by Anna Ellory
Twenty-five lashes.
My punishment for morphine, three jars of antiseptic, one roll of bandages, sanitary towels and a tiny wooden carving of a rabbit. All but the morphine made it back to the block. It was the last package. I had discovered the morphine and had hoped this would ease Hani’s pain. It was the riskiest thing I had stolen over the course of the week from the abundance in ‘Canada’. Bunny had sewn a pocket into the inside of my dress, each item had been hidden there – this was the final one. I had told myself no more, I couldn’t risk it. But Hani, cold, in pain, screaming into the night. I had to try and get it for her.
I got caught.
Twenty-five lashes to try to save my friend.
Twenty-five lashes.
The wooden stool had leather straps. They stripped me and put me in rubber pants. I was forced over it, face down, almost kneeling, but not. It was indented and I held on to it as my calves and shoulder blades were strapped, buckled. Secured. I lost all control, I thought I was going to die.
Twenty-five lashes . . . I cannot remember past ten. The body can endure more than the brain can. My brain gave up. I felt my skin slice open, a searing knife. They were standing around watching; they talked as the skin on my back to my thighs was split.
Scars fade, but what remains is this:
I saw a guard’s feet, his trousers had a perfect crease down the centre. I do not know what happened, maybe my blood splattered him. The whipping stopped. He knelt beside me, smelling of cologne and cigarettes. Rust blood. Someone held my wrist and felt for my pulse. I was eight lashes in, eight times the whip had broken the skin. I cannot tell you more than this. I do not want to remember. But the guard had stopped at eight. His hands cupped my chin and turned it towards him, tears and snot and dirt on my face. I looked to him as my saviour. The lashings had stopped.
‘Open your mouth,’ he said to me.
I did, and he spat in my mouth.
‘Continue,’ he said.
I remained silent until I passed out, the blackness was a blessing. For is this what it is to be called human?
When I awoke, I was in a tiny room alone. The first time I had been alone in months. I was bleeding, my skin had opened like an envelope on my left thigh, I hurt in every way.
I was cold. My soul frozen, my limbs blue and in shock.
I found my uniform and pulled it over my broken body. I could stand, I checked myself at every step, I was still okay. I could move. The room was four steps by six steps. I could lie down.
A woman in the cell next to me saved me some food, we talked. I cannot remember what we talked of. I slept and I walked and I dreamt.
Miriam exhales, having not consciously done so for the length of the letter. She sits stunned for a long time before spending the rest of the day writing the letters on plain paper in her own hand, merging them with the last of the French letters.
Later in the day the phone rings, reconnected for the call she is waiting for.
‘It’s Sue here from Ruhwald Hospice, Miriam. Your father has joined us this morning, the transfer went well. He is asleep now and resting, but if you wanted to stop by this evening, I think he’d like that. Would you like me to tell him you will visit?’
‘Yes, please.’
The hospice smells of lavender, fresh-cut flowers and gravy. The Christmas decorations hang brightly and the Christmas tree is real and twinkles in the entrance. Everything is either sunflower yellow or deep blue, which contrasts so radically with the red decorations and green tree, the entrance feels like a colour wheel.
She is shown to his room, which has a view overlooking Ruhwald Park. No one asks her to leave. She is given a mug of tea, and biscuits, she even gets an evening meal: a deeply rich leek-and-potato soup and fresh, crusty bread.
The chair is a fabric living-room chair. Miriam raises her knees and reads the letters aloud. She doesn’t know if he can hear her, he makes no movement and looks pale today.
Miriam takes time to turn him and offer him water, although he is hooked to many different pumps and monitors. By the end of the day she has read the bundle of letters she brought with her and he seems at peace.
‘I won’t stay tonight,’ she says to Sue, ‘but I’ll be back in the morning, is that okay? I’ll be back tomorrow, Dad,’ Miriam says and squeezes his hand, which is warm. And to her surprise he squeezes back. Firmly. And doesn’t let go. She perches on the side of the bed so as not to break the contact between them.
