by Rebekah Pace
“Somebody—show yourself or I’m leaving. Last chance.”
When there was no response, I pinched my arm. It hurt, but I didn’t wake up. I slapped my cheek so hard the blood rushed to the marks left by my fingers. That turned my rage to panic and my throat constricted until I thought I would suffocate. Why couldn’t I wake up? Why was I trapped here in the memory of my childhood home?
The image of my father rose to my mind. Gentle. Patient. Kind. Vacant. He had spent too much time inside his own head, ignoring what was happening around us.
Why didn’t my father get us out of Germany before it was too late? He was supposed to protect us. How could he let such awful things happen to Mutti and me? I picked up a stone and threw it with all my might, shattering the workshop window.
Chest heaving, I picked up another stone and ran a few steps toward Mira’s, but I couldn’t bring myself to damage her home. Instead, my anger turned inward. Just like Vati, I had failed. I hadn’t protected Mira and hadn’t done enough, after the war, to build the kind of life I should have had. I knew that.
Casting the stone aside, I jumped up on the garden wall and began to climb the apple tree. I was higher than the rooftops when I shook free my toy airplane and watched it coast gently to the lawn.
I’d once heard someone say that it was impossible to die in one’s own dream. It was time to test that theory. Near the top of the tree, I slipped and scrambled for a foothold. My arm grazed the jagged bark, and as I clung to the branch, heart racing, I watched the blood trickle down my arm.
High above the rooftops, I shouted one last time to rouse someone. “Mutti! Vati! Mira!” When there was no reply, I swung out, feet dangling above the network of branches between me and the ground. I let go.
5
Threadbare sheets. Age spots on the backs of my hands. Faded numbers inked on the inside of my arm. This was reality. I was old, but I wept like a little child over the young man I would have liked to be, thinking even as my tears fell what a putz I was. It had been many years since a dream had left me so emotionally drained. Then, I had dreamed that I saw my parents walking on a city street. They were young and dressed in the style I remember from my childhood, before we were taken away. I ran to catch up, calling out to them, but I could not make my way through the crowd fast enough, and it swallowed them up.
My parents had been lost to me nearly my whole life. Maybe my subconscious never accepted it. Maybe it hurt so much to remember them because I hadn’t honored them the way I should have. I imagined how disappointed they would have been by the course my life had taken.
I rolled over and something slid across my neck. I grabbed at what I feared was a cockroach, but instead, I clutched the hard metal of Mira’s locket. I didn’t have to look at it, because I knew it by touch. When had I put it on?
There was a scab on my arm where I’d scraped myself on the rough tree bark. At my age, a cut like that would take a week or more to heal, but this one was half-mended already. Strange. I couldn’t remember scraping myself on anything else in the past few days. Maybe it happened during the bodega robbery. Did I have other injuries as well? A concussion? I sat up and pressed all over my head, checking for a bump or bruise.
The clock read 9:30, and I hadn’t heard Vashon come in. I felt rested, like I’d had hours of uninterrupted sleep. With my thoughts still half in the dream world, the routine of boiling water for coffee and toasting a bagel seemed lacking. I wanted my mother to cook me breakfast. I wanted to see my father off to work.
Mira’s locket hung heavy against my chest, and I clutched it again. I always kept it safely put away, never lying around. How did it get to be around my neck?
In the closet, I rummaged on the shelf until I found the right shoebox and brought it to the kitchen table. Inside, a piece of silver cloth lay folded, just as I’d left it, but as soon as I picked it up, I could tell it was empty. Maybe I got up in the middle of the night, put on the necklace, refolded the cloth, and put the shoebox back on the shelf without waking up. Maybe I was completely meshuggeneh.
Someone familiar with the old ways, like either of my grandmothers, might have been able to interpret the dream for me. They probably would’ve had a theory about how the necklace came to be around my neck, as well. My parents would have scoffed and insisted that messages delivered in dreams were the stuff of fairy tales, and fairy tales were not logical or real. They would say I had simply forgotten I had put the necklace on.
Long before lunchtime, thoughts of the dream drove me out of my apartment. Outside, it was noisy. It was real. Cars, buses, and people crowded the street, streaming past me as I headed for the bodega at an old man’s pace.
As the bell on the door signaled my arrival, Benny looked up, surprised. “Pete—what are you doing here this time of day? You all right?”
“Yes, I am thinking so.” I took out my wallet. “First I must be paying you for the groceries.”
He shrugged. “I don’t want you to worry about that.”
“I will be worrying if I am not paying you. How much?” I handed two twenties across the counter and he gave me back my change. An awkward silence fell as I shoved the bills into my wallet and put it back in my pocket. As much as I wanted to talk about the dream, I didn’t know how to explain it to him. “Was I hurt yesterday during the robbery? I am not remembering when this happened.” I showed him the scrape on my arm.
He peered at it. “Gee, I don’t think so. That looks pretty well healed.”
“I have thought so too. Was I getting a bump on the head, maybe?”
“I don’t know, but if you think you did, you should probably visit your doctor.”
“Yes, maybe. Benny, are you having a grandmother or someone who knows about the meaning of dreams?”
