The Girl They Left Behind

by Roxanne Veletzos

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  For my grandparents

  Based on true events

  According to the Wiesel Commission, between October 1940 and the end of World War II, as many as 380,000 Jews were massacred in Romanian-controlled territories. One of the most well-known incidents, the Bucharest Pogrom, took place in January 1941, when thousands of Jews were dragged into the streets to be tortured or killed.

  One

  ANTON AND DESPINA

  1

  Bucharest

  January 1941

  THE GIRL SITS ALONE IN impenetrable darkness. Shivering, she wraps her arms around her tiny body and buries her face in the collar of her wool cardigan. Out here on the building steps, she tries to remember exactly what her mother had told her. Did she say how long she’d be gone? It was still light out when she last saw her parents rounding the corner, her mother with her shoulders slumped forward, trembling in her thin dress, her father shuffling down the frozen sidewalk just steps behind her. A chill tears through her as she places her palms on the icy concrete beneath her. The winter wind bites into her flesh, slashing mercilessly at her bare legs, and she wishes she had a blanket or mittens, or at least her bonnet, which somehow she has lost. Still, she’d rather be out here in the frigid cold than inside that dark, musty lobby. The smell of cooked cabbage coming from one of the apartments made her stomach growl with hunger, even though at home she always refused to eat it no matter how much her mother pleaded with her.

  Drawing her knees to her chest, she looks up at the building’s three stories and its vast, rounded balconies looming above. Certainly, she’s never seen this building before. She has never seen this street, this vacant, dimly illuminated street on which a single lamppost casts a glint of light over the blackened snow. There isn’t a person in sight. It is as if someone has turned out the lights on this once lively city, forbidding any strolling, greeting, or laughter.

  Her parents will be back any minute, she thinks, glancing up the length of the street again. She tries to recall her mother’s soft voice telling her not to be afraid, that if she is a brave girl, all will be well. Still, she knows that she shouldn’t be out at this hour. Just the other day, she overheard her parents talking about the curfew, how the Iron Guard were patrolling the city, arresting anyone still on the streets after sundown. How they’d shot someone in front of their own building, right there for all the neighbors to see. She heard them talk about other things, too, things they didn’t want her to hear, whispering in the room next to hers after she’d long gone to bed. Their words were muffled, indistinguishable, but the desperate edge in their voices made her shudder in her warm bed.

  There are noises in the distance now—shouting, shrieking voices intermingled with the rhythmic thumping of boots and windows slamming shut in the night. This has been happening for the last few nights, but this time, the sounds are accompanied by a strange smell, something like burnt coal but sickly sweet, which makes her stomach turn. Waves of nausea rise inside her, and she pulls the edge of her cardigan over her face to get relief from the stench, forcing her thoughts to her home and her bed with the pink satin quilt, the familiar light creeping through the door left ajar between their two bedrooms.

  Tears well up in her eyes, and she can no longer fight them. She is ashamed, because she knows she is not brave after all, even though she promised her mother that she would try her hardest. I will be good, Mama. I will be patient, she’d said, but now those words seem as if they were spoken a lifetime ago.

  In the crook of her arm, her sobs spring free, knifing through the silence and echoing through courtyards and alleyways. Although she knows she should be quiet, there is no way to contain whatever it is that has come loose inside her. She cries until there is nothing left, until even her jagged sighs have melted away, becoming one with the wind. Lying down on the concrete landing, she curls herself up into a ball and finally lets herself slip into a bottomless chasm.

  Suddenly, sturdy arms embrace her, lifting her in the air. She is startled awake, and looking up, she sees the face of a woman she doesn’t know—hair pulled back in a silvery bun, random strands falling about her lined, rounded cheeks. The faint scent of starch and perspiration envelops her as the woman folds her against her chest, so tightly that she cannot break free, even though she tries with all her might, flailing her limbs. Yet there is something tender in the woman’s grip, something comforting, and the girl is too cold and tired and weak, so she buries her face in the woman’s bosom and begins to weep. Opening the entrance door with her elbow, the woman carries her back into the lobby. The girl wants to ask if she knows about her parents, if they are coming to get her soon, but when she opens her mouth, only a long, sharp wail escapes from her lips.

  “Shh . . .” whispers the woman in her ear. “I’ve got you. Shh . . . You are all right. You are all right.”

  In the transient light of a passing car, the woman’s face shines pale and wide like a moon visible amid passing clouds, her eyes like that, too, sparkling and moist. As if sensing the girl’s gaze, they lower to hers, but an instant later, the light is gone, and they disappear from her again, sliding back into nothingness. Only the woman’s arms remain, soft and solid all the same, and that scent encircling her in waves.

  “Such a sweet thing,” she thinks she can hear the woman murmur as if to herself in the returning darkness. “Such a sweet little thing.” There is a cluck of her tongue. “What a pity.”

