Choices

I wish I had paper to write on and a pen to write with. I am sure in some bright future that I will never see, that my words could be used to show why falling prey to division, no matter how noble it may seem to be, can only ever lead to pain and misery.

That propping one group up at the expense of another, just means you are standing high on a pile of corpses.

In these final moments of life, I find myself journeying back to childhood. Back before this new war, in the aftermath of the first one. Germany had suffered a great loss during the great war.

Whether you believed in the war effort or not, you could not deny what the loss meant for Germany.

We were a country falling apart at the seams. That is the world my brother and I grew into.

Our childhoods were amazingly happy, considering the state of our nation. It was as if in having nothing, we had learnt to appreciate the little we had and find joy in even the smallest moments.

We were close, Karl and I. Closer than most brothers I think. Eighteen months apart in age, most thought us twins. Though I looked up to him as many little brothers tend to look up to their big brothers.

Both of us met girls in college. These women would later become our wives.

Claudia, was from a well off, but not wealthy Jewish family who were very traditional. We were from a Catholic family, that like many, was not overtly so. We went to church and confession and then tended to forget about god in between. So converting to Judaism, did not seem like an issue at the time.

The next few years were the happiest of my life. Two daughters born in the space of three years, a good job at the local bank and my brother by my side, as we young men conquered the world.

Then a man of passion and charisma came onto the scene and began to whip the nation into a frenzy. Slow to start, it built up momentum. Adolf Hitler would within a few short years become Fuhrer of Germany. That would start the madness that has become Germany’s new reality.

It started innocuously enough. With talk of the Jewish problem. It really was quite clever. The Jews were made into the reason for all of the woes of Germany. They were the reason things were going so badly. They had all the money and all the power.

It began to not matter that a person might be friends with Jews and even know that those people were no better off than they themselves were. once the word Jew had become synonymous with scum, all of us were suddenly the same.

One day, my brother came to visit. I had not seen him in some time and was beginning to get worried. Germany was not a safe place anymore. Claudia’s parents were talking about getting out of Germany, as were many Jews. The idea being that if we removed ourselves, the problem would go away.

My brother walks in wearing an army uniform. He has joined with Hitlers army and will proudly serve Germany as they gain their former glory, he tells me. There is a zeal in his eyes I have never seen before. The zeal of the fanatic.

He takes me aside and tells me I must leave Claudia and her family. He said he had done all he could, but if I didn’t come with him now, then I was at risk as well. When I asked what he had done, he said. “They asked if we knew any Jews, were we related to any? I told them the truth. You are no true Jew brother, this is not your family, I am your family. Come abandon them, come with me now and join Hitler in making Germany what it once was.”

I was beyond horrified. I told him to leave, that I would not abandon my wife and children. He tried again to convince me, but I was resolute. He left then, shaking his head.

When I went back in with my wife and her family, I told them what had happened. We decided that now was the time to go. We got what we would need together, leaving so much behind and we tried to leave. We never made it. German soldiers stormed in, smashing down the door and surrounding us before we could move.

My father in law began to stand to demand what this was all about and had his head smashed in with a rifle butt for his trouble. Before we could react we were all beaten to the ground and dragged from our home. The last I saw of my Father in law, was his lifeless eyes staring at the ceiling as if asking god “Why?”

What happened next was a blur that I can only describe as a living nightmare. We were separated, housed in cold cages. My boots were stolen by a German soldier. Forced to march for so many days. Watching as members of our group fell down either dead, or about to be. The soldiers didn’t ask them to get up, they just shot them where they lay.

Sometime along the way I noticed lumps on the ground, before long I realized they were the bodies of others, left where they were, frozen in the snow.

Somehow I survived the march. We thought we were the lucky ones. We were not. In the weeks that followed I wished for that cold death. because then the pain would be over. Beaten, starved, forced to work until we dropped. Then the final indignity, when we were of no more use. To be led into a building that we would never come out of.

Even in this misery, something occurred to me however. There were some truly evil men here. The type that enjoy inflicting pain, that smile as they beat you down. But there were also some that were here because they felt they had no choice.

You could see it in their eyes. They dared not say anything, or do anything wrong. because they could easily end up being us, or worse. because while a Jew was a monster to them, a Jew lover was far worse. That was a traitor to Germany, lower than the lowest scum.

We saw one. A guard refusing to beat a prisoner to death for some imagined infraction. He was beaten himself and the prisoner shot in the head. In the end it did nothing. The guard lasted three days before being shot himself.

Four days ago some new troops arrived. A new man was put on the building we all dreaded to enter. It took me a moment to recognize him, but when I did I almost cried out. It was Karl, my brother. He was now in charge of the final moments of every Jews life in this camp.

I tried once during the day to get his attention, but was ignored by him. The soldier in charge of our work detail noticed however and beat me until I couldn’t stand, then pissed on me for good measure. He was one of the ones that enjoyed it.

A few days later and we are back to the present. I stand now in a line of men going to the building we all fear. But I no longer fear it. I welcome it. This world has nothing for me. I have no idea what has happened to my wife and daughters, though I hope they were spared what many of our guards joked about happening to our women.

I am tired, I feel over one hundred years old, although I am not yet forty. I passed despair and into a cold clarity beyond it days ago. Now I only wait for the end. It seems an ironic thing that the brother that betrayed me, will be the one to end my life, but also fitting. For even with all of this, he is still my brother.

We are marched into the building slowly, to let the fear build. Some men are crying, others have lost control of their bowels from the smell. I however am calm. I look up and find my brothers face. Trying for one last look at the man whom I would have given my life for once and who was now taking it from me.

I caught his gaze and realized he knew! he saw me. There were tears welling in his eyes and he gave me an almost imperceptible nod and a look of such sorrow that seemed to say " I am sorry little brother, I wish this was not happening!”

Finally we broke eye contact and I was marched into the gas chamber. My last thought before life fled was a wish, almost a curse I suppose, that my brother, the one who had taken away all that I held dear, would live a long, long life. That Hitler would fail and my brother would live.

Why? Not to live in pain, although I am sure he would. Because maybe, just maybe, having made the greatest mistake someone can make, having betrayed ones brother for the evil ideas of an evil man, he would be able to tell the world.

Perhaps, he would go forward and tell them to not be beholden to any ideology that puts one group of people higher than another. That anything we do in hate, can never be a good thing. The ends will never justify the means. If the only way for you to get what you want is to hurt other people…you are not the good guy.

Of course, as I said. No one will ever read my story. I have no paper to write on, no pen to write with. I go now into death. Into paradise or oblivion, I do not know, though I welcome either.