The Memory Keeper of Kyiv

by Erin Litteken

Ukraine is fertile and plentiful, and Stalin thinks we should be the breadbasket of the Soviet Union,”

Everyone wants Ukraine’s fertile soil for their own, and nobody wants to let Ukrainians rule it.”

Bobby turned to face Cassie and closed her eyes, as if retreating into herself. Her voice broke as she translated the words into English. “Just make it through today, and hope tomorrow will be better.”

Katya, along with each person attending, had ripped off a piece and dipped it in salt while entering the house. She tried to imagine her neighbors performing the same treasured tradition of hospitality for the man who had shot her cousin Serhiy, and anger made her see red.

“I have loved you all my life.” His voice hitched as he struggled to take a breath. “Even when I pestered you and teased you, I loved you. Always you, only you.” He coughed and his body shuddered. “You must survive this and tell the people of the world what has happened here, so it doesn’t happen again. Use your pencil and paper and weave your beautiful words to keep our memories alive. Don’t let me die in vain, Katya.”

That’s what being a mother was—ripping out a piece of your heart and giving it to your child.

“This is not about getting us to produce more food,” he said, as the impossibility of survival suddenly became so painfully clear to both of them. “They want us all dead.”

Walter Duranty, from the New York Times, completely refuted that a famine was happening. Hell, he won a Pulitzer for his articles on it. Nobody wanted to believe the ‘breadbasket of Europe’ was being starved to death.”

Looking to the future doesn’t mean you have to forget the past. You can have both, Cassie, and be all the richer for it.”