Nina Ruble
"I hope it goes away soon."
"Huh?"
Selig looked into Amelie’s robin egg eyes the best he could as he waited for an explanation.
"The pain."
Selig smiled a weak smile and cringed at the pain it caused.
The girl frowned before speaking again, “I wish-"
"Gute Nacht"
Amelie instantly muted herself as she heard that voice. They quickly hid between two buildings, trying their best to hide from the Gestapo. He was by far the most brutal Gestapo officer to ever patrol their town. His name was Felix Schmidt. Schmidt was not, ‘spitting in Jews' faces’ mean, he was absolutely psychotic. There were numerous occasions where he beat to death young Jews, always between 3-13, and often just because he was in a bad mood. He was always in a bad mood, so much so that his major brutality forced them to make him take the night shift.
The Nazis couldn't have anyone feeling bad for the children.
Amelie and Selig knew that Schmidt’s presence only meant one thing, it was past 7, past the time Jews were allowed to be out.
"You should go, Mellie," he wearily said.
"What? No!" Selig's suggestion was appalling to her.
"If he sees us together, he may hurt you, too."
"There's no way I'm letting you just walk up to that bastard in your condition, you’ll end up dead in minutes," she whisper-shouted.
Mellie would never, ever abandon her friend. She could tell he was terrified, probably more for her than himself even, but she certainly was not. Mad about all the shit the Jews got in town, yes, but not even a bit afraid. Ok maybe a bit, but she ignored that part for Selig’s sake.
"What are we supposed to do, then," he sighed, knowing she would respond like that, but wishing she didn’t.
Mellie was a force to be reckoned with. If she saw something that was unjust, she’d quickly get involved and stop it. Even before the Nazis invaded Warsaw, she stood up for almost everyone. Most people in town were perplexed by how a beautiful Aryan girl would spend her time defending the Jews when the war began, but she didn’t care. Selig loved that about her. They’d been friends since they were toddlers, and no matter how many people tried to tell them their friendship was wrong, they never thought twice about it.
So here they were, hiding away from the police after dealing with violent bigots barely an hour prior. A group of Aryan boys had found the two talking with one another in a remote location and convinced themselves that Selig was manipulating poor little Amelie Astel, beating him half to death before the young girl pushed them away. She wasn’t going to let it happen again with someone even worse, so she quickly picked up a stone nearby and threw it across the street into a store window.
"Scheisse Mann," Schmidt grumbled at the sound of shattering glass, walking towards Mellie’s desired distraction to make sure a Judensau wasn’t trying to go somewhere they weren’t supposed to be.
Amelie and Selig quickly dashed into a burnt building that was once owned by a young entrepreneur named Gabriel. Everyone in town knew his kindness, but there were parts of him that only this unconventional pairing knew about.
They used to stop by his store every day to help him out. At some point they learned he was Jewish when Selig was struggling to remember his favorite part of the Torah after all of them had been destroyed in their town. Gabriel kindly helped him, quietly showing them the Star of David necklace he hid in his pocket, knowing they wouldn’t say anything about it.
One day Amelie was visiting Gabriel’s store on her own, hoping to get a gift for her mother. While roaming the aisles she heard Schmidt begin to beat a young Jewish girl with his baton. He wanted the girl to admit she stole a toy from a non-Jewish store, not even giving her a chance to respond between blows. Gabriel heard the ruckus outside, knowing that, in actuality, the girl was borrowing the toy from a friend. He told Amelie to stay inside and left to intervene. He was one of the few people she actually listened to, though her driven personality still ran her over to the front door so she could listen to them argue. So, technically, she was still doing what she was told.
Their voices were too muffled for her to hear every word they said, but she managed to understand the conversation’s focus points. Gabriel wanted to take the girl's "punishment," only to have Schmidt tell him he only harmed "Jewish pigs," which Mellie doubted. He was too angry and hostile to have only hurt Jews.
From what she could see the young girl was almost dead, bruises scattered on her body with her face coated in red. At first, she was just choking on tears, but now she was choking on some blood too, and everyone just watched. There was gasping and whimpering, chuckling and smiling as Gabriel began telling Schmidt to stop, his voice getting louder as he grabbed at the Gestapo officer’s arm and stood between the girl and her assailant..
"Stop, you bastard! She's just a child," he screamed, pushing against the man in an attempt to move him away.
Schmidt then yelled at him in a tone Mellie had never heard before. He claimed what he was doing was police business, somehow looking even more hostile than usual.
He lifted his baton up again as the child closed her eyes and covered her face. Before he could land another blow, however, Gabriel grabbed the side of Schmidt's bloody baton and pulled at it. Without hesitation he was violently pushed, the Star of David necklace falling out of his pocket as his body hit the ground from the force. Before he could hide it away again Schmidt completely stopped what he was doing and looked at the necklace on the floor.
“What is this," an unnerving calmness blended with his words as he picked up the necklace, “WHAT IS THIS," he abruptly screamed in the other man’s face.
Gabriel stayed silent, barely flinching when he was hit in the face with Schmidt’s baton and grabbed by his shirt.
"You're a Jew," the strange calmness returned, still only receiving strong eye contact and silence from his victim as he questioned the man.
Amelie fearfully looked at the girl still lying on the ground, waiting to see what would happen between the two adults. She was relieved that Schmidt’s back was turned to her while he screamed at her friend.
"Say it," he demanded, hitting Gabriel again, "SAY IT!"
Gabriel continued his silence, inspiring Schmidt to stand up straight and throw his baton to the side. As the officer rolled up his sleeves and clenched his jaw the entrepreneur had just enough time to look towards Amelie and give her a silent order.
