Piotr was always the last one of the night. During the winter, he came layered in swaths of long-sleeved flannel shirts, a wool-lined tartan hat with a buckle swinging under one ear, and wool socks on both hands. His slow approach up the walk was a wrestling match between himself and his walker. He would hunch over and then unfurl his torso like a hammer thrower, only to advance the stainless steel walker another foot or so. He would pull himself toward the walker and gather himself for the next hurl. One of the other clients would narrate Piotr’s progress as if he was calling a horse race, but even that had run its course long before Piotr made it to the door. It was exhausting to watch.
From the neck up, he was all smiles. His bright blue eyes, arching eyebrows and broad smile would turn my way once he was near the front of the line.
“Ah, my beauty, what’s on the menu tonight?”
Piotr had been coming to the neighbourhood Food Bank for probably a year and a half. He was always on his own. I worked the door, letting clients into the church basement a handful at a time. We hadn’t exchanged more than ‘hello’ and ‘have a good night’ in his first few visits, but he always smiled and made a point of making eye contact with each of the volunteers.
One night last winter, he was almost done his plodding approach up the pavement when one of the legs on his walker caught a block of ice. It was one of those big brown chunks that drops out from under a car fender. Piotr’s walker shot out, propelling him forward along with it. He let out a loud, whimpering grunt as he landed on the pavement in a belly flop with his hands and arms stretched overhead.
My partner at the door rushed over and crouched down.
“Sir, are you all right? Are you hurt?”.
Piotr was still and quiet for a few, long heartbeats. Then his torso began to shake.
My partner began to smile.
“You gave us a fright there. Do you think we can help you get up off this cold pavement?”
“Sure, sure,” Piotr breathed out. “Give me a moment.”
I was 5’2” and 120 pounds. The guy with me was more like 6’2” but also looked to be about 120 pounds. He was 70 or so and brittle looking. I doubt he could lift a full load of laundry without breaking a wrist. Between the two of us, however, we managed to get Piotr onto his sock-clad hands and knees, and then back to full height behind his walker.
“I wonder if I might be able to sit down inside for a moment, just to catch my breath,” Piotr said to me.
“Of course, of course,” I said, nodding too vigorously. I looked to my partner.
“I’m going to sit with him a minute, ok?”
I held Piotr’s elbow and the handle of his walker helping him move forward in a less spectacular fashion than his solo routine.
We sat on the steps leading up to the church’s main floor. The radiator on one side of us was throwing out blistering waves of heat as cold air blowing in through the open door froze our other halves.
“Thank you so much, young lady. That was very kind of you and your friend.”
“Of course, of course. How are you feeling?”
“Embarrassed, but otherwise fine.”
“Oh geez, please don’t be embarrassed. I slipped and fell running to the bus stop just the other morning. I had to go home because I was covered in slush. The whole city feels like one big skating rink.”
Piotr smiled.
He held out his hand and introduced himself. I took his hand and introduced myself.
There was a long silence as I tried to find a way to ask a question without it sounding like, “So, how did you end up at a Food Bank?”
“So, how did you find out about the Food bank?”
Smooth.
If he felt any awkwardness, Piotr didn’t show it. He responded with the enthusiasm of someone who had discovered a new favourite coffee shop.
He had been living in shelters the winter before last and tenting through the summer with a few others. Just as the weather was getting colder last year, a neighbourhood agency had found him a room in a boarding house a block away from the church.
“It’s a highlight of my week to visit here,” he said.
I stared back at him, uncertain what to say next.
“You know I was once a concert pianist,” he said.
“Really?”
“Yes, in Russia.”
He didn’t sound Russian.
“I know, I speak very good English, right? I moved here in my twenties. I was a student, but it was really a way to get out. I loved Russia, but I didn’t so much like Russians, if you follow me.”
I smiled.
“The government, to be precise.”
“Got it,” I said, starting to relax. “So what happened?”
God, could I sound more callous?
“My first day,” he said, wagging his index finger up at me. “My first day. I was walking and looking at all the people and buildings, marvelling at the newness of this place. It seemed so… shiny.”
He had a charming way about him. Self-deprecating, but also grandiose in the way he projected his voice and expressed every word with his face and hands.
“And then, a car hit me.”
“Wait, what?”
“Yep, I walked against the light and straight into a car. Broke my back.”
“Oh geez, Piotr, that’s terrible.”
“Thank you. I healed up and went on with my studies and music, but a few of the vertebrates were never the same, of course. They were like ticking time bombs that finally exploded when I was 35. I couldn’t perform. It was too painful. Sitting on the bench… it felt like electricity shooting all the way up between my shoulder blades. My toes would burn like they were on fire, like when they freeze and begin to thaw, you know?”
I grimaced and nodded.
“I couldn’t lie down. I would try to sleep sitting up, but it was no good. I couldn’t concentrate, let alone play. Things just kind of flowed from there.”
“That’s terrible.”
“I miss the playing, yes, but it’s really not. I think back and know that I was blessed. I am blessed.”
I braced myself for the inevitable ‘thanks be to God’ speech, but it never came.
“Days are hard now, but I am blessed,” he said again, looking into my eyes. “I met you after all.”
I blushed and looked down.
“I should be the one who’s blessed. That was a lovely story.”
Piotr grimaced.
“You don’t believe me?”
I stammered and grabbed his shoulders.
“No, no. I mean yes. I’m sorry if that came out wrong.”
He smiled.
“It was worth it to see you blush so beautifully.”
After that, Piotr would greet me at the entrance with a dramatic flourish.
“Hello my queen. I’ve come to rescue you from this dungeon of despair.”
One week, as Piotr stood at the front of the line and waited his turn, I asked him what songs he had liked to play.
“What composers do you like?” he replied.
