Rena's Promise (21 page)

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Authors: Rena Kornreich Gelissen,Heather Dune Macadam

Tags: #Biography & Autobiography, #Historical, #test

BOOK: Rena's Promise
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Page 110
pushes it back. And so we eat my portion of soup two spoonfuls at a time, splitting the turnip evenly between us.
The next day she refuses to get in line at lunch and I have to convince her all over again to take some of mine, and so it goes; we count our spoonfuls and share my soup. I wish she would return to the soup line but keep my mouth shut.
It is Sunday. It is fall. We get off our shelves. Get our tea. Eat our half piece of bread. There is a rumor that there is going to be a selection.
"What's a selection?" we ask among ourselves.
We groom ourselves all day, pulling lice from our armpits and clothes. There is no fighting these creatures; they are everywhere. I spit on my shoes and wet the crease on my pants. It is important to look good if there is going to be a selectionwhatever that means. I want to look right. Sunday fades with the light of a pale sun.
Four
A.M
.
"Raus! Raus!"
We grab our tea as we step outside. I notice that something is different immediately. The guards do not count us at once. Instead they stand at one end of camp, ignoring our neat lines and perfect rows. We wait and wait. Well after the sun is up, we wait. The row at one end begins to move forward slowly. We strain our eyes to see what is happening but they are too far away. "They are selecting us." The whisper scurries down the rows, informing those of us who are not yet moving toward the SS.
"What's it mean?" Danka asks.
"I don't know," I lie. I have an idea, but it is not something I will share with anyone I care about. We stand in our lines, forced to contemplate what new Nazi trick this is.
"They're deciding who will live and who will die," the whispers confirm. Our ranks grow silent and still. How can this be true? How can they do that? We have seen how they step on us like cock-

 

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roacheswhy does this next thing comes as such a surprise? We move forward. I take Danka's hand, squeezing it reassuringly. "I will go in front of you," I whisper.
There are two sisters at the head of the line. I recognize them from the first transport. Like me, they've been here since the beginning. They step up to the table of SS officers. An SS points for one to go left and the other right.
"No! Please!" the one who has been chosen for life cries, falling on her knees. "Let me go with my sister," she begs the officer, careful not to touch him. She huddles at his glossy obsidian boots weeping for mercy.
He points. She follows her sister. Hand in hand they step toward the flatbed trucks.
I squeeze Danka's hand one last time before stepping in front of those who will judge me fit or unfit. Tomorrow may have no meaning for us if we do not pass this selectionand if we do pass? Tomorrow may have no meaning for us.
I hold my breath. The thumb points for me to live. Stepping forward hesitantly, cautiously, I wait for my sister . . .
The thumb points for Danka to follow me. I breathe.
Squinting for a last glimpse of the sisters, I suddenly wish I had gotten to know them, their names, anything about them. All I know is that they were in line before me when we got tattooed the second day in camp. I think their numbers may be 1001 and 1002. I look at my left elbow. The gray-blue ink blazes up at me. 1716. Their numbers were lower than mine. I haven't seen many numbers lower than mine since we came to Birkenau. I wonder how many of us are left from the first transport.
They push and heave the girls who have gone the opposite direction as we have onto the flatbed trucks. I haven't seen the dreaded trucks since my first day of arrival. Danka's face pales as the blood drains from her cheeks. Frozen with fright, she watches the girls scramble against one another as SS beat them with riding crops. Cattle and sheep are treated with more respect. I take her

 

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hand, trying to pull her away from the scene across the compound, but recoil at the touch of her clammy flesh.
"Come on, Danka. There's nothing we can do for them now."
"Where are they taking them?"
"I don't know, but it can't be good. They treat them just the same way as they did the people on the transport platform." Her eyes glaze over. The sun has sunk below the horizon. I cannot believe we've spent an entire day waiting for self-proclaimed gods to decide if we are fit enough to deserve life. That night there are fewer girl-women in our block. We do not ask where they've gone.
The following morning we line up for roll call, but we are not counted. In neat rows of five we wait. In the dark. In the morning light. In the noonday sun. We wait. The line moves forward. There is no pause for lunch, there is no break from standing and waiting.
We are "selected" again.
Four
A.M
.
"Raus! Raus!"
There is another selection.
4
<><><><><><><><><><><><>
One night after roll call the block elder gives Danka and me, and quite a few others, packages from the Red Cross. We stare at these packages, puzzled by their presence in this place. They even have our names on the brown paper:
Rena Kornreich
and
Danka Kornreich
. The stamp is from Switzerland. I stare at it for the longest
4. "October 1 [1942] . . . A selection is carried out in the women's camp, Section B-Ia, in Birkenau. 2,000 prisoners are selected and killed in the gas chamber the same day . . . October 2 [1942] . . . A selection is carried out in the women's camp . . . 2,012 prisoners are chosen and killed in the gas chambers . . . October 3 [1942] . . . At another selection in the women's camp in Birkenau, 1,800 female prisoners are selected. They are killed in the gas chambers" (Czech, 247248).

 

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time. It's colorful and ornate, and confirms that there is a world beyond the electric fences and barbed wire that surround us. It is proof that somewhere someone cares whether we live or die.
We tear open the brown paper, ripping open the boxes as if we are opening presents from family. There is a can of sardines, a package of crackers, and a sweet tea biscuit. Slowly we unscrew the top from the sardines. They are so salty. After not tasting anything with flavor in six months, they are a smorgasbord to our mouths. We stick our fingers into the oil and lick slowly, trying to make it last, but even if we could lick it all night it would never be enough. The crackers and biscuits we stick in our pockets to save until tomorrow.
I feel stronger that day, savoring the crackers with our soup at lunch and saving the biscuit for dinner. The sweet cake serves as an actual dessert after our meager supper. It plunges our senses into another realm, melting in our mouths, leaving them yearning for more. We've craved sugar since the day we arrived in camp; it rushes through our bodies, but then it is gone. We are grateful for these three semi-meals, but the next day our stomachs yawn and ache for more and there is nothing left to eat except bread, tea, and soup.
"Are you going to get the soup today?" I ask, hoping the care package will have encouraged Danka's appetite. She shakes her head. I treat her as gently as possible, but if she doesn't start eating more and getting her own soup again we will both turn into a muselmann, and from that there is no way back.
5
If we become emaciated we're goners. I try and try to get her to get her own bowl of soup, but her spirit is dwindling before my eyes. How do I get my sister to want to live? Without that desire there is no way we can survive, and I need her just as badly as she needs me.
5.
Muselmann
is camp slang for those who have lost not only body weight from starvation but the will to live, becoming living skeletons.

 

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