Rozdział XXVII

On their first morning in Dublin, Rozalia woke before her father. Pale light filtered through the thin curtains, and from the street came the hum of cars moving along the wrong side of the road—as she still thought of it. She sat up, brushed her fair hair away from her face, and looked around the room that was supposed to mark the beginning of their new life.

There was almost nothing in it: a bed, a chair, a small table, the computer they had brought from Poland, and the bags they had not yet unpacked. To Piotr, it was a temporary condition that had to be overcome as quickly as possible. To his daughter, it was an adventure. Every unfamiliar sound, every new street, and every English word carried the taste of discovery.

— Dad, get up. The day's going to waste — she said, shaking him by the shoulder.

— We won't run out of days here — he muttered sleepily. — Money might be another matter.

She was not frightened. She only smiled, as though deciding that her father had begun the morning with one of his gloomy jokes. Piotr watched her and envied that ease. He saw the rent, bus fares, food prices, and uncertain employment. She saw Dublin.

The first days passed in a succession of doors and offices. At the welfare office they were told that without an insurance number they would be unable to arrange many basic matters. At the schools they heard that the classes were full. Secretaries politely examined their papers, then spread their hands.

— We have no places — they repeated.

Piotr already understood enough to grasp the meaning. So did Rozalia.

— Then tomorrow we'll go to another one — she said after yet another refusal.

— And what if none of them has a place?

— Then I'll study with you, Dad.

— With me, the main things you can learn are how to paint walls and write articles no one pays for on time.

— Then I'll be a painter and a journalist.

She walked beside him with her hands in her pockets, hopping over cracks in the pavement. She did not ask whether they would return to Poland. She did not complain about the cramped room. Her trust was both a source of strength and a burden to Piotr. Since he had brought her so far, he could not let her see that he himself did not know what to do next.

On August twenty-ninth, she sat cross-legged on the bed in an orange T-shirt, a newspaper spread before her. She pretended to read the English advertisements, though she recognized only a few words. Every now and then she looked up at her father.

— Here's a job for you, Dad.

— How do you know?

— Because they wrote a lot.

— It might be an obituary.

— Then you'd be good for that too, Dad. You know how to make things sound serious.

They laughed. Their laughter sounded unexpectedly loud in the empty room, as though the walls were not yet accustomed to people.

That day [private section]. Piotr was surprised, but also filled with admiration for certain qualities in his daughter. Her age on paper did not correspond to the maturity she displayed. She seemed to understand layers of adult reality that remained beyond the reach of other children.

September fourth was Rozalia's name day. Piotr had no table, no cake, and no money for larger presents. He placed a plate of sweets on the carpet and set a cup of Coca-Cola beside it. The girl knelt by her little celebration, folded her hands on her knees, and smiled as broadly as if a royal table had been laid before her.

— I'm sorry it's so modest — he said.

— It isn't modest at all. No one in my class ever had a name day in Ireland.

— You don't have a class right now.

— I will.

She said it without hesitation. A week later, when she turned ten, they once again sat almost on the floor. Piotr stuck a candle into a small cake. Rozalia blew it out on the first try, closed her eyes, and for a long while refused to reveal her wish.

— If I say it, it won't come true — she reminded him.

He did not have to ask. He was convinced that she had wished for a school, a normal apartment, or a well-paid job for her father. Only later did he understand that a child might want something far simpler: for adults to keep their promises.

Just as they were beginning to grow accustomed to their first address, the head tenants announced that their plans had changed and they needed the room Piotr and Rozalia were renting. The news came without warning. Piotr listened to the explanations while calculating how many days remained before they had to leave and how much they could afford to pay for somewhere else.

— Does that mean we're moving again? — Rozalia asked when they were alone.

— Only a little farther.

— Far?

— In Dublin, everything is far away until a person learns the buses.

They found their new lodging at 20 Grattan Crescent. The conditions were worse than before. They did not get a room of their own. They had to share the space with Andrzej, the head tenant, a former truck driver who had also come to the Emerald Isle in search of a better life.

