Someone Named Eva (7 page)

"Noses. That's what Franziska and Gerde were fussing over. What a ridiculous thing to argue about."

"I agree." I smiled, following Liesel into the classroom.

"Good. Then we won't have to measure our noses to see if we can be friends," she said, sliding into the chair next to me and winking at me.

***

That afternoon we sat through a long, boring arithmetic lesson. The monotonous drone of the teacher, Fräulein Müller, was making it hard to concentrate. I had begun wearing Babichka's pin on the inside of my skirt, rather than my shirt, so that I could easily finger its outline during the day without being noticed. Now I felt for the pin through the pleats of my skirt and let my mind drift.

The warmth outside and the tedious sounds of the lecture made me think of the piano lessons Mama had insisted I take the year before. Mama was very good at piano and singing and all things musical, and she had made me sit at the piano for hours in the warm summer air, practicing the same chords and scales over and over again. Unfortunately, I was clumsy and awkward, and her wish for me to play the piano well had been disappointed. I had found both the lessons and the practice pointless and tiring.

One hot summer day Papa and Jaro had appeared at the window as I sat practicing.

"Milada! Come here." Jaro beckoned from outside, his head appearing just above the windowsill. I stopped playing and put my hands in my lap.

"Jaro, what are you doing? I'm supposed to be practicing," I whispered. "Mama will be mad."

Papa's head appeared next to Jaro's, a grin on his face. "Your mama has left for tea with Mrs. Janecek."

I needed no further prompting and climbed out the window and into the arms of Papa and Jaro. We spent the next hour sitting in the field, watching clouds and chewing wheat gum. While we were there, I told Papa that I didn't really enjoy the piano. A few weeks later Mama announced suddenly that I didn't have to take piano lessons anymore, and even though he said nothing, I had had a feeling Papa had convinced her to let me stop.

Tears began to roll down my face as I thought of this time with Jaro and Papa. When would I see them again?

"And then..." Fräulein Müller stopped in mid-
sentence, staring at me as the tears dripped from my chin. Everyone in class was suddenly awake and interested, turning to see what she was looking at. I straightened and desperately tried to stop the tears, afraid that I would receive a beating like Heidi.

Fräulein Müller walked to her desk and withdrew a handkerchief. "We must be careful to add the proper numbers to get the sum," she continued, dropping the handkerchief on my desk. "Of course, you know, there will be exceptions."

Tears were routine that first summer at the center. Some girls cried every moment they were awake. Others walked around with eyes that were dry but looked dazed and confused. Clean, fresh handkerchiefs were always available, but there was never any acknowledgment of our sadness, never a hug or a pat on the shoulder. In the eyes of our captors sadness was the same as weakness, and weakness would not be acknowledged or tolerated. We were, after all, Germany's hope and pride. We were the chosen Aryan nation, God's special children, sent to save the world from the Jews.

I was learning to tuck away pieces of my real self: the girl from Czechoslovakia who had a family waiting somewhere for her. I was learning to put that girl in a box during the day, safe and secure, until just before going to sleep at night. Then I could take the real girl out in the darkness and examine her more closely.

The days belonged to Hitler, but the nights were mine. At night I could step inside my memories and listen to Mama singing our own beautiful national anthem, not the ugly German song I awoke to each morning. I could see Jaroslav and Papa playing ball and watch Terezie riding her bike. I could see Anechka's little hands playing patty-cake and Babichka's nimble fingers kneading the morning bread. If I tried hard enough, I could even see Babichka's face: her hair in the bun she always wore and the plain dresses she liked, with their tiny flowers sprinkled across the fabric. But it was getting harder to hear her laugh or remember the sound of her voice.

***

By October we had been at the center for four months, and it seemed Franziska was starting to forget her real self.
Really
forget. Not just tucking away who she was, but erasing everything she had been before coming to the center. As hard as I worked to remember, it seemed, Franziska worked to forget.

She excelled in everything and had become the shining example of the ideal Aryan girl. In the few short months since we'd been at the center, she had grown taller and more confident. She was an eager participant in all parts of our training and seemed to be slipping further and further away from the person she had been in Lidice.

