my own face redden as I explain, but Gosia barely blinks. She must have heard of all kinds of arrangements.
“Oh, Zofia, it’s good to see you again.” Gosia puts her hands on my cheeks, and I put my hands on hers; we touch our foreheads together. “I’ll come tonight. I promise.”
She tells me the names of a few nearby stores that are open and friendly, where I might be able to pick up food to prepare for dinner. When I get home, I climb the stairs again, preparing to apologize to Dima for the length of the errand.
And at the top of the stairwell, I see it. Tucked in Mrs. Wójcik’s flowerpot, where I’m sure there was nothing before, is a tiny flag, the kind children would wave at a parade, and on that flag is a swastika.
GOSIA COMES THAT NIGHT WITH GIFTS: A BLANKET. TWO extra pairs of underthings. A packet of laundry powder for my clothes and a bar of soap for myself, white and medicinal, not like the soft brown bars we used to buy from the shop. “The rationing isn’t as bad as it was before,” she explains. “But everywhere has been out of soap this week. I took this one from the clinic.”
“Thank you.” I’m grateful for what she’s brought, but the overly eager way she hands me the bundle—I can immediately tell the items are an offering to make up for bad news.
“Salomon couldn’t help.”
Her eyes lower. “He didn’t see him. He didn’t remember seeing him at all there.”
“I see.”
She moves to take my hand, but since I’m still holding the bundle, she ends up taking my wrists instead. “Salomon asked me to apologize. He said he would have looked out for Abek—he wanted you to know that. If he’d known Abek was there, he would have tried to look out for him.”
I can hear Salomon’s guilt spilling out of Gosia’s mouth. But I don’t blame him. The camp was the size of a small city. Salomon’s not being able to remember seeing Abek didn’t mean anything.
It just means I need to look harder. It just means I need to write more letters. Tomorrow I can go talk to Salomon myself.
Dima walks in from the dining room, broad smile on his face, kissing Gosia’s cheeks in a way I’ve learned is considered merely friendly for Russians, not overly familiar. She startles in surprise but rearranges her face by the time he pulls away.
“You are Zofia’s friend? It’s my pleasure to meet you.”
“Gosia, this is Dima Sokolov, whom I told you about. He’s also invited his commander to join us for dinner. So it will be a little party, if you don’t mind.”
“I am going to meet him now,” Dima says to Gosia. “Zofia, you have everything you need? For cooking?”
I nod, and when he leaves, Gosia raises her eyebrows. “He’s handsome.”
“He’s been nice to me.” I gesture for her to follow me to the kitchen, but she holds back, uncertainty on her face. “Gosia?” I ask. “Was there something else?”
She looks back toward where Dima just exited the door. “Salomon mentioned something—I don’t know if it’s useful. But, he said the Red Army liberated Birkenau in January.”
“I know that,” I tell her. “Dima already found that out.”
“But, listen. Before the liberation, Salomon said, they started to transport people away. The SS knew the Allies were coming, so they were trying to evacuate the camp before they arrived, by sending prisoners farther into Germany. Salomon didn’t go; they left him in the infirmary, and the camp was liberated a few weeks later.”
Evacuated. This is what happened at Neustadt, too. Roused from our beds, told to abandon the looms, told to walk for days in subzero temperatures until we reached Gross-Rosen on the fuzzy border of the Reich. Our evacuation didn’t outrun the Allies for long: the Red Army liberated Gross-Rosen a few months later. But if the camp had been deeper in the Reich—the Allies didn’t reach central Germany until late in the spring.
Now I see why Gosia didn’t begin with this information. There are two ways to read it, a bad way and a good way. Either Abek was in Birkenau for liberation and he should be home, or…
“Abek went to Germany,” I say.
“No, I mean, I don’t know.”
“But Salomon didn’t see him in the infirmary? He didn’t see him left behind?”
“No, but—”
“Gosia, at the time of liberation, was there anywhere else he would be?” I ask. “In the infirmary, as Salomon was, or