He shook his head.
“Are you ever having dreams that seem real, even after you are waking up?”
He shrugged. “I don’t usually remember my dreams, but I don’t think it would be unusual if you had a nightmare last night.”
“Was not a nightmare—but is not leaving my brain now that I am awake.”
“I’m all ears if you wanna talk about it.”
“Well, I was waking up in my bed—at home.”
“But you were in a parallel universe, exactly like this one?”
I knew he was kidding me. “No, it was my bed in the house where I was living when I was a boy. Everything was being perfect—but not so perfect, right?”
“You were upset after the robbery. Maybe your brain needed to show you someplace safe, so you could get away from what was bothering you.”
“The dream was nice, but it wasn’t, also. My family, they should still be alive in this place, but they were not there. I wanted to leave. But now all I am thinking about is to go back.”
“I’m sorry, Pete.”
“Is okay. I should be paying attention to what is here, in front of me. Still I am needing to fix the music box.”
“It’s all right. Don’t feel like you have to.”
“But I am wanting to.”
“Then no rush, all right? Promise me.”
“Yes, yes, all right, I promise.”
The damage to the inner workings of the music box was much worse than when I’d first found it, and I worked into the evening, peering through a magnifying lamp as I shaped new tips to replace the broken ones on the cylinder. Though I had hoped the delicate work would require all my attention, still I couldn’t put thoughts of my old home out of my mind. When I turned off the lamp, leaving the job unfinished, I went to bed hoping to have the dream again. I laid my hand over Mira’s locket and cradled it against my chest.
***
I could tell before I opened my eyes that I was back. The air smelled too clean for it to be my Weequahic neighborhood. Just as I had the first time, I bounded out of bed with ease and stuck my head out the open wi
ndow. When I heard violin music, my heart swelled until I thought it would burst out of my chest.
I dressed in record time and ran my hands through my hair. There was no time to find a comb. Such thick, wavy hair I never had in my life.
Dashing downstairs and out the back, I vaulted the garden fence. This time, the Dutch door and the windows in the Schlosses’ garden room were thrown open, and I held my breath in anticipation as I drew near.
Mira stood in the center of the room, violin tucked under her chin, eyes closed as she drew the melody from the strings. The soft breeze carried out the notes like a long and satisfied exhale.
Somehow, I had wished her into my dream. Without disturbing her, I let my eyes feast on the woman I’d longed to see for so many years.
She was young, like me, and lovelier than I could have imagined. Her skin glowed with good health, and her hair, darker now than when she was a child, fell in glossy curls that brushed against her shoulders as she worked the bow over the strings. Tears welled up in my eyes at her blissful smile. She looked as though she’d never known an unhappy day in her life.
“Mira.” When I tried to speak, a hoarse whisper was all that came out.
She stopped playing and laid the violin on the table. “Oh, Peter! I was hoping you’d come by today.” She ran to throw her arms around my neck, and we laughed as we clung to each other over the half door.
“Is it really you?”
“Of course, it’s me.”
“You look so happy.” As she opened the door and joined me in the garden, the gold locket on the red silk cord sparkled at her throat. I brushed my hand across my own chest. The locket I’d been wearing was gone, but I didn’t take the time to puzzle that out. I was only interested in Mira. “And you’re a knockout! Gorgeous. I was afraid you wouldn’t be here. Oh, Mira, you don’t know how good it is to see you and hear you play. It’s been so long.”
The ground rumbled under our feet like an earthquake, but with the answers to the questions that had been burning inside me for seventy-five years within reach, I wasn’t about to let a little tremor get in the way. “What happened to you?”
A look of alarm crossed her face as the earth trembled again. “Nothing happened. I’m right here.”
“No, I mean the day you disappeared from Theresienstadt. Where did you go? I never stopped looking for you….”
This time the earth tilted so violently that I lost my balance. She reached out, but as I tried to take her hand, a swirling wind, like some kind of reverse gravity, sucked me away and I grasped empty air. Her voice, calling my name, echoed in my head as everything faded to black.
I woke with a start, like I’d been dropped from midair and landed on my bed. I was back in Weequahic, tears on my cheeks and Mira’s name on my lips. The pain of losing her seared as hot as if it had been real, and not just a dream. Even worse, the last thing I had said to her was a lie.
Could I go back into the same dream? I glanced at the clock. I had hours until sunrise. I took a deep breath and held it, closing my eyes as I consciously relaxed the muscles in my face, my arms, my legs. Don’t think . . . don’t think . . . don’t think . . .
The violin’s last note faded away as I opened my eyes.
“Oh, Peter! I was hoping you’d come by today.” Mira set the instrument on the table and ran to throw her arms around my neck. We laughed as we clung to each other over the half door. Her surprise at seeing me was genuine. Did she not remember I’d just been there minutes before?
I stuck to the script. “Is it really you?”
“Of course, it’s me.”
“You look so wonderful. And happy.” As she opened the door and joined me in the garden, the gold locket on the red silk cord sparkled at her throat. I took both her hands in mine and looked her in the eyes. “Where were you the night you should have played in the concert at Theresienstadt?”
