“I’m sorry. I didn’t mean t...”
“Shut up!”
There was a silver rope and pitch-black lines – all together.
I blinked.
“Say the oath.”
“What?” I asked – eyes, nose, mouth. Everything wet.
“What you fucking learned, you retard.” Kröger’s words too stung.
His belt snapped my back once again.
“I don’t know it. I don’t know it.” I screamed it.
Handprint birds. Handprint birds.
With each slap, I could hear the buckle scraping my bone. I could taste metallic. The pain seared through my body more fiercely than a branding iron. My mind was conceding to the torment, unable to bring a thought to completion.
I realised I wasn’t even making words anymore. I was repeating the same stinging syllable.
Without meaning to, my body curled.
The other children carried on with their classwork. A screaming child was nothing more than a playground sound – Inland’s soundtrack.
I couldn’t make sounds anymore.
“Stand up.”
One feeling stood out amongst the colours. Anger.
I stood with every bit of energy I had left, raised my left arm, clicked my heels together, and in a pathetic voice coming from a pathetic body, I said it.
“Heil Hitler.”
What came to me next was the dustiness of the floor, and the sudden realisation that I’d be here forever and I would never see my mother or father again. The reality of it gave me a mind-Watsche. It stung me, and it did not stop for many minutes.
Above me, Kröger was smudged, but he soon clarified, and his cardboard face loomed closer. Dejected, he stood in his soldier-like posture, holding his belt to his side like a club.
I’d been in Inland long enough to know that Kröger hadn’t hurt me because he was a horrible person. He was a man. Like so many boys here, he’d never known anything but brutality. He had rules to follow. I broke the rules.
I had to be punished.
I knew that.
The welts grew larger on my skin as I lay there in the dust, dirt, and dim light. My breathing calmed, and a stray tear trickled across my face, around my nose. I could feel myself against the floor.
It was cold, especially on my cheek, but I was unable to move.
I would never see Mother and Father again.
I lay there for a good twenty minutes. Only when I saw Tomas’ face did I start to recover. His face was broken but still perfect. His bottom lip trembled, and he hurried to my side. His eyes wandered from one injury to another. I could see the conflict in his eyes already.
“It’s alright,” I said. “You can cry.”
I thought that was all the permission he would have needed, but Tomas didn’t cry. Crying would be going against orders. He simply buried his head between his hands, and he wouldn’t look at me for several minutes.
“Did you have to do that to him?” That was Oskar’s gentle voice, entering from above.
“It’s the only way they learn,” Kröger replied before walking on. He coughed many times.
Later, from a kneeling Tomas, “Josef, you’re alright. You’re just in shock.” Tomas said to me. He sounded more like our Father than my brother.
“It’s alright, little man,” Oskar said. Voices were everywhere.
The calmness of his voice reached down to me, it picked me up. He stayed with me in the cabin for many minutes. Later, he rubbed my foot in the hopes that I would laugh. I did not.
When I thought back to that day in the years to come, I held no animosity towards my parents at all, or towards Erich Kröger, for that matter. To me, it’s clear that external events were the reason for their predicament. Had circumstances been different, this would have ended differently.
The only thought that continually recurred was the lack of colours. There must’ve been colours, I thought, but I failed to remember them. It had been dark, I said. No matter how many times I tried to imagine that scene with the colours, that I knew had been there, I had to struggle to visualise them. I was beaten in the dark, and I had remained there on a cold, dark hallway floor.
It was the first time in my life I couldn’t see the colours – only darkness. And, as crazy as it sounds, that’s what hurt more than the beating. I didn’t want to see the world through an ordinary lens.
They only returned to me when I saw Tomas.
For about an hour that evening, I remained in my cabin, spread out on my bed, until I saw Tomas stood in the doorway, dominoes under his arm, and only then did I sit upright and smile.
Tomas and I played for several hours. My mind had drifted back to the colours many times, and I was unable to concentrate on my moves. Tomas won every game we played.
“Do you miss Mama and Papa?” I asked him.
“I don’t really miss them. It’s more like just being sad all the time.” As Tomas said the words, he could surely feel the weight on his shoulders lifting. A weight that he did not know was there until he spoke.
“It kind of feels like… being empty all the time. Especially when I sometimes forget they are gone, and I remember all of a sudden.”
We shared a sideways glance.
The shadow of our friendship grew bigger with the setting of the sun, and Von Bacchman’s shadow loomed at the door, coming back unusually early from his regular game of Trappers and Indians.
At first, he bounced around on his bed and tried to occupy his time by talking to the other boys, but I could feel his eyes on me, even if I wasn’t looking at him.
He left again and returned a few minutes later. In his hand, he had ice that he had stolen from Teichmann. He wrapped it in a towel. “For your face,” he said. That boy must have been brave to steal from Teichmann.
He held it on my face, and I kept my gaze on him as long as I could. I took the ice. “Danke, Von.”
If only he could see the colour of my thoughts when they circled around him.