She feels more positive on the way home. Recalling the letters, she feels an urgency to get home and get some more of them written up to take to her father, and to read what happens next. She was right not to destroy them, her father needs to know. She walks past the closed solicitor firm and pushes the thick envelope through the lower letter box, it lands on the mat on the other side of the door.
No turning back now.
One way.
Miriam breathes freely and walks home, enjoying the night air, hoping Eva will be there, so she can tell her that she is going to fight back.
No messages and no Eva. She continues reading the last of the letters Eva brought with her at Christmas.
Dearest Henryk,
Losing you without losing you is so terrible I cannot bring myself to believe you are gone. That we are apart. I didn’t get to say goodbye, although I am not sure I ever could. For us there is no end, no goodbye.
Miriam looks up, this letter is scrawled over a triangle of paper. There is no end, there is no goodbye. She cannot imagine having to say goodbye to her father. Yet she supposes that this is exactly what she has been doing for the past few weeks. She has been gradually showing her goodbye, her love, her care.
Miriam cannot stop thinking about Eva: why did she choose to stop helping, and what did she mean by ‘again’? She feels selfish and stupid for behaving so recklessly. She knows nothing about Eva and yet Eva has been reading these letters too.
Feeling sick at her own selfishness Miriam reads on.
I need you, Henryk. I need to look into your eyes just to prove to myself that we are true. That you do exist, because right now I am floating, drifting through a dead sea with only one outcome awaiting me.
I am doing this all alone. I have lost you, not that I ever had you. You chose Emilie every single day, and for the way you love her, I admire you. It reminds me of all that is right in the world. The feeling of pure joy of your love. Imparted to others as well as myself. I reflected light that made me shine, the moon to your sun.
I am forever in shadow.
Just like Louisa. She was bigger and better and brighter than me. I was always in her shadow. I idolised her, my parents adored her. I came second.
There was one thing that I wasn’t second in though, one thing I could always do. Every winter we would go to the frozen lake and I could skate. I loved the scratch of ice under my feet and the wind blowing my hair. I was free, and most importantly at that time, I was first. Louisa didn’t like the lake much, and I was cruel, pushing her, taunting her. I am not proud of myself.
Louisa was worried one day about the ice being too thin. The day was as bright and as cold as snow. I wrapped my blue scarf around my neck, it was long and it floated behind me like a ribbon as I took off. I left her behind, sitting on the bank, pulling on her skates.
‘Frey, wait.’ She must have called me many times. I was floating, beautiful. I was free from being in the shadow of Louisa. But when I turned back she was gone.
She fell through the ice. She died. And from then on I never left her shadow.
Henryk, you made me feel like I was first, even though I wasn’t. You saw me, but you always chose Emilie. I have never been enough for anyone, but Henryk, I always chose you.
If we survive this, can WE survive this?
Because I want you, all of you. War or not, do we exist in anything concrete at all? Or do we just exist on a metaphysical level where souls collide but fingertips remain separate?
Henryk, I wish so much to talk to y
ou. Because we have made something, I am sure. It flutters within me, and after the lashes, to have survived is beyond a miracle. But we have made a baby.
A baby. There was a baby?
Miriam reads and rereads the last letter and spends the entire night sitting up in bed.
Thinking.
Of her own baby.
Of how she grew and expanded, how everything changed. The small flutters to the almighty kicks. The tiny hiccups in the middle of the night. She thinks of all those things, and then she thinks of them in a place like Ravensbrück.
Wrapped in blankets, she cannot feel warm.
29
MIRIAM
The next day she takes the letters to her father, and as she reads further, her mind is on Frieda, pregnant, in Ravensbrück. She recalls all the worries, all the tensions, and how her own body changed. She places those worries in Ravensbrück and, though she cannot fathom why, she cries as she reads, every letter seems to have changed.
Now she reads as a woman who must have known pregnancy and death in the same breath. Every word transforms her into a human, alive. She cries, but reads.
