by Alex Amit
“This is not a place for a girl like you, get out of here.”
“I need to know something.”
“It will cost you.” He looked at me lustfully.
“I can give you that,” I handed him my monthly butter ration stamps, my hand shaking, not knowing how I would explain the loss of our butter ration to Lizette.
“What do you want to know?” His black fingers collected the stamps, quickly shoving them into his pocket.
“My family, I need to meet them. I have to; please help me.” My gaze focused on the grey building and the little figures walking between the barbed wire fences. I had to meet them.
“Are you Jewish?”
“No.”
“They were taken east by train, to Auschwitz camp.”
“Please, I must find them.” My fingers quickly dug into the bag, handing him our meat ration stamps. “That’s all I have.”
“You cannot find them; they are in Poland now, go away from here, it is dangerous for you, they will take you too.” He turned and walked away from me, refusing to take the meat stamps from my hand.
“What are you doing?” the train worker shouted at me as I started running towards the fences.
“I have to say goodbye to them,” I shouted as I gasped and stepped up, not thinking whether he heard or understood my words.
“They will catch you and send you there too.” He dropped me on the rails, made me scream from the pain of the fall.
“I did not have time to say goodbye to them,” I whimpered into his shoulder as it pressed me to the ground, feeling the rails hurt my body and smelling the diesel and grease from his dirty clothes. “I have to, I have to say goodbye to them.” I cried and tried to fight him off, wanting to keep running toward the fences and the people behind them.
“You must not; there is no point, they are no longer there, it is not them, they have been taken, now they hold POWs and American pilots whose planes have been shot down.” He kept pinning me to the ground, not releasing me until he was sure I’d calmed down and stopped crying, and would not keep running.
“I’m sorry, they’re not there anymore.” I felt his grip loosen as he stood up, stabilizing himself and looking at me for a moment, moving away from me but staying close in case I got up and started running towards the fences again. When I finally got up off the rails and looked at him walking away, I noticed my butter ration stamps thrown on the rails beside my old shoes.
“What do you think of my new shoes?” Violette asks me a few days after we first met, as she blushes and raises her leg so I can see them.
“They are very beautiful.” I bend over the counter; they are gorgeous.
“I told you she’s nice.” Violette laughs at Anaïs.
“She received them as a special gift,” Anaïs adds a piece of information as she leans back against the wall, and Violette blushes even more, smiling awkwardly.
“Come walk with us down the avenue after work, please, the weather is nice,” she asks.
“I do not know; I need to get home.”
“The days are much warmer now; please join us.” She looks at me with her big, round, dark eyes, as if begging for my company.
“Yes, that would be nice,” Anaïs adds from the side as she sizes me up, and the apron I am wearing.
And I let them convince me, promising myself I’ll be distant when we walk together, but meanwhile I say goodbye to them until the end of the day. I have no choice but to meet them; Philip expects me to bring him more information.
I arrange the croissants left on the trays in straight lines, placing the baguettes in the basket in order; what kind of smiles shall I show them? Cleaning the tables until they are shiny, checking and making sure there is no dirt on my dress, and washing the shop window facing the street, thinking what I will say. Slowly I return the change to the customer in the grey-green uniform, trying to avoid looking at the clock hanging above the door. Too soon, the end of the day arrives. They are not my friends; they’ll never be, my stomach hurts.
“We need to hurry. They are already waiting for us.” Violette rushes me as we walk to the metro, and I think I have not walked the boulevard since what happened to Claudine.
“Who is waiting for us?” I stop walking, surprised.
“Our guys.” Anaïs smiles at me as if to confess a secret. “They’ve wanted to meet you for a long time.”
“You did not tell me they were coming too.”
“We told you, but you were too busy arranging all your baguettes and didn’t listen to us.” Violette laughs at me. “Don’t be afraid; they don’t bite, after you know them, you’ll change your mind about German soldiers.”
“They can teach you a lot of new things, ask Violette,” Anaïs adds while Violette looks down, blushing.
“We must hurry, you can’t change your mind now, I promised them you were coming.” Violette takes my hand, and I walk with them, knowing they had not told me before. They must have been afraid I would refuse to join them, but now it’s too late.
“I can stand it,” I whisper to myself as we reach the stairs leading down to the Metro Opera station, passing a man in a long coat, his eyes staring at me.
“She’s with us.” Anaïs glares at him indifferently as she grabs my hand and pulls me after her down the stairs.
I’ll never be one of them; I think to myself as we ride in the cramped metro car, I’ll never go out with a German soldier.
“Monique, meet Fritz and Fritz.” And for the first time in my life, I’m shaking hands with a German soldier, and I want to scream.
They smile at me very politely when I lower my eyes from their blue ones, introducing themselves formally. Their names are not Fritz and Fritz, but in all the storm blowing through my head, I cannot hear anything else as I try to smile back and raise my head. They reach their hands out to me, and I touch them for a split-second and pull my hand back quickly, feeling my palm burning. If only I had thought to bring gloves with me.
“We already know you,” they say together. “From the boulangerie. You’re the nice saleswoman.”