Nightmares reinforced themselves that night as I began to realise that this is how things were, and how things would always be.
I was ready now.
I was ready to serve the Führer.
Heil fucking Hitler.
22
Oskar’s Gift
*Ochre*Ogre*Orchid
Early in September 1940, Hitler bombed London.
Regarded, today, as the Blitz.
I woke to the news. Pages were flying; children were cheering, people were laughing – their hearts beating as one. All were chasing visions of their imaginary futures.
All while a city was ripped apart by bombs.
The London sky burst into fragments: orange pentagons, circles, and squares – the silent hysteria of searchlights. The blinded buses rushing somewhere with their lights extinguished. The patter died away, along with the humans left behind who lay frozen on the asphalt. They didn’t make it to the shelter. Doors slammed, and lights were put out. And the city lay deserted, swept clean by a sudden plague. London knelt and cried, kneading the blue and white in its arms.
The word Blitz came from the German word Blitzkrieg or “lightning war”.
The first of the fifty seven consecutive nights of bombing, and it would continue until May 1941. Hitler took France, and it was only a matter of time before he set his voracious eyes on England.
Germany sought to wear down the Royal Air Force in anticipation of a land invasion but failed to cripple Britain’s air power. The attack was ruled out as unrealistic; Hitler chose sheer terror as his next weapon.
For a brief second, the colour of ash flashed. It took me to a place I couldn’t pronounce – Shoreditch. The air was beginning to erode and smelt like death and false hope. Four children: two boys, two girls. They sat in the wasteland of rubble that once was their home. The eldest of the children sat upright, cradling the youngest of them in his arms. When she stopped breathing, he still held on, and I have a feeling that he stayed like that for some time.<
br />
Tomas looked like an odd boy out as he sang with the others. Their colours were bright and vibrant with pride. But some of them had tints of despair mixed in for effect. “We bombed London. We bombed London.”
They didn’t fully understand the seriousness of the situation. How could they have? The ones who were supposed to shape us were behaving like maniacs, so we followed suit.
All that was known was that Germany was winning the war and we, the youth, would be the future. They say what you don’t know can’t hurt you, that ignorance is bliss. But ignorance is also a grenade, with a pin waiting to be pulled.
Young youth leaders entered like a parade of colours. A mixture of red and black, blue and yellow. All together. They gave Oskar a newspaper he didn’t read. Instead, he stuffed it into his coat. The words were stapled to his chest like a tattoo.
We were all made out of darkness, foolishly thinking that we could save the world by breaking it, and making lives better by ending them.
“Did you hear the news?” I asked Oskar.
He spoke from across the room.
“Ja. Germany bombed London.” His voice was not even remotely patriotic.
“That’s good, right? We’re winning the war?”
“Oh, yes. Fantastic.”
There was that face again – his midnight face.
I turned thirteen that day. The age where I turned into a backstage adult, waiting on my tiptoes for my chance. The age father described as “when the fun would begin”.
Yes, the fun certainly did begin.
Inland birthdays were not a day to boast about. Celebrations included dunking in a nice cold bath. Children would often hide birthday cards and gifts from their parents to stop the older boys from learning the date. Everyone in Inland remained ageless, and I was often mistaken for a much younger boy.
The only thing I desired was an impossible gift – Mother and Father, for them to share in my birthday as they had before. To hug us, to kiss us – even if it was only a second.
That couldn’t happen, of course. I knew that.
But Oskar had the next best thing.
He waited till the other boys left the cabin that day, and then he spoke.
“I have a surprise for you, little man.”
From behind his back, he pulled a tin artisan box and sat it on my knees. When I traced my fingers over it, the tin made the sound the wind does in the trees. It was red. Different kinds of hues and shades, some light and some dark; some in between light and dark. A little boy was painting a ship on the front. Oskar said the boy reminded him of me, and that’s why he got it. He even wore the same uniform as I did – Swastika and all.
Written in gold at the top of the box was
“Watercolour paintbox.”
I had owned a selection of watercolour paints at home, and they were my favourites. I loved the way the paint glided onto the paper, blending and mingling with the other colours; creating new, unusual colours. It was magical. At least, I thought so.
When I opened the box, the red of the tin mingled with the sunlight and glowed. A large sketchpad, some paintbrushes, and an unlimited collection of colours. Bleached blue, dusty grey, fast orange, and yellows.
With wonder, I smiled. My toes curled up in my boots with excitement. I couldn’t believe that such a wonderful thing was happening amongst the chaos.
“I know it’s probably not what you’re used to, but it’s the best I could do.”
“No, it’s perfect.”
I hugged him. Neither of us expected it.
He drowned in it.
“Thank you, Oskar.” The words spilled over my mouth.
He wrapped an arm around my shoulders and pulled me closer, gently rubbing my arm. He sunk into my warmth, appreciative of the simple gesture. His touch made the room warmer, somehow. The walls seemed a little less bleak.
“But now, I expect a gift back, you know?”
I grinned. “With what money?”
