24 May 2013 fiction, "Cartoon Moon"

It was a night with a cartoon moon. The kind that is so big and so full that you remember it for its obscurity; somehow in its size it becomes less detailed, more buffoonish. I remember that much about it.

I had sat down to another dinner alone. My husband was on a business trip, yet again. Traveling seemed to be the occupation; I had no idea what his actual meaning was in the world of economics. Regardless, I was sitting alone at the kitchen table, smiling at the ceiling with my hands folded. How wonderful that on such a night in 1942 I was able to resort to my primitive nature. Candles to save electricity, barely any food on the table to preserve rations. Sweet irony.

The knock on my door came like God thrusting his fist on my table to yank me out of my self-pity. It was sudden, sharp, shocking. After a few seconds of wary contemplation, I found myself trusting the outside world, and slowly I opened the door.

Standing on my porch bathed in the glow of the unflattering street lamps was a woman with an unforgettable face. She was beautiful, really. Full lips and high cheekbones, dominant eyebrows and brown eyes that sparkled. A tacky yellow star plastered on her right shoulder, and a bundle in her arms. We didn’t speak, but something told me to let her into the room. As she walked in, the bundle stirred and she stiffened. I invited her to sit on a chair, and she fell into it, with an unbelievable relief, one I had not ever and will never feel.

The warm glow from my candle was not enough to keep me out of the dark, so I turned on a light in the kitchen. Instantly I saw how haggard she was. Time dragged bags underneath her eyes, stress pulled at the very fabric of her beauty.

She caught her breath and cleared her throat. With a thick German accent, she spoke my beautiful French to me. Please Madame, I am a Jew in a world where the very letters of my religion rearrange to spell the word death. I do not ask you to save my life. I do not even ask you to feed me, nor to give me rest. I can be out of your life in less than ten minutes. Please if I could have your sympathy, take my baby. Have mercy on her. She is two months old, she has no chance to survive, not with me. She eats little, cries less. I do not care about anything except her. If anything in this world can be saved it mustn’t be me.

At first I was taken aback. To have this woman come into my home and expect so much was something only true desperation would bring. I found myself wondering how many houses she had tried before mine, how many times she had been turned down. Her eyes pleaded for mercy. It was a moment in my life when I felt my female instincts take over. This woman begged for help. She needed it, and who was I to say no to god’s will, god’s true meek right here in front of me?

“How will I explain her?”

“Call her a sister’s child, a niece’s illegitimate baby. Anything you like madame, please take her.”

She opened the bundle to reveal a sleeping child, beautiful and peaceful. Her eyelashes fluttered in her innocence. Only innocence can take an eyelid and bring compassion. Her little hand grasped the blanket, and I smiled. No children of my own, by no choice of my own. And here was a little miracle to reward me with a chance.

Only a woman starved for motherhood can understand what it feels like to fall in love with a child at first glance. To imagine her hair in neat plaits as she runs through wild grass, to recreate lullabies from childhood to sing to her.  Feeding her in the high chair, food ending up where it has never ventured before, pots and pans becoming musical instruments in her soft but strong grip. 

The woman opened her mouth to speak again, but I looked up before she could. “Oui. Yes, I will take her. It isn’t right to let a child suffer through such a hellish war, not like this.”

The light in that woman’s eyes was like nothing I had ever seen. Tears welled up in her eyes and she spoke from a ray of sunlight. To save her child was like nothing else. Such extreme happiness grasped at my arms that an embrace was the only way to greet it.

When we parted, her eyes were sad again. “Madame, I cannot stay here with you, the authorities are mere footsteps behind me. To hide will be the only way I will survive to see my baby again. Merci, thank you so much for your kindness.”

She looked down at the sleeping bundle then, and her face fell even more, if it was possible. She sat down again on the chair, and I sat down as well. Silence overtook us, and tears spilled from her eyes as she leaned down to kiss each closed eyelid. She began to sing what I assumed to be a German lullaby, and the child smiled in her sleep. The woman rocked her and rocked her, pulling the baby close to her chest.

When the lullaby was over, the woman spent one last long moment looking onto the tiny face with admiration. Memorizing each detail, giving herself something to fight for. She stood up and pushed the bundle into my arms, then leaned in to kiss me on both cheeks. “I cannot thank you enough.” She said with tears, and she opened the door quickly, shutting it behind her. The child’s eyes fluttered open and I threw the door open once again.

“Her name?” the child began to cry as she realized I was a stranger.

“Sandra.” The woman said as she ran from the porch. To turn around was to succumb to her baby’s cries, and that meant never to return her to this small sliver of a chance at life.

