Read Online American Gypsy by Oksana Marafioti - Free Book Online Page B

with the heels of his scruffy shoes. I couldn’t tell if he was going to cry or rip the couch in two, so I sat down on the other end, hoping he’d do neither with me there.
    â€œThe next show’s in three hours,” I said.
    He scrutinized the people walking about as if he’d never seen anything more interesting.
    â€œYou just gonna wait here this whole time?”
    â€œDon’t feel sorry for me,” he said.
    But how could I not? If my mother had up and left, I would’ve been terrified.
    â€œI’m not,” I said, so nervous he’d grow silent again. “We’ll take care of you.”
    He stopped tapping.
    â€œOh yeah?”
    â€œSure.” I shrugged. “Now we’re your family.” But I wanted to say “I’m your family.” One day I was a nine-year-old with the musings of a nine-year-old, the next I’d sit through two shows to see him play for a minute or two. Over the next four years Journal Number 1 grew fat with love notes:
    Before going onstage last night, Ruslan winked at me. I will die if he does it again. God, please, make him!
    Â 
    Ruslan showed me more dance steps today. I lost count. Twice. And walked out even though he didn’t laugh at me. Now I’m stuck in this hotel room, too embarrassed to show my face.
    Â 
    I have to go back to Moscow in a week, and he won’t even notice how I love him.
    Six months after my thirteenth birthday, during our tour of Uzbekistan, Ruslan asked if I wanted to tag along to buy guitar strings at the music shop a few blocks away in downtown Tashkent.
    â€œOn the way,” he said, “there’s something I need to ask you.”
    At the shop, the bushy-sideburned salesman peered at us like a toy terrier after a bath. “Young people these days. Barely weaned and already doing God knows what. Running around together, unchaperoned. Aren’t you a little too young to be out with this fella? How old are you?”
    â€œThirteen,” I said.
    â€œYoung man?”
    Ruslan jabbed a finger at the packets of strings that hung on a hook above a poster of Lenin preaching to a sea of soldiers. “Two of those. If you’re not too busy.”
    â€œ Vonuchie Tzigane (rotten Gypsies).” The old man plucked the packets off the hook and tossed them in a paper bag. “But such are the times. Let everyone do as they please.”
    I couldn’t understand it. Our clothes were good quality, our faces clean. We paid with rubles and displayed good manners. How could a stranger tell us apart from everyone else?
    On the way back to the hotel, Ruslan squeezed the brown bag into a ball, and I nearly had to run after him. We passed a park where a small gathering of old men were arguing over a game of chess. The sidewalks bustled. We tried to shoulder our way through a crowd boarding a trolley, each passenger fighting for their rightful place.
    â€œAre you all right?” Ruslan asked. He took my hand so we wouldn’t get separated.
    â€œAre you?”
    A sharp nod, and he pulled me to the other side of the street.
    â€œHe’s old,” I said. “He didn’t mean it.”
    â€œYou notice how it’s never just ‘Gypsy’? It’s always ‘dirty’ or ‘rotten’ or ‘stupid.’ They mean it, Oksana, never doubt that. And the old are most dangerous. You can’t change their thinking.”
    â€œNothing we can do about it,” I said.
    â€œIn Romania, right now, Romani our age are fighting back.”
    I’d heard of rallies going on in Romania at the time. Romani all over Europe told stories about women being sterilized without consent; there were rumors that no Romanian Gypsy could get documents in order to work. Some of the younger Gypsies were becoming restless.
    â€œAs soon as I save up enough money I’m going to join them,” he said.
    â€œIn Romania?”
    â€œImportant things are happening