11. Forever

The three of us were in different orphanages. I lived the furthest away. Maria would come from the village to pick me up and on the way back we would get Dima or Olya. I don’t remember her ever picking up all three of us. After we were put in the orphanage I have no memory of all three of us ever being together.

Like usual she picked me up to take me back to the village to spend the holiday. On the way back to the village we stopped to get Dima, the second oldest. He was in different orphanage. When we got to his school and checked in with his teacher she told us he was in the hospital. Something was wrong with his appendix.

All of the orphanages I ever saw, the orphanages I was in and the ones my brother and sister lived in, were surrounded by fruit trees. During recess the kids would go out to play and sneak off to the trees to eat the fruit. I loved eating apricots. It didn’t matter if they were ripe. The teachers tell kids that if you eat fruit that isn’t ready to be eaten it hurts your appendix. So when we were told Dima was in the hospital it made sense to me that something was wrong with his appendix. I didn’t know where the appendix was but imagined it was on the side of your stomach and you would get a bubble there if you ate too much green fruit.

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Maria and I left Dima’s orphanage and took two different buses to get to the hospital. She didn’t have much money so this was expensive for her. Once there we asked to see Dima Burlaka. The hospital carefully went through the records and even the doctors said he wasn’t there. Maria and I went back to the orphanage and asked them again, “Where is Dima?” That’s when the orphanage told us he had been adopted.

Maria was furious that she hadn’t been told and that the orphanage had lied to her. The orphanage had us pointlessly search for him and worry about him being ill. She was especially upset because there were two laws that weren’t being followed. One law says when your kid goes to the orphanage you have the right to see them and pick them up as you please for visits. It’s as if your kid is just at boarding school. Another law says if you are having regular contact with your child you have to be notified when your child is adopted. Since she was regularly visiting us she had the right to be notified.

I was confused because I didn’t know what “adopted” meant. I just knew Dima left and he wasn’t coming back to the village with us then. I didn’t understand that I would never see him again. Maria tried to explain the reality to me but I didn’t understand the concept of forever. Back then I couldn’t imagine life more than a few days ahead.