WHAT SHE LOST, EXCERPT

Melissa W. Hunter is an author and blogger from Cincinnati, Ohio. Her articles have been published on Kveller.com and LiteraryMama.com, and her short stories have appeared in the Jewish Literary Journal. Her novel What She Lost is inspired by her grandmother’s life as a Holocaust survivor.

We’re delighted to feature this excerpt.

WHAT SHE LOST, EXCERPT

 Olkusz, Poland

July 31, 1940

The knock came in the early hours of dawn. Like a rude shake, it pulled me unceremoniously from sleep. My mother’s face swam before me as I blinked in the dim light. Majer was sleeping in her arms. David held onto her skirt, his thumb in his mouth. “Sarah,” she said urgently. “Wake up!”

“What’s happening,” I murmured, looking up at her frightened face.

“Stay in here,” she whispered, laying the twins in bed beside me and pulling her shawl around her shoulders. “Whatever you do, stay in here with the twins and stay quiet. Stay hidden.”  

David and Majer whined softly as they curled up in my lap. My mother quickly kissed each of our foreheads then stepped into the main room, pulling the curtains closed behind her.  

“Öffnen Sie die Tür!”

The command was shouted from outside our front the door. “Open the door!”

I had just turned fifteen, and in the ten months since the Germans had occupied Olkusz, I’d witnessed their brutality and cruelty grow bolder with each passing day. Panicking, I grabbed each of the twins’ hands and fled to a corner of the room, pulling them with me. They whimpered as their little arms hugged me close, curling tightly around me in fear. I tried to squeeze as much reassurance as I could muster into their trembling bodies. “It’s alright,” I whispered. “We just need to be quiet now, ok?”

They nodded, staring up at me with large, solemn eyes. “Good,” I said. “Think of this as a game, like hide and seek.” They nodded again. I heard movement in the main room and my parents’ urgent whispers. The knocking became a pounding on the door. The twins jumped.  Despite my better judgement, I told them to remain where they were and crawled forward to peer out into the main room, making sure to stay hidden at the same time.

My father waved my mother behind him and unlatched the chain and opened the door a few inches. It was thrust open completely by a black boot.

“Papers,” a voice barked. The soldier that filled the doorway was dark and faceless. All I could see from my corner was the sign of the swastika emblazoned on the arm of his uniform, and the letters . . . S.S.

“Please,” my father said softly, fumbling inside his pajama pocket for the papers he kept close at hand. Please, please, please – a word I would hear over and over, in prayer, in appeal.  “Please, we’ve done nothing . . .”

Then the butt of a gun slammed against my father’s face. I felt all the air leave me and I wilted against the wall. My brothers cried out softly, but I waved them behind me, my finger to my lips. “Papa!” I heard a voice exclaim, and I turned back to see Jacob, Sam, and Isaac rush out of their own room. My father stood there holding his bearded cheek, shocked into silence and submission. The soldier that crowded the doorway now stepped into the small room. He was tall and dressed head to toe in the S.S. uniform, his menacing presence pervading our crowded living room. “Papers,” he said again, and this time there was no pleading or arguing. Papers were presented.  

I remembered the day we went as a family and stood in a line to receive our identification papers stating that we were Jewish citizens. I remembered the day my father came home from the bakery, face white, and told us a large Jewish star had been painted across the storefront. I remembered the night last October when my father joined the other Jewish men in town to discuss the fate of the Jews who had recently arrived in Olkusz from other towns, including my father and Abraham’s brother Berish and his wife, Tova. It was then that the Judenrat was created.   

The soldier’s eyes now scanned the room as he leafed through our identification documents. They shone like a spotlight from beneath the brim of his hat. I was sure he’d see me, peering from behind the curtain, but I was unable to turn away. “You, you, and you,” he said, pointing at my brothers, who stood, frozen, against the wall in their nightclothes. “And you,” he said, indicating my father. “You will come with me.”

My mother threw herself at the man, only to receive a slap across her cheek from the soldier’s gloved hand. He seemed unmoved as she stumbled backward. “Mama!” Majer cried. I hugged him against me as hard as I dared, hoping to swallow him permanently from view, hoping to stifle his cries as he struggled against me. If the man saw or heard us, he said nothing.

Jacob, Sam, and Isaac stepped forward to join our father. Dressed in nothing but pajamas, they scrambled to grab coats, caps, and shoes, but the soldier thrust them forward with brute strength. I desperately searched their faces as they were shepherded out the door; Jacob’s large brown eyes were melancholy and despondent, Sam’s face was defiant and angry, his hands clenched into fists at his sides, and Isaac’s gray eyes darted back and forth in fear. Our father, with stooped shoulders, eyes downcast and unable to meet our mother’s tear-stained face, shuffled out the door. Before I could utter a sound, before I could even think a coherent thought, the door closed behind them, shutting out the darkness of the pre-dawn. Then, there was nothing but silence.

—

Follow Melissa on Twitter https://twitter.com/authormelissa

Find out more about her on her website https://www.melissawhunter.com/

WHAT SHE LOST, Melissa W. Hunter

Is it possible to resurrect a life—and find love—from the ruins? Or will Sarah be forever haunted by the memories of what she lost?
For thirteen-year-old Sarah Waldman, life in the small Polish town of Olkusz is idyllic, grounded in her loving, close-knit family and the traditions of their Jewish faith.

But in 1939, as the Nazis come to power, a storm is gathering—a relentless, unforgiving storm that will sweep Sarah and her family into years of turmoil in the ghetto and concentration camps, tearing them apart. Will Sarah’s strong will and determination be enough for her to survive when everything she loves is taken from her?

Part memoir, part fiction, What She Lost is the reimagined true-life story of the author’s grandmother growing into a woman amid the anguish of the Holocaust. It is a tale of resilience, of rebuilding a life, and of rediscovering love.

BUY THE BOOK HERE

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