One
night I had a dream:
“I am looking at the calendar on the wall, it says June 1942,
the color of numbers and letters is red.
I am a Russian gypsy, my name is Lara and I am seventeen
years old.
The Nazi army occupied our small town and we cannot move anywhere.
My aunt is pregnant and some old couple let us, gypsies, stay
in their house and the garden.
My, my mother, my aunt, uncle and grandfather stay in the
garden, but sometimes I go knit with the old woman and my mother watches us.
At that evening we were knitting socks.
I remember my mother, who has long black hair and big black
eyes watching us. She is sitting on the bed like gypsies usually sit, with her
head on her knees.
I try to knit, I don't know how, and I am very slow.
We all are quiet.
Then I hear the dogs are barking almost near the windows
and someone is talking in a very loud German language.
My mother jumps from her seat. I can see how scared she is.
Then my mother grabs my hand and pushes me in to the hole
to the basement.
The basement has a few steps down, but because my mother pushes
me very fast, I fall on the cold wet floor.
I heard my mother closing the lock on the tiny door and in
the next second I hear a man talking to my mother in Russian.
He asks if she is hiding anyone.
My mother and the old lady say that they were alone
knitting.
Then the same person tells my mother to go outside and
prepare to leave.
I am very scared. I think they would find me, but no one looks
in the basement.
The basement has a small exit outside, we made it a while
ago in case we had to hide and run.
I am hiding in the house for a few days. I know my mother wants
me to run away, but I cannot. I do not know where to go, because the Nazi are
everywhere.
And I decide to find my family; at least we will be
together.
Then I am walking in to a big house with a tall desk at the
hallway.
Two German soldiers are talking at the desk.
They are looking at me.
I think they are surprised to see a Gypsy.
I am dressed in the long Gypsy skirt and I wear an open
top. My hair is long, black and wavy.
The taller soldier looks at my open top and says something
in German. Then he laughs and I can see that the second soldier's face started
to flash red, like he is very shy.
Then someone screams very loud and the tall soldier runs
away.
I am telling the shy soldier that my family was arrested
and I don't have any place to go.
The soldier tells me in a very bad Russian I cannot see
anyone here; I have to go away, but then he nodes me to follow him.
He takes me to my mother and my aunt. I do not see my
grandfather and my uncle.
My mother hugs me. She speaks in Gypsy language.
We are talking when the shy soldier opens the door.
I think he wants to take us to the labor campus.
Then he gives us some bread and milk.
I look at his face and I see his future, like a flash of
movie in front of me.
I tell him. I hear my voice: “It will be a big fight here
after three months. You will not survive if you stay. No one from your army
here will survive. If you run away now, you will live until ninety five years
old and will have five children, ten grandchildren and fifty five great
grandchildren”.
The soldier looks at my eyes, very deep, and says: “Yes”.
Then I woke up.
