Good luck homing pigeon

Chapter twenty nine: When an angel get's her wings (27th January, 1945)

To those few who are watching, please note this as an important chapter. And note the date especially, if you know your history on this.

They came for us at dawn.

When Briana had felt brave enough, she'd snuck into one of the kapo's empty barracks and swiped a thin, white sheet and a proper duvet. Why? Because she'd decided, starting that night, that we'd sleep side-by-side. Our rescuers had to be getting closer, hadn't they? Together, we only thought it right we should meet them as a family. Or, whatever honorary family we could've been. So the moment I was strong enough to move about from the waist up, I'd helped Briana set up our miserable, basement room to look at least  a shadow of what we could call home. I used a long broom to sweep across the short square of dirty, concrete floor, while Briana used her new-found linen to make the cot look almost like a normally made bed. After it was done we sat beside one another, eating the rich, creamy potato soup Briana had swiped from the kitchens. I just felt so damned relieved that I could finally eat upright, without Briana spoon-feeding me, I wanted to do it as much as possible. As nice as it felt, being cared for so tenderly, I needed not to feel like a cripple. The war took many things, but it couldn't take my mobility.

Did I know that this supper was going to be my last supper as a prisoner? Of course not. If I did, it wouldn't have felt nearly as shocking. We simply ate our soup until the bowls were wiped clean with our fingers, drank the canteen of ice-cold water 'till the very last drop was swallowed, and until we felt tired, I told a new fairy tale for Briana. Not one with Jacques, or Annamarie. But with a boy, known as the Robin, and a girl he called Pigeon. How together, they were the happiest pair Paris had ever known. But when an evil King from an opposing country abducted the duo, they were torn apart and thrown into two, separate dungeons-both far away from one another. It was hard for Pigeon to be away from her Robin, but even in the darkest depths of those dungeons, sometimes they could find one another. Just for minutes at a time, but it was the greatest gift to her-greater than anyone could ever know. Once, she thought they really could be together forever. But alas, the evil King took them both in his clutches. With his fat, greedy hands, he tore the wings clean off the pigeon, leaving her to shrink in the dust. And the Robin, he was thrown back in his dungeon and forced into ignorance. He didn't know whether his pigeon was dead and free, or alive and wingless. But in the end, he did make her a promise. That he'd find her. Wherever she was, whatever happened, he'd always find her.

I don't think Briana knew what to make of the story; she'd said she wanted us to be completely honest with one another, but whenever I talked about me and Angelo, she just froze. Was it really that unbelievable to her that I could fall in love with him? Back at school, Angelo had his fair share of admirers too. Girls, in love more with the image of a tough-skinned, trouble-making boxer than they did of Angelo himself. And by the way things were beginning to grow between us, we would've ended up together anyway. But then if we were still in Paris, at least I would know of his well-being. Waiting for our rescuers to come each day was another day I would wonder what happened to him. But they did come-at the earliest signs of dawn did they march through the tall, black gates of Birkenau; decked in their foreign, like saviours sent from God to bring us our long-awaited salvation.

We were sleeping when the first sign of life outside roused me from my slumber. Briana, who had her arms around me, was still snoring silently at my side. Softly as possible, I shook her 'till she blinked softly up at me. She must've thought one of the soldiers were up there when I told her to 'shush'! But when she realised it couldn't have been, she'd sprung up from the coat-still dressed in her nurses uniform, and took me off the bed with her. I had no clothes when she'd brought me here, so she took the clean sheet off the cot and wrapped it round me-swaddling me like an infant. She had both arms around me as we made our way out the steel door; I was still unsteady on my feet, and yet more than strong enough to see what stood beyond these windowless, brick walls.