Day 60 - March 1942

Only darkness surrounded me in the early hours each day. I never knew the true time, but I believed it had to be three or four in the morning. At the sound of heavy boots marching around outside and the loud screech of an alarm, I rolled off of my bunk and waited for my eyes to clear. Without electricity, it was easier for my vision to adjust from one level of opaqueness to the moonlit dirt courtyard where I would start my fifteen-hour day.

I pulled my dress down from a hook I had made from stolen paper clips and slipped it on over my undergarments. It was the only sense of normalcy I could offer myself before starting the workday. Small rituals such as those helped me continue to feel human.

The other women around me scurried to prepare for their jobs too, as they did every morning, which made things a bit chaotic in our small block. “Amelia,” one of them called out to me, but in a whisper of a voice I could barely hear. “Did you get that bandage for me?”

Alise, the woman around Mama’s age who slept on the bunk above me asked if I could sneak a bandage for her. She refused to go down to the sick bay in fear of being marked as injured. I couldn't blame her—I still don't. More frequently, we were seeing people’s identification numbers marked with a note, labeling them as sick or injured. Shortly after, they would be transported elsewhere. We were told they were being taken to a different location where they would receive better care, but we all had a difficult time believing anything the Nazis told us—for a good reason. It was hard to avoid the assumption that the next stop would have better conditions than what we were experiencing.

“I did,” I whispered back. I reached into my coat pocket and pulled out the bandage. “May I see the wound?” Not that I could see much in the dimly lit barrack, but the wound looked quite bad the day before when she asked me to help. With absolutely no prior medical training, I wasn't quite sure what I was looking for, but I had been watching the German nurses work, taking notes so I could help wherever and whenever possible.

The irony of my work there was that I had once planned to attend the university with hopes of becoming a nurse. At that point, however, I doubted I see a day where I’d be allowed to take such prestigious classes, so I focused on learning as much as I could by observing the nurses. When my eyes finally started adjusting to the darkness, I dropped my legs down off the side of the bed. My bones felt heavier than my muscles could handle in the mornings, especially after being on my feet with such little sustenance day in and day out. It was taking a toll on my body. It was hard to even imagine what it was doing to the older women.

Alise carefully climbed down from her bed, and I helped her as much as I could until her feet touched the ground. I wrapped my hand around her wrist, noticing it was so thin I was able to close my grip around it a little more than once. It wasn't surprising that everyone was losing weight and starting to look more like skeletons than people. I pulled her arm toward me and gently rotated it to the side. I could immediately see that the wound looked worse than the previous day, and the area of inflammation had spread, but it was still hard to tell exactly how bad it was without much light. “Alise, I'm not sure this bandage will cover the wound entirely,” I told her.

“You have to try,” she said with fear in her frail voice. “I’ll be working in the dirt again today, and I can’t let this get any worse. They’ll send me away if I become ill.”

Each morning, Alise was taken outside the gates to the SS building so she could help with a pool the Nazis were building. She said they were using their hands to do most of the digging, and I could only imagine how awful that must have been. At the end of each day, she would come back covered in dirt from head to toe. Her fingertips were bloody, and she had bruises all over her hands and arms.

“I'm worried about this wound, Alise. I think it needs ointment at the very least, but antibiotics would probably be better. I wish we had some. It may already be infected,” I told her. Regardless, I placed the bandage over the area, then quickly hid the wrapper beneath my mattress.

“Do you think you can get some of that ointment or antibiotics today, too?” she asked, pleading as she leaned up against the bed to give her emaciated body some support.

Taking anything from the sick bay was not permitted, and I could be put into one of the prisoner cells for doing anything of that nature, but Glauken, the head German nurse, would often leave to take breaks. She would close me into the nurses’ quarters, and I would continue working on the paperwork. It offered me a few moments of freedom from time to time, and it would give me the opportunity to take what I needed to care for Alise or any of the other women in my block.