“There was another girl, but we don’t see her anymore, she was nice too, what happened to her?”
“She doesn’t work there anymore.” I rub my palm, pressing it firmly with my fingers.
“What about us?” Violette asks, and gets a warm hug from her fair-haired Fritz.
“We are here just for decoration,” says Anaïs while she places her arm on the back of her private Fritz, bringing him closer to a long kiss while turning her back to me. “Shall we go?”
Had they notice that I held back when they touched my hand? I must learn to control myself, to make Philip proud of me. Their attention is on their girls as we walk down the avenue. They are watching all the people enjoying the summer afternoon, and my eyes are focused on Violette’s fingers playing with Fritz’s grey-green jacket.
The cafés are full of German soldiers and their accompanying young girls; the group is trying to locate a place to sit while I walk a little behind them; maybe the passersby will think I’m just looking in the shop windows and I’m not one of them.
“What do you think?” Everyone stops and looks at me.
“Sorry, I didn’t hear you.”
“What do you think of the new movie that came out?”
“What movie?”
“The movie we were talking about, with the French actress Arletty.”
“I haven’t seen it yet.”
“Will you join us to see it? They say she plays wonderfully.” Violette looks at me questioningly.
“I don’t know; my evenings are usually busy.”
What do the people on the street think of me? Do they spit or curse at us when they pass on the sidewalk? I feel as if strangers’ eyes are staring at my back, penetrating me with hateful looks. I must learn to fit in with them.
“I would be happy to go if I had a day off.”
“Great, you’ll enjoy spending time with us.” Anaïs looks at me a
nd smiles. What does she think of me?
“Maybe next time we’ll take care of Monique? So you won’t have to hang out with us so lonely?” she adds as she turns to her Fritz and hugs him, making me look down.
“It’s okay; I’m having a good time on my own.”
“It’s a great idea.” Violette holds my arm with enthusiasm. “It’s a lot more fun to walk down the avenue together.”
After I say goodbye to them and start walking home, I hurry away from the Champs Élysées and the noisy cafés. But even on the quiet street, I can imagine the stares at my back, as if they remained and hurt my skin. Even my palm is still hot, burning from the touch of their hands.
“Are you okay, my dear? How was your day?” Lizette asks me when I enter her warm living room, and I shake my head and say nothing. I cannot tell her who I hang out with and why. What would Lizette think of me if she knew? Would she stab my back with her glare too? Or throw me out of the attic she’d given me as a place to sleep?
At night, before bed, I try to comfort myself; the first time is always the hardest, like when I was a girl and Dad took me to the Tuileries Gardens playground.
“Roll over, it’s okay, the first time is always the scariest,” he assured me in his calm voice, as I sat crying at the end of the ladder, afraid to go down. “After the first time, you will get used to and enjoy the feeling.”
‘Are you also getting used to Auschwitz camp?’ I ask him in my imagination, but he does not answer me.
I haven’t met him since that time he hurt me so much, after Claudine was killed, and I go downstairs in fear. How should I behave in front of him? How will he react?
He is waiting for me as always, at the bottom of the stairs, and we approach each other slowly, step by step.
“You are quiet.” He is standing close to me.
“I have nothing to say.”
“Say something,”
“I’m trying to learn and get better.” Even though I haven’t forgiven him, I stay close to him.
“How are you?” Philip doesn’t walk away either.
“Working at the boulangerie as usual.”
“And how is your new place? Is it comfortable?” He does not mention the name of the one I killed.
“I feel great.” Nor do I.
“Does Simone treat you nicely?”
“Yes, she treats me well, and I’ve already met two new girlfriends.”
“That’s good.” Philip leans back, that’s probably what he thinks of me, that I hurried to replace dead Claudine with the living Anaïs and Violette.
“And how are they, those two new girlfriends of yours?”
“They are very nice, they usually hang out with German soldiers, so I am joining them.” I also lean back, thinking of Claudine and her Messerschmitt pilot, the one who courted her for days, but disappeared when she lay in a simple wooden coffin.
“And is it good for you? To go out with them?”
“What’s good for France is good for me.”
“I’m happy.” He walks away from me, and I can no longer smell his body odor.
“They want to bring someone else with them, their officer. They suggested I go out with him.”
“And will you do it?” He turns his back to me; doesn’t want to look at me at all.
“Yes, I’m willing to do it.” After I killed Claudine, it’s my turn to take her place. At least, that’s what he expects me to do; the only reason he’s kept me alive.
“Thanks.” I hear his voice, though he is standing with his back to me. He will not stop me from hanging out with a German officer; he will keep his distance from me, waiting for my reports, sending me back to him, without asking me how scared I am. He won’t hug me like last time; I do not want him to hug me anymore.
“I have a lot of new information to report.”
“So sit down and report.” Philip slowly turns to me and leads me to the small wooden table, touching my arm for a moment.
“What new information do you have?”
Now that Claudine is dead, I have a lot to tell him. All day I listen and remember, concentrating on all those soldiers who think I’m a stupid Frenchwoman who does not understand the German language, opening their big mouths and gossiping to their friends while waiting to see my smile.