“Sandra.” I repeated the name quietly, and the baby turned her face to me, silenced in a moment by the magic of simple recognition. She fell back asleep and I felt a tear slide down my face.

~~~~~~~~~~~~

The night was overcast. The clouds were gray, and it was inspiring, the way they contrasted with the hallow purple sky. I remember how warm it was. Unseasonable, unreasonable, a small sliver of reward in the cool climate of my beautiful France. I remember that much about it.

Sandra and I were sitting down to dessert. Dinner had been simple, as it usually was. The divorce was final, and my ex-husband was officially moved out. 1950, a new era. My daughter was eight years old, eight years in my life and I still couldn’t help counting the seconds, as if they were to be snatched from me.

I honestly remember feeling as if I had made a deal with the devil. Not that the woman who gave Sandra to me was evil in any sense of the word, but because I felt an unreasonable bliss in what I had. I felt that my happiness was an emotion in an unbearably limited supply, and that any second without Sandra would be my eternity of suffering.

I don’t remember what game we were playing, but I had just stood up to put Sandra’s empty ice cream bowl in the sink, never turning my back on her because she was known to teasingly switch the pieces around. She never cheated, just found enjoyment in my confusion. The light flickered, and I heard a small knock on the door.

Sandra leapt up to open it, and my heart fell to my stomach. It was time for me to make good on my deal, I felt it. “Mama? Someone is here to see you?” I heard Sandra’s sweet little voice say.

I walked to the front door with careful steps and bated breath. When I looked up from the bowl in my hands, I saw a face I could never forget even if I lived for a thousand years. Beautiful tired brown eyes, and full gray lips. High cheekbones and eyebrows that made her seem serious and intimidating, though she was thin and haggard. She stared at her child, never for a moment looking away. My eyes flicked back and forth between the two of them.

“Madame? Would you like to come sit down? Let me get you a glass of water.” The woman looked up at me, and smiled with eyes I couldn’t quite read. She nodded and walked towards the kitchen, Sandra trailing her with eyes wide as the ice cream dish I had yet to put down.

We sat down, and I placed a glass of water in front of our guest. The bowl was on the counter, and I used it as an excuse to avoid sitting at the table.

When I finally did sit down, the woman smiled again, and looked at Sandra with caring eyes, then back at me. Taking the hint, I said, “Sandra, honey? Do you think you could give our guest and me a little privacy? I will come upstairs and get you when the time is right.”

Sandra nodded and bounded upstairs, the moment broken by all the prospects of enjoyment in her room.

The woman looked at her hands, and after a moment, she looked up and directly into my eyes, speaking once again my beautiful French to me.

Madame, I do not know what words I can say to you to express my gratitude. The beautiful child I saw before me, she is more than I could have ever imagined. She is healthy, she is happy, and that gives me strength. I feel as if I am on a cloud, floating somewhere I have never been before.

She paused for a moment to take a deep breath, and then she continued.

I will spare you the details of my story, it is long and full of suffering I wish never for you to imagine. I want to make something clear: I never want you to pity me. I do not wish to question why your circumstances were so much different than mine, nor do I wish to understand why a drop of your blood shed is different than a drop of my own. It is beyond my capabilities, and for now I would like to remain seated in your kitchen, with a glass of water in front of me and my beautiful baby girl seated only a floor above my head.

I simply want you to know how wonderful a thing you did for a stranger. Each day I woke up, when I was on the run and when I was eventually captured, I smiled at the simple fact that she was safe. I hoped each morning as I rose with the sun that at some point during the day she would open her beautiful eyes to see the same one. And as the sun shone, I hoped that she smiled and bathed in its glow, looked around her, and never once saw the things I did. And I hoped that as the seasons passed she and I felt two raindrops that fell from the same cloud and she remembered always the blessings of the life she lived. I prayed to a god I was not sure existed anymore that if he smiled upon anyone he smiled upon the gift of my daughter.

You did something wonderful for me, and I never wish to diminish the gift of life you renewed. This is why our visit will be short. Sandra is beautiful, she is wonderful, she will always be a part of my heart, but she is not mine to claim anymore. The baby I gave to you on that night is gone, and she has turned into a glorious child that I hope for years you cherish with the love I only wish I could. You gave her life, and to me you gave a chance to live for. Not a chance that someday I would return to claim my baby, but a chance that one day the war would end and the sun would shine and the suffering would die before me. The chance that one day I would return to see my baby again, to see her chest rise with breath and her eyes gleam with life.

She rose from the table, and I rose as well, confused and tearful. She walked around the table to embrace me, and I hugged her with more conviction than I have ever had for anything in my life. She had given me a wonderful gift, and yet I seemed to be the one receiving thanks. As she and I walked back to the front door, she gave one last look up the stairs, and then she opened the door and departed more quickly than she had come.

All of a sudden I understood. A twinge in my chest and I realized that no matter how hard I tried, there would always be a small part of motherhood that I would never truly understand. Sacrifice. The kind of love that takes a part of your being and moves mountains. I realized that no matter where I went, or what I did, or how long I lived, I would never love my Sandra more than her real mother. The realization stung, but it was also more beautiful than anything on this earth.