  Twenty years she’s worked as a concierge in this building. Twenty long years, during which she’s gotten to know every family on the block, and so she can practically swear that this little girl does not belong to any of them. No, she is most certainly from a different part of town. Perhaps her parents were visiting someone in the building when the girl slipped away without their realizing. But who would let a child wander off in the middle of Dacia Boulevard? Who would leave a child of three, maybe four, in the middle of gunfire and the curfew and dead bodies lining the streets? In disbelief, in disgust, she shakes her head. She isn’t the most educated woman, but she does know human decency, and she realizes this is an aberration.

  Even in her sleep, the poor thing is clutching her hand so tightly that she finds it impossible to move from the stairwell between the lobby and the first floor, where she’s been cradling the girl in her lap. Just when she thinks she can try to lift her, the girl goes rigid, writhing and twisting, and all she can do is still her with her own failing body, folding over hers in a prayer. A prayer that she repeats again and again hours later, when she’s managed at last to bring the child down to her basement room and the wavering light of a winter dawn trickles in through the sliver of glass that is her window.

  The girl wakes and sits up on the narrow bed. Her eyes roam unfocused about the tiny space, taking in the old dresser with its peeling lacquer, the kitchen half visible behind the threadbare curtain, the rusted soba in the corner in which a few sputtering flames leap like overgrown moths. Gathering the blanket closer around her, she scoots over to the far corner of the bed, but there is no fear on her face now, only confusion.

  “Where’s my mama?” she utters after a silence. Her voice is small, hardly audible. “Is she coming to get me soon?”

  The woman’
s hands are cold, so cold as she looks down at them, the way they keep rubbing each other as if they have a mind of their own. In the wood-burning stove, the embers flare and pop, and it is only when they’ve turned completely to ash that she raises her eyes.

  “No, my sweet girl,” is all she says simply. “No.”

  2

  ANTON AND DESPINA GOZA WERE known in their vast circle of family and friends for their promptness. They never arrived a minute late either for appointments or for social gatherings, regardless of the irregularity of the trolleys, the icy sleet glazing the sidewalks, the alarming state of the city in the weeks past. Despina insisted on punctuality as if it was the very thing that defined her. She was a woman with impeccable social etiquette, always on time and polished to perfection, from her hat fashioned in the latest Parisian style to her reptile-skin pumps chosen to match her handbag and a belt that accentuated her tiny waist. Although she towered by at least a head over her four older sisters, she was profoundly feminine, a vision of restrained, manicured beauty balanced by a sleek, powerful frame. The face of a Greek goddess, friends of her mother often said admiringly and perhaps a little enviously of her porcelain skin, sculpted cheekbones, and wavy chestnut hair that set off the creaminess of her shoulders.

  To her dismay that morning, opening her eyes and looking at the pendulum clock on the bedroom wall, she realized that she had overslept. Yet she remained propped against her pillow a little while longer, listening to the world gradually awaken outside her window, like water swelling into a boil. Every morning, she was greeted by the sounds of early traffic on Vlaicu Boulevard, the footsteps and muffled greetings. She found comfort in the familiar, her husband sleeping soundly next to her, the slant of sunlight falling across the foot of their Victorian bed, the café au lait silk sheets shimmering all around her like fine desert sand. But on this particular morning, her tranquility was cut short. Thinking of the day ahead, her stomach somersaulted in an almost violent way. What madness to do this now, she thought. What madness, with the war at our back door.

  Deep down, she knew there would never be a right time, that the right time for this may have come and gone long ago. That despite her good fortune and enviable life, she would never have the one thing she desired most in this world. God had turned his back on her, it seemed, for despite her pleas, her silent bargaining, she was still without a child of her own. And yet fragments of hope still existed in her heart, even though she’d have given anything to dispel them. Then all would be quiet. Quiet and still, a land at peace after a long war. Stop wanting, she chided herself over and over, but her heart would not listen.

  At least she had given up praying for it. Truly, she should have stopped praying years ago when it became clear that her womb was not capable of sustaining life, when her bouts of self-loathing and hopelessness became so frequent that her sisters began visiting only as a unit, tiptoeing around her, trying to distract her with meaningless gossip. One hasty word, one careless sentence, was enough now to send her into a vortex of despair that lasted for days and from which lately it took all of them to pull her out.

  “You are blessed in many ways, Despina. Focus on everything else that you have in your life,” they would whisper encouragingly beneath knowing glances as they brought out boxes of chocolates and served her tea and rubbed her hands while she slumped in a chair, broken, devastated.

  Four miscarriages. After each one tore a fresh wound in her heart and her body, after the disappointments had become so predicable that they had lost their bitter edge, her once ardent hope gradually eroded to a mere flicker. Yet the fire wouldn’t die out, not entirely. And now this unexpected chance. The appointment had been set so rapidly she had barely had a chance to prepare herself for it.

  In the mirror over the bathroom sink, she sighed at her own image, pressing her fingertips to the hollows under her almond-shaped eyes. Her face was but a whitewashed mask, her Grecian features sharper than usual. In her sleeplessness, she must have bitten her lips, for they looked swollen and slightly bruised, like overripe fruit painted against the backdrop of a blank canvas. A splash of cold water seemed to revive her senses, returning her to the day ahead. Anton came into the bathroom, and they passed each other in the doorway.

