“Natalia?”
She nodded, grinning.
I carefully set my half-eaten bowl of soup on the ground and jumped up, wrapping my arms around her, making sure not to spill any of her soup either. We both knew how precious every drop of food was. She hugged me back and sat down beside me, our shoulders touching as we leaned against the barn and ate our breakfast in silence. Once we were finished, I asked her, “When did you get here?”
“Late last night.”
“Where from?”
“I’ve been going from camp to camp, looking for my family,” she said. “There was a group of us who arrived last night.”
“Have you found any of your family?”
She shook her head.
“What about Kataryna and Zenia?”
“We escaped the work camp together and hid in the woods for weeks,” she said. “But Kataryna was killed. She stepped on a land mine.”
Poor Kataryna. My heart ached at the thought of her dead. “And Zenia?” I was almost afraid to ask.
“She and I hid in a few places, but mostly the root cellar of a bombed-out house until the spring. We survived on old potatoes and whatever else we could scrounge. We were picked up by the British together,” said Natalia. “The British sorted the refugees, so she was taken to a Jewish camp and I was taken to one for Poles. I visited her a week ago and she seems happy, all things considered. They’ve got her working in the kitchen and she likes that.”
I placed my hand over my crucifix and felt its warmth. Thank goodness Zenia was safe. She had lost so much already. I hoped that she would find a community in that camp.
“Have you heard anything about Luka?” asked Natalia.
“As a matter of fact, I have.” I told her how he’d been at the camp for the last few weeks, and that he had just left before breakfast to go back to Kyiv. “They say his father is alive.”
Natalia looked at me uneasily. “I hope for Luka’s sake that they’re telling him the truth.”
Chapter Twenty-Two
Lost
I was so grateful that the day Luka had left for Kyiv, Natalia arrived. She sat in class with the older children after our breakfast, then we walked through the camp together, questioning the clusters and groups that we met up with to see if anyone had heard news about a friend or loved one. After supper we went to the fluttering messages and painstakingly read each one. By the time we were finished, Natalia was in tears. “So many people, all lost,” she said. “How will the survivors ever find one another?”
“At least you found me,” I said.
She smiled at that. “Yes, and I’m glad I did.”
I told Natalia that she could share the small converted office space that I called my bedroom, so we walked to the supply area and an American issued her new blankets and a pillow. We stayed up late, talking about our lost friends and family, food we had been eating since the end of the war, food we’d love to eat again, things we would do when we finally found a home.
“Will you go back to Lviv?” I asked her.
“I haven’t decided. If I can’t find my parents, brother or sister, I will try to immigrate to Canada or the United States instead. Even if I find a relative, I hope they’d come with me rather than go back to Lviv.”
I sat up in bed and stared at her. “But why wouldn’t you want to go back to Lviv?”
“It’s part of the Soviet Union now,” said Natalia.
Her comment confused me. “But Pani Zemluk told me that I should tell the authorities I was born in Lviv. If Lviv is part of the Soviet Union now, what’s the point of lying?”
“It’s confusing,” said Natalia. “But people like me and your teacher who were born in pre-war Poland are allowed to leave if they wish. People who were born in pre-war Soviet Ukraine don’t have a choice. They’re supposed to go back.”
“So you would rather go to a country you know nothing about instead of your old home?”
“I will not live under Stalin,” said Natalia. “Four years of Hitler was bad enough.”
I lay back down on my bedroll and considered her words. Life was certainly not good under Stalin. It was bearable until my father was taken. I fell asleep, dreaming of a time when I was truly happy. When Tato was still alive, and Mama too. Larissa and me and the lilac tree …
That was all lost now.
I woke in the middle of the night to cries for help. Natalia stayed deep in sleep. I didn’t wake her, but slipped out of the little office bedroom and ran towards the shouting.
Through the darkness I saw silhouettes of refugees down by the convent gate. I ran to them, weaving my way through the crowd. When I got to the front, Pani Zemluk was kneeling on the ground, cradling the limp body of a young man. His face and chest and arms glistened black with blood in the moonlight. Was this a refugee who had set out on his own and been attacked?
Pani Zemluk looked up and scanned the cluster of refugees, her eyes filled with urgency. “You,” she said, pointing to one of the healthier looking men. “Help me carry him inside.”
Pani Zemluk wrapped her arms around the unconscious young man’s chest and gingerly lifted him up, making sure not to let his injured head fall back. The young refugee carefully gripped him by the knees and they carried him in past me.
It was Luka.
How could this be?
I followed them to the first-aid building and watched as they gently set Luka down on a cot, then Pani Zemluk turned on the light. Blood glistened on Luka’s face. His clothing was torn, shredded at the knees, and his hands were covered with scrapes.
“Lida, get me a basin of water and some clean cloths,” said Pani Zemluk.
I was grateful to be useful. Anything to help Luka. I filled a basin with water and found bandages and cloths in one of the cupboards. I brought these over to Pani Zemluk and she gently wiped the blood away from Luka’s face.
