The Things We Cannot Say(124)

CHAPTER 39

Alina


Everything worked just as we’d hoped and just as we’d planned, except of course for the very important exception: Tomasz was not there to see it. Saul and I were taken directly to the US embassy in London. Word was sent to Henry’s brother in America, and we were told we’d have wait for his arrival.

In the meantime, we were offered comfort like we wouldn’t have dared to dream of during the years of the occupation—clean linen, hot baths, treatment for the lice, more food than we knew what to do with. The staff even arranged a translator for us—and sourced for us a hacksaw.

When the air hit my forearm for the first time in all of those months, I looked down and saw the wrinkled, pale skin left behind, and I sobbed with relief as I reached to scratch it freely.

The cast had fallen into two pieces on my lap, and nestled within the lining was a roll of film as expected—but also, right beneath it, a folded piece of leather—a texture and color I immediately recognized as cut from the corner of an old satchel my father had owned.

“What is this?” Saul murmured, but I shook my head, bewildered. “Did you see him put this in there?”

“I was distracted...” Saul carefully pried the film container from the plaster and handed it to the translator for safekeeping. But as soon as this was done, Saul returned his attention to the cast. He lifted one half, stared down the line of his cut, and smiled to himself.

“Well done, Tomasz,” Saul said softly, then he glanced at me. “He knew where we would cut the cast.”

He very gently pried the leather out from the layers of plastered bandage, peeled off some residual plaster, then unfolded it. But as soon as Saul took a look inside the makeshift pocket, he passed it to me.

“It’s for you,” he said softly. “A letter.”

He stood then, squeezed my shoulder gently in reassurance, and he left me alone. My hands shook as I opened the leather pocket, and a piece of paper fell out and onto my lap.

Alina,
Perhaps I’m sitting beside you as you open this, and you’re laughing at me for doubting for even a second that we’d make it. But war is unpredictable, and life itself these days is risk. I just don’t know what’s going to happen and I can’t bear the thought of us being separated without reminding you of who we are.
Moje wszystko, the love I feel for you has been the fire that fueled my desire to be a better man. Until we are reunited, I will be longing for you, and I won’t rest until you are back with me where you belong.
Till that day—be safe, my love.
Tomasz
As I read that letter for the very first time, all I felt was guilt—an immense wave of sadness and regret that threatened to swamp me. I should have waited for him. I should have stayed. I pressed my fists over my mouth and pressed hard against a scream that surged as I considered a series of unbearable possibilities: What if Tomasz had arrived at the camp in the hours since I’d been lounging here in luxury in London? What if he was waiting at the gates even as I left, locked outside because of the overcrowding? Why didn’t I think to double-check that? Why didn’t I wait just a little longer? Why didn’t we discuss what I should do if he didn’t arrive before the British soldiers?

But the letter had fallen onto my lap, beside the fragile curve of my stomach, and when I looked back down to it I was reminded of why I’d agreed to leave with Saul. It was a reality that did not yet feel real, one that I still forgot myself at times.

Our baby.

If Tomasz knew we had made a baby, he’d have wanted me to do anything within my power to reach for a safer life for that child, even if it meant we were separated for a little longer. And there was no doubt in my mind even then that Saul had been right—pregnancy in the camp was a tenuous prospect at best, and caring for a newborn in those conditions all but impossible.

I had done the right thing, I promised myself. It might be a few extra weeks or months before Tomasz found me, but I calmed myself by refocusing on his promise that he would.

In the week at the embassy as we waited for Judge Adamcwiz, Saul and I made a new plan. We would meet with the judge together, and we’d admit the truth about who we really were. It only made sense—there was no more need for subterfuge, and surely Saul’s testimony would be all the more powerful once the judge understood it was actually personal experience.

But beyond the judge’s visit, we knew we couldn’t stay at the embassy forever, so Saul and I were hopeful that someone would help us find accommodations elsewhere in Britain. Saul would try to reconnect with the Polish army eventually, but until Tomasz arrived, he’d stay to help me find some kind of life here during the waiting.

My morning sickness had resurged since we arrived in London—partly because after years of a starvation diet, the heavy, rich foods on offer were both tempting and cruel to my fragile stomach. The night of the judge’s arrival, I was particularly sick, and in the end I spent the evening in our room riding the waves of nausea. Saul had to meet with the judge on his own—but this didn’t concern me. If the judge wanted to interview us about the suffering back in Poland, no one could give a better account of that than Saul Weiss.

Saul returned at our room very late that night, but he was unexpectedly pensive, his brow furrowed and his lips pinched. He fussed over me as he always did—tucked me into the blankets and checked that I’d been keeping up my water intake.