“I will try,” I told her as I placed my hands over the bony area where her shoulders and arms met, offering her some warmth—the same kind I craved. The sensation of bone covered by only a thin layer of frail skin was unlike anything I had touched before. I remember the worry I felt at that moment, thinking Alise was not going to make it much longer without real medical attention, but it also seemed clear that she might have already come to terms with that.

I headed out of the barracks, watching for the soldiers who were continually marching up and down the dirt paths in between the buildings. I did what I could to avoid interacting with them, as it never led to anything good. Though I could no longer run, I was still able to move quickly through the courtyard toward the sick bay where a line was already beginning to form. It was truly endless there. Every day more Jews were brought in, and every day at least half of those were transported away from the camp to another location.

Once inside the sick bay, I prepared the area for Glauken and the other nurses. I organized the supplies and the previous day’s paperwork so it could be submitted to the SS officers. I typically finished the pre-day work just as the nurses arrived. They never greeted me or acknowledged my presence, but I tried my hardest to be cordial to them. As much as it killed me to be pleasant, I wanted to remind them that I was human. I also wanted to think I was making it harder for them to replace me. I'm not sure if that was the case or not, though. Had I known what that day was about to bring, being pleasant to the nurses would have been the least of my concerns.

When only a couple hours had passed by, the line of people waiting for care had wrapped around the nearest barrack block. There had to be at least two hundred sick patients in line. Each day, it seemed as if the number of people in line doubled. After making it halfway through the line, I spotted a man draped in dirt-covered clothes like the rest of us, except his belt was tightened so much that the excess leather was hanging down by his thigh. The man’s stomach looked concave as his shirt billowed inward from a passing breeze. His face was blackened with soot, and his beard was covered in dirt. His eyes were sunken and hollow, almost as if there was nothing behind them. I studied him for a moment, trying to analyze the torment he must have gone through to make him look that way, but as I stared at his smudged features, I recognized the olive hue of his eyes and the natural auburn highlights strung through his hair in the glow of the rising sun.

My knees began to tremble, and I dropped the clipboard, creating a cloud of dirt at my feet. “Papa?” I whispered.

He was in a state of shock from seeing me—his mouth was agape, and his bottom lip trembled furiously. “Amelia,” he groaned with a scratchy rasp. He tried to lift his arms, but it was as if he had weights holding them by his side.

“Papa, where have you been? What have they done to you?” I asked, trying to maintain my composure, though everything inside of me was falling apart all over again. Papa was the strongest man I knew. He worked with his hands, chopping wood for factories. There wasn’t much he couldn’t do, and he proved that by taking such good care of our family all those years before the war. At that moment, though, he wasn’t that man. He was broken, hungry, and by the looks of his sagging pale skin…dying.

I leaned down to retrieve the clipboard, scared of anyone spotting my mistake. “We’re in the other section—the ghetto,” he answered. His worn, scratchy voice came out in hardly a whisper. “I looked for you every day, but I was sure you had been transported. Even after we heard there were women and children over here, I had very little hope of ever finding you, my precious girl.” His voice was so torn up, I could hardly understand him.

“I've been looking for you too,” I told him. “Where is Jakob?”

Papa managed to lift a hand and draped it over his chest while using what looked to be all his strength to swallow whatever thickness was in his throat. “He was transported,” he said, his voice cracking with emotion. “They took him two weeks ago, but I don't know where.”

With so many reasons the Nazis seemed to have for moving us around, I couldn’t begin to guess why they took Jakob. Surely, he had to have been working hard. He always had been a hard worker, just like Papa. “Why did they take him?” I placed my pencil down to my paper, making it appear as if I were taking notes.

Papa looked down at the dirt and shook his head with disdain. “Oh Amelia, you know Jakob. He tried to escape.”

“Escape?” I questioned with disbelief.

“Don't worry, Amelia,” Papa tried to tell me.

“Where was he escaping to?” I felt a pain working its way through my body, wondering what Jakob could have been thinking. “Why would he leave you?”

Papa lifted his heavy arm again, reaching toward me as if he were going to tuck my hair behind my ear like he always had when trying to calm me, but his gaze scanned the surrounding area, and he lowered his hand. “Amelia,” he exhaled.

