Hope Is Gone

TRIGGER WARNING!!

I was just a young boy when they took me away, took my family. I remember it as clear as day.

"Mama, what's for dinner?" My little sister asked my mother from the living room. I glance up from my drawing long enough to see Mother turn and smile sweetly at Nancy.

"We're having soup and bread, darling."

I look back down at my picture and continue to draw a bear. My favorite animal.

Just then, I heard a loud bang from underneath our apartment. Then screaming. Both Nancy and I look at Mother in panic.

"I'm sure it was nothing, children."

Our front door busts open and I see a bald man with a mustache and expensive leather clothing holding a gun.

"Downstairs. Now!"

I look back at Mother for her to tell us what to do. She's motioning for us to follow her. So we do.

All the way down the apartment stairs and outside where a cart is holding many other people from our complex.

“Get in!”

So we do. We huddle close because there’s barely any room to begin with and we cry.

After what feels like forever, the cart takes us away.

“Mommy, where are we going?” Nancy asks through her tears. Mother holds her close and whispers, “I don’t know, honey. I don’t know.”

The cart takes us to a place called Auschwitz. We all pile out and are told to line up behind a table with a man behind it.

“Lie about your age,” The person in front of me says.

“Huh?” I look up at him to find a man with a curly flop of hair on his head and crystal blue eyes.

“They’re going to kill your mother and sister. Do you want them to kill you too?”

My stomach drops. This wasn’t where I was. I was not at a concentration camp.

“Next!” The man at the table says, and I walk up to him reluctantly.

“Age?”

“Eighteen,” I tell him. But I’m fourteen! I want to scream.

“Can you work?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Go to the left.”

So I do. And then I look for mother and Nancy. I find them to the right of me with a large group of children and women.

I love you, baby, Mother mouths to me. I love you.

Why is she saying that? We’d be together soon!

But I watch as they lead Mother’s group towards a small shed with a lock on the door. They urge everyone inside and lock the door behind them. Then someone pushes a button and a cloud of gas escapes from the creases of the building. The guys outside cover their mouth and noses with their expensive sleeves.

I wait for everyone to come back out.

They don’t.