“Stop it, Nora. We deserve nothing that has happened to us, but that doesn’t mean we are going to let our past define our future. What good would we be doing by giving Dr. Mengele and every other Nazi what they wanted from us—from our lives? If no one stopped them, we wouldn’t be here. They’re all cowards, and for the evil beings who escaped during liberation, they will live with the truth of what they have done—the thoughts will eat them alive.”
At some point, Elek might tire of being the one who forces himself to see the bright side of life. I may be the one with an immobile leg, but I’m the ball and chain he won’t want to drag around when he tastes the first hint of freedom. He won’t agree, but I’d rather be honest with myself now than heartbroken in a year when I find myself alone again.
Elek leans behind the bench, struggling to keep his balance as he retrieves whatever it is he’s reaching for. When he corrects his posture, he lifts his arm over the back of the bench and hands me a sunset orange tulip. “Your favorite.” I peek over my shoulder, making sure none of the houseparents are watching after Elek plucked a flower from their precious gardens. “If anyone asks, it was lying in the grass.” He flashes a wink and curls his lips into a lopsided grin.
“A p-p-perfec’ ’ulip l-l-lying in—” I swallow against the back of my tongue, frustrated with my struggle to speak.
“Just lying in the grass. Yes. You wouldn’t question such a thing,” he says, reaching the tulip up for me to smell. The petals brush across my lips and tickle the tip of my nose. Laughter catches in my throat. “If you close your eyes and use only your sense of smell, you’ll find yourself in a place you want to be, enduring the way you want to feel, and resembling the way you want to appear. Bliss will fill you, and for the moment or moments, however long you choose to be in that place, you are somewhere better and nothing outside of that will exist. There is always more beyond the here and now.”
I watch him as his eyes center on the flower between us. I take the stem from his hand and hold it against my chest. “You don’t have to believe anything I say,” he continues, “but you never know when you might need a momentary break from reality.”
I stare down into the petals, finding a sunlike glow encompassing the pistil and stamens. Papa taught me about botany and what each part of a flower does to support its growth and life. If this tulip were to be missing one of the six stamens, or worse, the center pistil which is used for trapping pollen, it would die. The facts of nature have forced me to face the truth that humans aren’t as frail. Though we share many commonalities, people can thrive on less than what we were born with.
“I steal moments like this more often than you might think,” he says, staring intently into my eyes as if they are windows he can see through. “Especially when I collide with a memory of my mother’s scream that spiraled into the air as she pleaded with an SS guard to let her keep her twin sons. Or even when I hear an unexpected siren from police vehicles in the distance from here—they sound like my father’s guttural cry fading into the wind as we were taken from them. There’s no way to control the pain from slipping in and out of our lives, but we must find a way to protect our hearts.”
Elek and I are both living proof that people can survive with broken pieces, shattered hearts, and missing body parts. But unlike me, it seems he’s capable of feeling hope. “D-d-do you f-f-find your mom and dad wh-wh-when you d-d-daydream?”
“Sometimes. I like to think if I can imagine them with me again, it means they’re still alive.”
Whenever I try to imagine Mama, Papa, or Arina, an internal light goes out and I can’t visualize anything around me—like I’m blind to what may not be possible to see again.
Two Years Earlier
Auschwitz, Poland, May 1944
I complained about the apartment in the Munkács ghetto being too small and having to share a space with four other families. We had no privacy, quiet, or enough time in the toilet room. I complained that there wasn’t enough food. That I was bored. That I had already read through all the books I packed in my suitcase and used every scrap of paper for sketching. This is my fault.
“I’m s-s-sorry, Mama,” I whisper in her ear. “I sh-sh-should not have c-c-complained.”
“This isn’t your fault,” Arina says, her voice anything but a whisper.
“Hush,” Mama says to me. “Nora, this is not your fault.”
I didn’t appreciate what we had, not when we were in our family home and not when we were sharing the small space in the ghetto apartment. Now, we’re in a cattle car with boarded windows, allowing in only thin strips of light along with shallow bouts of air to share with the dozens of others standing up against us.
“Do you have any idea where they’re taking us?” Papa asks another man who is shoulder to shoulder with him.
“I know as much as you,” the man replies, “and I can’t say our destination won’t be grimmer than what we’re experiencing now. I fear for us all.”
Maybe if I appreciate this dark cattle car that smells of cow manure and sweat, we won’t end up somewhere worse. Mama places her arm around me and her other arm around Arina, and we sway along with the moving car. I readjust my footing every few minutes, fearing the loss of balance. We all seem to hold each other up, but if one falls, we might all go down like a trail of dominoes.
I press my cheek against Mama’s bosom, reeling in her sweet scent that never differs no matter where we are, how much sweat we have shed, or how many shivers we have endured. “I-I-I’m frightened, Mama,” I confess. Others have spoken to one another, and the train is no longer silent like it was when we first boarded. There are only questions being passed around and assumptions for answers, each one worse than the last.
“I won’t let anything happen to either of you. I promise,” Mama says. She hesitated to say those words—words that have always come with ease to her. A mother’s job is to protect her children. It’s never been a question of “if” she could, but none of us know what awaits us when this train stops.
It would be impossible to know what time it is or how long we’ve been standing upright in the darkness, as the sore muscles in our legs fight against the gravitational pull and push of every rigid movement. I’m tired, as I suspect everyone else is. There’s no more sunlight leaking through the rickety boards, and there’s no end in sight to this journey. I’ve never attempted to sleep while upright. I’m not sure my body would know what to do, or if I would be the first domino to fall. My eyes have adjusted to the opaque surroundings, allowing me to sense the shadowy figures of those around me. If I had a pencil and paper, I would need to coat the paper with black charcoal and use the darkest shade of black for the surrounding people. The only color is in the grain of the wooden boards, and the wooden panels pick up a hint of the moon’s glow—not quite strong enough to offer light within the car, but enough to brighten the porous wood to a shade beyond black.
I wonder if this is what it might feel like to be blind. If I were to live the rest of my life in total darkness, would I adjust? Or have I already seen too much beauty to live any other way? I suppose it’s much like speaking without a stutter. I’ve never known a life without a stutter. My unique form of speech doesn’t bother me, but I’m sure it must annoy those I’m communicating with. No one has said anything of such, but I keep an eye on fragmental changes in a person’s expression. I try to keep my words to a minimum to avoid spotting the almost unnoticeable frustration, even with Mama and Papa. They don’t know I see when a line deepens on her forehead or his brows crawl a fraction toward his nose. Arina doesn’t know any differently, I suppose, so my impediment doesn’t affect her patience.