I know very little about classical music, but I didn’t want to show it by simply saying Beethoven or Bach. I thought of that beautiful movie with that Australian actor about the piano player.
“Rachmaninoff?”
“Ooof,” he said. “Yes, I played him, but as little as possible. What’s your favourite?”
I stared back, mutely, as he sensed my predicament.
“There are so many, I know. He was very popular. I’ve never confessed this to anyone before, but I really don’t like his music. His music is a bit, how should I say this… It’s like a smelly bouquet, but too smelly. Too sentimental.”
I smiled, grateful for the way he had effortlessly steered the conversation past my embarrassment.
Piotr had good weeks and not so good ones. Sometimes his charm seemed as off balance and careering as his locomotion up the walk.
“Ms. Rachmaninoff, why, with a rich bosom like yours, do you not have a husband?”
“You’re feeling good today, Piotr?”
“I could dance Swan Lake, my dear!”
Other times he would be more withdrawn.
We were sitting on the steps on an especially hot, summer day as he started to take off his shoes and socks. Worn and inelastic, the socks had bunched up under his heels inside a pair of perfectly kept loafers. Having draped his socks over the handle of his walker, he peeled a penny off the bottom of his left heel.
I raised my eyebrows.
“My lucky penny,” he said. He stared out the glass door in front of us and smiled.
“You know, when we don’t have a home and we are moving around night to night, we can’t always feel like ourselves. Shelters, where you can get a shower, can be rough. Some of the people are quite ill, as you know from here. Others are suffering and act desperately. It can be safer to stay awake through the nights and sleep during the day on a busy sidewalk. It sounds like an exaggeration, I know, but people don’t see you, even if you lie down right in front of them. You start to believe you’re already a ghost – people walking past you… through you… stepping right over you.
“A wonderful young man who I met during this time took pity on me. He let me travel with him, night to night. When we first met, he told me to place a penny in each sock. He said it would keep my feet from getting too smelly or growing any nasty funguses. I apologize if that’s too graphic. My friend was a scientist of some kind – or he had been. He explained that the penny absorbs some of the sweat of our feet and keeps them from smelling. I was as skeptical as you look now, but let me tell you something…”
He was looking deep into my eyes as he leaned closer. His voice became a whisper.
“It was like a miracle. It really worked. Well, at least a little. I couldn’t get over it. It didn’t matter if we were sleeping under a freeway during a rainstorm or melting under a hot sun on the downtown pavement . My lucky penny was protecting my feet. I marveled about it constantly.
“‘Piotr,’ my friend would say. ‘Get over it. It’s zinc oxide, just like in a woman’s foot cream. It’s not magic.’
He shook his head and smiled.
“But it was magic to me. I needed it to be. Do you understand?”
I nodded.
“I think so,” I said. I could feel tears spilling down onto my cheeks. “Can I give you a hug?”
He laughed.
“I’ve been waiting for one of your bosomy hugs for some time now.”
“Jesus, Piotr, don’t spoil the moment.”
A few weeks later, the end of the night at the Food Bank came and went – no Piotr. It wasn’t unusual. Some folks moved on. Some found jobs, or better jobs that paid enough for rent and food both.
I thought of him again as the holidays neared. I was out for an evening walk, fleeing the quiet of my apartment. I stopped off at a used vinyl store, browsing robotically through the Brit pop section. As I started to leave, I spotted the classical section. I flipped through the albums until I found one: ‘The Best of Rachmaninoff.” Who knew they made greatest hits albums for old composers? The idea seemed beneath the handsome man staring earnestly out from the album cover. Piotr had been extolling the virtues of vinyl one day last winter when I mentioned I had started to date a guy who collected records. We moved in together briefly, but he had left with all his records. A spat over dishes or something equally petty had escalated into words that neither of us knew how to take back. I bought the record, imagining Piotr’s smile as I held it up to him. It seemed like a longshot, but maybe he’d be by the Food Bank again. And even if he didn’t come, I thought, I’d just ask around for his address and drop the record off. I looked forward to Piotr’s broad smile and grandiose greeting. I missed them. I missed him.
The holidays are a busy time. Donations were at their highest around then, so there were usually some special additions to the hampers. It was also a time when people who normally managed through the year may have chosen to spend a little extra on gifts at the expense of groceries. I was downstairs in the church the next Thursday, pinning on my name badge before opening the doors for the evening. I had wrapped a red bow around the album and planned to stash it behind the front door so I could reveal it in a flourish when, if, Piotr came.
The coordinator, a tall woman a few years older than me, came up behind me.
“Hey Lady, how you doing?” she said.
“Good,” I said. “Ready for the week to be over.”
“Amen to that. Hey, the pastor gave this to me. She seemed to know somehow that it was meant for you.”
She held out a small envelope. It was the mini kind you get for cards at a flower shop.
Written on the envelope’s front was the name, “Ms. Rachmaninoff.”
“She said someone dropped it off this afternoon for a friend who had passed away recently. I’m sorry if it was someone close to you, Hon.”
“Oh yeah, thanks, that’s me all right,” I said, feeling the blood rise up my cheeks. The crossfire of conversations across the room faded as if someone had dropped a giant glass over me. I forced a smile and pretended to tuck the card away for later.
As soon as the coordinator turned to greet another volunteer, I walked to the washroom and locked the door.
I could hear my breath getting heavier as I stared at down at the thing in my hands. It seemed so fitting that Piotr’s passing would be delivered in a comically small envelope. I let out a small sob of frustration trying to tear open the envelope’s tiny flap without damaging the card inside with my trembling hands.
It was a plain white card with a few musical notes sketched on the front. A shining penny dropped into my palm as I opened the flap to read inside.
“May my lucky penny bring you the same hope and dignity that you both gave me. – Warmest regards, Piotr.”
-30-
