Page 44

FORTY-THREE

LUKA

Moments after the first gong strikes, warning us of how little time we have before roll call, Etan slaps his hand over my shoulder as I’m pulling the blanket over my narrow space on the bunk.

I don’t know how he moves so fast in the mornings.

We’re the same age and he’s been here a while, too.

I try my best to keep up with him, so I don’t look like I’m becoming one of the weak.

Many men are not moving at all.

Some of them will die in their beds today and they’ll be gone when we return.

Others will hold up roll call, requiring all others to stand in the row longer, only to be physically assaulted with punishment after.

It’s hard to think past the moment we’re living in, I guess.

I step outside and a gust of powdery snow stings my face before I step foot into an unmarked path toward the latrine.

The march through the partially frozen snow soaks my socks.

My ankles will be wet and cold for hours just so I can relieve myself in the latrines and possibly steal enough time to wash my body before it’s time to claim breakfast.

There’s never a change in the food we receive, except for the occasional slab of margarine or jam they spare for us to scrape a thin layer over our leftover evening bread.

I wash it all down with a cup of warm water mixed with floating coffee grinds.

I’ve forgotten what something savory is like.

Even my imagination fails me.

No amount of food ever satisfies my hollow stomach.

If anything, a deeper hunger follows my final bite.

A second gong informs us it’s time to line up at roll call, which is as brutal here as it was in the other section of the camp—long, drawn out, and cold.

The wind traps between the buildings, swirling around us as if we’re caught in an icy vortex.

All I can do is shiver and try not to crack a tooth while my teeth chatter.

Once dismissed, I report to my designated location where I will sing until I damage my voice even more while straining through the painful cold for the next ten hours.

I find Etan standing by the gas chamber, adding rosin to his bow then fine tuning the small knobs at the base of the strings.

I notice a slash along the side of his face that I didn’t see when I was half awake this morning.

“What happened?” I ask, keeping my voice low.

He shakes his head. “It was nothing.”

“It doesn’t look like nothing. It’s bleeding.”

“I was rewinding a string, and it fell,” he says, before nudging his head toward a nearby guard.

“He got to it first.”

Etan continues to tune his violin, and I wrap my hands around my neck, trying to keep my vocal cords warm for as long as possible.

I no longer attempt to vocally warm up my voice as I don’t know how long it will last throughout the day as it is.

I can’t afford to waste the sound.

I could easily mistake the line weaving around for the same line that was here yesterday when I left.

It’s as if I’ve seen the same group of people walk in over and over when I know that’s impossible.

The only difference between them all aside from their gender and age is the slight differences between their personalities.

There are those who appear to have some form of hope.

Others seem to sense the doom as they stare, unblinkingly, at the foreboding door.

Then there are the mothers.

One places her hand on her child’s shoulder as she exchanges whispers with another, even sharing a smile or two.

The quiet bond between them is a glimmer of light, yet casts a deep, vacant shadow within me.

Another mother gingerly straightens her young son’s collar, the gesture so natural and ordinary it makes my chest ache for them.

Still, I force myself to pick up the next verse of lyrics awaiting me in one measure.

Despite being amid music and singing, albeit the damage in my lungs, nothing distracts me from the rusty hinges squealing as the door to the building opens.

It must be near noon.

The door only opens two to three times a day, since more than one thousand people enter at once.

I’ve noticed a pattern of timing and can now predict when the door will open next, depending on the last time it opened.

Etan told me it takes less than ten minutes to fill the chamber, then another ten to twenty minutes for the Zyklon B gas that’s dropped in between the slats of the roof.

All of this takes place at the back side of the building where no one in line can see what their future holds.

SS guards will stand watch at a peephole along the wall of the interior chamber and wait for the complete stillness of each body before sending in the Sonderkommandos, the forced Jewish laborers assigned to the task of removing the corpses, extracting gold teeth, shaving all hair, then transporting the bodies to the crematorium.

This process takes up to three hours before the next group is sent inside.

The most gutting part is the excitement the line of people share with each other when the door finally opens.

They think they’re about to be properly taken care of once inside.

What else could they think when we’re forced to play uplifting music full of cheer and promise?

As the noon time group enters, two walk through the door at a time.

As if on instinct, I glance toward the families edging closer to the door, but then I freeze.

My gaze catches on a woman who moves just within my range of sight.

Her figure is bent like a question mark, but her movements are stern and deliberate, as if each step carries more than just the weight of her body.

She isn’t wearing traditional clothes like those who step off the train.

She’s a prisoner, dressed in a familiar blue and white striped smock, her head covered by a black scarf with a red floral pattern that ties in the back and falls to her shoulders into frayed edges.

I blink, telling myself I must be imagining things again, but when my eyes reopen and I focus back on the scarf, my chest fills with an icy numbness.

I know that scarf. I remember the way I would tug at it when Grandmother tied it around my head, telling me I needed it more than she did.

I would be embarrassed because it was covered in red flowers, and argue that I didn’t need to be warm.

But it was warm, and the fabric was soft as it swept against my cheek.

It smelled like Grandmother’s favorite vanilla fragrance.

I held on to her scarf after she passed away.

I slept with it at night as if it would bring me the same comfort she did.

When we were taken from Warsaw and shoved onto the train, I took the scarf out of my pocket and placed it into Mother’s, knowing she might need it more than me.

My lungs are like stone walls in my chest as I fight to breathe and exhale the lyrics I’m meant to be singing.

My voice bleeds into the air as I search around, wondering if anyone has noticed.

But the guards are too busy escorting the line in through the door of the chamber.

My eyes lock onto her face, the features becoming clearer the closer she gets to me.

She’s watching the children in front of her, smiling weakly as she offers them a gentle wave.

Closer and closer she comes, and her profile sharpens, the line of her jaw, and the faint tremble of her chin and bottom lip.

She’s here. In this line.

My mother.

My legs weaken at my knees.

They shake from the cold, from the fear, from the incredible pain slashing through me.

My body wants to give up and fall to the ground again as it’s done too many times before here, but I hold myself steady, willing myself to stay upright and think of a way to pull her out of this death line.

During the brief, momentary pause between songs, I open my mouth to shout her name, but stop myself when a guard snaps at someone for being too slow.

There are too many guards around.

They’ll hear me shouting.

Frozen with terror, I gawk at her without blinking, praying I can somehow get her attention, but she’s unaware of me standing here.

She must not even recognize my voice with how damaged it’s become here.

The music restarts, giving me just a few more seconds before I will be forced to start singing again.

I’m counting the measures, making sure I stay in time, but then Mother glances over at me, her eyes meeting mine, and I clench my fists.

My eyes bulge and I shake my head, trying to warn her without being able to say anything other than:

There’s a place for you

Warm, inviting, bright, and true.

A dreamland waiting to be found,

Where peace and beauty both astound

She mouths my name, but I can’t hear her voice over my own until the music softens.

“Luka,” she shouts, her words frantic, pleading, and full of relief to see me.

I wave my hands at her by my waist, telling her to stop.

I try to mouth the word “run” instead of singing the lyrics to keep with the music.

My eyes are about to fall out of their sockets, trying to warn her to do something, not to come any closer, but she doesn’t see the words I’m trying to speak.

She sees me, her son who she’s probably assumed dead.

She lunges out of the line in my direction, crying out for me.

I move toward her, leaving the music behind.

Leaving everything in this world behind for this one single moment.