As soon as Marlene is in the clear, I look out the window again, finding the children still playing with the football, and now their nannies talking on a patch of grass, staring at this house as if there’s a secret to tell. What do they know?
TWENTY-FOUR
HALINA
I believe I just signed my life away without a choice or say in the matter. As if perfectly timed, a man took his life as a measure of reason and proof to fear the other side of those gates. Then, Heinrich’s statement about the one matter I haven’t kept my distance from.
It didn’t come as a surprise that he chose not to follow his remark with an explanation—just another tool in his box to coerce with and cause terror. I could easily assume he was speaking about Flora’s bottle, and the lack of bourbon no longer tainting the liquid. Or he could suspect my loyalty to Gavriel.
Between each blink and step, I can vividly see the decomposing world of Auschwitz, the gloom and smoke, people struggling to move. How does Gavriel survive there when he’s not working himself to the bone at the Schäfers’ house? It’s far worse than anything I imagined or thought I’d seen from a distance.
A shiver bears down my spine despite the heat radiating from the sun as I turn the last corner onto the street with the three houses owned by the SS. The irony of watching children play in the street, as if life is nothing but ordinary, leads me to unanswerable questions. How will any of them grow up to finda semblance of normalcy? They’ll find out who their fathers are and what they do. There’s no way of knowing if they’ll forgive them or run as far away from here as possible. Most of them are too young to know of a world where they weren’t considered to be among the elite.
Celina and Rosalie are huddled beneath a trimmed willow tree, chatting as the children shriek and squeal with the joy of running with freedom of space, fresh air, and full bellies.
“Where are you coming from? Alone too? Goodness,” Rosalie says, her words snipped and a bit cool. Jealous, perhaps? Though she wouldn’t be if she knew what I was doing and where I’ve come from, I’m sure.
“An errand,” I reply, keeping my response short.
“I’ve never seen the Schäfers allow their servants to wander off alone without the children,” Rosalie continues.
Celina stares at her while she talks, a troubled grimace tugging on her quaint face.
“You should bring the children out to play,” Celina adds. “It’s a lovely day.”
“I’ll see what Frau Schäfer has planned. Thank you for the invitation,” I offer. Is that what that was? An invitation for someone else’s children to play on the street?
I make my way to the front door and hesitate before walking inside, unsure if I’ve earned the right to act as if I belong here rather than I’m the slave as I was so kindly told. With caution over where I figuratively stand, I knock on the door. Ada will probably be irritated that she’s forced to get up from whatever she’s doing to let me inside. Either way, I would be wrong.
The kitchen prisoner opens the door, a girl whose name I still don’t know. “Frau Schäfer is in the family room,” she says, bowing her head at me as if I’m something of more importance than she is.
I step inside and place my hand on her shoulder. “No need to bow,” I whisper. “I’m no one important.”
“You’re not a Jew,” she replies with a small shrug.
“What’s your name?” I ask just as quietly.
“Kasia, but—” she presses her shirt sleeve up and twists her arm to show me a set of numbers tattooed along her forearm. “This is who I am now.”
“You’re still Kasia to me,” I say, pushing past the ache in my chest—the tears that threaten to burn down my cheeks.
How did we get here? I thought I knew so much, and now I see I knew very little.
Kasia’s dimples deepen but she doesn’t smile. Instead, she turns and walks back to the kitchen. I follow, but stop in front of the family room, finding Ada perched on the sofa with her stocking covered feet up on the coffee table. She’s reading a fashion magazine. I didn’t think those existed anymore.
“Oh, good. You’re back,” she says, her voice monotone. “The older girls are reading in their bedroom, and Flora—she’s down for a nap.”
“Very well. The other children are outside playing together. I thought I might bring the girls out to join them?”
“I don’t care what you do with them,” she says, flapping the back of her hand at me. “Leave Flora to sleep, though.”
“Of course.”
Ada doesn’t take her eyes off the magazine and flips to the next page as I continue to stand here. “Might I ask how far along you are in your pregnancy? I’m sure everyone is looking forward to another bundle of joy.”
Ada drops her magazine onto her lap and places her hands around her belly as if I’ve insulted the unborn child. “I should be nearing four months along,” she says.
“Any inkling of a gender?” It’s best to act as if I didn’t pick up on any of their argumentative words from last night.