No sooner had the words left my lips than the world tilted again, and I awoke back in my bed in Weequahic.
Undaunted, I took another deep breath, settled back against my pillow, and started over. Don’t think . . . don’t think . . . don’t think . . .
Again, when she rushed to greet me, nothing in her manner indicated that I’d been there—and disappeared—a few moments before.
Assuming I was about to make another hasty exit, I took a moment to appreciate the warmth of her hands in mine before I spoke. “Where were you when you heard Hitler had committed suicide?”
This time when I found myself back in bed, I got a pen and scratch pad out of my nightstand drawer and wrote a list of the questions I had asked. Then I lay down and tried again.
Don’t think . . . don’t think . . . don’t think . . .
“Where did you live after the war?”
“Did your hair turn gray when you got old?”
“Did you have any pets?”
“Where were you when the Berlin Wall came down?”
“Where are you now?”
She met every question with the same bemused expression, which melted into a look of concern as the world tilted and spat me out of the dream.
Everything I’d asked pertained to things that took place after I last saw Mira. And it all got me banished back to my present.
I’d had to fight my way out of the dream when I was there alone. Now I couldn’t stay for more than a few minutes—unless, it seemed, I stopped asking questions.
But why?
Perhaps Mira was what I imagined she would be, no more, no less. Maybe she couldn’t answer questions I didn’t know the answers to.
I’d never had dreams in which I realized I was dreaming. Now I would continue the experiment. If I could avoid speaking about anything that occurred during the seventy-five years since I’d seen Mira, would I remain with her as long as I liked?
It wasn’t a difficult choice. I’d rather be with her than know the answers to any of those questions. Don’t think . . .
Mira set down the violin and ran to the door. “Oh, Peter! I was hoping you’d come by today.”
I threw my arms around her and buried my face in her hair. “I’m here.”
6
When Hitler became chancellor in 1933, there were more than eleven thousand Jews living in Leipzig—the sixth-largest Jewish population center in Germany. Leipzig was somewhat insulated from the increasing sanctions against Jews because its international trade fair brought people to the city from all over Europe. In the early days of his regime, Hitler was not ready to let other countries know how badly the Nazis treated Jewish people.
That Germany’s Jewish citizens had made significant contributions to the nation’s success in medicine, banking, education, commerce, and the arts no longer mattered. As part of Hitler’s Aryanization of Germany, the government confiscated Jewish businesses, including Mr. Schloss’s garment factory, and transferred them into German hands. The new manager was one of Mr. Schloss’s long-time employees, and a family friend. He relied on Mr. Schloss’s advice to run the business and paid him under the table.
After my father was barred from teaching at the university, he was able to find steady work doing odd jobs and repairs for other Jewish families, in addition to his role at the Lehrhaus. On the days he did not accompany Mira and me to the school and teach class, he left for work in coveralls, with the leather strap of his toolbox slung over his shoulder.
I was ten years old when Mira’s father’s factory burned to the ground during the pogroms known as Kristallnacht, the Night of Broken Glass. Mr. Schloss had kept up the payments on his insurance policy, but when he filed a claim, the government confiscated the money, saying that as a Jew, he owed reparations for the riots. Without the insurance money, neither he nor the new manager had the funds to rebuild. Once the business closed for good, Mr. Schloss took in tailoring jobs. Though he struggled financially, he insisted Mira continue with her viol
in lessons.
After Kristallnacht, one of Hitler’s advisors recommended Jews be required to wear the Star of David on their outer clothing, since it was hard to tell on sight who was who.
It was true of my family. If you’d seen us in a park or at a museum, you wouldn’t have immediately recognized us as Jewish. We all had fair complexions and light brown hair. My father and I didn’t wear yarmulkes or prayer shawls. My mother dressed in the same style as other young German housewives.
European Jews had been forced to wear distinguishing badges or clothing as far back as the thirteenth century. The practice had been abandoned in the 1800s—until the Nazis brought it back. The yellow Star of David was meant to set us apart, but for the first time, I experienced solidarity with other Jews.
When deportations began in the weeks following Kristallnacht, those who could bribe government officials to get visas fled the country. My father applied for us to immigrate to Palestine, but we were so far down the queue that there was no hope. Jews were being turned away from America. Poland and Czechoslovakia had fallen to the Germans. We could not escape Nazi-occupied territory.
These were all things I could have talked about with Mira in the dream—but I did not want to.
***
Earlier that same year, my father had been elected to serve on the Judenrat, or Jewish Council. As Jews from all over Leipzig were forced into ghettos, the Judenrat took responsibility for reestablishing the social services that were now denied to Jews. Without their intervention, the burgeoning ghetto population would have been without food distribution, clinics, orphanages, schools, and care for the elderly. Though the council’s purpose was to serve the Jewish community, the German administration pressured its members to enforce anti-Jewish laws and regulations.
Even with his position on the council, I heard my father tell my mother we were not safe. It was just a matter of time before the Gestapo came pounding at our door. I lay awake most nights, listening for the inevitable rumble of trucks, the tramp of boots, and shouting. But when they finally came for us in April 1939, it was without any of the expected warning signs.