Page 54 of Cilka's Journey

Cilka is also grateful that the job will be so busy and all-consuming that she will have no time to think about Alexandr Petrik, the Czech man working as a messenger. Because no good would come of that.

As Cilka lies down, Josie pushes her over, crawling in beside her. She sobs, “I’m sorry about the sheet, Cilka. About you having to go into the hole.”

“Please, Josie, you don’t have to keep saying that. It’s over. Can we get back to being friends?”

“You are my dearest friend,” Josie says.

“Well, dearest, get out of my bed and let me get some sleep.”

Auschwitz-Birkenau, 1942

Cilka stares at a fly on the cold cement wall of her room in Block 25. He has not come for her today.

Women and girls stagger into the block to seek out a place to lay their head for the final time. She sighs, stands up from her bed and opens the door, watching the wraiths pass by her, holding her arms around herself.

A woman, being assisted into the block by two others, turns to Cilka—thick gray-brown locks, dark circles under her eyes, sunken cheeks. It takes Cilka a moment to recognize her.

“Mumma!” she screams.

Cilka pushes herself into the trio, grasping the woman in the middle.

“My baby, my beautifuldievca!” the woman cries.

The other women are too distraught, blank-eyed, to pay much attention to the reunion.

Cilka helps her mother into her own room, and onto the bed. For a long time they sit there, holding each other, not saying a word.

The clanging of pans and shouts rouses Cilka. The evening rations have arrived. Gently removing her arms from around her mother, Cilka goes to meet those bringing in urns of watery coffee and small rations of stale bread.

She tells the women around her to come and get some food. She knows from experience that those who have the strength will. The others are too far gone.

Back in her room, she places her mother’s portion on the floor as she attempts to prop her up against the wall. When this fails, she places a small piece of bread on her lips, encouraging her to open her mouth. Her mother turns her head away.

“You have it, my darling. You need it more than I do.”

“No, Mumma, I can get more,” Cilka says. “Please, you have to get your strength back, you need to eat.”

“Your hair…” her mother says. It was still there, tucked behind her ears, falling over her shoulders. She reaches up and runs her fingers through it, like she did when Cilka was a child.

Cilka brings the food up to her mother’s mouth and she opens it and allows Cilka to feed her. Pulling herself up, she drinks the foul-tasting liquid Cilka holds to her lips.

Cilka settles her mother on the bed.

“I’ll be right back, just stay here and rest.”

“Where are you going? Don’t leave me.”

“Please, Mumma, I won’t be long, I have to find someone…”

“Nobody can help us, please stay with me. We have so little time.”

“That’s why I have to go and see someone, so we can have more time. I won’t let them take you.”

Cilka reaches the door.

“Cilka, no.” The voice is unexpectedly firm.

Cilka returns to sit on the bed, cradling her mother’s head in her arms. “There is someone who can help us, someone who can have you put into another block where you can get better and we can see each other, be with each other. Please, Mumma, let me go and speak to him.”