Sixteen
Sixteen
I wait in the gray light of dawn on the bridge.
Steady rain is falling and Kuschi and I are quickly soaked through.
I turn up the collar of my trench coat and tighten my belt.
Kuschi regards me with sullen eyes, his head bent low, tail tucked between his back legs.
He isn’t a fan of the rain and would have preferred it if I’d left him curled in a tight circle in his basket.
“Sorry,” I say to him as I stroke his head, “but you’re my cover.” He gives my hand a half-hearted lick.
By the time Walter arrives, Kuschi and I are shivering. He kisses me gently on the cheek and brushes a damp strand of hair out of my eyes.
“You both look miserable.”
“Better now you’re here.”
He smiles, and all the doubts crowding my mind are rinsed away.
“Let’s find somewhere dry. I can see you need warming up...” He frowns in thought. “There’s that old hay barn on the far side of our wheat field. We could shelter in there. On a morning like this, we’ll be sure to be all alone.”
The thought of Walter warming me up makes me giggle, and I no longer care about being soaked to the skin. What is it about him that brings this lightness, this frivolity, this downright recklessness to my spirit? It’s a side of me I never knew existed.
We take the path by the river. Around us, the trees and fields are distilled through a glistening, rain-wet filter as the morning light grows stronger. Everything appears more beautiful than before. I curb the urge to break into song.
We reach the barn and Walter pushes open the door. I hesitate in the entrance. There’s a musty, damp smell in the air and it’s gloomy inside. I make out some bales of old hay in one corner and piles of rusting farm machinery in front.
“It’s fine, Hetty. I’m not going to... take advantage, if that’s what you’re worried about,” Walter says softly. “I mean, we don’t have to go in. I just thought it’d be nice to be out of the rain.”
“Oh.” I look down at my shoes, mortified that he should think that I might think... “I trust you.”
“Good.”
I follow him inside. Take advantage. Is that what it’s called? But what if I want it too? Are those images of the two of us that play in my head normal ? I’m not supposed to want it. Not the way a man does.
Walter climbs up on the hay bales and spreads out his coat. He leans down with a grin and offers me a hand, helping me up next to him. Kuschi whines at us from below.
“Oh come on, you, too, dog.” Walter pats the hay next to him and in three bounds, Kuschi is up and nestling himself next to Walter. I sidle closer on the other side, and Walter slips his arm around my waist, pulling me in tight. “Relax.” I feel him smile. “Are you warm enough?”
“Yes.” I rest my head on his shoulder.
After a moment’s pause, he says, “I never thought sitting on moldy old hay, in a falling-down barn damp from the rain, could feel like a piece of heaven. But it does. Anywhere with you feels like that.”
I laugh. “Don’t tease!”
“It’s true. I can forget who I really am.”
“What do you mean?”
The air stills. We breathe. In, out. In, out, in harmony with each other.
“I don’t know where to start,” he says.
I reach for his hand. “Start from the beginning.”
“I miss our flat,” he says. “I miss home .”
I remember the first time I went to Walter’s flat, not long after the Almost Drowning.
Coming from our run-down apartment, where the stench from the outside toilet was so bad you could smell it from the street, Walter’s flat had seemed like a palace.
Behind the smart, white facade was an elegance beyond my then imagination.
As a treasured only child, Walter had always been destined for the gymnasium.
He’d befriended Karl, really because the two had been the brightest in the class at volksschule.
Had Vati not done so well at the newspaper, enabling him to afford gymnasium fees, Karl and Walter’s friendship might have ended there.
The atmosphere in the flat had been warm and welcoming.
I can picture Frau Keller, petite and pretty, with her light blue eyes and fair hair, cut to just above her shoulders and neatly curled in a fashionable style.
In the high-ceilinged sitting room, I’d perched on the edge of a big armchair, scared to touch anything that might break.
Frau Keller even had a maid who brought lemonade and delicate biscuits on a flowery tray.
I remember Frau Keller playing the piano and laughing, her fingers dancing over the keys and the jolly tune she played.
She had asked if I wanted to have a go at the piano.
But I was much too shy and I’d just buried my head in Mutti’s chest, hiding my eyes.
I remember following the boys to Walter’s room.
The shelves of books, his neatly made bed.
The old-fashioned furniture and the tall clock that ticked and chimed in the quiet of the elegant hall.
“I mean, I love my grandmother, and my extended family,” Walter is saying, “but we don’t have our own space anymore.
To make ends meet we have to take in lodgers—it’s our only income, really, as the business makes no money anymore.
So I share a small room with my three cousins.
They’re children, noisy and annoying at times.
Not their fault, but it’s hard. And my grandmother is always on edge about having things just so for the lodgers.
Besides, we never really know the views of those staying.
Most people are fine, but it only takes one to make some sort of official complaint.
So we are rarely able to speak freely at home.
Sometimes the strain of it is unbearable. ”
“That does sound... difficult.”
“And my father, he’s a shadow of what he used to be. It’s like he’s aged and shrunk. Given up. Sometimes, I hate him for it. Hate him for not getting us out while we still had the chance.”
“Why can’t you go now? Find somewhere better to live?”
His face crumples and for a moment I think he might break down.
But he pulls himself upright. “It’s impossible.
Too damned late. No country will take more Jews.
They all say they have too many. Besides, we can’t afford the exit tax—I told you about it before.
We can’t get our passports back without parting with a lot of money, which we don’t have, even if we could get a visa somewhere else. ”
“And your mother? What about her?”
