But now she realized this was no delusion; it was very much reality. Whatever chemicals the women were stuffing into the shells, had taken possession of their bodies and turned them into creatures of horror. Suddenly she wished all of this would end. Soon. She yearned to fall asleep and never wake up again.
But as always when she was truly desolate and ready to give up, Mindel’s smile and the trusting look in her brown eyes spurred her on to stay alive – for Mindel.
“What’s happening to us?” she asked, looking at the other women for answers.
But there were no answers.
A foreman came over and shouted at her, “No dawdling, Jew. Get back to work!”
When finally the horn sounded to mark the end of her shift, she was even more forlorn than usual. Even if this nightmare ended, would she ever be the same person again?
She barely noticed the long walk back to the camp in the darkness, only lit by the torches of the guards. By now, she knew the way by heart and could have walked it with her eyes closed. The shock about her becoming orange sat so deep, she wished she could step out of the poisonous shell her body had turned into and find a new home for her soul.
If she even had a soul left.
At the camp the Kommandant was in a foul mood, letting the women stand still for hours, while doling out punishments for the slightest irregularity. The woman in front of her was sentenced to kneel on a log of wood for the rest of the evening.
Rachel had never done this, but she knew it was a cruel thing. Not many women made it through the torture, because they collapsed from the excruciating pain and were then discarded. Today, she put out of her mind the woman in front of her without the slightest hint of compassion. If she’d had the energy, she would have shrugged and said, “Such is life!”
After hours standing out there, rain began pelting down on the women. Within minutes Rachel felt like a drowned rat and the incoming wind tugged at her clothes, making her shiver.
To add insult to injury, the Lagerkommandant disappeared into his dry, warm office and sent die Schwarze to be in charge. Clad in a long raincoat, a fashionable cap, and with two prisoners in tow holding an umbrella over her, she strode along the rows of miserable women, searching for her next victim.
At last, Rachel felt an emotion well up in her petrified heart. Unadulterated fear. Susanne Hille’s penchant for cruelty was unparalleled. She had a plethora of creative punishments in store, one more atrocious than the next. The sadistic woman bathed in the misery of others and the more pain she inflicted, the happier she seemed to become.
Despite the raging panic in her body, Rachel managed to take on the posture of a rock: immobile, unfazed, eternal. As much as she sometimes longed to perish, she wouldn’t give the Schwarze the satisfaction of doing so at her hands.
The woman standing next to Rachel started coughing, just as Susanne Hille walked past her. The guard froze in her tracks, turned around, and for a moment Rachel could see deep into her cold eyes. She all but recoiled from the impact of getting a glimpse into that soulless monster. If Susanne Hille wasn’t the devil incarnate, then Rachel had no idea what she was.
Not a human, certainly.
A split-second later, the guard lashed out at the coughing prisoner with her truncheon, accidentally scuffing Rachel in the process. Rachel’s skin flared with pain, but she somehow managed to keep her lips pressed together, not uttering a syllable.
To her right, the poor woman who received the full impact of the punch screamed with pain, as the vicious guard struck her again and again. Rachel forced herself to stare straight ahead and keep her horror locked inside, willing her ears to become deaf and her heart to return to numbness.
She hated herself for being so apathetic, but she simply didn’t have the energy to feel compassion for the other woman. She truly had become an animal, exactly the way the Nazis wanted them to be.
Nobody spoke about the incident. Ever. These days the women rarely spoke, because it took up too much energy, but the main reason was that if they didn’t talk about it, they could pretend it never happened and that the nightmare they perpetually endured wasn’t quite as horrible as it really was.
13
Laszlo never managed to get onto the transport. Weeks later, he still moped around about the lost opportunity, especially because Ruth and her parents had been amongst the lucky ones.
Mindel, though, was quite happy to have her friend by her side, although she didn’t say so and pretended to be sad for him.
One day someone came up to her, saying, “Hey, little girl!”
“Are you talking to me?”
“Yes. You asked me about your sister a while ago. Do you remember?”
Mindel didn’t remember, but nodded anyway, since she had probably asked every person in the Star Camp about Rachel.
“Is she your only family member?”
“Yes.” Mindel squeezed Paula close against her chest as a wave of loneliness assailed her. “Just the two of us. I need to find her.”
The woman squinted her eyes. “Who’s taking care of you?”
Mindel shrugged. What kind of question was this?
“Anyone?”
“Laszlo.”
“Is he a relative? A cousin maybe, or an uncle?” The woman frowned.
Mindel shook her head. “Laszlo is my friend.”
A suspicious expression crossed the woman’s face. Mindel knew that look, it was the adult look, meant to let her know that this was all wrong. “Exactly how old is this Laszlo?”
“He’s seven and he cares for me very well.”
The woman shook her head. “I’m sure he
