The White Rosebush

Chapter 7: The German and the American

Chapter 7: The German and the American

 I woke up the next morning to realize Andreas was missing from the bed we were sharing. I jumped up with a start, feeling a moment of temporary, unjustified panic, but it quickly faded as I saw him sitting in a chair by the radio. He gazed at me comically, as if wondering why I was having a conniption, but his humor didn't last. He looked concerned. It unnerved me when he was like this; I was looking toward him as my only source of security at this particular episode of my increasingly stressful life. I was almost annoyed, as selfish as I realized it was. I can't get angry at him, I scolded myself internally. Rather than cursing his apprehension, I decided to take a different approach and offer him comfort

"Something wrong?" I asked him, moving off the bed and towards to radio.

"Shh. Listen," he whispered. I looked at the radio unnecessarily, as if I was expecting to gain something by both listening to and watching the motionless box. The words coming out from it were thick with static; if it weren't for my family's habit of listening to the radio rather than purchasing a television, I probably wouldn't have been able to understand a thing. Even now, however, even with all my years of dealing with unclear radio broadcasts, I was only catching pieces of it. From what I understood, it was warning of unidentified planes, possibly Axis, flying over England.

"It could be anything," I assured him.

"Yeah, right," he muttered, his expression blank. I then knew why he was so worried; if these planes were indeed German, life would become much more miserable for him.

"Germany isn't the only country involved in this war," I moaned in an imploring tone. "It could be Italian or Japanese." His face didn't change. "It could even be an ally!" I snapped, getting frightened by his unchanging fear.

"And what if it isn't?" he asked me softly.

"We'll worry about that later."

We?" he asked, his voice growing in volume. No."

"No what?" I asked in a puzzled tone.

"Amy, there IS no 'we'. There's just me, alright? You shouldn't be here with me. That will look so bad if something happens and you're caught alone with a runaway German. What if your parents think I kidnapped you or something? This entire caper was just dumb. We're going home today and are going to forget all of this ever happened."

"I'm not." He obviously thought I wasn't being serious, because he repeated,

"We are."

"No, I'm not, Andreas, and you can't make me," I said with such authority in my voice that I surprised myself.

"I'm not getting you in trouble," he growled.

"And I'm not going home. It's not just a matter of wanting to be with you."

"Then what is it, Amy?!" he yelled. "What, in your deranged mind, is possessing you to stay with me now and not go back to a family that loves you!?"

 "There's nothing for me there! You can't understand that, can you?" I could feel angry tears sliding down my face. "I can't stand them, ANY of them! My sister is going to drive me to kill myself if I can't get the hell away from her!"

"And what about your mum?"

"She has Jennifer, her perfect daughter," I spat.

"Really Amy, Jenna is her perfect daughter?" he asked doubtfully. "You two are twins; identical in every way." I gawked at him for several seconds, my mouth hanging open and my eyes wide.

"How can you say that?"

"Isn't that the point of twins?" he asked savagely.

"There IS no 'point' in twins! We don't have any more reason to exist as any other person, and we aren't identical, Andreas. I can't believe you even said that to me. I'm nothing like her, she's nothing like me." I could feel my temper boiling.