“She’s the strong one now. She keeps going, even though my father’s lost his will.
And my grandmother. Without them...” He sniffs.
“I’m not sure where we’d be. Everyone just keeps hoping and praying things will get better.
But they’re burying their heads in sand.
They need to see the reality. Things will only get worse. ”
“Worse? It already sounds awful, Walter,” I say, squeezing his fingers where they lie next to mine. “How could it possibly get worse?”
“We’re being banned from more and more places.
There’s even talk that the city’s Jews be banished to one area in just a few buildings—like a ghetto from the Middle Ages.
” He snorts. “People wonder how we got to this place, in just a few short years. But it’s because we’ve let it happen.
We’ve just sat back and taken it. Nobody has been brave enough to speak out. To stand up and fight.”
I remember what Vati said about all the Jews who still live in Gohlis. How they persist, like vermin. Anger stirs inside me. These are people , like us, not rats. We listen to the rain, thudding now, on the roof of the barn.
“I read letters from friends in London and New York,” Walter continues. “The things they’re able to do. And me? What sort of future do I have?” He tenses, turning toward me. “Oh, Hetty, if only you and I could leave tomorrow, on a steamship to New York. If only that were possible!”
“And then?” I whisper.
Walter paints a picture with his hand in the air.
“We could live in a high-rise—one thousand feet tall. With a view over Central Park. Or Broadway. I’d work in a smart office, instead of a dirty old warehouse.
” He pauses. “We could go to restaurants and cinemas, theaters and libraries. Together. Nothing is banned. You can buy any book, listen to any music, watch any film. You can do any job, Jew or gentile, black skinned or white.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“So... I could be a doctor. They have women doctors?”
“Probably. Certainly.”
“And you could go to university too?”
“I could. And, better still, we’d be able to be together, openly, instead of having to hide in fusty old hay barns.”
We both smile at the thought.
A place I could become a doctor.
But I gave that dream up years ago.
The barn door creaks and we jump. It creaks again, but we are quite alone. Just us, the rain, and the wind. We smile again at each other.
I try to imagine what that might be like, to live in a place like New York. The way Walter describes it makes it sound enticing. But I wonder if, in reality, it isn’t just a little... frightening. With all that freedom, how do they control people? How do they stop criminals from wreaking havoc?
Perhaps Walter spends too much time with gloomy people.
From what I gather, he creeps about all the time, on the outskirts of society.
I need to show him that Germany isn’t so bad.
That it is also vibrant and growing and that Adolf Hitler, aside from not liking Jewish people, or pretty much any foreigners, has the best interests of Germany at his heart. He is doing good things , too.
“We can’t go to New York,” I say slowly. “But we could catch a train somewhere. Where we wouldn’t be recognized. We could go shopping, stroll in the park. Nobody would suspect...”
He stares at me and I wonder if I’ve said the wrong thing. Have I been too forward, or would it be too risky? He’s quiet for a few moments.
“You know, Hetty, you’re right. Walking in the countryside with you is lovely, but it would be nice to do something more. I’m fed up with hiding in the shadows. Why don’t we go into the city?”
“That would be too dangerous, Walter.” I sigh. “We might be seen.”
“It’s not likely, though, is it? Especially at the moment. The Leipzig Fair is on. There’s about two hundred thousand strangers in town. Everyone I know is busy working.”
“Everyone I know avoids the crowded city center at this time...”
“Exactly!”
“But... Why would we risk being seen, even if it’s only a small risk?”
I look into his pleading eyes. Such a trip seems foolhardy.
“There’s something I want to give you,” he says carefully. “We’d hide in plain sight. Nobody would suspect a Jew to brazenly parade so openly with a German in public. We’ll be completely ignored.”
I shake my head. “We can’t.”
“Look. We won’t go to any of the places anyone you know ever goes. I promise. It’ll make a lovely change from these fields.” He grins at me. “I wouldn’t risk this if I thought there was any chance we’d be seen,” he encourages. “I should be able to take my girl out for a day of fun, if I choose.”
My girl.
“We could go next Saturday,” I find myself saying.
“Don’t you have school?”
“I rarely go to school on Saturdays anymore. They prefer us to be with the BDM. I should be going on a hike, but there are six hundred girls going on this one. I’m not a leader, so they won’t miss me. I’ll get Erna to tell them I’ve hurt my foot.”
“That’s it. We can do this.” He nods. “I’m fighting back. In a small way. But it feels good. It feels so good. Hey,” he says as he nudges me. “How about a joke?”
“Okay.” I sigh.
“This one’s a bit naughty, so no telling your father, right?”
“Of course not!”
“So two men meet. ‘Nice to see you’re free again,’ says one to the other.
‘How was the concentration camp?’ ‘Great,’ replies the first. ‘Breakfast in bed, choice of coffee or chocolate, and for lunch, soup, meat, and dessert. We played games in the afternoon before coffee and cakes. Then a little snooze and a film after dinner.’ The second man was astonished.
‘That’s great! Funny, though, I recently spoke to Meyer, who was also locked up there.
He told a different story.’ The first man nods gravely.
‘Ah yes,’ he says, ‘that’s why he’s back in there again! ’” Walter looks at me and smiles.
“You seriously think that’s funny?” I stare at him in amazement.
“Ah well,” he says, shrugging. “Maybe the dark Jewish humor takes a bit of getting used to.”
He hugs me tight, tickling my ribs, and now we’re both laughing. Kuschi catches the light mood and becomes playful, yapping and pawing, hopeful we shall be on the move once more.