My Bridges of Hope

by Livia Bitton-Jackson

  I love all six of them. There are no clouds on the horizon; Vienna remains eternally dazzling. The spring ripens into summer, but for me Vienna remains forever spring. The only carefree, joyful spring I have known.

  The parks of the city, the banks of the Danube Canal, the forests on the outskirts, and the hills above are my playground. The fabulous Ring, and the Prater. The Burg. The museums. The Schönbrunn Palace. Vienna, elegant and grand, vivacious and charming, city of the Hapsburgs, of the Strausses and Liszt, your music and bewitching landscape, your freedom, has restored my soul.

  And yet, you are the city that embraced Hitler with open arms—I shut my eyes and refuse to remember it. You shouted “Juden raus” and thundered “Heil Hitler!” even louder than Berlin—I plug my ears and refuse to hear it. Your language is German, your face is Aryan, your soul is corrupt—I seal my mind and refuse to think.

  For five months I blot out reality and indulge in delusion. For five months I exhilarate in undiluted youth.

  I am eighteen in Vienna and do not yet know that I will never be eighteen again.

  Andy

  Vienna, May—June 1949

  In time, Andy becomes a “special” friend. He is the first gang member to visit every morning and the last one to leave in the evening. On our walks, bicycle rides, and shopping trips, he monopolizes the space near me. He always snatches the seat next to me at the movies and at all the other places we attend, always conniving ways to be alone with me. Before I notice what is happening, the other gang members begin to keep their distance. This nonverbal “understanding” is at times challenged by Tommy or Pete. During Andy’s visit Tommy would sometimes appear in our room, nonchalantly flicking his cigarette and, with mock formality, present me with a red rose. Andy would turn scarlet and stare at his brother with ferocious intensity but make no sound or movement until the latter tipped his hat and made his exit. A few minutes later Pete would appear and insinuate himself between Andy and me at the foot of the bed. Andy would fall silent again, awaiting the end of Peter’s visit. But Pete would ignore Andy’s discomfort and stay, invariably bringing up innocuous topics of discussion and causing Andy visible anguish. Sometimes the sunshine would beckon, and we would continue our chat in the park, where several other members of the gang would join us. Andy, his “territorial rights” violated, would bristle with annoyance and plunge into deep gloom.

  Mommy is amused by these goings-on. She likes the boys and is tickled pink also with the little tokens of attention they shower on her as well. But lately she is concerned about Andy’s growing intensity and warns me “not to encourage him.”

  Andy is intelligent and high-strung. He is the most serious and the most educated, and from the start has assumed a leadership position in the group.

  I have not objected to this subtle arrangement, because I enjoy Andy’s company and his erudite debates. I find his intensity strangely stimulating.

  This afternoon, Andy seems more intense than usual.

  “I received a telegram from my sister today,” he reveals with obvious tension when we are sitting alone on a park bench. “She and her husband are due to arrive next Tuesday.”

  “How nice for you and your brothers! You must be very happy.”

  “Yes. Next Tuesday … that’s in five days. It would make me very happy if I could introduce you to my sister. Will you permit me to introduce you …”

  “Of course! What a question! Of course you may introduce me. I have been hoping to meet her. …”

  All three brothers, Andy, Tommy, and Leslie, have been speaking about their elder sister with great affection and anxiously awaiting her arrival. I feel I have gotten to know Annie through the brothers’ references to her warmth and sense of humor. Andy’s attachment to her and his anxious waiting for the young couple’s arrival have made me especially eager to meet her.

  “No .. . not that—” Andy nervously interrupts. “I wish to… may I introduce you … as my fiancée?”

  Even I can hear my sudden intake of breath. I am thunderstruck. Is this a marriage proposal?

  I have always wondered how it would happen. Who would it be? What would he say? Under what circumstances? So that’s how it happens. Out of the clear blue. Just like that. “Introduce you as my fiancée.” Andy did not say he wished to marry me. Or that he loved me. He simply wanted to introduce me as his fiancée. How strange.

