The Family Behind the Walls

17. Jordanna

SEVENTEEN

JORDANNA

AUGUST 14TH, 1943 – ?óD?, POLAND

I keep my eyes trained on Alfie as his are on me, sitting diagonally across from each other in the back of the truck as we make our short return trip to the holding walls of Przemys?owa Street. We stare at each other throughout the endless moments it takes to return to our prison. I wish I could read his thoughts. Though if I could, they might make me cry. The thought of him being in pain—it’s agonizing. My heart, weak and tired, still thumps within my chest, feeling too much from just a long gaze. Too much when there could never been anything more, not a world where we barely have the freedom to breathe without permission. There’s no order between any of us as we bobble along in the back of an old squeaky. I should be used to the putrid odors of bodily fluids, but the bitterness turns my stomach sour and the resulting acid rising up my throat makes my tongue feel fuzzy.

When the truck begins to move, the bumps along the road shove us in every direction. Somehow, many of the others look to be asleep, but with their eyes open.

Not Alfie. He’s still, and somehow holding himself upright. He reaches for my hand and holds it between his as he continues to stare at me. It’s as if he wants to share every one of his thoughts with me over the airwaves. He brushes the pad of his thumb across my knuckles, and I close my eyes, trying to imagine we’re somewhere else—anywhere else. But the sounds, the smells, the hungry pain in my stomach won’t allow my mind to wander far.

We’ve seen dead people. Too many for children our ages. I’ve witnessed a Gestapo shoot a Jewish man in the center of our hometown. I’ve watched other Jewish people beaten to the ground for no reason I could see. In the last couple of weeks, I’ve seen dead children stacked in a wheelbarrow. We don’t hear much about how the children die. We just see them being carted away.

Neither Alfie nor I had ever touched a dead person, until today. Alfie had to drag the dead girl off the field. He had to carry her in his arms, her limp body draped like a rag. When he returned, he was holding a pile of the girl’s clothes as instructed.

He knelt back down in the grass to continue harvesting potatoes, and I heard him stifling a cry, gasping for short breaths. I watched him clench his eyes to try and stop any tears from falling. He’ll forever feel the end of a young life in his arms, thinking she was robbed of a future, but he doesn’t know what I know…what Papa once told me. His story, his words—they mean more to me now than ever before.

Lilli is the biggest offender when it comes to asking Papa for more war stories. Mama would often change the topic or tell us it’s time to do something different, but Papa doesn’t always listen to her.

“A lot of people died in the war, little mouse.”

“But how many were your friends? You said you were friends with a lot of soldiers.”

She’s six. She doesn’t know or remember we aren’t supposed to ask these types of questions. Mama has asked us many times to be mindful of what we ask Papa about the war.

“That’s a tricky question,” Papa says, staring toward the brass horn of our gramophone.

I glance at Mama. Max does too. “Lilli, darling, do you want to come help me sew a loose button?”

“But I want to hear Papa’s story,” she whines.

“It’s fine, Papa. Maybe another time,” Max says.

“I didn’t even know him,” Papa says. “He was right next to me, and something got him. It easily could have been me who was shot, but it wasn’t. I recognized the young man, but never had the chance to talk to him. He died quickly, little suffering at least. All I could think was, we might have been friends had I found a moment to exchange a few words. I knew it was too late to learn anything about him, but as it turned out, I was wrong to think that.”

“Papa, you look very sad. Maybe we should talk about something—” I interrupt.

“Now, now. Your sister asked a question, and I have a reason for answering it, despite the difficulty. There’s an important lesson to take away from this,” he says, pointing at the gramophone as if it’s another person sitting in our living room. “It was a while before the battle came to a point where I could move the fellow. All I could think to myself was: what was this all for? These are lives, gone for no reason. But when I lifted him into my arms, I noticed a slight smile along his mouth. His eyes were wide open but not with shock, with wonder or a sense of reverence. I was desperate to know what he must have seen in that last second of his life, because it must have surely been something miraculous. We all deserved a moment like that after the battles we were fighting. And it was then that I realized those who died didn’t have their life cut short, but instead, were set free—to a place where war doesn’t exist, where unimaginable happiness and beauty awaits beyond the precipice of our fearful last breath.”

Max and I don’t know what to say. Mama has her hands cupped over Lilli’s ears, but tears have formed in her eyes. “So, what comes next is something better than what we know now?” I ask.

Papa’s stare finally unlocks, and he glances at me. “Precisely. We’re here to find our way to the next place by enduring challenges until we eventually succeed. And we will all succeed at some point. Then, we’ll be handsomely rewarded.”

“That’s why when we see rainbows in the sky, Mama says hello to grand-mama, and grand-papa, isn’t it?” Lilli, who shouldn’t have been able to hear anything, asks.

Mama swallows what must be a lump in her throat and removes her hands from Lilli’s ears. “Yes, my darling. That’s exactly why,” she utters.