Her father interrupts her. ‘Miriam,’ he says, and she jumps out of the chair shifting the letters from her skirts. He squeezes her hand tighter.
‘My second coming,’ he says slowly, ‘is at hand.’
‘Don’t be afraid, Dad. I’m right here.’
He wheezes as she sits by his side, and as she listens to him breathe she thinks of second comings, of second chances, and she picks up a clean piece of paper and writes the address of the editor at B.Z., found on the day’s newspaper that flitters around the ward. Miriam writes a letter asking for information about Frieda. She lists Frieda’s age at incarceration in Ravensbrück, Frieda’s father’s name and all the personal details she can recall from the letters. She asks for anyone who knows her, or knew her, to come forward. She encloses her address and telephone number and twenty Westmarks to place the advert. Miriam posts it just outside the hospital.
Finally, she drags herself home, full of words and worries and the past. Heavy on her feet, she walks into the building. She feels darkness seeping in. Two questions, like ivy twisting and curling:
What did happen to Frieda? And where is she now?
The end of the letters, she presumes, is also her father’s end too. This is what he is holding on for. She wonders if the advert might yield more answers before she gets to the end, but with some of them still in French and many still with Eva, maybe she will never know.
She shuts the main door behind her and checks it holds fast when she pushes against it. Locked. Lionel must have gone home for the evening. Moving up the stairs at a steady pace, she feels prickles of fear rising with every step. She shakes them away. Although not as mentally unstable as they all would have her believe, she thinks, maybe her father is better off being cared for by someone else.
She cannot shake the sensations of fear and tries to calm her breathing. She thinks she can smell him. That smell of him. Soap and something else. But she knows it’s her mind, it plays tricks. She has made the step towards divorce, this will be over soon. She thinks back to the solicitor.
Six months, they said, unless there are financial difficulties, which there won’t be. He has his money and she has hers now, well, Dad’s.
Six months until freedom. She almost loses her footing on the stairs and grabs the handrail.
‘Six months,’ she says aloud. Maybe, just maybe, she can manage this. Maybe there is something to hope for.
She grips the handrail harder, seeing her knuckles protruding out of her skin, white. ‘Six months.’ She pulls herself up the stairs. Opening the door, the feather floats past her vision and she collects its soft, downy plume in her hand. Rubbing it gently in her palm, she relaxes, shuts and locks the door and replaces the feather.
Removing her shoes, she allows her toes time to luxuriate into the thick, soft carpet.
The hospice, like the hospital, has a way of getting into everywhere, and her feet feel swollen and tired. She removes her coat and hangs up her jumper, gathering her handbag close to her she walks into the lounge, switches on the lights to place the letters on the table. She is over halfway into the room before she looks up.
She cannot place what she sees. Her brain scrambles, trying to make sense of the person sitting at her parents’ dining-room table. A person who shouldn’t be there.
Her bag falls from her shoulder and she grabs it with both hands.
‘Like what I did with the feather?’ he asks.
She backs away, nudges into her father’s chair and sits abruptly.
‘Leaving so soon? Aren’t you going to ask me why I’m here?’
‘Axel?’ Her mind is racing to work out how he got in and how she can get out. ‘Do what you like, Axel, I don’t care.’ He looks at her, unmoving. ‘It is time to leave.’ She steps aside so that he can walk past her to the door.
‘Oh, come on. Don’t be like that. I bought you flowers and chocolates.’ He points to the table where an over-large bunch of lilies lie in their wrapping with a small box of chocolates beside them. ‘For the misunderstanding,’ he says, and runs his thumb down her cheek, tilting her chin up to him. ‘You still feel me, don’t you? My imprint inside of you? When you walk, when you sit down?’ He laughs and she tries to look away but he is holding her chin.
Miriam stands so still she thinks she may have forgotten to breathe. He kisses her lips softly. And for a millisecond she thinks about launching herself at him. Ripping that smile off his face with her broken fingernails and pressing her fingers into his eyeballs.
