Chapter Twenty-Eight Chloe
Chapter Twenty-Eight
Chloe
Chloe felt as if she could barely breath. Ever since the additional roll calls had begun, she’d found it impossible to sleep, waiting for one of them to be called away from the other.
And she didn’t know how she could live with losing Aletta or Emma now, after all this time together.
They’d defied all the odds, they’d propped each other up and fought for every extra scrap of food, for every bit of warm clothing, and they’d had a lot of luck, but it made thinking about being parted now even harder.
‘Chloe?’ Aletta whispered in the dark, tucking her body even closer.
‘It’s fine, I just can’t sleep,’ Chloe whispered back.
Aletta was silent after that, and Chloe curled against her, eyes shut, trying to block out her thoughts. But instead of silencing her brain, the thoughts only multiplied, and suddenly she found herself thinking about her brothers, about her father, about her apartment.
She squeezed her eyes more tightly, but the memories just kept on coming, one after the other. Of what she would leave behind if this was the end for her.
Chloe had thought about her family even more since Herr Weber had posted her letter; imagining them opening it, remembering so much from home that she had tried so hard to forget.
She’d said little other than telling them she was alive, and recalling a short poem to write for Adrian so he’d know without doubt that the letter was from her, but the process had brought back so many memories.
Memories that she was struggling to ignore.
‘Where’s Mama?’ Adrian asked.
‘Mama is in heaven now,’ she whispered, stroking the hair from his forehead.
‘I miss her.’
‘I miss her too, sweetheart, more than anything, but I made a promise that I’d look after you now that she’s gone.’
Adrian’s blue eyes were wide as he looked up at her.
‘I won’t ever take Mama’s place, but I will spend the rest of my life looking after you and making sure you feel loved. I will do anything for you, Adrian. I promise.’
He snuggled into her and she wrapped her arms around him, wishing she could take his pain, hating to feel his little body shudder with tears.
But she knew that, hand on her heart, she would do anything for him. He was hers now, and she would love and protect him as fiercely as her own mother would have.
Chloe opened her eyes then and stared into the dark.
And not for the first time, she wondered if she’d done the right thing when she’d taken the fall for Claude.
She’d been prepared to do anything to keep either of her brothers from harm, but after being parted for so long from Adrian, she’d questioned whether she should have stayed, letting her older brother accept the consequences of his actions.
But she also knew there was no way she could have said nothing, that she could not have watched them take her older brother and done nothing to protect him.
She only wished that there was someone to save her. Because she was scared, and she knew that when they eventually came for her, there would be nothing anyone could do to stop them.
But she wasn’t alone. She had to keep reminding herself of that. For now, she had Aletta and Emma, her camp family, who would do anything for her, who were hiding papers for her on their bodies, like some of the other women in their barracks, in the hope that they might survive until the end.
If there was an end to this goddamn war.