Mama always made light of everything for us. I have to do the same for Alfie and Lilli now. That’s what she would want me to do. With Alfie’s hands still gripped around mine, I tap my fingertip in his palm, using Morse code to tell him that not everything is as it seems, and it isn’t the end but rather the beginning of something much better when we leave here. It would take me too long to share Papa’s entire story through finger taps, but Alfie seems to consider what I’m trying to tell him. His eyebrows dip down toward the creases of his eyelids, but I watch as he takes a long breath, then squeezes my hands a little tighter. I don’t know if I’ve helped him in any way, but maybe it will give him something more to think about tonight while he tries to sleep.

As the truck comes to a stop, a pain fills my head as my pulse thumps between my ears, thinking about Lilli, wondering if she made it through the day all right without me. The sun is setting, and the trumpet will play soon, warning us to line up in front of our blocks. In lines, once again, we’re herded back into the enclosure where the SS sit in their watch towers, and prisoners who answer to the SS guard the corners. Alfie is in the line for boys and I’m in the one for girls, nearly side by side. He glances over his shoulder toward me and quirks a small smile, mouthing the words, “Good night.”

My chest aches as I watch him move in the opposite direction. It would be easier if I could keep him and Lilli with me at all times, but then I’m not here for my life to be easy.

I walk in through the door of my new block, holding my breath as I search around for Lilli. She isn’t where we set our blankets down this morning, but our blankets aren’t there either. I notice some others nibbling on bread, standing by their wooden bunks.

Quickly turning back around and hurrying to the opposite outside perimeter of the block, I find an older child, serving as a guard distributing bread and the black liquid. A young girl is second to last in line and I’m hoping it’s Lilli. I make my way to the end of the line, knowing I don’t have my cup. That isn’t what I’m concerned about. I touch the little girl’s elbow, trying to be discreet so as not to startle her. She peers over her shoulder, and I’m gutted to see she isn’t my sister.

“Where’s your cup?” the guard shouts at me. I didn’t realize I was next in line.

“I—I forgot it.”

“No coffee.” She hands me the small loaf of bread and I run off in search of Lilli.

She could be in the latrine. I’m running in circles around the block, knowing someone is going to tell me off at any given moment, but I need to find her.

The trumpet’s honking sound blares through the air, forcing me to gasp in the musky air, signifying evening roll call.

If I’m not in line, I’ll be the next to get a flogging.

Please, Lilli. Please show up to roll call.

By the time I make my way around to the other side of the block, most of the children are already lined up. I realize now that the new block is made up mostly of younger girls around Lilli’s age. They all look the same with their shaved heads from behind. I know her number. They must call it. They would have to. She was assigned here with me this morning before I left for the farm.

The night seems to grow darker by the minute as the guards rattle off the list of numbers in no particular order.

Number 512 is called. That’s me.

“Present,” I say, raising my hand.

“Report to me after roll call,” the girl says.

What for? I want to ask my question out loud. Is there something she needs to tell me? Is it about Lilli? She hasn’t told anyone else that she needs to speak with them.

She’s called dozens and dozens of numbers. I can see her finger scrolling down the page, reaching the bottom.

My pulse throbs in my ears and along my temples.

A girl coughs relentlessly, making it hard to hear the remaining numbers being called. The words “be quiet” are rolling off my tongue but I bite my lip to make sure I don’t say something stupid.

“513,” Lilli’s number is finally called.

There’s silence for the longest second. A never ending second.

“Present,” I hear her say, her voice mousy and soft.

A sob bursts up through my chest, and I clutch my hand over my mouth, suffocating the air to stay inside of me. I cry silently, my chest trembling with every heartbeat. I need her. I need Lilli. I can’t be without her. I’m supposed to be the big sister. I am. I’m older by a lot, but I need her so badly right now.

“Report to the block for lights out,” the snitching guard tells us all.

All the girls scatter and scamper, running into each other, tripping, pushing, shoving, anything to do what we’ve been told.

“Jordie,” I hear a meek voice, a name she hasn’t called me in so long. Her arms reach between others and loop around my waist, squeezing me with all her might. “You’re all right. You’re really fine?”

I’m finally able to get my arms around her and hold her head against my chest, kissing her forehead over and over. “I’ve been so worried about you.”

“Your heart is punching me in the cheek,” she says with a small laugh.

“Go on inside the block. I’m supposed to speak to the—” I almost referred to her as the snitching guard. I don’t want that to accidentally come out of Lilli’s mouth.

“The block elder? That’s what she’s called,” Lilli informs me.

“Yes, her.”

“I’ve found us a place to sleep on one of the bunks next to each other. I already set up our blankets. It’s in the center of the third row.”

“I’m proud of you,” I tell her, squeezing her once more.

I walk towards the block-elder and wait for her to lift her stare from her clipboard. “You told me to report to you following roll call,” I say.

“You’re the girl who worked on the farm today,” she states.

“Yes, I did.”

“I need to write up a report of the death that took place at the potato field. You were the eldest girl and one of few who speak fluent German. Jot down the information on this piece of paper and return it to me at once. Details are important. They’ll be worth an extra piece of bread.”

She hands me the paper and a pencil, and I rush to the side of the block to use the wall as a surface to lean on. There aren’t many details to give, but I write out everything I remember, including the incoming rain, the breeze, the thump rumbling through the ground, and the sight of the girl face down in the dirt, pronounced dead within seconds of falling.