  “How can you introduce me as your fiancée when I’m not? I’m not your fiancée, Andy, am I?”

  “What I meant was … would you? Would you be my fiancée? I love you very much. From the first moment. Since Bratislava … I have had no rest. Not a moment’s rest. I’ve not slept for weeks, thinking of you … thinking of how to ask you to marry me. Thinking of what you’ll say.”

  Now he’s said it. He’s said it all. Love. Marriage. Torment. Just as it is in the novels. Just as I have imagined. How strange. I feel nothing. Not even flattered. On the contrary, I am embarrassed. Painfully embarrassed.

  “Andy.” I so wish to say the right words. Are there right words?

  “Andy, you see, I don’t know where I’m heading. There is so much I want to do. Most of all, I want to study. I don’t know if I’ll ever get to America, but if I do, I want to work by day and study at night. In America you can do that. I want to complete high school and then go to college. I don’t know when I will get married. But it is not now. Not for a long time yet.”

  Andy is silent for a long time. His eyes are fixed on a cluster of bushes ahead. “I know,” he says at long last. “I knew it all the time. If I were to go to America, if I were to live where you’ll live, then perhaps in a year or two, when you are nineteen or twenty … maybe then you’d be ready to get married.” Andy falls silent again. Is he expecting an answer? Now his intent gaze falls on the ground, where a few blades of grass have been flattened by the agitated tapping of his feet. “But … ,” he goes on after a long pause, “I have no prospects of getting to America. And so, when you are ready to get married, I won’t be there. You’ll be in America, and I’ll be in Israel.”

  What shall I answer? Shall I tell him that I would not marry him in Israel, either? Neither him nor anyone else. I want to achieve my goals first, and that will take years. One day I want to be a teacher in an institution of higher learning. I want to speak English with impeccable pronunciation. And write beautiful, literary English. I also want to extend my knowledge of Hebrew. Israel will be my home one day, and I want to know Hebrew as if it were my native tongue. I have no time for marriage. I never even think about marriage.

  Andy is very, very quiet. In a barely audible tone he says he understands. He is not feeling very well, he admits. Would I mind if he went home? No, he does not want me to walk with him. Abruptly Andy mumbles goodbye and hurries away.

  I do not understand what has happened. Didn’t Andy say he understood? Then why the hasty departure?

  I must have hurt him, after all. I will make up for it later. We have a date tonight: We are going to see Der Fledermaus, a very popular opera in Vienna. I am sure the music will lift his spirits. He has been looking forward to tonight. I will explain everything afterward. I’m sure he’ll see my points then.

  “I’ll see you later!” I call after Andy. I don’t know if he can hear me. He is just turning the corner and does not look back.

  Andy is due to call for me at 5:10. At five I am ready. I am wearing my pink taffeta dress, the one I designed for the exam in my pattern-making course in Bratislava. It is a lovely two-piece dress with a flaired skirt, a tight waist, and a form-fitting top. The dolman sleeves and the Cossack-style standing collar lend it a striking, dramatic look. Andy likes this dress, and he will be pleased that I have chosen it for tonight. My hair is long, with a soft wave, the aftermath of a permanent wave that has, thankfully, grown out since then. The new shampoo I bought here in Vienna gives my hair a brilliant luster.

  I am glad I look my best. Andy will be pleased, despite our little misunderstanding. Or perhaps
because of it. I will be very warm and attentive all evening. It is essential that he does not take my refusal to marry him personally. I must make amends whatever way I can.