"Are you a Jew," he hovered over the man again, getting on his knees this time as he grabbed Gabriel by the shirt again, yet he still received silence, “are you a Jew," he violently slammed the man’s head into the ground as a final warning.
Still the kind man remained silent as Amelie followed through with their plan, trying to ignore the newfound sound of her friend getting punched repeatedly. As quietly and quickly as possible the Astel girl pulled the other child into Gabriel’s store, locking the door behind them. With shaky arms she hid behind the store’s counter, flinching at Schmidt’s returning screams as she placed the little girl’s body in her lap. She couldn’t have been much older than 6, if that, and yet here she was, sobbing in Amelie’s lap with a tinge of pink in her tears.
"It's ok, it's ok," she repeated to the child, trying her best to be comforting, "you're ok."
Mellie held the whimpering girl as she continued listening to what was happening outside, tears now running down her face, too.
'Why won't he just tell the truth,’ she wondered.
But Gabriel refused to give Schmidt what he wanted, too angry to fully feel the blows to his face anyway. He knew the child-beater wasn't going to stop punching until he got what he wanted, but Gabriel decided dying with his pride intact was better than giving any damn Nazi what they wanted, knowing that keeping the truth of his faith hidden when the Nazis first arrived at Warsaw would get him killed too.
Amelie wanted to run outside and help, but for the first time ever she was too afraid to. The gurgling coming from the girl on her lap, alongside the screams of pure rage was too much. The last thing she heard was a raspy, “fuck you,” coming from the man who she had never heard cuss in her life, and then everything blurred.
When her focus returned, she felt a coldness against her skin and silence surrounded her. She looked down and started crying again. The little girl’s face had no color on it except the splattering of red, her eyes wide open and expression sorrowfully relaxed. Her crooked teeth stood out as well, a couple of gaps in them. Amelie wondered if they were caused by Schmidt or if the girl just lost her baby teeth prior to the altercation. She imagined the girl excitedly telling her parents about it and earning a proud smile back. Her mother would’ve probably even given her a, “good job, sweetie,” as well.
Sweetie, darling, my love; all these names were easy to imagine, but what Amelie couldn’t imagine was the girl’s name being used. She didn’t know her name. She knew absolutely nothing about her, except the way she looked while drowning in her own blood.
More tears filled her eyes as she moved out from under the girl, shakily crawling away from the body, whimpers escaping her lips. She sat against the wall, head tilted up, feeling strands of her own honey blonde hair cover the puffy redness of her cheeks. Her breathing was fast and rigid until she noticed the blood still splattered on her arms. Then she went silent, frozen in place for a moment before she hastily stood up and ran to the sink nearby. Without thinking she pulled off her sweater, violently washing away the blood on her hands before realizing what she was doing and turning her head towards the store’s entrance. She instantly noticed the bloodstains on the pavement in front of the store, thankful she was in enough darkness to take it in without being seen. Then she looked back at the girl, staring at her corpse, willing her to wake up as if she were asleep. Maybe Gabriel would even come out of the storage room to sit and wait with her, but she knew neither of those things would happen. Amelie glanced at her sweater and sighed, ignoring it to instead remove Gabriel’s jacket from a hook on the wall. She wanted to tell someone, about the girl, about Gabriel, but she wasn’t sure she could.
‘Dziękuję, przyjacielu,’ she thought to herself, putting on the jacket and breathing in the familiar smell.
Now that smell was gone as Amelie led Selig into the store through the back door, replaced with the smell of smoke and ash. They cautiously sat against what used to be a wall separating the main room and back room, keeping themselves hidden behind it while they took a moment to rest.
"That was close," the young boy quietly took a deep breath as he watched his friend through swollen eyes.
"Yes, it was," the blonde replied, looking around.
"Hey, Mellie," Selig earned the girl’s attention as he moved a bit and groaned, "thank you for helping me."
They stared at each other for a moment before the Astel girl looked away again.
"I just didn't want that bullshit copper to kill you," she retorted as she continued analyzing their surroundings, not seeing what she did as a choice.
"I mean with those jerks earlier today too," he responded.
Again, yelling at people like that felt necessary to her, not optional.
"They almost killed you, Selig. I wasn’t gonna let them succeed," she finally said.
Then she continued looking around once again.
"It still took a lot of guts," he praised, noticing her lack of eye contact before following the movement of her eyes, confused.
"I guess."
There was a long pause, but then Selig spoke again.
"Are you okay? You seem so on edge," he asked, earning a long, exhausted sigh.
She glanced back over at the young man before responding.
"Yeah, I’m-,” she tried to remain calm, “-I’m fine.”
They talked for a bit longer, becoming more comfortable in their hiding spot as they did so. At some point Amelie began ranting about some creep staring at her, making Selig laugh quietly when she mentioned kicking the guy's shin. He loved the power she held over everyone, but something kept eating away at him. Soon enough Amelie wouldn’t be able to save him. If the rumors about redlining Jews and Christians were true, no matter how hard she fought, she wouldn’t be able to stop it. They would be separated, he had felt it coming for a while now, and judging by the way he and his people were already being treated, it wouldn’t be pretty.
Without thought, Selig leaned his head against Mellie’s shoulder, startling her a bit. They weren’t supposed to touch each other, whether they had different religions or not, it was inappropriate. Of course, they’d touched each other before, but not in such an intimate way since they were little. He expected her to shove him away when he realized what he did, but instead he felt her hand run through his hair. They smiled at each other and stayed like that, comfortable in the silence for a moment as they waited for the Gestapo man to leave their area. Amelie pulled one of Selig’s ice-cold hands into the sleeve of her baggy jacket, warming it up with her own.
‘Dziękuję, przyjacielu,’ she said in her mind again, ‘Dziękuję Ci.’