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over with my 02
father. His name is the one you see on the sign out front.” She 03
nods. “And in the meantime, can you do something for me? 04
Can you make a list of everyone you know who might be 05
interested in joining you?” 06
“Yes,” Bryda says, and her eyes follow Joshua’s face in the 07
way mine so often do. Suddenly Joshua is her Jewish Ameri 08
can hero. 09
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S28
N29
01
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04 Chapter Nine
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14 Even after Bryda leaves the office, I cannot
15 concentrate on my work because I cannot erase the image of
16 her number, right there, so horrible and obvious, on her fore
17 arm. I want to forget about it. But I cannot.
18 I stare at my typewriter for a while after she leaves. I can
19 not exactly remember the look of Bryda’s face. But the look of
20 the numbers, the way they were preceded by a sharp dark
21 blue A , I can remember without hesitation.
22 I know it’s because I was in Poland during the war, just
23 like Bryda. I did not want to be there; I did not really know it
24 at the time. But I was.
25 In 1944, Mother, my sister, and I waited in line after we
26 were unloaded from the cargo train by thick black-booted
27 men. They had pulled our arms, throwing us off the train as
28S if we really were cargo, laughing, joking with one another in
29N German as they did it, cigarettes hanging loosely from their
mouths, thick rings of smoke swirling above their heads. 01
We’d just been transported from Westerbork camp in Hol 02
land to Auschwitz in German-occupied Poland. It was the 03
beginning of September, a month after we’d been ripped from 04
the annex. The sun was shining. To walk in it, it actually still 05
hurt my skin, as if its rays were overexposing me, after so 06
much time hidden away. 07
We stood in line, and I held on tightly to my sister with 08
one hand, my mother, with the other. Mrs. van Pels was 09
somewhere behind us. 10
“We’ll be killed,” my sister whispered to me as we waited 11
there for what felt like forever, the soles of our feet beginning 12
to burn from standing still. It was warm outside, and we were 13
sweating, thirsty. Even my sister’s whisper sounded hoarse. 14
“Shhh,” I told her. “No, we will not.” I felt I was lying to 15
her then, but it seemed a necessary lie. I was terrified she 16
would hear the pounding of my own heart in my chest. “Just 17
do what they tell you,” I whispered slowly. “Don’t struggle.” 18
The woman in front of us in line was an older lady, older 19
than Mother by twenty years at least, and her back was 20
already hunched; her arms fell frail around her sides. The 21
guards yelled at us in German to undress, and when she was 22
naked, her flesh hung off her bones, loose, wrinkly. It seemed 23
she was too old to be so naked. 24
Then the guards came to shave us, and she began shout 25
ing. “Jestes diablem. Jestes diablem.” She shouted it, over and 26
over again. So loud, her voice hurt my ears. 27
“You are the devil,” Mother whispered, translating. “It’s S28
Polish.” Mother knew a little Polish from a childhood friend. N29
Jillian Cantor
    01 My sister’s almond eyes opened wide, the way they often
02 did. “She’s so brave,” she whispered.
03 “Don’t even think it,” I whispered to her, because it seemed
04 they must have had a way of knowing then, even our thoughts.
05 When you are stripped naked, shaved bare, nothing is yours
06 anymore, nothing is left.
07 We stood in line again for a long time, and her words, they
08 began to hurt my ears. My bare flesh turned numb. My ears
09 felt like they were bleeding. Jestes diablem. The Polish woman
10 screamed and she screamed.
11 The guard held her down as he tattooed her arm, and then
12 he shoved her roughly and yelled at her in German to shut up.
13 She was still screaming.
14 Finally another guard came and pulled