  “Hello, love.”

  He kissed her cheek, flashing her an absentminded but dazzling smile. Despina could not help thinking that he looked handsome in his striped silk pajamas, even at this early hour, his short-cropped hair rumpled, the faint smell of last night’s whiskey still on his breath. He began brushing his teeth, humming a tune to himself. Sometimes his boundless optimism rattled her a little, but it was part of his charm. And her husband was certainly a man blessed with undeniable charm. Even on this morning, watching the bright gaiety with which he performed this mundane task, she couldn’t help smiling.

  It wasn’t just her on whom Anton had this effect but practically everyone who knew him. His lightness of being was infectious, irresistible. Women turned their heads as he passed them on the street, looking like Cary Grant in his suits tailored to perfection, a white angora scarf draped over his broad shoulders, hat in hand tipped ever so slightly in a gesture of hello. Underneath the hat, an unguarded smile, not flirtatious but open and cheerful, welcoming the beauty of life. Men patted him on the back and smiled, too, taken with his joie de vivre and prosperity and his arms open to the promise of a new day.

  Ten years had passed since Despina met Anton, yet every detail of the day was still as crisp in her mind as if it was yesterday. She realized with amusement that they might have never met had her father not run out of ink for his Montblanc that Sunday or had he chosen to go buy a fresh jar for himself. But her father had been particularly busy going over his accounting ledgers, and the air was brimming with the promise of spring, so when he’d asked her to go instead, she gladly agreed.

  “Piazza Romana,” he’d said, handing her several large bills. “You know the store. And don’t forget to get some envelopes, too. The linen stock if you can find them.”

  This was their usual routine. She would buy whatever he needed and was allowed to keep the change. Her father never asked any questions, and there was always something that caught her eye in the display windows along the way—a pretty hat, a silk handbag, a colorful scarf that complemented her hair.

  Deep in thought about how she would spend that day’s change, Despina walked the few blocks to Piazza Romana, strolling along in no hurry. She crossed the streets absentmindedly, not bothering to look at the signs, for she knew the route by heart. Her father had been buying supplies there for years, and she was acquainted with the landlady, Mrs. Zoltof, almost intimately. Thus when she entered the store, she was startled to find not the old woman, but a young man perched on a ladder, arranging cigarette cartons on the shelving over the register. Her first thought was that she’d entered the wrong shop, but just as she was about to leave, a confident, friendly voice greeted her from the top of the ladder:

  “Good morning, miss.”

  There was a smile on the young man’s lips, warm and slow, as if he already knew her. For a moment, she found herself staring, forgetting herself and her manners. A perfectly straight, Roman nose. Strong cleft chin. Light brown eyes, dancing with some unspoken joy, like cognac swirling in the bottom of a glass. As he came down the steps as if it required no effort at all, she glanced at his muscled forearms, dark as honey against the white of his rolled-up sleeves.

  “Please, come in, miss,” he said again. “Let me know what I can do for you.”

  She stepped in fully, closing the door behind her.

  “Yes, I’d like some paper stock and some ink, thank you,” she pronounced crisply, lifting her chin though she wasn’t quite sure why. “I’m Mr. Papodopulos’s daughter. Well, one of his daughters.”

  Instantly, she felt ridiculous. Why would he care who she was? She was here to buy paper and ink, for God’s sake. But he seemed genuinely glad for the introduction. As he stepped out from behind the counter, r
aking a hand through his thick blackish hair, he flashed her that irresistible smile again.

  “At your service. Whatever you need.”

  Feeling her cheeks grow alarmingly warm, Despina looked away, trying to pin her eyes on something that she might comment about, to distract from the fact that despite the elegance and social graces that had been instilled in her since she could barely walk, she was acting like an absolute oaf. God, this is unbecoming, she thought. He is just a store clerk. Quickly, she turned away and began leafing through the hundreds of stationery samples arranged in narrow wooden slots on the wall.

  “I’d like five hundred of these envelopes,” she said coolly, holding one out to him.

  She had no idea what she had just pulled off the shelf, but it would do. As he took it from her, their fingers brushed slightly. The pink in her cheeks deepened, and she looked away again, began fidgeting with some miniature glass figurines on a display case. But she could feel his eyes still on her, smiling, amused.

  From the very beginning, Anton fit into her life like a missing piece of a puzzle. Her father, a wealthy Greek businessman who had moved his family to Bucharest after the Great War, took Anton under his wing almost instantly, surprising himself with how quickly he warmed to the young man. Yes, Anton was not nearly as educated as Despina and did not come from a prosperous family, but in the weeks since she’d met him, the changes in his daughter were so favorable that he found himself unable to form a single objection.

  Overnight, his youngest daughter began shedding the armor that had cloaked her since their first few years in the new country. When they’d left Greece twelve years before, Despina was a young girl, with eyes like quicksilver and a personality to match. Now at twenty-three, she was somewhat of a stranger to him. She had undoubtedly blossomed into a beauty but one who exuded perpetual coolness, an indifference of sorts.