day to Moscow. They brought me my things. And money. It was the ninth of May. He always used to say to me: “You have no idea how beautiful Moscow is! Especially on V-Day, when they set off the fireworks. I want you to see it."
    I'm sitting with him in the room, he opens his eyes. “Is it day or night?”
    “It's nine at night."
    “Open the window! They’re going to set off the fireworks!"
    I opened the window. We're on the eighth floor, and the whole city's there before us! A bouquet of fire was exploding in the air.
    “Look at that!" I said.
    “I told you I'd show you Moscow. And I told you I'd always give you flowers on holidays . . .”
    I look over, and he's getting three carnations from under his pillow. He gave the nurse money, and she bought them.
    I run over to him and I kiss him.
    “My love! My one and only!"
    He starts growling. “What did the doctors tell you? No hugging me. And no kissing!"
    They wouldn't let me hug him. But I ... I lifted him and sat him up. I made his bed. I placed the