Heidi, however, continued to struggle. Her problems worsened after the beating she received from Fräulein Schmitt. It was as though she was caving in on herself a little bit each day, and nothing seemed to help.

Her sister, Elsa, stayed protectively by her side, constantly reminding Heidi what she should be doing and where she should be going. She tutored Heidi in German at night, going over the day's lessons with her long after the lights were off and everyone else had grown quiet. But Heidi seemed to wilt a little more each day. She grew thin and walked around looking dazed and lost. Several times she wet her bed. One night we awoke to the hushed sounds of Elsa moving about in the darkened room.

"What is it?" Franziska asked, pushing herself up to lean on one elbow.

"I think Heidi wet the bed again," I whispered.

"She shouldn't drink so much water before going to sleep." Franziska sat all the way up.

"Would you like help, Elsa?" It was Gerde, from the other side of the room.

"No, no. Just go back to sleep," Elsa replied, her voice tense and quick. In the dark I could see her outline as she removed the covering from Heidi's cot and tried to air it out.

The next morning Fräulein Krüger knew what had happened the minute she walked in.

"Again, Heidi?" she asked, her lips pursed together so tightly that the words coming through them sounded like the hiss of a snake.

Heidi nodded, her eyes on the floor. Everyone was standing in the morning pose, arms out in the Hitler salute, waiting to be dismissed for breakfast.

"Well, Heidi. Well, well." Without finishing the morning inspection, Fräulein Krüger left the room, clicking her tongue and absently waving a hand behind her to release us from our salute.

The next afternoon neither Heidi nor Elsa appeared for lessons.

"Heidi needs additional training," Fräulein Krüger announced, interrupting our last lesson that day. "She will attend a special camp for this training."

Franziska glanced at me with an I-told-you-so look on her face. I was filled with a jealousy so strong, I could feel the hair on my arms raise. Perhaps Heidi had been sent back home, and was with her mama and papa by now.

"I knew something would
have
to be done," Franziska murmured next to me. The superior look was still on her face. "I am sure it is a good camp."

When we returned to our bunks after lessons, Heidi's cot was gone. Elsa sat on her own cot, the one that had been next to her sister's, with a handkerchief wound between her fingers. Her eyes were red and swollen.

"Oh, Elsa. Don't worry." Gerde went to her and put an arm around her shoulder. "She will come back once she's learned what she needs to."

"No." Elsa said flatly. "No. She will not." My stomach gave a lurch at the finality of those words. Suddenly, I felt guilty for my jealousy earlier.

For the next two days Elsa refused to get out of bed or participate in anything. At first Fräulein Krüger was kind and understanding, as she tried to coax Elsa back into our daily routine. But by the third day she was losing patience, and on the fourth she resorted to a beating. All of us stood in our morning salute listening to the German national anthem on the invisible phonograph, as Fräulein Krüger hit Elsa with a leather belt. The sounds of the belt mixed with the tinny chords of the music, but Elsa made no sound at all. She just lay in bed, receiving strike after strike.

The next day Elsa, too, was gone. We were told she had been sent to the same place that Heidi had gone for "additional training." With a bright smile Fräulein Krüger assured us that both girls would come back as soon as they were ready. But somehow, deep in my heart, I knew that wasn't true.

Late into the night, long after the lights had been turned off, we discussed this from our cots.

"Maybe they were sent home?" Gerde whispered hopefully.

There was a grunt from Franziska. "Fräulein Krüger said they were sent to a camp for additional training."

Several murmurs of agreement came from across the room.

"What if they were shot? I've seen that happen. Once, in Poland," Siegrid whispered from her cot.

"Oh, Siegrid, don't think such thoughts. I don't exactly know what happened, but I am sure they are safe." This came from Gerde.

"I saw someone shot once too. Right out in the open. A Jew." Ilse spoke up from her cot. "They do shoot people."

"Jews deserve to be shot," Franziska interrupted.

