Side By Side

27

Warnings:
-Mentions antisemitism
-Mentions death/amputation/blood

George's POV

I was in shock when I looked at the two soldiers laying down on the beds we've spent weeks in. I was shocked after what I saw and how much strength these guys had. They both looked really young.

Ever since I wasn't allowed to go to school anymore for being Jewish, me and Karl hid in my house with my parents and his dad. We had no idea what was about to happen until we heard that the leader from the German army wanted to kill all Jews.

My parents started making a plan, but they both died during it... I didn't even exactly know how they died, but I figured they were shot when they walked on the street for longer than a minute. I cried for days, but realised I really needed to hide myself. Together with Karl's dad, we made up a plan so I wouldn't get killed too.

We evacuated from England and went to Belgium to this house in the forest. We spent weeks in a bunker that Karl's father made under this house. We had a small food supply, but it was almost running out now. We needed to be quiet and no one talked to each other in case someone would be able to hear us and then kill everyone single one of us.

Before today, there had been people, who spoke German, in this house. They didn't notice us at all and luckily left again without looking around...

I looked up at the boy who got shot twice. He screamed when Karl's father took out the bullets and bandaged his shoulder and his leg. The boy sat up again and loaded his weapon as he climbed back up to see if anyone was near. Once he noticed no one was, he climbed back down into our bunker.

'What's your name?' he asked Karl.

'Karl, sir,' he answered with a shaky voice.

'Don't call me sir, I'm probably just as old as you are. You saved me, thank you, buddy.'

Karl smiled shortly and nodded. 'I figured you were from the US army and came to save us instead of kill us.'

The boy nodded and opened his bag. 'Here, get something to eat. You must be starving. How long have you been here?'

'A few weeks to months, I don't even remember,' Karl's dad answered.

'Are you Jewish?' he asked, handing both of us a chocolate bar.

'I am,' I whispered, looking away.

'What's your name?'

'I'm George, sir- I mean,' I started, stuttering because I was really nervous.

'I'm Clay,' he answered. 'It's getting quieter again outside, I think we might have defeated them.'

'Am I allowed to ask your age?' Karl whispered.

Clay nodded slowly as he laid down. 'I'm seventeen. That's Sapnap, he's nineteen.'

'Did you want to join the army or did you get forced to?' Karl's dad asked.

'I wanted to,' Clay admitted. 'I started my boot camp before I even knew this war was going on. I wanted to fight for freedom and equality. I'm gay for the record and I've always wanted to prove that a gay soldier could be one of the bests.'

'Is that allowed?' I questioned with a quiet voice. 'I'm not homophobic, I thought it wasn't allowed.'

'It's not, but they fought for me because I proved them I was good enough before I was outed. Anyway, don't worry about it. You're best friends, right?'

'Yes,' I whispered. 'They aren't Jewish but they still went with me because my parents died in the war...'

'I'm so sorry to hear that. Where did you live before?'

'In England.'

Clay smiled at us. 'It was really nice meeting you and thank you so much for your help, sir, but we really need to go now and find our platoon again.'

'Good luck,' I mumbled as Clay stood up slowly, limping as he tried to get out. Sapnap seemed to be in a lot of pain which wasn't too weird after getting an arm amputated, but he got out too as they started to walk off.

I looked back at Karl who was curled up into a ball shape, shaking a lot. 'I stabbed that person... I feel so terrible.'

'You didn't kill him and by stabbing him, you saved that boy's life,' his dad answered. 'The soldier you stabbed was from the wrong side, he wanted to kill us.'

'I'm not a murderer, am I?' Karl sniffed, wiping a tear away.

I scooted closer to him and wrapped my arm around his shoulders. 'You aren't. You stabbed him and he wasn't dead. Clay shot him after that. Even if you would have killed him, you would have saved Clay's life with that and Clay is from the allies.'

Karl nodded slowly and rested his head against my shoulder as I stared at my feet.

'I should have never involved you in this, you would have been safe at home...'

'No,' Karl's father started. 'We decided to come with you because you lost your parents and an underaged boy can't take care of himself alone in a different country. We don't want to lose you because that would have broken us. You already lost your parents, we won't let you do this all alone.'

'I miss them so much,' I whispered. 'My last memory of my mother is that she gave me my favourite shirt back and took the star off to make me happy...'

'That's a beautiful memory,' Karl smiled, holding me tightly.

'I'm still wearing it.' I looked at my shirt and rubbed my hand over it. 'She touched this right before she died...'

I had tears in my eyes and Karl gave me a tight hug. We sat in silence for minutes while I softly sobbed while remembering my parents. I knew they were saver now, that was a comforting thought to me.

Minutes passed by and it was quiet outside as suddenly everything escalated completely. Someone entered the house again which caused us all to crawl as deeply into the bunker as we could.

I heard two people talk to each other in German and then I saw a trail of blood on the floor. They most likely saw it too when their footsteps came closer and closer. We all held our breath until the door to our hidden room was opened...

1065 words