  It is 5:10, and Andy has not come. Normally he is very punctual. Five-thirty, and no Andy. Five forty-five comes and goes without Andy’s appearance. I start to change into my ordinary clothes, all the while keeping an eye on the entrance to our room. Mommy is my official lookout. At six o’clock she advises me to go upstairs and find out what has happened to Andy. I categorically refuse. I know Andy is angry with me, and this is his way of punishing me. There is no point in swallowing my pride. I am not going to beg for forgiveness. I am sorry to have hurt his feelings. I am sorry to miss Der Fledermaus. And I am very sorry for not having had a chance to show off my fancy clothes. But to go to Andy’s room and risk being snubbed in front of all the gang members? Never.

  Around eight o’clock several of the gang members usually call. Tonight not one comes to visit. What’s going on? If Andy was home, they would know I was home. Perhaps Andy is not at home. Where is he, then? Did he go to the opera by himself? Or, perhaps, with someone else? Would he do such a thing? It’s not like him.

  All evening no one comes, not even Peter. I am miserable.

  “Why don’t you go upstairs and investigate?” Mommy keeps urging. “I don’t understand your mulish stubbornness.”

  Mommy does not know about the afternoon incident in the park. How can I expect her to understand my reluctance to humiliate myself in front of Andy and his friends?

  In the morning Peter comes to visit. His behavior is strangely reserved. After some small talk he suddenly blurts out: “Elli, I’m sorry to tell you, but Andy is very ill.”

  “Andy? What are you talking about?”

  “Late afternoon he came back from somewhere downcast and did not speak to anyone. Later in the evening he became agitated and confused. He started to talk irrationally. Then he began to shout. When we tried to calm him, he turned on us. He became violent. He threatened to kill Tommy, then tackled him and began to strangle him. It took four of us to pull him off and hold him while someone called the house police. The police called for an ambulance. He was so violent that he broke a male attendant’s finger. The police had to tie him up. He was taken to a sanatorium in the Vienna woods. We all spent the night in the nearby woods and went to see him early this morning. He is asking for you. The boys sent me to give you the message and ask you to go see him.”

  Oh, God. My dear God.

  “Where is he? Which sanatorium?”

  “It’s a state institution, in Semmering. About an hour’s ride by bus from the Danube Canal terminal. Visiting hours begin at two o’clock. We are all going. Do you want to come along? He keeps asking for you.”

  “I’m so sorry. Andy and I had a misunderstanding yesterday.”

  “We all know about that. For days he was very nervous about talking to you. We all knew he was going to ask you to marry him. We all told him it was a hopeless case, but he wouldn’t listen. He worked himself into a state.”

  “I am very sorry. I had no idea. …”

  “Don’t blame yourself. It’s not your fault. Do you think you want to come to the hospital? You don’t have to. I can tell him you felt it was better that you saw him after he came out of the hospital.”

  “How is he? Is he rational?”

  “Now he is less agitated and less confused. I think he is sedated. But he keeps repeating that he must talk to you.”

  “Thank you, Peter. I think I should go. Will you please call for me?”

  Shortly after Peter leaves, Tommy comes to thank me for agreeing to go visit his brother.

  “You’re simply wonderful for doing this. It’s a great mitzvah.” I reject his accolades, and Tommy refuses to listen to my self-recriminations.

  A few minutes later Leslie, the oldest brother, comes to warn me: “You should be prepared for a great change in my brother. He may be abusive. Please, think it over. You may not want to be exposed to this.”

  I thank Leslie for his concern. “I must go to see him. I’ll be okay.”

  In the bus my stomach shrinks to a tiny, hard ball. I do not know what to expect. The gentle, soft-spoken, intelligent young man is in a mental ward for the violent. I cannot grasp it. I have a crushing sense of sadness and an overwhelming desire to do something to help Andy.

  The bus stops in front of a sprawling yellow building with black wrought-iron gates. We walk on impeccably white gravel paths through a well-tended garden, up wide, stone stairs to the black metal doors. They are locked. We have to ring a bell, then another. A little window in the middle of the door opens. A face appears. Then the portal opens, and the cool, shadowy interior receives us silently. Locks click, and the gate shuts behind us.