I winced and heard Liesel gasp beside me. It was such a cold statement. Fräulein Krüger would have been proud.

"Just go to sleep. Don't talk of such things. Everyone just go to sleep," whispered Gerde.

I lay awake for a long time after that. Fräulein Krüger had said Heidi and Elsa had gone to a camp. She had assured us everything was fine. But she was also the one who said my town had come under attack by the Allies, and I knew that was not true.

I tried to put the sisters out of my mind and finally fell into a restless sleep.

B
Y
January we had been in the center for seven months. The air outside was cold, and the short skirts of our uniforms had been replaced with long, itchy woolen ones. Each of us had a lined winter coat, complete with the Nazi eagle sewn on the collar, and a pair of warm winter boots.

Routine settled over the center like a thick blanket, covering everything in dull, lifeless shades of gray. Day after day was the same. Even the food that had once seemed so wonderful now tasted plain and dreary to my tongue.

Every morning began with the German national anthem and our salute to Hitler, then calisthenics and German lessons. In the afternoon there was more saluting, history and math lessons, and dinner. Then finally bedtime arrived, when I had a brief moment to think about my family, until I fell asleep and the same routine would begin again in a few short hours.

One night, just as I was drifting to sleep, Liesel's voice brought me fully awake.

"That is not so." She was arguing with Siegrid, whose cot was on her left. Liesel's voice was loud and angry.

"Yes, it is true," Siegrid replied. "You heard what Fräulein Krüger told us. Your mama doesn't want you anymore. You were too expensive. That is why no one has come for you."

"I am sure that if Fräulein Krüger said that, it is the truth," Franziska added from her own cot.

"No! That is
not
true. It's not." Liesel turned her back to Siegrid and faced me. Doubt and confusion rested in her eyes.

By that time almost everyone had stopped asking Fräulein Krüger or the other guards about their parents. The story was always the same. We were orphans from Allied air raids. Or we had become too expensive for our families. No matter which story was told, the end was always the same. We had been chosen to serve Hitler. We were Aryan girls of Germany. We were the hope of the future.

Secretly, I was glad no one asked much about their families anymore. Every time I heard the story that Lidice had been bombed by Allies, there was a small part of me that was actually starting to believe it. I could almost feel the vibrations of the bombs as they fell. It was easier to imagine that than to re
member how I had been taken in the middle of the night by Nazis.

I lay awake, listening to the sound of Liesel crying.

"Liesel," I whispered. "Do you want to talk?"

"No, Eva. Go to sleep."

I looked around in the darkness. Moonlight was coming from the four small windows that lined one wall. To my right Franziska's eyelashes caught the light, and I could see she was also awake.

"Liesel," I continued softly. "You know what Siegrid said is not true. You know someday this will end and you will go home. We will all go home."

"What if Mama doesn't want me? What if it is true?"

Her questions brought tears to my eyes. "You have to think about what you do remember, Liesel. You have to hold on to that."

"I didn't even get to see my sisters to say good-bye. Mama was the only one home when they came for me. It was so awful. I will never forget the sound of her crying. Never."

"I remember my mama too. I try to think about her every night," I said. My finger traced the outline of Babichka's pin underneath my nightdress. "I think of everyone in my family every night."

"Oh, I'm sorry, Eva." Liesel's voice softened. "At least I know my mama is safe. It's so awful how your family was killed in an air raid."

"There was no air raid," I said. The words came out louder than I had intended.

"What?" she asked.

"There was no air raid," I repeated, needing to hear the words again myself. "We were taken in the middle of the night by Hitler's soldiers."

"But Fräulein Krüger said..." Liesel's voice held both doubt and hope.

"We were taken. In the middle of the night. By Hitler's soldiers," I repeated, highlighting each word carefully in the cold darkness.

The images of my last night in Lidice appeared vividly in my mind. I could see Papa's face, his hand outstretched toward Mama's as they were pulled apart. His eyes had been filled with a pain I had never seen before. I could still smell the sweet sourness of the hay as we waited for hours and days in the gym, and I could see my own hand outstretched toward Mama's as I was carried away.