“Why, Papa?” If I had the ability to cry, tears would have been present, but I had worked hard to shut that form of emotion off. I didn’t want to cry. It would have been like admitting defeat to the Nazis and Hitler.

“He wanted to find you,” Papa uttered.

I cupped my hand over my mouth as if to stop any sounds coming from me. “Do you think he’s okay?”

Papa looked away from me and then down at the dirt. “I don’t know, Amelia. I’ve tried to stay as positive as I can but it’s impossible not to think the worst—these men have no regard for life. The truth is, I fear that they murdered your brother the same way they did your mother.”

I tried to refocus on my papers, but I was suddenly unable to write Papa’s name in a straight line. “What are you sick with?” I asked him, sounding as despondent as I felt.

“I don’t know,” he said. “I've been coughing and vomiting for three days, my head hurts, and I believe I have a fever.” I placed the back of my hand on his forehead, feeling the heat radiate from his skin to mine. He certainly had a fever, and I could hear a wheezing noise coming from his lungs when he inhaled.

“Papa, they’re transporting all of the sick,” I tell him, softly.

“I’m aware of that, but I don't know what else to do, Amelia.”

I leaned in close, making sure no one else could hear me. “There is a storage closet in the administration building. It's around the back. You need to sneak in during a shift change, probably in two hours or so. Once you’re inside, take a left, and it’s the second door on the right. It’s not being used right now, and you’ll be safe there until I can get to you. I’ll bring antibiotics tonight.”

“Amelia, no, that could get you killed,” he argued in the same quiet, but firm voice I was speaking in.

“You could die,” I reminded him.

“I can’t let you do that,” he argued. “I already had to watch your Mama die. There is no way I can let you do this.”

“Papa, don't leave me. Please, you’re all I have right now, and I will do whatever I can to keep you safe, just as you have done for me my entire life. Please, Papa.” If the pleading look in my eyes didn’t speak loudly enough, I knew that the pain we shared was enough to make him accept my offer.

“There is no safety,” he said, shaking his head. “I’m shoving bodies into crematoriums all day, one after the next. We’re all dying here. They’re starving us and making it so we are susceptible to diseases.”

Hearing the truth was different from witnessing it. Papa’s words were just illuminating what I already knew but was too afraid to admit to myself. “I know, but I need to keep you with me as long as I can—I will do whatever it takes, Papa. It’s the least I can do as your daughter.”

“Excuse me,” a woman shouted from a few people behind Papa. “The rest of us have been waiting here for so long. When will it be our turn? My daughter has a fever, and we need help.” I looked past Papa, spotting the mother and child. The little girl’s eyes were half closed and swollen. Her hair was braided tightly behind her head, revealing prominent veins protruding up the sides of her face. The child leaned all her weight against her mother’s legs, embracing her with a tight hold. It hurt me to the depths of my soul to know what the future would likely hold for both that mother and her sweet child. After all this time, I still don’t understand why so many innocent lives were put through that horror?

Papa swallowed hard, pulling my attention back to him as he mouthed something silently to himself…a prayer, I believe. “So, you think it’s just a cold?” Papa asked out loud.

“I do,” I replied.

“Thank you,” he said while stepping out of line.

It was hard to think of much else throughout the rest of the day. Papa was more than a little sick, and I was scared that it may have been too late for antibiotics to do anything, but I had to save him—I just had to.

The line continued to grow throughout the day, and it seemed endless as usual. Whatever was wrong with Papa was running rampant through the men’s barracks. So many of them looked just like him. At the time, I wasn't aware that there were hundreds of men living in a small, tight confinement without beds. They were forced to use one another’s backs and shoulders as a form of comfort to sleep. The comprehension of how much worse it could have been, has always been unfathomable.

As I rounded the part of the line behind the nearby barrack, a hand grabbed my wrist and pulled me off to the side. It wasn't the first time I had been pulled away from the line in that spot. It was happening almost daily. I didn't fight it, though maybe I should have.

