Her words are so cruel. I’ve never known her to be so hostile and mean before. I’m trying my best not to take it personally, but when she looks directly at me and unleashes her anger, it’s hard to avoid. My heart aches and my stomach burns, knowing neither of us would ever intentionally hurt each other, which means she must not realize what she’s doing to me. Or worse, she’s lost her ability to care, which would also be understandable.
I’m already in my pajamas and ready for bed thankfully, so I reach over to the lamp and pull the chain, allowing Arina to have the last word as she’s always preferred.
She isn’t quiet about changing out of her clothes or opening and closing drawers. It doesn’t take long before her light goes out too, and it takes even less time to hear her sniffling into her pillow.
“H-h-he’ll find a way ’o be wi’h you,” I say, trying to offer hope if that’s what she needs right now.
“He needs this job and Vallentine thinks she can control everyone’s lives like they are pointless light switches.”
If Arina wasn’t explosive right now, I might tell her all light switches have a point. I’m no stranger to the sheer number of rules that come along with any orphanage, but it’s up to us whether we want to abide and stay out of trouble. Arina doesn’t seem as worried about that.
“I c-c-can ’ry and help you ’omorrow. We c-c-can ’alk ’o H-H-Helena Blum.”
“You truly didn’t tell Vallentine where I was?” Arina asks, sniffling again. There’s a hint of remorse between the words of her question.
“No. It-it-it wa’ like ’he knew.”
“It was like she knew?” Arina repeats. “How would she know?”
“Ye’,” I answer with a tired sigh. How should I know?
“She was probably just looking for a reason to get rid of him. She’s always been rude to him, and I’m sure it has something to do with the power his father holds as the groundskeeper. I just don’t know what type of power that is.”
“M-m-maybe he won’ lo’e hi’ job then.” Power can give anyone a reason to dislike someone.
“I don’t know. Please, just let me cry myself to sleep. No one has had a problem with me doing so over the last year and a half.” Arina whips her pillow around and groans. “I’m sorry for accusing you. I’m sorry for everything. I know you wouldn’t hurt me. It’s the rest of the world that’s out to get me.”
“I u-u-under’and.”
I would have had a problem with just listening to her cry herself to sleep. I would have climbed into her bed and wrapped her in my arms until the pain subsided. That’s what we always did when we had a bad day. Of course, we didn’t know what a bad day truly meant back then.
TWENTY-THREE
ARINA
CHICAGO, UNITED STATES, JANUARY 1947
Her head is so smooth, like nothing I’ve seen before, and the incision is puffy and jagged with thick black stitches. They shouldn’t have left it exposed without a bandage; she could catch an infection. The longer I stare at the folds of her skin, a dark ooze rises to the surface and spills down her head as if the incision is crying tears of blood. I circle around for gauze or a towel, something to put pressure on the wound, but the room is empty with nothing but a spotlight above my sister’s body. I tear the bottom of her bed sheet and wrap it around my hand to press against her head. The more force I use, the faster the blood seems to appear, saturating the white sheet within seconds. Mama told me that to stop blood on a wound, I should use pressure. It’s not working. “Nora!” I shout. “Nora—don’t die! The blood won’t stop. Nora!” The top of her head falls into my hand as if someone sliced her scalp right off. I scream at the top of my lungs as bile torpedoes through my stomach.
A stiff hand grapples my arm and light shines into my eyes.
“A-A-Arina,” Nora says, shaking me. The room is dark around the single glow of light, but Nora’s face is clear enough to see and she has beautiful hair down to her shoulders. She’s not bleeding to death. She’s here. I push myself up on the bed, feeling sweat drip down the center of my chest and my back. “Y-y-you were ha-ha-having a nigh’mare.”
“It wasn’t a nightmare,” I cry out.
“Wh-wh-wha’ do you mean?” Nora asks, staring at me with profound bewilderment.
“My nightmares are memories, mostly of you after your surgery.”
“You n-n-never ’aw me af’er my ’urgery.”
As the seconds pass, the opaque darkness of our room becomes easier to see through, and I see Nora is in her wheelchair at my bedside. “Yes, I did. I went looking for you and I found you, alone in a dark room on a bed with your hair shaved, a large incision, and there was blood—at least I think there was. You looked dead. I thought Dr. Mengele had killed you during surgery. You wouldn’t wake up.”
“D-d-dead? I don’ r-r-remember—no’ much an-an-anyway.” Nora’s breaths sharpen and she tugs on the sheet beneath me as if she’s trying to tear it apart.
“Nora, I want to kill him. I have thoughts of it, and I sometimes dream of it happening. I want to torture him the way he tortured you. Supposedly, he ran away and got away with everything he did in Auschwitz.”
“M-m-move over,” Nora says. I slide to the side, closer to the wall, and she hoists herself up out of her chair and onto my bed, swinging her good leg up first, then lifting her other leg by hand. She pulls the sheet up over us both and wraps her arm around me. “I’m a-alive.”
“What if he—Mengele—knows where we are?” I ask.
Nora doesn’t respond. Instead, she combs her fingers through my hair and hums the stormy weather song, lulling us both to sleep. She remembers.
The dings of alarm clocks sting my ears. I turn over, finding Nora stirring but still half asleep. I lean over her and hit the top of my alarm clock, then climb over her to shut hers off, too. As soon as my hand hits the switch of her clock, thoughts of what happened last night hit me harder than the sunlight striking through the blinds. Dale. I need to find him, but we must go to school. Maybe he’ll be waiting outside of the schoolhouse this afternoon like he does sometimes. I suppose it all depends on how Vallentine took this up with his father.
“Y-y-your bed is c-c-comfor’able,” Nora croaks.
“I don’t deserve comfort after the way I treated you last night. I’m so sorry again for accusing you of getting me in trouble. I don’t truly think that. I couldn’t. You wouldn’t. I know better.”
“Ev-ev-every’hing will be okay,” she says.
“I want it to be,” I say, sniffling. “We have to get ready for school or we’ll miss breakfast.” The guilt is eating me up alive. I don’t deserve her as a sister. She doesn’t deserve the wrath of having me as one, either.
I don’t normally sit in the mess hall for breakfast because I’d rather eat on my way to school, but Nora might want to sit and eat before her first day at another new school. “Want me to help you down to the washroom?” I know she’ll say no. She has every time I’ve offered. I’m not sure how else to show my remorse now.