“The Germans are starting to fortify the beaches against possible invasion. They have moved new engineering divisions from the East, and I will be much more efficient after I go out with my new friends and their acquaintances.” But Philip does not place his fingers on mine, even though they are waiting on the table. I don’t want him to touch me.
“Do not forget that they are not your friends.”
“No one is my friend.” I pull my hands away from the simple wooden board and say goodbye to him. He could have been nicer to me after he made sure I would be left without a friend.
“He’s really nice,” Violette whispers to me excitedly a few days later, when they enter the boulangerie.
“And he’s high-ranking, they call his rank ‘Oberst’ in German, he has a lot of privileges as an officer. A lot of privileges are good for Monique,” adds Anaïs with a secret smile, while taking a bite from the croissant I gave her.
“And he’s lonely here in Paris.” Violette continues, not understanding I have been waiting for their trap, knowing I would have to step inside and fall.
For days I’ve been hoping that maybe their German officer would change his mind, or be moved with his unit from Paris. Whenever the glass door opened and the bell rung, I looked up apprehensively and let out a sigh of relief when the entrants were German soldiers, not Violette and Anaïs. But now both of them stand in front of me, waiting for my acceptance.
“I’m not sure I’ll be an interesting companion to him.”
“You are beautiful, believe me, he will be interested in you,” Anaïs looks at me and takes a box of cigarettes out of the fashionable handbag, but after she notices Simone’s look, she chooses to return the package inside her bag.
“Will you come with us on Saturday?” Violette smiles at me.
“Monique, there are customers.”
I want to ask Anaïs what she means, that he will be interested in me, but Simone calls me again.
“What’s his name?” I have to go back to work.
“His name is Ernest, Oberst Ernest.”
Oberst Ernest
“You should put lipstick on.” Lizette hands me the red tube as I stand in front of the mirror, getting ready for the meeting.
My fingers tremble as I slide the soft burgundy tip over my lips, feeling its softness and weird taste for the first time.
“Let me help you.” Lizette takes the lipstick from my hand and gently holds my chin while I concentrate on her brown eyes.
“There you go, look in the mirror.” She smiles at me with satisfaction, and I stare at the woman I become, trying to get used to my new me.
“Where are you going?” she’d asked me earlier when I was on my way to the door, hurrying to get outside and trying to avoid her.
“I’ve met someone.” I immediately regretted telling her, afraid she would ask more.
“You can’t go out like that.”
“This is my nicest dress.” I looked embarrassed in my simple beige dress, not knowing what to answer her, but she took me by my hand to her bedroom, ignoring me telling her that I was already late.
I was detained all morning, opening and closing the attic window, looking at the grey zinc tiles and the street below.
“You’re a woman; you need to be at your best.” She sits me in the chair in front of the dresser and starts combing my hair, turning it into the smooth waves of a movie star.
“What do you think?” she asks after helping with the lipstick.
“It’s lovely; thank you.”
I’d always dreamed of looking like that, but Mom never agreed to it. The only time she ever slapped me was when she caught me putting on pink lipstick I’d bought with a shaking hand, in
those days before the warrants. We were still allowed to go into cosmetics stores, at least the ones far from the German headquarters. “Only prostitutes wear makeup like that!” she shouted, and tossed the lipstick in the trash as I ran from her, locking myself in my room and stroking my aching cheeks, hating her, and wishing she would be gone.
“Are you excited about the date?”
“A little bit, but I’m okay.” I dab the tip of my eye. Where is she now?
“Something’s missing,” Lizette pulls a light pink scarf from the brown closet in her bedroom and ties it around my neck, looking at me with a satisfied look and hugging me warmly. “Take care of yourself.”
“Thank you; I won’t be late.” My legs carry me down the stairs, wanting to get away from Lizette’s warm hugs and all the lies I’m telling her. Maybe it’s better Mom can’t see me like this, not knowing who I’m going to meet.
I have to hurry; they are probably waiting for me.
Even though I’ve never met him before, I can recognize him from a distance and slow down, stopping and breathing deeply. They are all standing and chatting near the café where we’d arranged to meet. Fritz and Fritz stand tall, not moving, next to them are Violette and Anaïs dressed in cheerful cream-colored dresses, and they all give him respect.
He stands alone in a relaxed position and is a little taller than Phillip; he has short light hair rather than a dark quiff, and his uniforms are clean grey-green, decorated with many medals and ranks, not dirty with black printing stains. But as I stand at a distance, looking at him, I notice that he also has a pistol stuck in his belt. However, his firearm is hidden in a shiny new leather case.
Breathe slowly; I need to get close to them; he is waiting for me.
“Ernest, nice to meet you.” He notices me, extends his hand, and I force myself to take the small steps left between us.
“Monique, nice to meet you.” He looks at me with his green eyes, and I’m shiver
“Shall we sit down?”
And as we step between the tables outside, waiting for the waiter to accompany us to our reserved table, I feel his hand gently touch my waist, taking ownership of me. At any time, I can change my mind and back off.