War Girls Complete Collection Chapter 328

Chapter 47: Lotte

Berlin, October 1946

L

otte watched enviously how Ursula and Tom fell deeper in love with every passing day. Since they had officially applied for an intermarriage license, Mutter had grudgingly agreed that Tom was allowed to spend time in the apartment – although never the night. Lotte laughed at her mother’s bigotry. The two of them already had a child together, for God’s sake.

Thankfully, she herself was too busy with her studies at the university and her part-time job to dwell much on missing and worrying about Johann. She wrote him a letter every month and delivered it to the Red Cross office, although she never received anything in return.

By now the older woman there knew Lotte well and only shook her head slightly when she saw her again. Lotte wasn’t the only one. There were tens of thousands of women like her clinging to the hope that their men would one day return from captivity.

The Western Allies – except for the French – had released big batches of POWs already, but from the Soviet Union, only a few had returned. In general, those who had were more dead than alive, unable to work and thus of no use to the Soviets.

She sat on the sofa, hanging after her thoughts of the few happy weeks she’d had with Johann. Perhaps her fellow students were right and she should move on. It wasn’t as if she and Johann were married or even promised to each other.

A deep sigh escaped her and she turned her attention again to the law text lying on her lap. Some time later she heard a soft knock on the door. Her first thought was that Jan had forgotten his keys again, but then she shook her head. Her nephew’s knock was loud and blustery.

She put the law text aside, glad for the distraction from the dry subject and opened the door. It was like déjà vu and she stumbled backward from the impact. The emaciated man standing in front of her had the same bedraggled appearance as Karsten, who’d brought her news about Johann’s whereabouts in the beginning of this year. But this man was much older – and – it wasn’t until he raised his voice and all but fell into her arms that she recognized him.

“Oh my God, Father. What did they do to you?”

“Lotte. Look at you. You’ve become a woman.” Tears sprung from his eyes and he stumbled. She caught him in her arms. Her strong father, who used to dwarf his daughter, now felt light as a feather. She might as well have carried him to the sofa as if he were her child and not the other way round.

“Sit. I can’t believe you’re here.” Her own eyes filled with tears. “Mutter will be overjoyed. She never gave up hope that you’d return.”

“Frida… where is she?”

“Queuing up for food.” Lotte patted her father’s shoulder, feeling the bones protruding from the leathery skin, and said, “Speaking of food. Are you hungry?”

“Very.” He closed his eyes, seemingly exhausted by the few words they’d exchanged.

Lotte got up to bring him a glass of water and a big chunk of bread with the rest of their cheese. Everyone else would have to go hungry tonight.

He was still chewing on the bread when the door opened and Mutter came in with Jan in tow. She looked at the stinking, dirty, bedraggled man on her immaculate sofa for an instant, dropped the grocery bags, rushed over and fell on her knees in front of him.

“Georg. You’re back. You’re back. You made it. You’re really here with me. Is this a dream?” she murmured again and again.

Lotte decided to give them some privacy. She picked up the dropped groceries and then nodded at Jan to follow her into the kitchen where she closed the door behind them.

“Who is that?” Jan asked.

“My father.”

“He looks really bad. Even worse than my own father when he was liberated.”

Lotte busied her hands with putting away the groceries. Her nephew had not yet learned to conceal his thoughts behind polite remarks. “That’s because he was in Russian captivity for five years.”

“Five years?” Jan whistled through his teeth. “Nobody survives five years in a Russian camp. Your father is a hero.”

It was meant as a compliment, but Lotte’s heart froze with the icy chill his words brought with them. Johann had already spent one and a half years in Russian captivity. And she had no way of knowing whether he was still alive. Except for the stubborn voice inside her saying that he couldn’t be dead, couldn’t fail in his promise to return to her.

One day.

Father was much too frail,

sick and weak to contribute to the household. Mutter cared for him almost around the clock, with short reprieves when their daughters, and especially trained nurse Anna, pitched in.

But winter was approaching soon and it was foreseeable that rations would be reduced again, because there simply wasn’t enough food to go around. According to the farming association, this year’s harvest had been the worst in over a hundred years. Naturally, the war they’d endured was to blame for a great portion of that with devastated landscapes and lack of farm workers. But the unbearably hot summer with little rain aggravated the situation even further.

Peter had alerted the family to start scouting for coal, wood, or anything at all, to heat the apartment during the cold winter months. And since heating material was so hard to come by – even with Tom’s help – he’d also declared that from now on they couldn’t use the kitchen stove for cooking, except on the weekends.

The living room was the only place they were allowed to heat. Lotte despised her brother-in-law every morning for these tyrannical rules when she had to get up before dusk in the chilly apartment. But the year progressed and winter arrived with exceptional brutality, making it one of the coldest winters of the past one hundred years.

As early as November the thermometer fell below freezing temperatures and many families had used up their coal by mid-December and froze in the cold houses. Hundreds of Berliners died daily from what they called the

White Death

, the merciless cold taking the lives of those who were too weakened to resist.

By that time, Lotte was immensely grateful for Peter’s foresight that gave them at least one moderately warm room. The entire family of eight had moved their bedding into the living room and slept there, huddled together. Her father, though, had caught a bad case of pneumonia and, after him being hospitalized for weeks, they had to make a decision.

“He won’t survive the winter in Berlin. You should send him to the country,” Anna said, her fists on her hips.

“I won’t let him leave again,” Mutter said.

The two of them had argued at length over the topic when Ursula chimed in with a sensible solution. “Look, Mutter. Why don’t you call Aunt Lydia and ask her if the two of you can live with her?”

“I can’t possibly impose on my sister like this,” Mutter said, too proud to ask her sister for help.

“At least for a while,” Lotte pleaded.

“She doesn’t have room. Since Ursula and Richard moved out, the Amis have ordered her to take one displaced soldier and one refugee couple.” There was a short silence in the room.

“What about Richard?” Lotte suddenly asked.

“What about him? He’s fine.” Mother looked at Lotte with confusion.

Ursula, though, understood Lotte’s way of thinking and came to her aid. “I’m sure he’d be delighted to have you live with him.”

Lotte thought that was a stark exaggeration and he’d in fact make his sisters pay for the grandiose idea of having his parents move in with him. But sometimes sacrifices had to be made.

“It’s, in fact, the perfect solution.” Anna’s eyes lit up. She and Peter had been sharing their room with Jan since Father had returned and she yearned to have some privacy with her husband again. “I’m sure he and Katrina will love to have help with little Jarek and you can finally get to know your grandson.”

Mutter smiled at the mention of Jarek. “Well, yes. We shall go to live with Richard, but only until the winter is over.”

“And who’s going to tell him?” Lotte whispered to Ursula.

“Mutter, of course. Since it was her idea.”

Lotte turned to look at her sister. “Since when have you become such a scheming woman?”

“Since Tom and I had to hide from the world.”