Charlie would sometimes pull me down to a small, rock-covered tunnel that seemed to be abandoned since I don’t believe it was connected to the parts of the camp the Jews were restricted to. There was also a large indentation hidden in the shadows of the inner wall where a person could hide in the daytime and not be seen.

My legs and feet were aching by the time we arrived at the tunnel, but I knew what awaited me, so I complied.

“Talk to me today,” he said in the privacy of the tunnel. “Please.”

As I did each day, I only stared at his pleading face that was highlighted by the dim light behind him.

His hand rested on my cheek, and I immediately wrapped my hand around his wrist to pull it away. As I did that, I felt bones in his arm, noticing they felt different than the previous time I had moved his hand away from me. Curiously, I placed my hand under his chin and then on the side of his face. I felt a hollowness that appeared to be forming beneath his cheekbones. “Why have you lost weight?” I finally spoke to him. Since the first day of my job at the sick bay, Charlie had been pulling me from the line to offer me extra food—food Jews were not supposed to be given.

“It doesn't matter,” he said under his breath. “Here.” He handed me a soft, fresh-smelling sweet roll and a chicken leg. As ravenous as I was, I didn't offer my gratitude before taking a large bite of the meat. A moan murmured from my throat, but I quickly remembered the emaciated look of Papa’s body, and couldn't find it in me to take another bite of food. I needed to give it to him, but he would wonder why I had such lavish food when the rest of the prisoners had only been fed one stale, hard, bread roll and a small bowl of cabbage soup once a day since we arrived.

“Why are you not eating?” Charlie asked.

“Why are you thin?” I retorted.

“Amelia, I need for you to eat.”

“Are you starving yourself to feed me?” I asked him.

Charlie placed his hands around my arms and squeezed gently. “I want you to eat.”

“I haven't said a word to you in two months. Why do you care about what I eat?” The sound of footsteps followed my last word, and my heart froze in place as my arms and legs became cold and numb with fear. Charlie's hand pressed against my collarbone, shoving me against the wet rock wall of the nook. His body pressed against mine, and I felt his heart beating into my heart as his arms boxed me in. Charlie’s head slid to the side of mine until it touched the wall. As his warm breaths covered my neck, I squeezed my eyes shut to hide from all other sensations.

The gravel beneath a pair of boots crunched towards us at a steady pace, and I thought if tried to ignore it, I could block out the fear I felt. However, I was so scared that I was sure our heartbeats could be heard by anyone passing through that small space.

I just needed to focus on something else and forget the rest. It was my only choice.

The warmth of Charlie's body against mine was something I hadn’t felt since arriving. It was like a wool blanket and a roaring fire enveloping me in its heat. He was comforting, but if we were to be found, it was likely we would both be executed.

Minutes passed by, and the sound of footsteps finally faded. The soldier was gone. It felt like a small cause for celebration that he didn’t find us, but Charlie didn’t move. “I have been alone for so long, feeling like a prisoner of this war. Though I haven't been physically tortured like you, I’m here against my will.” Charlie told me the same explanation each day, and I couldn't understand why, but I assumed it was to offer himself hope that I would eventually believe him. It wasn't that I didn't believe him, it was that we were two different types of prisoners, and at the end of the day, my life was at risk, and his wasn’t, as long as he acted appropriately. I was his prisoner, even if he was someone else's.

“Please, believe me, Amelia.”

“I believe you, Charlie.” It was the first time I admitted to any form of trust with him. “However, it doesn’t change the fact that we are not the same.”

“You’re right,” he said. “You are a much better person than I am.”

“You don’t know that,” I said. In truth, he didn't know much about me at all.

“It’s in your eyes,” he continued. “You can tell if a person is good or bad by peering into their eyes.”

“How?” The heat of his body was still moving through me, removing the permanent shiver and ache I had from fighting against the cold. It felt like the winter mornings when I would wake up wrapped tightly in my bed’s thick linens at home. It was always hard to climb out of bed those mornings, knowing the cold floors were waiting for me, as well as the drafts that whistled in through our old windows, but I would have done anything to touch those cold floors or hear the melodic sounds of the wind filtering through cracks at that moment.

