The Choice

says.
e factory is nearby, across a little bridge over a fast stream. I lie
under the coat, pretending not to exist, anticipating the moment when
I will be discovered missing and a guard will come into the shed to
shoot me. Will Magda be able to hear the gunshot over the noise of
the machines? I am no use to anyone now.
I swirl into delirious sleep. I dream of ĕre. It’s a familiar dream—I
have dreamt for nearly a year of being warm. Yet I wake from the
dream, and this time the smell of smoke chokes me. Is the shed on
ĕre? I am afraid to go to the door, afraid I won’t make it on my weak
legs, afraid that if I do I’ll give myself away. en I hear the bombs.
e whistle and blast. How did I sleep through the beginning of the
attack? I pull myself off the bench. Where is the safest place? Even if I
could run, where would I go? I hear shouts. “Factory’s on ĕre!
Factory’s on fire!” someone yells.
I am aware again of the space between me and my sister: I have
become an expert at measuring the space. How many hands between
us? How many legs? Cartwheels? Now there’s a bridge. Water and
wood. And ĕre. I see it from the shed door where I ĕnally stand and
lean against the frame. e bridge to the factory is ablaze, the factory
swallowed in smoke. For anyone who has lived through the bombing,
the chaos is a respite. An opportunity to run. I picture Magda pushing
out a window and dashing for the trees. Looking up through the
branches toward the sky. Ready to run even as far as that to be free. If
she makes a run for it, then I’m off the hook. I can slide back down to
the Ęoor and never get up. What a relief it will be. To exist is such an
obligation. I let my legs fold up like scarves. I relax into the fall. And
there is Magda in a halo of Ęame. Already dead. Beating me to it. I’ll
catch up. I feel the heat from the ĕre. Now I’ll join her. Now. “I’m
coming!” I call. “Wait for me!”
I don’t catch the moment when she stops being a phantom and