“That’s enough,” shouted a guard. “Put your shovels down in front of you and stand in a line.”
The prisoners stood shoulder to shoulder along the edge of the mass grave. Stephen stood between Viktor and Berek. Someone screamed and ran and was shot immediately.
I don’t want to see trees or guards or my friends, Stephen thought as he stared into the sun. I only want to see the sun, let it burn out my eyes, fill up my head with light. He was shaking uncontrollably, quaking with fear.
Guns were booming in the background.
Maybe the guards won’t kill us, Stephen thought, even as he heard the crackcrack of their rifles. Men were screaming and begging for life. Stephen turned his head, only to see someone’s face blown away.
Screaming, tasting vomit in his mouth, Stephen fell backward, pulling Viktor and Berek into the grave with him.
Darkness, Stephen thought. His eyes were open, yet it was dark. I must be dead, this must be death….
He could barely move. Corpses can’t move, he thought. Something brushed against his face, he stuck out his tongue, felt something spongy. It tasted bitter. Lifting first one arm and then the other, Stephen moved some branches away. Above, he could see a few dim stars; the clouds were lit like lanterns by a quarter moon.
He touched the body beside him; it moved. That must be Viktor, he thought. “Viktor, are you alive, say something if you’re alive.” Stephen whispered, as if in fear of disturbing the dead.
Viktor groaned and said, “Yes, I’m alive, and so is Berek.”
“And the others?”
“All dead. Can’t you smell the stink? You, at least, were unconscious all day.”
“They can’t all be dead,” Stephen said; then he began to cry.
“Shut up,” Viktor said, touching Stephen’s face to comfort him. “We’re alive, that’s something. They could have fired a volley into the pit.”
“I thought I was dead,” Berek said. He was a shadow among shadows.
“Why are we still here?” Stephen asked.
“We stayed in here because it is safe,” Viktor said.
“But they’re all dead,” Stephen whispered, amazed that there could be speech and reason inside a grave.
“Do you think it’s safe to leave now?” Berek asked Viktor.
“Perhaps. I think the killing has stopped. By now the Americans or English or whoever they are have taken over the camp. I heard gunfire and screaming; I think it’s best to wait a while longer.”
“Here?” asked Stephen. “Among the dead?”
“It’s best to be safe.”
It was late afternoon when they climbed out of the grave. The air was thick with flies. Stephen could see bodies sprawled in awkward positions beneath the covering of twigs and branches. “How can I live when all the others are dead?” he asked himself aloud.
“You live, that’s all,” answered Viktor.
They kept close to the forest and worked their way back toward the camp.
“Look there,” Viktor said, motioning Stephen and Berek to take cover. Stephen could see trucks moving toward the camp compound.
“Americans,” whispered Berek.
“No need to whisper now,” Stephen said. “We’re safe.”
“Guards could be hiding anywhere,” Viktor said. “I haven’t slept in the grave to be shot now.”
They walked into the camp through a large break in the barbed-wire fence, which had been bit by an artillery shell. When they reached the compound, they found nurses, doctors, and army personnel bustling about.
“You speak English,” Viktor said to Stephen as they walked past several quonsets. “Maybe you can speak for us.”
“I told you, I can’t speak English.”
“But I’ve heard you!”
“Wait,” shouted an American army nurse. “You fellows are going the wrong way.” She was stocky and spoke perfect German. ”You must check in at the hospital; it’s back that way.”
“No,” said Berek, shaking his head. “I won’t go in there.”
“There’s no need to be afraid now,” she said. “You’re free. Come along, I’ll take you to the hospital.”
Something familiar about her, Stephen thought. He felt dizzy and everything turned gray.
“Josie,” he murmured as he fell to the ground.
“What is it?” Josie asks. “Everything is all right, Josie is here.”
“Josie,” Stephen mumbles.
“You’re all right.”
“How can I live when they’re all dead?” he asks.
“It was a dream,” she says as she wipes the sweat from his forehead. “You see, your fever has broken, you’re getting well.”
“Did you know about the grave?”
“It’s all over now, forget the dream.”
“Did you know?”
“Yes,” Josie says. “Viktor told me how he survived the grave, but that was so long ago, before you were even born. Dr. Volk tells me you’ll be going home soon.”
“I don’t want to leave, I want to stay with you.”
“Stop that talk, you’ve got a whole life ahead of you. Soon you’ll forget all about this, and you’ll forget me, too.”
“Josie,” Stephen asks, “let me see that old photograph again. Just one last time.”
“Remember, this is the last time,” she says as she hands him the faded photograph.
He recognizes Viktor and Berek, but the young man standing between them is not Stephen. “That’s not me,” he says, certain that he will never return to the camp.
Yet the shots still echo in his mind.
HARLAN ELLISON
Mom
If you have been blessed with a Jewish mother, then you know there are four things she wants for you: (1) You should be healthy; (2) you should be successful, a doctor, maybe, or if you have to choose second best, then a lawyer, but you must make enough money so you should have a good life and make the neighbors and relatives grind their capped teeth with envy; (3) and now we’re getting to the heart of the matter, you should marry a nice girl who can make you a nice family, even if she can’t cook as well as your mom; and (4) this is the most important, she must be Jewish.
Now it’s up to a mother to give her son a little push here, a little push there, to make sure he’s doing the right thing. Isn’t that right? And a mother who loves her son would try to help him even if, with God’s help, she passed away into the next world, for what kind of mother could rest in Heaven knowing that her son wasn’t settled…?
IN THE LIVING ROOM, the family was eating. The card tables had been set up and tante Elka had laid out her famous tiny meat knishes, the matzoh meal pancakes, the deli trays of corned beef, pastrami, chopped liver, and potato salad; the lox and cream cheese, cold kippers (boned, for God’s sake, it must have taken an eternity to do it), and smoked whitefish; stacks of corn rye and a nice pumpernickel; cole slaw, chicken salad; and flotillas of cucumber pickles.
In the deserted kitchen, Lance Goldfein sat smoking a cigarette, legs crossed at the ankles, staring out the window at the back porch. He jumped suddenly as a voice spoke directly above him.
“I’m gone fifteen minutes only, and already the stink of cigarettes. Feh.”
He looked around. He was alone in the kitchen.
“It wasn’t altogether the most sensational service I’ve ever attended, if I can be frank with you. Sadie Fertel’s, now that was a service.”
He looked around again, more closely this time. He was still alone in the kitchen. There was no one on the back porch. He turned around completely, but the swinging door to the dining room, and the living room beyond, was firmly closed. He was alone in the kitchen. Lance Goldfein had just returned from the funeral of his mother, and he was alone, thinking, brooding, in the kitchen of the house he now owned.