‘Matilda.’ Magda and Cibi say together; they know the details of their sister’s ordeal.
Magda shivers. ‘I think we all have one memory that stands out above all the others.’
‘Well, you both know mine.’ Cibi sighs.
‘The blanket girls,’ say Livi and Magda.
Cibi nods, also shivering.
‘I don’t know yours, Magda,’ says Livi. ‘Do we, Cibi?’
‘Well, I have a few jostling for the top spot.’ Magda smiles sadly. ‘But there’s one I come back to more than the others. Do you remember that day Volkenrath brought me to Auschwitz?’
‘When she didn’t tell you where you were going?’ says Cibi.
Magda nods. ‘She didn’t say one word the entire journey, but it was before she ordered me into the car. I was in the sorting room, miserably opening those parcels for the dead, when she came in and called my name.’ Magda swallows. ‘Well, I’d made a friend there, a girl my age, she was Czech and she had a sister at Auschwitz. She asked me to pass a message to her, to tell her that she was fine and trying to find a way to get back to Auschwitz herself.’
‘Did you?’ Livi asks, wondering why she has never heard this story.
‘I found out her sister was dead. I could have sent word to her with one of the prisoners who was still going to Birkenau to work, but I didn’t.’ Magda hangs her head.
‘Will you tell us why?’ asks Livi.
‘I think I know why,’ says Cibi.
‘I imagined myself as that girl receiving the news that you or Livi was dead.’ Magda draws a deep breath. ‘I couldn’t stand the thought of it, so I just forgot about her.’
‘Only you didn’t,’ says Cibi.
‘In that inhuman place we still managed to feel guilty.’ Livi shakes her head in wonder. ‘Can you believe it?’
The children are all crying now; even Oded has woken from his dreams and is grizzling for food. Livi puts him on her breast while Magda and Cibi rustle up some food in Livi’s tiny kitchen.
‘Eat,’ says Magda, passing Livi a plate piled high with latkas. ‘They’re good for your milk.’
Livi pops one into her mouth and chews. The children are bouncing on Livi’s bed and no one tells them to stop.
‘I think I would like to live in this moment for ever,’ Livi says, taking a smaller bite of another latka. ‘I’m with my sisters and our children and .?.?.’
‘And we have latkas and, if I’m not mistaken, some of Ziggy’s excellent wine for later,’ says Cibi. ‘You know, one day we’ll be grandparents, maybe even great-grandparents.’
‘You won’t live that long, Cibi. As the eldest, you’ll go long before great-grandchildren,’ says Livi, giggling.
‘I might be around, you never know. Well, I’m just wondering if we’ll still feel the same about each other.’
‘Of course we will,’ says Livi. Oded has fallen asleep again and she takes him through to his bassinet in her bedroom. The cousins are fast asleep on her bed, exhausted by their bouncing.
‘Let’s have a glass of Ziggy’s excellent wine, shall we? Just a small one?’
Magda shakes her head and points to her belly. ‘I’d like some orange juice, though.’
The sisters raise their glasses and, as one, they say: ‘To Mumma.’
Magda thinks of the last time she saw their mother, in that classroom. She and her grandfather were insisting they accompany Magda to wherever the Hlinka were taking her, but she had reassured them she would be back soon, even though she knew it was probably a lie.
Magda watches her sisters as they sip their wine and munch on latkas. She was deferring her mother’s pain, she realises, it wasn’t much more than that. A small act of kindness and that’s what binds these sisters now: small acts of kindness, of consideration. They no longer need to renew their vow to look after each other, as their promise is as much a part of them as their children. But, all the same, she raises her glass once more.
‘To the promise.’
The sisters clink and the children, all at once, wake up.
*
Four years after the birth of her son, Livi and Ziggy are blessed with a little girl. They name her Dorit. Odie relishes his role as big brother, protector of his sister and, in his mind, his Ema.
EPILOGUE
Rehovot
December 2013
‘T
hey’re here! Oded, take the lift and bring back your aunt! I can’t wait to see Cibi,’ yells Livi.