Andrzej received them without enthusiasm, but not with hostility either. He was a man accustomed to truck cabs, nights in parking lots, and living out of a suitcase. The cramped conditions made little impression on him. Piotr knew, however, that for his ten-year-old daughter, sharing a room with a strange man could not become normal.

— It's only for the beginning — he repeated, placing the bags against the wall.

— It won't be bad.

There was no accusation in her voice. That was precisely what hurt him most.

Andrzej and Rozalia became unwilling rivals for Piotr's attention. They did not like each other. The very presence of the strange man irritated the girl, for she had to share not only the cramped room with him but, in a sense, her father as well. Andrzej, meanwhile, saw her behavior as possessive. Whenever he tried to talk with Piotr, Rozalia appeared at once, interrupted, asked questions, or drew her father into a story of her own.

One evening, all three of them were already in bed. The room lay in half-darkness, with only the light of a streetlamp pressing through a gap in the curtains. Rozalia turned toward the wall, but Piotr knew she was not asleep.

Andrzej remained silent for a long time. At last he spoke from the other bed:

— Piotrek, don't be angry, but you're raising her badly.

— What do you mean?

— She always interferes. A man wants to talk to you for a moment, and she immediately cuts in. You can't finish a single sentence in peace. It's simply rude.

— She's ten years old — Piotr replied.

— All the more reason she should know that when adults are talking, a child does not interrupt.

There was no concern for Rozalia's upbringing in Andrzej's voice. There was only the irritation of a man who believed someone was taking away the attention owed to him. He did not understand—and perhaps did not even try to understand—that the girl was hundreds of miles from her mother, her siblings, her school, and everything she had previously called home. She had only her father beside her. She felt safe with him, and that was why she wanted him close, preferably all to herself.

Piotr looked at the daughter nestled against him.

— Rozalka isn't trying to spite anyone — he said more quietly. — She's simply far from home. Here, I am her whole home.

Andrzej snorted, as though he regarded that as an excuse for bad manners. Rozalia did not move. Piotr had no doubt, however, that she had heard every word.

At last, the official matters began to move forward. They received the necessary insurance number, and after further conversations a place was found at Scoil Mhuire Gan Smál. The school was relatively close. One of the Polish mothers living in the same block offered to take Rozalia with her own child and bring her home after classes.

— If you don't understand something, ask — Piotr said, knowing that on her very first day his daughter would go to school with a stranger.

— And what if I don't understand the answer?

— Ask again.

— And what if I still don't understand?

— Smile. That works in every language.

She came back from school excited and tired. Her father was not yet home. He was working. When he returned, she spoke rapidly, leaping from one event to another. The children had asked where she came from, the teacher had repeated her instructions several times, and someone had offered her a cookie during recess.

— See, Dad? I'm in school now — she said. — They accepted me.

It was as though she had been reassuring him all along, not the other way around.

The commute took Piotr Korycki a long time, but distance ceased to matter the moment he heard that the work would be legal and paid regularly. He rose before dawn, crossed the dark housing estate to the bus stop, changed buses, and reached the warehouse before Dublin had fully awakened.

The work had nothing to do with journalism or genealogy. Cartons filled with bottles of a popular Irish cider rose in stacks inside the warehouse. Piles of folded packaging stood in one corner; workers assembled boxes, cleaned bottles that had gone moldy after a flood, packed them, and prepared them for transport. Piotr put on a reflective vest and did what he was shown.

His checks arrived on predictable dates. For a man accustomed to overdue fees and delayed payments, that was almost revolutionary. After several weeks, he began calculating when they would be able to afford a separate apartment for the whole family.

In the evenings, he told Małgorzata about each new step forward.

— I have a job. Rozalka is going to school. I only need to save enough for the deposit — he said over the telephone. — If everything goes well, soon we'll rent something for all of us.

— Rozalka should come back — she replied.