Most of the blood had come from a single scalp wound and once that was bandaged, he looked much more like himself. But what was he doing back here? And what had happened to him? A hundred questions swirled in my mind. Finally, thankfully, Luka opened his eyes. I could see fear and pain in them as his gaze met mine. He gripped my hand and tried to speak, but all that came out were racking sobs.
“Slowly,” said Pani Zemluk. “Tell us what happened.”
He gasped in a few deep breaths and after a while he found the strength to speak. “You were right, Lida. I should never have tried to go back.”
I squeezed his hand.
“All was well for the first part of the trip,” he went on. “The officer stopped when we were a few miles along the road and gave us kolbassa and cheese. We sang and laughed and talked about the war. He seemed sympathetic about my time as an Ostarbeiter.”
“When did things change?” asked Pani Zemluk.
“He took us to a train depot at the border between the American and the Soviet zones. There were several dozen refugees who had been brought in from various camps — mostly men, but a few children and some younger women. As soon as we were out of view of the Americans, everything was different,” said Luka. “No more food, no singing. Red Army soldiers punched and kicked me, then stole my boots and my satchel. They told me I would have no need for Western goods in the Siberian concentration camp they were taking me to.”
“So they weren’t taking you to Kyiv after all,” said Pani Zemluk. It was a statement, not a question.
“They told me that my father had died a long time ago. They said I was a Nazi.” Luka wept.
“But you were a prisoner of the Nazis!”
“That doesn’t matter,” said Luka. “They told me that anyone who was captured by the Nazis is considered a Nazi. Those who aren’t executed are to be sent to ‘re-education’ camps in Siberia.”
Dozens of thoughts swirled through my mind. Natalia had been right, and so had Pani Zemluk. Luka couldn’t go home after all, and neither could I. The fact that I had no choice did not make it simpler. In the back of my mind I had dreamed
of going home some day. Going there with Larissa. I dreamed of finding our lilac tree together, maybe placing lilacs on our parents’ graves. Now I knew I could never go back.
Mama always said beauty could be found anywhere, but where was the beauty in this situation? I looked at Luka, beaten and despairing. He’d lost his father today, but also his country. Most of all, he had lost his hope for the future.
“Luka,” I said, gently squeezing his hand. “I am here. I will not leave you.”
He was silent for a long time, but I could see the streams of tears coming from his closed eyes. I can only imagine the horrible thoughts he was having of his father’s last days.
After a while the tears stopped and I thought he was asleep, but all at once his eyes opened and they locked onto mine. “Lida, I am so glad that you didn’t come with me.”
“How did you get away?”
“After I was beaten, some of the other men were lined up and shot. They shoved the rest of us into boxcars. We pried away one of the floorboards in our car,” said Luka. “Those of us who were strong enough lowered ourselves through that hole and dropped down onto the tracks. I’m not sure how many got away because we scattered in all directions in the darkness of night. By some miracle, I wasn’t caught. The hardest part was getting past the Soviet police at the border to the American zone, but luck was on my side again because the border police got drunk. I waited until they fell asleep and crept back across to the American zone.”
“Rest now,” said Pani Zemluk. “You are safe.”
Luka tried to sit up. “They may come back for me.”
“Don’t worry,” said Pani Zemluk. “We will get you out of here.”
I stayed by Luka’s side for the remainder of that night, curled up on a chair but wide awake. When Luka cried out in his sleep, I would squeeze his hand to let him know that he was safe. But how safe were any of us? What had happened to Luka terrified me. Now I knew for certain that none of us could ever go home.
Chapter Twenty-Three
Fleeing
I patched the knees of Luka’s trousers with the remnants of a shredded Nazi flag and darned the holes in his shirt with coarse thread from Pani Zemluk. How I wished the damage to his soul could be fixed that easily. We knew we could not stay in the American camp. The Soviets would be back, looking for him but also for me. I was sure that they suspected I was from the east, like Luka. We had one last bowl of pea soup and said goodbye to Natalia.
We joined the thousands of refugees who walked from camp to camp. There was safety in the crowds. If we weren’t registered at a specific camp, how would the Soviets find us?
By August 1945, we had walked so many miles of dusty roads that my feet ached despite the good boots Astrid had given me. I despaired at the sight of so many bombed-out cities and towns and so many desperate people. Would the world ever be safe again?
I searched the crowds for familiar faces but I did not talk about myself, nor did I ask about Larissa. Luka was also quiet. We had learned the hard way that we had to be very careful when it came to asking questions about our loved ones.
At each camp we reached, we’d stand in the food lineup and listen to the gossip. It was a way to find what the Soviets were up to and how the different camps were dealing with the issue of forcing refugees to go back to the Soviet Union. Once we had caught up on the news and filled our stomachs, we could go to the camp entrance. Luka would stand watch and I would carefully go through all of the fluttering papers — the wishes and missives of lost loved ones.
Once, my heart nearly stopped when I found a note signed Raisa Barukovich from Kyiv.
“Luka …” My hand trembled with excitement as I held the paper out to him. “Is your mother’s name Raisa?”
“Yes,” he said, snatching the note. But as he read it, his face sagged in disappointment. “This isn’t my mother’s handwriting.”
“Maybe someone wrote it for her.”