“When a person can look another directly in the eyes, it shows compassion, understanding, and honesty,” he explained. Charlie had always looked me in the eyes when speaking. Considering he had done almost all the speaking for both of us in the previous months, it felt like an odd characterization. However, Mama and Papa had raised me with respectable standards. They taught me to always do the right thing and help people when I was able to. I couldn't understand how he would know that about me by just looking into my eyes. “What should I see in your eyes? Have you hurt anyone?” I asked.

“No,” he responded without hesitance. “I'm a guard.” His eyes widened as they focused on mine. It was so dark there, but my vision adjusted enough to see the look on his face.

“Am I going to be killed?” I asked him. It was a question that had been running through my head each moment of every day. Was everything for nothing? Was I just waiting for my number to be up?

“I can't answer that truthfully,” he said.

“I was afraid you would say that,” I replied.

“I was afraid you would ask.”

Feeling as though my breath had been stolen from my lungs, I knew I had to return to the line so I could finish taking down the remaining patient information. I had hoped to finish a little early that day so I could tend to Papa. “I need to get back to the line waiting at the sick bay,” I told him, needing to digest the reality I had been desperately avoiding. I placed the chicken leg inside my coat pocket and then placed the roll carefully on top of it. “Thank you for the food.”

“Thank you for listening to me,” he said. Charlie took a step or two back, allowing a cool draft of air to fill the space we were in. He locked his hand around my elbow and guided me out from under the tunnel and back toward the line. Two other soldiers were heading toward us, looking between Charlie and me, and a sick feeling gnawed at my stomach. Charlie’s hand unsurprisingly tightened as he jerked me forward for show.

One of the Nazi’s elbowed the other as they erupted into laughter before puckering their lips with a clear innuendo. Charlie ignored them and tugged me harder, forcing me to walk up the hill faster than my legs could handle. When we reached the line, he tossed me into a few of the sick people. “Watch yourself,” he shouted at me before walking away.

A woman in the line grabbed my arm and righted me on my feet. “Are you okay?” she asked with concern.

“I'm fine,” I answered, feeling guilt coursing through my veins. “Did he hurt you?”

“No,” I replied, fearful to say anything else.

The woman placed her hand on my back and rubbed gently for a moment before I took the clipboard I had dropped when Charlie grabbed me.

I had to make my way up the line to find where I left off, which wasn't easy, seeing how similar everyone had begun to appear.

My mind was in a fog for the remainder of the day. I found it hard to focus on the words I was writing and the accuracy of it all. I had yet to make a mistake, and I was terrified of what would happen if I did.

I must have made it through five hundred prisoners that day, all with similar symptoms. Most appeared to have the flu or pneumonia, while others were dealing with wounds that had become infected. Showering once a week was not enough to keep us from the dangerous bacteria in the environment we were trying to survive in, but I considered that to be their plan for us. They wouldn’t have to kill us if we all just died off.

At six that evening, the doors to the sick bay closed. A nurse locked up, quarantining those who required overnight medical attention versus those who were well enough to be sent back to their block, or the dozens who weren’t evaluated during the available hours. It was time for me to type up my papers from the day and leave them for Glauken to review at her convenience.

The moment I finished my work, I took a small stack of blank paper, along with a needle and vial of antibiotics. Thankfully, I had gotten quick at locating supplies. I then snuck through the adjoining doors between the sick bay and the administration building while creating the appearance of delivering notes, which allowed me to make it past the guards in the hallways near where I told Papa to hide. The area was clear when I made it to the empty storage room, and I opened the door, quietly closing it behind me.

I was afraid to turn on a light, as it would shine under the doorway, so I took caution while entering the room. When searching for a utility closet a few weeks earlier, I had mistakenly discovered that empty room and knew there was a window covered by boxes in the back. Before I called out for Papa, I wanted to be sure he was in there, so I felt my way around the small room until I reached the far wall. I pushed the boxes aside so the moonlight could brighten the room enough for me to see.