— Why should she come back when all of you are supposed to come here?

— Because she should be with me.

— She's with me. She goes to school. She's safe.

— She should be with her mother.

The conversations went in circles. Piotr ended each one increasingly bewildered. Małgorzata did not reject the plan of living together in Dublin. She talked about an apartment, the journey, and money. At the same time, she demanded more and more often that their daughter return immediately. The two positions could not be reconciled, yet she voiced them as though no contradiction existed between them.

In Poland, she was effectively living with the remaining children at Marianna's house in Janów Podlaski. September sunlight fell across the wooden walls, and mother, daughter, and the boys sat together on the bench outside. Marianna held a cup, watched her grandchildren, and calmly explained what, in her opinion, ought to be done.

— A child should return to her mother — she repeated.

— Piotr says he has found a school and a job — Małgorzata replied.

— He has a job today; tomorrow he won't. And are you supposed to wait until he graciously decides what to do with all of you?

The words did not sound like an attack. Marianna knew how to give accusations the tone of concern. She did not shout. She planted doubts patiently, one at a time, until they began to look like self-evident truths.

Meanwhile, father and daughter were discovering Ireland. In mid-September, they stood by the sea. The wind tugged at Rozalia's jacket, blew her hair into her eyes, and would not let her pose calmly. Piotr looked at the line of the water and then at the slight figure of his daughter beside him.

— Cold? — he asked.

— A little.

— Shall we go back?

— No. Just a little longer.

It was much the same on Bray Head. They climbed high above the rocky cliffs. The air was damp, and the sea was the color of lead. Rozalia stood in her cap and jacket, proud of the distance she had covered. Piotr thought that these were the days he would remember forever—not the offices, not the cramped room, but his daughter against the endless water.

On October sixth, Małgorzata flew to Dublin. She was to stay for only two days. They walked together through the city center, among buses, motorcycles, and crowds. She met with her nephew Andrzej Sołoduszkiewicz, who was also in Ireland at the time. Rozalia walked between her mother and her cousin, happy that, for a little while, the family was on the same side of the sea.

Małgorzata looked at the streets, the shops, and the people. She asked about rents, wages, and the school. She could smile, joke, and talk about moving as though she had come to inspect the place where they would soon live. Only in the evening, when Rozalia became occupied with her own things, did she return to the same demand.

— I want her to go back to Poland with me.

— You were supposed to see how we live here. There's a school. I have a job.

— The conditions are dreadful.

— That's why I'm looking for an apartment. The three of us aren't going to live with Andrzej forever.

— She should go back now.

— And then come here again in a few weeks?

— We'll see.

— See what? We've been talking all this time about all of you coming here.

Małgorzata did not answer directly. She spoke about the younger children's longing, Rozalia's school obligations in Poland, and the fact that a daughter needed her mother. Each argument sounded reasonable on its own. Together, they formed an attempt to take from Piotr the one thing that gave meaning to his emigration: the conviction that he was building a new place for the entire family.

Rozalia sensed the tension. Later, when she was alone with her father, she whispered:

— Does Mom want to take me away?

— She says she misses you.

— Then she should stay.

— She can't.

— Why?

Piotr could find no answer that would not burden the child with the problems of adults.

Małgorzata flew home alone. At the airport, she embraced her daughter, promised they would see each other soon, and told Piotr once more that Rozalia ought to return. Then she disappeared beyond security. The girl stared at the closed doors for a long time.

— Will she come with the boys? — she asked.

— That's the plan.

He spoke the words firmly. He did not want her to hear that he himself was beginning to lose faith in them.

At the end of October, Piotr's first job came to an end. On the final day, he took Rozalia with him. The girl was given a stack of flat cartons and taught how to fold them into boxes. The adults placed bottles inside, while she worked with such seriousness that one might have thought the entire order depended on her speed.

— You're doing well — one of the workers praised her.

— I take after you, Dad — she replied.