  “Second floor,” the attendant replies to our inquiry. “To the right. To the end of the corridor.”

  White-clad attendants slip past soundlessly. We approach a narrow metal door with peeling white paint. Again we must press a doorbell, which prompts the opening of a peephole in the door, the flicker of an eye. We slip our visitors’ passes into a slot under the peephole and are admitted to a small corridor. The lock clicks behind us, and we are facing another metal door with peeling white paint, bell, peephole, and attendant. Finally we enter a spacious room. The walls are lined with rows of mesh cages.

  My legs are leaden. Tommy touches my arm: “This way, Elli.” I allow myself to be led to the cage next to the last on the left wall. In the cage lies a human creature in a dark blue hospital uniform, with hair cropped to the scalp and two enormous dark eyes fixed on the ceiling in an unflinching gaze.

  “Andy?” A faint flicker. A smile? No. A frightened shadow of a grin.

  “He has recognized you,” Leslie whispers. The frightened grin remains fixed, but the eyes continue their one-track stare. My God. Is this really Andy?

  I place my palm against the metal mesh. “Andy? Andy?”

  The eyes open wider. They become two black pools. The grin fades, and slowly a hand reaches toward the metal mesh and sweeps lightly the spot where my palm is flattened. Then the hand drops, and the eyes close. The face becomes the face of a corpse, drained of color and life.

  I turn around to face the others. “He is tired. He is very tired”. Their faces all have the same expression of bewilderment. “I think we should speak to a doctor or something. To find out why is he so … so tired.”

  Leslie speaks German best. “I will find a doctor,” he volunteers. “Wait for me here.”

  We all move away from Andy’s cage, as if afraid to wake him with our presence. The heavy silence turns each minute into an eternity. Finally Leslie returns.

  “A nurse told me he received treatment this morning. An electric shock, or something. The treatment is draining.”

  I tiptoe to the mesh. Andy lies in a stupor, and the metal grating casts a curious shadow on his inert features. Please, God, is he dead? Will he ever be himself again?

  “I think we should leave now. He is going to sleep.” Leslie is in charge, and we are grateful. We need a guiding hand to cope with this shocking, incomprehensible reality.

  We pass through a series of doors and locks on our way out of the building. The sun is shining, but the dark gloom of the hospital seems to follow us like a cloud all the way back to the colorful, noisy excitement of the Rothschild Hospital, our home.

  My Visits to the Hospital

  Vienna, July—August 1949

  To my surprise, the tall, thin doctor directs his words to me: “Fräulein, we have a problem. Mr. Stein refuses to eat. He closes his lips tight when the sisters attempt to feed him. This is very serious. One sister found out that he will eat only if Elli feeds him.”

  Now I understand why the doctor is talking directly to me. “You must be Elli. He speaks your name often. Fräulein, can you come to feed him?”

  “Yes, I can come.”

  “But there is a little problem. Mr. Stein wants you to prepare the
food. He will eat only the food that you cook. Is that a possibility? Can you bring the cooked food here, every noon?”

  “I don’t know how to cook. But my mother will do it, I’m sure. And I can bring it here. I can feed him. No problem.”

  Mommy instantly agrees to do the cooking. On a small hot plate we received from a former neighbor, she makes potato, bean, or pea soup, pastas, and omelettes. I balance the pots and pans so as not to spill the food on the bumpy ride in the streetcar. The most difficult task is spoon-feeding Andy.

  On the days when he receives treatment, his eyes do not focus, and he cannot open and close his mouth properly, so the food drips down the side of his face. It’s painfully embarrassing. I must be more careful, concentrate better, I say to myself. In time, I learn to feed him without a mishap. On the days when he does not receive treatment, Andy eats with obvious appetite, able to swallow without a mess.

  The treatments have a dramatic effect. They are electric shocks, administered directly to the brain. Daily I watch him get better and better. His eyes become more focused, and he starts to speak clearly. His hair begins to grow.