Twenty #2
“I’m sure you did,” she says at last. “But I hear that some of these prison deaths aren’t as accidental as they might at first seem. There are rumors, awful rumors, about what goes on in these prison camps.”
I close my mind to what Walter has said too.
“What sort of rumors?” I ask, irritation escaping into my voice. She’s been listening to her father’s rhetoric, I’m sure. It’s rubbing off on her. The perfect Erna, perhaps becoming less perfect? Was it a mistake not to mention Herr B?cker’s views to Vati?
Erna’s face clouds for a moment. Then, with a frown she says, “I’m not saying that those who’ve done wrong don’t deserve to be in prison.
.. It’s just that, many of the people who were taken into protective custody , due to their political opinions, have been transferred to camps.
The conditions are apparently very bad. I heard that, when they are due to be released, those dates get pushed back, or there is a mysterious death, or someone has tried to escape and died for it. ”
“And who told you this?”
Erna closes her mouth and gives her head a slight shake.
“Erna, you shouldn’t listen to such talk. You know that,” I say, looking hard into her eyes.
“It’s difficult to know what’s true, and what’s rumor,” she says carefully. “But surely Tomas’s family deserve to know how such an accident could have happened. It sounds suspicious—”
“What could you know about it?” I round on her. “Don’t make things worse than they already are for Tomas.”
“It’s all right, Hetty.” Tomas frowns. “There are a lot of rumors flying about. You mustn’t believe everything you hear, Erna. Bastard enemies of the Reich. They just want to cause trouble.”
Erna is quiet for a moment. “Well, I’m sorry anyway, Tomas.”
We sit in silence again, letting the news about Tomas’s father sink in. It seems like another lifetime when Tomas and I, aged twelve, stood shoulder to shoulder in Vati’s study that day. How much has changed since then. Even little weedy Tomas is becoming a man. Lanky, square jawed, and low voiced.
Through the branches of a tall plane tree, I watch colored light filter through the high, narrow windows of Thomaskirche, while the boys’ voices, honey sweet, crescendo to an impossible high, then abruptly stop. A hush descends over the square.
Erna and I say good-bye to Tomas and walk home through lamp-lit streets, hand in hand, friends again, after our disagreement over the camps earlier.
Rain begins to fall, light to begin with, then with full, soaking intent.
There is a rich, earthy smell in the air.
Cars swish through puddles and lights reflect on the newly wet black pavements.
“Everything is changing, but I want it to be how it was,” I say suddenly, thinking back to how uncomplicated life used to be, before we had to watch what we say to each other; before Walter’s family had to hide in the shadows. Before I knew about Vati and the girl-child.
Erna looks thoughtful for a moment. “Don’t you think the future’s bright then, Hett?”
“It doesn’t feel like it, at the moment.” How much to reveal? I wish I’d not been so defensive about Tomas’s father. Have I made Erna wary?
“Why not?” she asks, her voice falsely bright. “We have loads to look forward to. The Gewandhaus concert. The BDM dance. How about a kiss with a good-looking Wehrmacht officer?” She nudges me. “What more could a girl want?”
She makes me smile, despite the melancholy that has settled deep in my being.
“Really, what’s bothering you, Hett?”
“Oh. Nothing. I suppose I’m just missing Karl, that’s all.”
“Of course you are. How is he getting on?”
“Fine, I think. He doesn’t write to me much.”
“Bet you can’t wait to see him when he’s home.”
“Heaven knows when that will be.”
“Christmas, isn’t it? That’s what he said—” Erna stops mid-sentence.
“What?”
“I mean, I think it would be about that time, wouldn’t it?” She speaks quickly, rushing over her words, but her walking pace has slowed, and even in the dark and through the rain, I can feel she is blushing.
“You just said, ‘Christmas. That’s what he said...’” A mist descends. I stop walking. The sounds from the street are muffled, as though I am far away. Then, as if the fog has cleared, I see it. What I missed. How could I not have realized? Perhaps I did, but I didn’t want to know it.
“Hetty...”
“How do you know when Karl is coming home?” I snarl. “And I don’t?” Nausea stirs in my belly. The rain is soaking through my jacket, and my shoulders are damp. Water drips from my hair.
“Because Karl wrote it in a letter.”
“A letter? How many letters has he written to you?”
“I’m not sure.”
“Three. That’s how many he’s written to me since he’s been away. Three. Is it more, or less, than three , Erna?”
“More than three,” she mumbles. “I’m so sorry, Hett. I knew I should have told you. Karl thought you might be upset, so I kept quiet. It was the wrong thing to do, I know that now.”
“Don’t you dare blame Karl!”
We stare at each other through the wet darkness.
“I’m not blaming him, I—”
“Why would you keep this from me? Why would Karl want to keep it from me? We tell each other everything! You and I tell each other everything.”
“Yes, we do. And I was going to tell you, honestly. I just couldn’t find the right time.”
“That’s pathetic, Erna. You coward.”
So it was Erna’s idea. Karl would never have kept a secret from me. She has talked about it with him. Persuaded him. I imagine her whispering in his ear. Them laughing together, at my expense. Turning him away from me. My own brother! My so-called best friend!
“So you’re his sweetheart then?” I try to keep my voice calm, even.
“Yes.”
I feel a sharp pain in my heart. Karl is mine. I’m his Little Mouse. He kept it from me. She kept it from me. Excluded me. They don’t want any part of me in this thing .
“How long?”
“Not that long. A few months, that’s all.”
“A few months ! And you never thought to tell me? What about Kurt? It was all a lie, wasn’t it?
And you begged me not to tell your parents.
For Christ’s sake... What about our friendship?
Does it mean so little to you? Were you just using me, to get to Karl?
” Rain, spit, and anger, ugly and bitter, spew from my mouth.
Vati. Karl. Erna.
Three of the most important people in my life, and they’ve all betrayed me.
“I’m sorry.” Erna’s voice is pleading. Her sodden hair is plastered to her head, her face shiny and wet.
“I never meant to upset you this much. We were going to tell you, but there didn’t seem much point in the beginning, what with Karl due to go away; we thought it wouldn’t last. Then, after the summer camp, it started to get serious, but the time never seemed quite right. ..”
“So you chose to lie about a made-up boyfriend. Why, Erna? What was the point of not telling me the truth?”
“I don’t know. It was stupid. I hated lying to you. Truly, Hetty. I was just worried it would ruin our friendship...”
“Well, it damn well has now, hasn’t it?”
I stare at Erna, her shoulders sunken in misery at my vicious words. I’m hurting her and it feels good. She’s the easiest one to take my rage out on. I can’t do it to Vati, or to Karl. But Erna? Eternally good and perfect Erna? I can get to her, all right.
But you haven’t exactly been truthful either.
That is different .
Walter is a secret for his safety.
A different situation entirely.
“Go away, Erna,” I say at last. “Just leave me alone. I hate you both. But mostly you. You’re nothing but a lying pig .”
I turn and run, hard and fast through the downpour. My chest hurts and I’m soaked to the skin, but it doesn’t silence the torrent of voices in my head.
What have you done?
YOU are the villain, for falling for a Jew.
VATI is the lowlife with his secret family.
You’ve just lost the best friend you have ever had.
Hetty Heinrich, you are the biggest fool in the universe.