Piotr stood beside her among the rows of packaging and, for a moment, felt a pride he could not explain. He did not want his daughter to spend her childhood in warehouses. At the same time, he was glad she had seen the place that made it possible for them to live. His work was no longer an abstract word spoken in the evening.

On November ninth, he entered another apartment with a paintbrush in his hand. Canada had taught him the trade he had once been ashamed of. Now he knew how to prepare a wall, protect a floor, and lay on paint in even strokes. A ladder stood in the empty room, pale marks from pictures remained on the walls, and the employer watched him for several minutes.

— You've done this before — he observed.

Piotr nodded.

After several days, he was told that if he continued to work that way, he would be given permanent employment in the new year. The news was exactly what he had been waiting for. He called Małgorzata, believing it would finally end the dispute.

— I'm supposed to have a permanent job from January — he said. — We can truly begin planning for an apartment.

There was a short silence at the other end.

— Rozalka has an orthodontist appointment at the beginning of December.

— We'll reschedule it.

— We can't. We've waited a long time for it.

— We'll fly in and come back.

— She has to be at that appointment.

The way she repeated the final sentence disturbed him. The appointment was important, but it did not explain the tone that allowed no room for discussion. Piotr suspected the orthodontist had become a pretext. Even so, he did not want to give his wife grounds to accuse him of neglecting their daughter's health.

— All right — he said. — We'll come. After the appointment, we're going back.

He heard no confirmation. He should have paused over that silence. Instead, he accepted the absence of objection as agreement.

At the beginning of December, they returned to Poland. Rozalia threw herself at her younger brothers, who clung to her from both sides. On December sixth, she prepared a small meal for Tomisław. She arranged plates on a low table, set out sweets, and proudly showed what she had learned while staying with her father.

For several hours, the apartment on Sowińskiego Street seemed like the home they had missed. Piotr unpacked the bags, the children all spoke at once, and Małgorzata asked about the journey. Only later did he understand that she had welcomed them as people who had come back for good—at least Rozalka.

— The return tickets have to be confirmed — he said the following day.

— Rozalka isn't flying back — Małgorzata replied.

— What do you mean, she isn't flying?

— She's staying in Poland.

— We agreed on something else.

— We agreed on nothing.

— I said we were going back after the appointment.

— You're going back.

Piotr felt the meaning of the carefully prepared trap settle over him. This had never been about the orthodontist. It had been about bringing their daughter back to Poland and separating them in a place where Małgorzata held the advantage.

— I won't leave her — he said.

— Then I don't know whether there is any point in continuing this marriage.

The threat of divorce was delivered calmly, almost bureaucratically. Piotr was to leave whether he wanted to or not. Rozalia was to remain whether she wanted to or not. Małgorzata presented the decision as an accomplished fact.

By then, Marianna Andrzejuk had become a permanent resident of the apartment. She had brought her belongings, occupied the space, and ever more boldly assumed the role of someone who not only helped but also judged, decided, and set the rules. Piotr's study—the place where he worked and the only corner in which he had once been able to close the door—had been assigned to other purposes during his absence.

He returned from Ireland to his own apartment and discovered that there was no longer any place in it that was his.

Rozalia was enrolled in the fourth grade of a Polish school. For months she had followed a different curriculum and studied in a foreign language, yet it was decided that she must make up the entire semester. Classmates' notebooks were brought to her, and she was ordered to copy them page by page.

— I can't do it — she said, staring at the pile of written pages.

— You can — she was told. — You should have thought of that earlier.

— But I went to school in Dublin.

— This is Poland.

She sat at the desk until late, copying someone else's notes. Her letters grew increasingly uneven, her hand ached, and the number of pages did not diminish quickly enough. Piotr saw in it not education, but punishment for the fact that his daughter had wanted to leave with him and had dared to enjoy life beyond the control of her mother and grandmother.

When she protested, her belongings were taken away. The room was emptied, as though her will had to be removed along with the disorder. The small things she cared about disappeared, even a little Catholic figurine.