He must sense the wave and steps back, pulling an envelope from his back pocket. A white envelope, folded in two. The way he holds it means she knows exactly what is inside.
‘You promised,’ she says. ‘You promised you’d get rid of them for me.’
‘And you promised to love and obey me.’ He smiles and dangles the envelope just out of reach.
‘It was important, to know they were gone. You kept them? All this time?’
‘Can’t throw everything away that you used, now, can I?’
‘Those were . . .’ she stutters. ‘Different.’
‘Oh darling, have I disappointed you? I just thought, now you are healthy again you may want them back. A memento, if you like?’
‘I don’t want them, Axel. Leave.’
‘I wasn’t staying long. Evidently you’re not in the mood to play nice. Enjoy your evening, Mim.’
Her attention is on the envelope as it hovers above her head. Miriam feels disorientated, the envelope has the same effect on her as a hypnotist’s watch.
He looks at her and then back at the table. He places the envelope against the huge bouquet. It rests slanted on its crease against the black paper of the flowers. He taps two fingers on the table before turning.
‘Hmm?’ he says, as a question, an expectation. Long and slow he strides back to her. She waits. The smell of him conjures images she is unable to stop. The pain, the endurance, the fear. Just that smell and she’s back at the beginning. He bends and kisses the top of her head. And takes a deep breath.
‘You smell good,’ he says.
And then he is gone and she rocks on the spot, left in the bruise of the room. She hears the door open and shut, but doesn’t trust herself to turn around in case he is still there and his leaving was just an illusion, a trick. She doesn’t want to feel that relief, turn and then see him again, to think it’s over, but then it’s not.
She waits. Holding her breath, every sinew stretched taut to breaking point. Every sense crying out for some sign of him. He is still in the air. Stale. The lilies bold and strong.
When her legs begin to tremble, when her toes ache and her teeth groan from the pressure of being clamped shut, she turns, as ready as she’ll ever be to come face to face with him.
But the room is empty. She checks through the house, every single room, checks the windows are shut, the cur
tains drawn back. She feels the same rush as a child might checking for monsters under the bed.
Only this time the monster is real.
The envelope compels her back to the table. She circles it a number of times, straightening the curtains, removing the flowers and then circling back to gather the chocolates, putting both items in the bin, until all that is left at the end of the table is the envelope. She picks it up in both her hands. The weight of the small item feels heavy, and its heaviness is comforting. It is time, she thinks.
She walks to the bin and opens its lid. The faces of the lilies look up at her, she looks at them until they morph into open-mouthed snakes. She closes the lid with a bang.
In her bedroom, sitting on the end of the bed, she opens Axel’s gift. A rush of excitement floods her as they tinkle on to the bed sheets. She puts the envelope down. She licks her lips.
The scissors have landed open on the bed, their gold handle and the screw in the middle, faded gold, almost white. Their blade sharpened to a point. Scissors that were hers; never to cut paper or thread, but to cut away at her own pain. She only ever used these, something about their beauty and size and precision. These scissors were hers and hers alone.
She draws up her blouse and sees the scars along her inner arm, an eclectic design.
She takes the scissors and opens them into one long blade. The room becomes fuzzy around the edges, she feels held in time. The point, gold, presses into her pale skin.
Scratch. She flattens and then slides the blade, and everything oozes out.
Red.
She breathes fresh air, as if she is no longer drowning. She places the scissors back into the envelope and takes them to the dining-room table and puts them next to the letters from Frieda. It doesn’t take long for the pale skin of her arm to throb, for her to feel again, and as soon as that ache returns she wants to grab for the scissors and take them further, deeper, to allow the thoughts to disappear, maybe for longer this time.
She turns on the radio in her father’s room and the living room and his study. She switches on the TV and the nine o’clock news is in full swing with images of Brandenburg Gate and how East and West will celebrate the new year as a united country.
