“It’s a boy. I’m quite sure. I’m carrying differently with him than I did with the other three.”
“That’s wonderful. I’m sure the girls will be thrilled to welcome a baby brother.”
“Yes, they will be,” she says with an annoyed sigh.
“I’ll let you get back to your magazine.”
I gather the girls and wait for them to use the toilet and pull on their boots before we can go outside. Isla leaves with a book in hand and Marlene has her hand curled in mine, leaning her head against my arm. “I didn’t know when you’d come back,” she says as we step out the door.
I close the front door behind us and lead her down the front steps. “I’m back now,” I reply.
“Gav was worried too,” she says.
“Gav?” I question her.
“The man in the attic.”
“Gavriel,” I correct her.
“No, I call him Gav.” I can’t help but snicker a bit. I’m not sure how this little girl has so much personality when she’s being raised by the Schäfers.
“He was worried about me?” I ask her.
My heart flinches. How can someone who carries so much pain still find the strength to worry about someone else? And me, of all people. I’m not sure what to make of that but it thaws something icy inside of me, making it harder to convince myself I don’t feel safer when I’m around him.
“No one knew where Papa made you go.”
I turn over my shoulder and stare up at the construction, finding the gaps between the framing to be covered, leaving the windows to see in and out of now. I catch Gavriel’s eye through the open frame. He stops mid-step, moving closer to the window as if pulled by something invisible. “Are you all right?” he mouths.
The sight of him, the worry written along his face, it unravels me for a second. My breath catches in my throat and my cheeks tingle. He’s a prisoner, but he still wants to protect me. The look in his eyes says things I’ve never believed I had the right to feel.
I nod ever so slightly, hoping to be discreet amid Rosalie and Celina who are likely watching my every step right now.
It appears he was worried. How can he worry about me when he’s living in that place?
“Ah, look who’s joining us outside to play!” Celina announces to the children.
“I’m not playing,” Isla quips. “I have a book to finish reading by tomorrow.” I wasn’t aware of any deadline for her to finish reading.
“Soak in all the sun this week, young lady,” Rosalie follows.
“Is something happening next week?” I ask as I step in toward the other two ladies.
“Of course. School starts back up,” Celina says, looking at me with wide eyes as if it’s impossible that I didn’t know this. “They didn’t tell you…? Little Marlene is starting her first day—the poor thing must be all wound up.”
I glance over at her as she approaches one of the other little girls around the same age as her. I’m not sure which child belongs to whom yet, but I suppose I should figure that out too. She hasn’t said a word about starting school. No one has.
“How does it all work? Do we—take them in the morning, and pick them up? I’m not sure what time or where to go? What do they need?”
Celina and Rosalie give each other a look that makes me feel like more of an outsider than I already am. “We’ll help you. Don’t worry,” Celina says.
I wonder if the two of them are paid to do their jobs? Am I being punished for the accusation of begging and loitering?
“School begins next Wednesday at eight in the morning. It’s just down the road, a ten-minute walk. It’s a small schoolhouse for children of?—”
Rosalie lets out a soft cough.
Nazis? I’d like to say it out loud.
