Chapter 9 INGA
It had been two days since the American—Gideon—gave me the gum. Two days of replaying his voice in my head when I didn't mean to, two days of pretending the whole thing had meant nothing.
I gave the strips to Klaus as soon as he woke the next morning.
For a moment, I thought I'd keep it, save it for his birthday.
But the truth was sharper: It wasn't mine to keep and give.
Gideon had given it to me for Klaus. Klaus's eyes had gone so wide I thought they might spill right out of his face.
"Gum?" he'd whispered like it was a magic word. "For me?"
"Yes," I said. "Try it."
He'd held the little stick like it was treasure from another world. When he finally put it in his mouth, he chewed once, twice, then grinned like the sun had broken right through our collapsed ceiling.
"It's sweet!"
"Only a little," I warned.
"I love it!" He broke the stick in half the way I'd shown him and held the other piece out. "You can have the rest."
I shook my head. "No. I want you to enjoy all of it." I watched as he carefully wrapped the broken stick back up and secured it in his pocket.
We came outside today after lessons, and he popped a piece in his mouth, chewing happily, then noticed me staring across the courtyard.
Axel was there, half-shadow and half-boy, pressed against a wall like he wanted to disappear into it.
Klaus followed my stare. "You want me to give the other half to him? " he asked, incredulous.
I nodded.
Klaus sighed like an old man, but he walked over. Axel recoiled before Klaus even spoke.
"Here," Klaus said, holding out the gum.
Axel's eyes narrowed, darting between my brother's hand and the other kids in the courtyard. The Trümmerkinder were watching, snickering, elbowing each other, whispering cruel things they'd learned too young.
Axel backed up, shaking his head. "What do you want me to do for it?" he muttered, suspicious.
"Nothing!" Klaus said, offended.
But Axel didn't believe it. None of them ever did.
I stepped closer. "Axel, it's a gift. From my brother."
He hesitated. Just for a breath. Then he turned and limped away, shoulders hunched tight. Something stung behind my eyes. Not anger, just that deep, endless sadness this city had carved into us all.
"Stay away from them," I told Klaus softly as the other boys laughed. "They're desperate. Desperation can be dangerous."
But watching them, boys and girls with dirt-smudged faces, torn coats, and no parents to hold them steady, I felt sorry for them too. There were so many. Too many. I had no idea how any of them kept breathing.
Klaus tugged on my sleeve. "Do you think the pilot will wiggle his wings today?"
I swallowed hard. Gideon. His smile flickered in my mind, just a flash from the doorway of Die Ecke, the heat in his eyes when he looked at me.
I told myself I didn't care.
A low hum rolled across the sky. The kids jerked their heads up all at once, like a flock hearing a signal. Then came another hum—deeper, louder—the familiar thrum of engines hauling hope. The plane dipped low over the rooftops, and then—wiggle, wiggle.
The courtyard erupted.
The children exploded forward like someone had cut a string. Even the wary ones. Even Axel, hobbling at the edge. And Klaus turned toward me, eyes bright as coins.
"Go ahead," I told him. "But stay where I can see you."
I watched him sprint with the others, heart hammering.
The world beyond the courtyard was treacherous, more treacherous than he understood.
Several Trümmerfrauen—rubble women—shoveling bricks stopped what they were doing and watched the kids.
Their faces were streaked gray from the dust, but a smile lit all their tired faces as they watched the children fly over broken glass that glittered between loose stones.
Whole slabs of concrete shifted underfoot like they were tired of carrying the weight.
And farther out, beyond the intact blocks, were the places that scared me most, collapsed cellars, their floors hollowed like animal traps, bomb craters that collected debris and hid deadly drops, the occasional unexploded bomb, half-buried and forgotten, and stairwells that led nowhere, their iron rails rusted through.
Every week, you heard one of the duds go off. A single muffled boom somewhere in the ruins, followed by silence. Someone stepped wrong. Someone ventured too far.
"Klaus," I whispered under my breath, "look where you're going."
But he was already gone with the tide of children, chasing the possibility of chocolate falling from the sky.
I started after him, picking my way over the rubble. The air stank of old smoke and wet stone. Somewhere beyond the next block, a woman was calling a name over and over. Somewhere else, a hammer struck metal, repairing something that would probably break again tomorrow.
The kids streamed toward the open lot near the collapsed tram depot. It had once been a street, but now it was a maze of broken walls and mangled tracks, danger disguised as a playground.
Klaus slowed at the edge of a jagged break in the pavement.
"Careful!" I called. "That's one of the old cellars, don't go near it."
He waved as if he'd heard me, but his eyes were on the sky, not the ground.
A gust of wind pushed warm dust through the ruins.
