I've been Challenged Once, Given Coffee Twice

One April Morning

One April Morning

Hunger...
Fear...
Cold...
Pain...
Hunger...
Fear...
Cold...
Pain...
Which one worst than the other? Which one did I choose to feel first... or ignore first?

It has been two days of silence and inactivity. The heavy iron doors were locked -like every night before- two nights ago but no one has come to open them since then. No forced labor, no abuse, no more r*pes... No food either.

Twenty - well, eighteen, because two men died yesterday of cold and starvation- agonizing specters of humans confined in a ten by ten room smelling each one's feces, urine and vomits. We've been reduced tu scum, bones and a few threads of flesh and blood infested by lice and fleas, parasites that suck off what is left of us while we sleep.

Where have the soldiers gone? Why did they leave? The sun has risen and then set without any changes. I guessed we've been left to die inside this horrid place. Anything was better than living in the way I was for the last year. Deprived from liberty, home, family, love and dignity we were invaded, conquered and enslaved and treated like sh*t by the Nazis. I rather preferred to be killed in one of those gas chambers with the rest of my family or being incinerated than living like we were. Everyday was another day to experience hell on Earth.

That morning the air felt different... It smelled different -besides the acrid smell of rotten meat, blood and excrement- and somehow light and serene. I slept the whole night for the first time. I was the only woman in the camp. A Jewish nurse was useful for both prisoners and soldiers, in more than one way. For an extra bit of me I was given a decent plate of food at least once a day... And that had kept me alive for a longer time than the rest of the group. We were about one hundred when we were brought here.

I decided to get up from bed and revised the famishing men still alive. In that precise moment it was heard an explosion in the distance, but close enough to make the floor of the structure vibrate. There was a great commotion inside the barracks. Even the weakest ones sat up straight.

Another explosion! This one a lot more closer. I ventured to peep out the six by six inches squared window and there was a huge column of smoke and fire in the main gate of the camp.

"What is happening?" The prisoner standing next to me asked me.

"I don't know Benjamin. There's a lot of smoke and fire but I can't see anything else." I replied moving from the peeping hole on the wall.

The sound of biplanes, tanks crushing concrete and rifle detonations was deafening.

"I think we should get off the walls." I told the group.

And so we did and gathered in the center of the barrack. We were all trembling, expecting the worst. A minute later, I distinguished the voice of men screaming in another language amongst the chaos outside... It was not German! It was English!

"British! Or Americans are here!" I spoke out loud and I ran again to the small window. "Hey! We are here! Help! We are here!" I screamed to make them notice we were locked inside.

In that moment the heavy iron door was thrown making a glorious thumping noise. The light that came through the opened gap was the light from heaven, and the faces of the American soldiers glowed like the faces of the angels as we were finally rescued in that April morning.