A body was crumpled on the ground, up against the side wall. He was in the fetal position with his arms around his knees and his head tucked into his chest. I recognized his belt. It was Papa. The belt was the only part of him that looked familiar. Papa had always been on the heavier side, and the doctors often told him he was slightly above average on the scale and needed to maintain a healthy diet despite his physical labor. Mama would cook for us each night, always dressing up the food in unique ways so Papa wouldn't feel as if he was missing out on his favorite foods. However, when Jews were no longer allowed to shop at the local markets, we could only purchase food in the subsidized Jewish market, and our options were limited. We made do with what we had, and though it wasn’t the way Papa had wanted to lose weight, he certainly would have surpassed his doctor's expectations.

“Papa, I’m here,” I softly called out to him. I pulled my dress above my knees then kneeled beside his body and placed my hand gingerly on his back. “Papa, it’s Amelia. I brought you some food.” He didn't move at the sound of my voice, so I reached for his forehead to check for a fever. His head was no longer hot, but rather cool, instead. “Papa, I think your fever broke,” I said, trying to force an uplifting sound in my voice.

I pulled his arms loose from his knees, gently rolling him onto his back. “Papa, wake up!” I cried through a whisper.

As the space beside him was exposed from where his face was, I noticed a wet spot on the cement. The site concerned me, so I placed my hand on the side of his face, finding a matching dampness beside his eye. Was he crying before he fell asleep on the floor? “It’s okay, Papa, I’m here now.”

I didn’t ask myself why he wasn’t responding because in my heart, I already knew. It took me several minutes before I gained the courage to place my hand over his heart, seeking a beat that I knew I wouldn’t find. It took me another few minutes after that to check the artery on his neck for a pulse that wouldn’t be there, and one more minute to check his wrist. All three spots were silent and still. Papa died while waiting for me in a small closet. I told him not to seek medical attention because I could help him. Instead, he died waiting for me. Papa died because of me. As I heaved in pain and grief, I tore another piece of my dress, feeling an ache rob another part of my soul as I cried silent tears that would not stop. Papa was gone, Mama was gone, and Jakob was gone for all I knew. For the first time in my life, I was all alone. Papa would always be the one to start the prayer over our deceased relatives, but there was no one here to speak the Mourners Kaddish but me.

Yitgadal v’yitkadash sh’mei raba. B’alma di v’ra chirutei…

I recited the Hebrew words, trying to remain strong, but my voice broke. The silence took over, and I listened for Papa’s voice out of memory, as well as the words I had heard too many times before.

That day was the day I went from being a good person to one who was partially responsible for her papa’s death.

I sat beside Papa’s lifeless body, talking to him about what I had experienced over the last two months, telling him how scared I was of dying. I told him I was trying to be brave, but the horrors I saw each day while awake were sometimes becoming worse than my nightmares. Part of me felt a little envious of Papa, just as I felt when Mama passed away. He was no longer in pain, no longer suffering, and he was with Mama. Maybe I shouldn’t have been trying so hard to stay alive, was all I could think at that time.

I sat in that dark room for a long while. I contemplated staying there until I died, but then I realized that would mean Papa had died in vain. I couldn’t do that to him. I had to honor his memory by doing my best to make it through that nightmare. I had to find every scrap of food I could get my hands on, and eat it. I promised myself that if Charlie had food for me, I would take it because Papa would want me to do so.

I pulled out the chicken and sweet bread roll that Charlie brought me and I scraped the bone clean. Even though my stomach felt sick, I knew I couldn’t let it go to waste. “Food is a gift from God that should never be wasted,” Papa would always say, followed by, “It's why I will always be a happy, fat man.” At that moment, though, Papa was all skin and bones—limp and lifeless. His frail body was lying in front of me, but his soul, the part of him that made him the man that he was, had left me there alone. I took his hand and kissed it one last time. “Oh Papa, I love you now and forever. Rest in peace.”