The plane circled, lining up for another pass, and all the children surged forward at once toward the safer part of the courtyard where the ground was mostly solid and the rubble had been cleared by hand over the last months.
Still, my heart lodged in my throat.
You didn't relax in Berlin.
Not even for a second.
A ripple of sound rolled through the kids. "Look!" one of them shouted. "Look, look!"
Tiny parachutes—made from scraps of tissue, handkerchiefs, maybe even old ration wrappers—floated down from the sky like little ghosts dancing on the wind. The courtyard erupted.
Whoops, squeals, shrill laughter, the real kind, the kind that hit me straight in the chest. For a moment, I forgot how to breathe. How long had it been since I heard kids laughing without fear?
My heart soared with them.
Klaus came running toward me, holding a parachute above his head like a trophy. A Hershey bar swung from the string in triumph.
Before he could reach me, one of the Trümmerkinder lunged at him, a boy I had seen before who was older and so much stronger than Klaus. His face was sharp with a hunger that should never be seen in a kid's eye, and it wasn't for food. Klaus stumbled back, nearly falling.
"Hey!" I snapped.
I caught the older boy by the ear, not even trying to be gentle. "No," I hissed. "Leave him."
He scowled but backed off, rubbing his ear. The other Trümmerkinder watched, some laughing, some whispering, all with eyes too hollow for their age. Too broken. Klaus barely noticed. He was too busy staring at the miracle in his hands.
"Can I keep it?" he asked breathlessly.
That one question nearly cracked me open. He was only six, but he already knew the truth: chocolate like that could fetch bread on the black market. Oats. Maybe even a proper blanket or a shirt that didn't choke his wrists. It could keep us fed for a week.
A week.
My stomach twisted painfully. I thought of our empty pantry. I thought of the nights I pretended I wasn't hungry so he wouldn't worry. But then I looked at him, really looked. At the light in his eyes. At how he trembled with excitement. At how long he had waited to be a child again.
And I knew.
"Yes," I said, my voice soft. "It's yours. You go ahead and eat it. Just…not all at once, okay?"
His mouth fell open. "Inga?"
Everything emotion reflected in that single word—everything he feared, everything he wanted, everything he hoped—hit me like a tidal wave. I fell to my knees and hugged him so tight he squeaked.
"You decide," I whispered into his hair. "It's yours. But understand this: sometimes it's more important to live—really live—even for one minute…than to save everything for a future we can't promise."
It nearly killed me to say it. To tell him to be wasteful.
But I wanted to see his face when he tasted something good.
He pulled back, solemn as a priest, and broke off a small square.
He looked at me again for permission. I nodded.
I watched him place it on his tongue, and his whole body reacted.
His eyes rolled back. His shoulders rose.
He sighed—this deep, ridiculous sound of pure joy—then laughed like he couldn't hold it in.
He laughed.
"Ingaaa," he groaned dramatically, "it's soooo good."
I laughed too, tears stinging my eyes. Then he held out another piece he'd broken off. "For you."
I shook my head. "No. It's yours."
But he kept his arm out, stubborn as a mule, his little jaw set. "Sometimes you have to live in the moment," he said very seriously.
I barked out a laugh, the sound surprising both of us. "You're right," I said, taking the chocolate. "You're absolutely right."
I put the piece on my tongue and closed my eyes.
It was like falling backward through time.
I remembered a Christmas, lights, a tin of sweets, my mother humming as she stirred something warm on the stove.
I must have been five. Six. Before my father lost his job…
before everything. He had been an architect, fired for refusing to join the Party.
Because he wouldn't design the grand new buildings the Reich demanded.
Courage cost people their lives back then.
I suppose we were lucky that it only cost us our home.
The chocolate brought all of it back, bright and warm and unbearably precious, and for the first time in a long time, it didn't hurt when I allowed myself to do so. It was a warm memory, one I would cherish for the rest of my life.
When I opened my eyes, Klaus was watching me.
"Happy?" he asked.
I nodded, swallowing past the lump in my throat. "Yes. That made me really, really happy."
He beamed. "I'll get you more tomorrow," he promised somberly, like a knight making a vow.
A tiny laugh escaped me. "I know."
And as I looked at him—his teeth still stained with chocolate, his eyes shining—my mind flickered back to the words I'd told him about living in the moment. A pair of blue eyes rose in my thoughts. A quiet smile. A jacket, warm on my shoulders. Gideon.
My stomach fluttered, traitorous and warm.
I shook myself back to reality. "Come on, Klaus," I said. "Let's go home. I need to get ready for work."
He grabbed my hand, the rich scent of chocolate still lingering on his fingers, and we headed back through the ruins, one miracle lighter, but somehow, impossibly, heavier with hope.