On the way to Switzerland

                                                                On the road to Switzerland

         I rounded the corner, breathing hard. The sound of their boots in hot pursuit of me kept me going. I glanced over my shoulder, but I couldn’t see them in the thick fog that encased the city of Stuttgart. When I turned my attention back in front of me, I narrowly missed tripping over a hydrant, which was in the middle of a walkway.
         Under the gray sky, though it was hard to see, I made out:
                                                    Switzerland, seven miles ahead.
There was a gunshot, narrowly missing my arm, which was shielding my eyes while I squinted at the sign. I shrieked, and then covered my mouth. Yelling might give the Nazis a clue of how far away I was.
         Ducking behind the cover of a tree, I tried to shrink myself so that I was hardly visible. I reached into my pocket and pulled out the locket mother gave me before she was captured. On one side, a very tiny aquarelle of an Edelweiss flower.  In the other was a picture of my family, now imprisoned at a concentration camp. The pictures gave me hope, and always reminded me of how mother was a genius at painting and how genteel my family was.
         “Where did the little Jewish girl go?” I froze. They were here. They were going to find me. Also quite possibly kill me.
         “Search this area!  She may not get away!” The man ordered. I shoved my locket in my pocket and my fingers closed around my father’s genuine aquamarine ring.  Tears filled my eyes as the sound of boots crunched near my tree under the dried grass.
         “Sir, I mean no disrespect, but I’m sure the rest of us are tired. Can’t we just leave her be? She’ll probably die of fatigue by the time she reaches any city in Switzerland.”
         My eyes shoot open in shock. Would someone be as generous and brave to ask to let me go? The probability was small, but I was still grateful that someone would risk their life for me to go happily to Switzerland.
         The tension of the request is hanging in the air.  Through the bushes I saw guns go down as people turn to their commanding officer hoping for a response. “Ja, but only once though. Jews are cowards and not that smart. Perhaps you are right.  But we cannot let this happen again. If it continues, we might not know which side is good or bad.”
          I watched as the group trudge over to their commanding officer and salute. “Did you hear about the hydrogen bomb that The United States dropped on Hiroshima, Japan?”  A voice said. It was far off, so I figured I was safe. A small thought popped up in my head. Even though Germany had invented the subaqueous U-boats, and other deadly items, Japan was an ally for the Axis Powers. If it dropped out of the war, would that affect what happened to Germany and Italy?  From the time I started running away from Berlin, that’s all I heard about. What if the Allies do win the war?
          I am too busy pondering this to notice the tears of that relief filled my eyes when a voice says, “Help replenish the Jewish population.”  A small bag of slightly warm food lands near my side. It has fish on it, and momentarily I’m whisked back home, standing in front of the aquarium, with my first fish in it. The tears finally spill over, and when I turned to see who could be so kind, but he’s already gone. I take the food and whisper a prayer of safety for that man, then turn my back on Germany forever.