— It's mine. Give it back, Mom — she pleaded.

Silence was her only answer.

Piotr collected one warning sign after another, yet he still tried to believe that everything could be reversed through conversation. He explained to Małgorzata that Rozalia had been deceived. She had flown in for a medical appointment and found herself in a situation in which her school, her home in Dublin, and her possibility of returning had all been taken away.

— She wanted to come back herself — Małgorzata insisted.

— She missed her brothers. That doesn't mean she wanted to stay.

— She's a child. We decide.

— Who does "we" mean? You and your mother?

That question ended conversations faster than shouting.

Late one December evening, Krzesisław and Tomisław were already lying in the bunk bed. Krzyś was on top, Tomiś below. A broadcast of prayers came from Radio Maryja. The leader began another Hail Mary, and Marianna responded along with the listeners.

Piotr was walking through the hall when he heard the familiar rhythm:

— Zdrowaś Maryjo, łaski pełna, Pan z Tobą...^[1]

The rest of the prayer should have come from the children's room. Instead, Marianna's voice sounded, gentle and filled with feigned concern:

— Tomiś, why does your father hate you so much?

Piotr stopped in mid-step.

He did not know whether his son answered. For several seconds, he could no longer hear the radio, the children's movements, or even his own breathing. One sentence was enough to make him understand that the dispute was no longer about travel. Marianna had begun to come between him and his children, planting in them an idea that might remain for years.

He should have entered the room, interrupted the prayer, ordered his mother-in-law to pack her things, and made her leave the apartment. Later, he came to regard his failure to do so as the second serious mistake of his life.

Instead, he went to Małgorzata.

— Do you know what your mother just said to Tomiś?

He repeated it word for word. He expected outrage, an immediate reaction, at least disbelief. Małgorzata listened with a tense face.

— I'll talk to her.

— When?

— I said I'll talk to her.

— She is telling our child that his father hates him.

— You don't have to repeat it to me.

Piotr never learned whether the conversation took place. Marianna did not apologize. She did not change her behavior. She continued to live with them, use the room, and move through the apartment with the confidence of someone whom no one intended to restrain.

Piotr began to fear that he would lose his children not through one judgment or sudden event, but through hundreds of sentences like that one. Each would be spoken quietly, preferably in his absence, wrapped in concern, prayer, or family advice.

He contacted Joanna, who lived near Nasielsk. She knew conflicts of this kind and understood how quickly a marital dispute could turn into a battle over children. Only later did he discover that she was a cousin of his cousin; at the time, what mattered was her clearheadedness.

— Don't act in anger — she advised him over the phone. — Write down what happens. Keep the messages. Don't leave until you know where you stand.

— She wants me to leave alone.

— That's precisely why you have to stay.

Piotr put down the receiver and looked at the closed doors. The children slept behind one. Behind another, Marianna conducted long telephone conversations. In the kitchen, Małgorzata went about ordinary household tasks as though their family were not standing at the edge of collapse.

Christmas came despite everything. On December twenty-first, they celebrated Tomisław's name day. Cake, drinks, and sweets appeared on the table. The children moved among the chairs. Rozalia hugged Krzyś, and he laughed, nestled against his older sister. Their closeness was natural, still resistant to the arrangements of adults.

On Christmas Eve, Marianna stood at the table beside Rozalia, Tomisław, and Paweł. They prayed. A candle burned among the platters, and the red table settings reflected its light. From the outside, everything looked like an ordinary family celebration: the sharing of the Christmas wafer, beet soup, presents, and children waiting to open their packages.

Piotr handed gifts to his sons and tried not to think about the conversations taking place behind closed doors. Paweł sat upright and silent. Again and again, Rozalia glanced at her father as though checking that they were still on the same side.