His face lit up with the possibility, but as he read further, the hope was extinguished. He crushed the note and threw it onto the ground.
“It’s not my mother.” His voice was flat. “Wrong street address, wrong details. Barukovich is a common name in Kyiv. So is Raisa.”
I picked the note out of the dust and smoothed it back out. “This may not be your mother,” I said as I pinned it back onto the wall. “But she’s someone’s loved one.”
Luka sighed. “You’re right, Lida. I shouldn’t have thrown it down like that.”
Weeks later, we shared a campfire and tea with a Czech woman and her two children. The toddler had dark eyebrows and brown eyes like her mother but the older child was a fair-cheeked, flaxen-haired boy who pushed the woman away when she tried to comfort him. Without thinking, I sat close to where he was and quietly hummed a lullaby. He stopped fidgeting and cocked his head to listen. Moments later, he walked over and sat down by my feet. As I hummed, he hummed along, raising his left hand to wipe a tear from his cheek as he did so. I noticed a black mark on the inner part of his wrist.
“You’ve got a bug there,” I said. “Let me brush it off.”
The boy looked up at me, startled, then hid his wrist.
“It’s not a bug,” said the mother. “It’s a tattoo.”
I had seen the Auschwitz tattoos but this was something different. And on a child?
I looked up at the mother and saw that her bottom lip trembled. “I found him abandoned at the side of a road,” she said. “He was babbling in German but no one knew where he came from.”
“What does the tattoo mean?”
“I didn’t know at first,” said the woman. “But a nurse at one of the camps told me she had seen others with the same mark. They’re children who were stolen from their families and adopted by German families. The tattoo is so that they can’t entirely blend in. Once the war ended, the families didn’t want the children. The nurse said she’d turn a blind eye if I wanted to rescue him. There’s no chance of finding his real family, after all.”
The mother’s words felt like ice piercing my heart. Could this be why Larissa had been with that Nazi family? The possibility sickened me. Would she still be with them now, or had they discarded her like trash now that the war was over? Could she survive on her own? Would she even be able to remember who she really was?
I clutched the crucifix around my neck. “Larissa, Larissa, please be safe.”
We walked from camp to camp and searched for loved ones for the rest of August and into the fall. I read thousands of notes scrawled on faded bits of paper, but I never found Larissa and Luka couldn’t find his mother.
While shivering in line for soup at one of the British camps in November, I listened to snatches of conversation around me.
“They’re not forcing people back to the Soviet Union anymore,” said a grey-bearded man whose gnarled fingers wrapped around his steaming tin cup.
“The Brits, you mean?” asked a younger man standing in front of him.
“The Americans haven’t been sending people back for a few weeks,” said the older man. “And now the British won’t either.”
Chapter Twenty-Four
Fischbeck Camp, British Zone, Germany
It was a relief not to have to run anymore.
The British camp we settled on had many Ukrainians. Despite their pledge not to forcibly repatriate us, I didn’t want to take a chance. I told them I was from Lviv. So did Luka.
The year ended and 1946 began. Then’47 and we were still refugees. The camp became our home by default. Where else could we go? No country wanted us.
My nimble hands and keen eyesight ensured me steady work over the years, and I didn’t mind being paid in food. Refugees liked to be tidy. They needed to look clean and eager when they went for their interviews with the immigration officers from different countries. I always had a long list of people waiting for my services. I amazed myself at what I could create with the limited materials at hand. Out of old Soviet and Nazi uniforms I fashioned decent suits,
coats, skirts and blouses. We never went hungry again.
Luka apprenticed to a German pharmacist in town. It was never his plan to stay in Germany, but he needed to hone a skill to impress the immigration officers.
I tried not to feel discouraged, but it was frustrating to still be on German soil this long after the war. The ramshackle camp school and church looked nearly permanent. We DPs had been at the camp for so long that we put on plays, had elections and a camp newspaper.
Still, no country wanted us. I watched every day as the mail was distributed. I watched people’s faces and envied their joy when a loved one was found, or a distant relative in Canada or Britain or America agreed to sponsor a lost soul.
But who would sponsor me, and who would sponsor Luka? We had no family. Sometimes I wondered if the whole camp would empty out and no one would be left here but me and Luka.
The Germans were friendly, and many had little to eat and their bombed-out homes were no better than the barracks we lived in. But when I went into town, I looked into the faces of women and children and men. I remembered how they looked at me when I was a slave. I didn’t know what they saw when they looked at me now, but they made me uneasy.
I always searched the faces of blond girls in town and I always dreamed of finding Larissa. One day, I made up my mind to tell the woman who visited from the Red Cross everything that I suspected. I told her about seeing a girl who looked like Larissa with that Nazi family. I told her about the flaxen-haired boy with the black mark on his wrist.
“You think the same thing might have happened to your sister?”
I didn’t reply right way, but finally I said, “Yes.”
Then the woman sighed. “It could be very difficult to find her if she can’t remember her past. All we can do is look out for a blond girl with blue eyes who looks like she was born in about 1938. We will do our best.”
Epilogue
1951
Making Bombs For Hitler Page 14