“You can paint me something. Call it the Oskar.” The words halted and got stuck at his teeth as he was trying to light a cigarette. “That way, when you get your big break, I can tell everyone that one of your first paintings was named after me.”
I nodded with great sincerity.
It was a happy day.
A beautifully evil day.
23
Tumbling Colours
*Tenné*Thistle*Teszopiggyt
I stood with a quiet voice and a loud mind in the line of boys. A picture was taken, and plausibly would have made it into history books in years to come. Perhaps you even saw me. I wasn’t hard to spot. An awkward boy in the back, with a forced, painted smile. Can you see Tomas, too? A black and white angel in the back. Yes, we teased him relentlessly for that. Somehow, Tomas was even paler than the rest of us. In pictures, it made him look colourless and waxlike. He was someone you noticed.
In the end, boys were already starting to fix their appearance. Untucking shirts. Pulling down neck scarves. You needed just the right amount of scruffiness. I was in mid-tease of Rouvon when Kröger plucked me from the line.
“You.”
“Yes, Mein Herr?”
“You like to paint?”
“Very much so.”
“Then make yourself useful.”
And just like that, red, black, and white paint cans were shoved into my arms. It was my new job to paint the flags. At first, I did just that, but as my predisposition for trouble making grew, the banners I painted changed, too. Disinterested in the dull red, black, and white, I made pink. Light pink. Dark pink. I mixed and mixed until the shade was just right. I quivered with excitement. Rosy cheek pink was much nicer, don’t you agree?
The world loved the Swastika until Hitler stole it. It’s a symbol for German people, but not in the way you’re thinking. For years, it was a symbol of well-being and good fortune in many parts of the world, used by Buddhists, Hindus, and Jains. Yet, in the twisted telephone line game that is history, it became something that invoked fear and dominance. Add a little black and red, and it’s suddenly chilling. I wonder if it will ever dust off its evil associations and walk freely.
My painting style changed throughout the years. I was no longer concerned with tiny details. I used broad, energetic brush strokes. I painted with anger. Instead of holding it in and letting it slowly destroy me, until the old me didn’t exist anymore, I took it out on my paintings, in the flags.
Those who came to observe didn’t scold me – a silly child with a vivid imagination they presumed. The flag dominated the walls. Every colour was bold and innocent. They seemed to be stable but tumble at the same time. Like myself, I think. Seemingly stable, but always free-falling on the inside. Soft, but lampooning anyone who sparks my insecurities without meaning to, often feeling painted onto the background, like there isn’t really anything of substance inside. I hope there is. I hope there is more meaning in my bones than tumbling colours and chaotic lines.
Years earlier, painting in the basement was one of my favourite things to do. Mother’s face was lit with vexation. I hadn’t completed my maths homework because I couldn’t. I tried to explain. “The numbers get mixed up…”
“I can’t hear you.” Mother cut through. Anger continued to travel across her face.
“You would if you listened.”
Mother always complained that she never got to spend time with me, but when I tried to speak of my paintings, she never listened. Like this part of spending time together didn’t matter at all.
The colours were alive in my eleven-year-old heart.
“Josef, you must grow up.” A pencil-sharpening hand moved from the table. I turned from the easel and listened to the speech. “The world has artists, my dear. It also needs bus drivers and shop keepers.” I let my feelings boil over inside. I kept painting. “You have such big goals inside that little head of yours, but sooner or later, you’re going to have to settle for less because sometimes it’s all you have.”
The starlight
sucked up the room.
“You don’t need maths to be a bus driver or a shop keeper, Mama.” I thought of saying that much later – a Treppenwitz.
Literally, a staircase joke. A witty comment that dawns on you after the fact.
I sat at the table.
I suffered from day-dreamer’s disease, and there was no cure.
24
The Fight
Firebrick*Fresh Avacado*Faloobang
Over the next few weeks and well into the winter, the friendship between Von, Tomas, and I continued.
Von’s father was sent to Paris to recover from the horrors of the eastern front. Germany took over the world. Nazi banners littered the French flags. Foreign signs were replaced with German ones so that the German troops could feel at home – that was nice of them. They practically recreated Germany in the higher, elite places of France. German language book stores opened and cinemas were permitted to play only German films, however many French productions still carried on. Von’s father wrote it in his letters, and the information was passed to Tomas and me.
They didn’t care that I was endlessly teased.
“Look, it’s Beckmann himself.” Penn laughed, a stupid, thirteen-year-old grin of smugness. His Backpfeifengesicht. Derrick was like a shadow behind him, partaking, but never actually delivering the blows himself.
Backpfeifengesicht: the meaning of this word is far more familiar than you might think. Do you know those kinds of people whose face is enough to make you want to slap them? Well, from today, I kindly invite you to use the German word, instead of “punch-bag face.”
“Come on, Beckmann.” Penn was carving my skin with his juvenile words.
Max Beckmann: a famous German expressionist painter.
At first, I didn’t speak. I couldn’t, for I would certainly scream or cry.
The Boy Who Saw in Colours Page 15