On Christmas Day, the children climbed into Piotr's bed. Tomisław settled beside his arm, Krzesisław almost on top of him, and Rozalia on the other side. They laughed, pushed one another, and pulled at the comforter. The father whom Marianna portrayed as filled with some incomprehensible lack of love could barely fit three children pressed against him beneath the covers.

The following day, Krzesisław and Tomisław threw themselves at their parents as they sat on the sofa. Małgorzata tried to cover her face, while Piotr laughed under the boys' weight. For several seconds, they were a family threatened by nothing. Then the children jumped down, and the tension returned with the silence.

Marianna sat apart, her arms crossed over her chest. She watched the grandchildren and adults from beneath furrowed brows. She did not look like a helpless guest. She was present at the very center of the apartment, and her silence carried the weight of the words she had spoken before.

Arguments ignited more and more easily. During one of them, Małgorzata seized a glass and hurled it at the floor. Shards scattered beneath the table, the children fell silent, and Piotr instinctively shielded the youngest ones.

— Have you lost your mind?! — he shouted.

— This is because of you! Everything is because of you!

Marianna stood in the doorway. She made no attempt to calm her daughter. She watched as though she had received further confirmation of her own story about the son-in-law who brought misfortune upon the family.

On the last day of the year, the children once again occupied their father. Rozalia, Krzesisław, and Tomisław climbed over him, embraced him, and knocked him to the floor. Later, Piotr sat with Rozalia and Tomisław, holding his younger son close. Across the room, Marianna and Małgorzata sat side by side on the sofa.

Two camps in one apartment did not have to be separated by a line. Glances were enough, along with conversations that stopped when someone entered and doors that closed a little too quickly.

Marianna had been given a room of her own and a telephone. Krystyna Sołoduszkiewicz called, and at times she spoke with Małgorzata. The voices grew quieter whenever Piotr passed through the hall. Rozalia began to notice those sudden changes in tone.

— Dad — she whispered one day — when Aunt Krysia calls Mom or Grandma, they often talk about you.

— How do you know?

— Because I hear my name and yours. Then they start speaking more quietly.

She thought for a moment, and then the familiar gleam appeared in her eyes.

— It's a shame you can't hear them, Dad. We could record it.

Piotr looked at his daughter. As a journalist, he knew that a spoken word and a recorded word were two different things. He had a small recorder that could be activated with a single button.

— When I'm nearby, they won't say what they say behind my back — he observed.

— But I can be there.

— Exactly.

He showed Rozalia the red button. He did not go into detail. She was to press it when she heard Krystyna talking with Marianna or Małgorzata, then switch the device off afterward. The girl accepted the task with the gravity of a heroine in a detective novel.

The trap worked the very next day.

— Dad, we have a recording — she announced triumphantly when he returned home. — Aunt Krysia called.

They sat down at the computer. Piotr played the recording. At first, there were ordinary questions, sighs, and the sound of objects being moved. Then Krystyna's voice became clearer.

She did not advise her sister to calm the situation. She did not try to understand what had happened in Dublin or why Rozalia wanted to return with her father. She urged Małgorzata to divorce him. She described her brother-in-law in language from the lowest shelf, and at one point compared him to mistletoe feeding parasitically on a rowan tree.

Piotr listened without moving. What struck him most was the certainty with which Krystyna passed judgment on his marriage and his children. She did not sound like someone worried about her sister. She sounded like someone who had long been working toward a single solution and finally felt close to achieving it.

Rozalia watched her father, waiting for his reaction.

— I said that's how they talk — she said.

— You did.

He copied the recording in several places. Then, once again, he made the mistake of a man who believes that exposed truth must necessarily change something. He took the recording to Małgorzata.

He did not shout. He played the conversation and waited. Krystyna's voice filled the room—brutal, certain, and devoid of scruple. Małgorzata listened with a drawn face.

— That's your sister — he said when the recording ended. — She is urging you to divorce me and insulting me in front of your mother. In our home.

He received no answer that would bring the dispute to an end. Krystyna was not pushed away. Marianna did not leave. The demand remained unchanged: Piotr was to return to Ireland, while Rozalia was to stay in Poland.

