Four Scraps of Bread Read Free

bitten.
    One day one of them was cheeky enough to disobey its master: it rubbed against my leg without hurting me. Could the animal feel my affection?
    This sensation, buried deep at the time, and its encounter with my numbed heart, remain vivid in my memory.

T HIRST
    The distribution of soup and drinks at Birkenau 6 was so disorganized that when it came my turn to offer up my metal bowl, there was nothing left.
    I had not drunk for several days. I was thirsty: my lips were full of cracks, my tongue was swollen, and my senses were completely numbed. I would have thrown myself into the next puddle if my companions had not been there to stop me. Your pupils dilate, your eyes grow wild—people think you have gone crazy.
    I must have drifted into unconsciousness, since all I can remember is the sensation of life coming back to me.
    I felt drops of water. Where were they coming from? I only found out later. Other prisoners whom I did not know came to my aid, performing miracles just in time to save me. They have no names or faces in my memory. I do not know if they are alive or dead. I know that I owe my life to them.
    I saw other prisoners dying from dehydration.
    One time, I knocked into one of these almost dead skeletons without realizing it at first. They felt the bump and moved their leg. That is a painful memory. I could not save them: it was too late. As for me, I had been lucky once again.

E DWIGE
    Edwige was a former Auschwitz deportee turned block commandant.
    I can still feel her whip cutting into my body, and her powerful slaps. I can still hear her hateful insults: “Hurry up and die.” “Pity is a crime.” “You are nothing but useless mouths.” “Kindness is futile.” “We are all enemies.”
    Cries of pain, groans, and our exhausted silences irritated her and made her beat us harder. Older faces were particular grounds for cruelty: “You are stealing bread from the young ones!” she would yell. “Why is it taking you so long to die?” I saw prisoners collapse at her feet; she would kick them to death or finish them off with the riding crop.
    She played the game of death so casually, more concerned with taking care of herself, and dressing up in all that she had stolen.
    She gave out hot tea in the mornings with one hand, and randomly hit us with the other, yelling to try to get silence and minimize the chaos. She dished out only just enough to fill the bottom of our cups and used what was left in the huge kettle to do her ablutions in front of us.
    At the end of a long day, there she stood at the door of the barracks, clean, fresh, and wearing a new outfitthat she had traded our bread for. How many paid with their lives to fill Edwige’s wardrobe?
    It took me thirty years to remember Edwige’s face. Spring has come back to my heart because I can now talk about her without being overwhelmed by a mudslide of hatred. She was the daily temptation to despair. She was the one among us who had been trained to be just like our executioners. But how could I forget the painful deaths of my fellow prisoners? How could I forgive her look of contempt and her cruel laughter at seeing that we had lost everything?
    What became of her? I have no idea, but I know that for me she remains a troubling mystery.

M Y B LANKET
    My blanket is a loving clown with a face whose color has drained away.
    On good days
    It serves as a pantry:
    stolen beetroots and jams
    armies of vermin
    swarming all over them
    leaving brightly colored streaks.
    With wounds in our flesh we gouge out
    a path for senseless convoys.
    At night, exhausted,
    I wrap myself up in its worn-out warmth
    as if to forget.
    It also whispers to me in its threadbare voice:
    â€œChin up!
    You have to carry on.
    You are not allowed to weaken.
    Feelings kill, don’t forget that!”
    You have to allow yourself one certainty:
    that this nightmare will end.
    Even if believing on your own is