CHAPTER 8In Through a Window
We step off the train in Košice. Our hometown is no longer in
Hungary. It is part of Czechoslovakia again. We blink into the June
sun. We have no money for a taxi, no money for anything, no idea if
our family’s old apartment is occupied, no idea how we will ĕnd a way
to live. But we are home. We are ready to search for Klara. Klara, who
gave a concert in Prague only weeks ago. Klara who, somewhere, is
alive.
We walk through Mestský Park, toward the center of town. People
sit at outdoor tables, on benches. Children gather around the
fountains. There’s the clock where we watched the boys gather to meet
Magda. ere’s the balcony of our father’s shop, the gold medals
blazing from the railing. He’s here! I am so certain of it that I smell his
tobacco, feel his mustache on my cheek. But the windows of the shop
are dark. We walk toward our apartment at Kossuth Lajos Utca #6,
and here on the sidewalk near the place where the wagon parked
before it carried us to the brick factory, a miracle occurs. Klara
materializes, walking out the front door. Her hair is braided and coiled
like our mother’s. She carries her violin. When she sees me, she drops
the violin case on the sidewalk and runs to me. She’s moaning.
“Dicuka, Dicuka!” she cries. She picks me up like a baby, her arms a
cradle.
“Don’t hug us!” Magda shrieks. “We’re covered in bugs and sores!”
I think what she means is, Dear sister, we’re scarred. She means,