Meanwhile, the girl became convinced that she could uncover the secrets of adults. Mobile phones were still simple, their small screens used mostly for calls, messages, and the game Snake. The snake grew as it swallowed one point after another, and children and adults competed for the best scores.

One day, Rozalia was playing with Małgorzata's phone. Suddenly she stopped the game, ran to her father, and tugged at his sleeve.

— Dad, come here—quickly.

On the screen was a picture message from Stanisław Stachnik. It was no innocent joke. It contained unambiguous [censored content intended only for close family], which a child should never have seen.

Piotr stared at the screen for a moment, then placed the phone back exactly where it had been.

— Don't touch anything — he told his daughter.

— Will you tell Mom, Dad?

— Yes, but not everything.

He did not want to build another argument around a message Małgorzata might not yet have seen. He did not consider Stanisław a rival. In his eyes, the man was making a fool of himself rather than threatening the marriage.

Paradoxically, despite the tension, Piotr and Małgorzata could still sometimes speak to each other almost normally. Later, she herself told him about the strange messages from Staszek. Piotr did not make a jealous scene.

— Does he really think this is impressive? — he asked in disbelief.

Małgorzata shrugged. For a moment, they both smiled. It was one of those brief moments that made it difficult to understand whether the marriage was already collapsing or merely trapped in a conflict being fed by the people standing beside it.

January 2008 brought no immediate solution. Piotr did not leave alone. He had no intention of leaving Rozalia in a home where she was punished for her loyalty to her father and where her grandmother could tell a younger child that his father hated him.

Małgorzata repeated that their daughter was staying. Marianna continued her conversations. Krystyna sustained the pressure from a distance. Rozalia copied the notebooks, but at the same time guarded the documents and asked her father when they would return to Dublin.

— Are we going back? — she asked in the evening.

— Yes.

— For certain?

Piotr remembered that he had already promised her a life together in Ireland and had allowed himself to be brought back to Poland under the pretext of a brief visit. This time, he did not want to answer too easily.

— I will do everything I can so that we go back together.

Only in the second half of January did Małgorzata yield. There was no reconciliation or calm explanation beforehand. It was late, the children were in their rooms, and documents lay on the table.

— All right — she said at last. — Go.

Piotr looked at her, uncertain whether another condition would follow.

— Both of us?

— Both of you.

Piotr no longer wanted to take risks. He did not begin another discussion about where they should go. Several times before, he had told his wife that although things had begun to fall into place in Dublin, he had already secured a better-paying job in Calgary. Małgorzata did not want to hear about it. She agreed, at least in conversation, to the possibility of Ireland; Canada she rejected outright. She did not want to leave her mother and sisters. Now that she had given permission for him to leave with their daughter, Piotr did not risk another dispute.

Rozalia stood behind the half-open door. She did not run into the room or begin to celebrate. She had already learned that decisions made by adults could change between one day and the next.

Piotr did not feel victorious either. He had gained permission to return, but he had lost the last of his illusions. In August, he had left with his daughter believing that he was preparing the way for the whole family. In December, they had returned for a few days under the pretext of an important appointment, after which their joint departure had been blocked. In January, they regained the possibility of leaving only after weeks of pressure, punishment, and conversations conducted behind their backs. He had been expected back with his Irish employer in December. It was now the end of January.

The most painful discovery was that the threat had not come from a foreign country, a government office, or the labor market. It had been waiting in the apartment on Sowińskiego Street, speaking in the voice of a concerned grandmother, calling from a sister's telephone, and demanding obedience in the name of the family's good.

They were to return to Dublin. This time, however, they would travel as people who already knew that one could find work in a foreign city, cross borders, and learn a new language—and still be defeated by a single lie spoken at a kitchen table.

They were let down. And both of them knew they had been deceived. At the same time, these events forged a stronger bond between father and daughter. In truth, they were alone and belonged only to one another.