With the backing of the approaching Allied armies commanded by Generals Eisenhower and Bradley, and with the French people and their triumphant fighting of the Nazis in Paris, Charles de Gaulle announced triumphantly, ‘Paris! Paris humiliated! Paris broken! Paris martyred! But now Paris liberated! Liberated by herself, by her own people with the help of the armies of France, with the support and aid of France as a whole, of fighting France, of the only France, of the true France, of eternal France.’
A few weeks later, with the war nearly over, I found myself in the filthy attic with my father. For once, the loud explosions outside were not from bombs, but from a powerful thunderstorm. The storm split open the night; the most ferocious storm I had ever experienced.
During the night, the rain leaked into the attic, saturated the floor, and poured into the bedrooms, causing great havoc for my father and me. The next morning, we climbed into the attic where we found a thick layer of sludge. The attic had accumulated layers of dust over the many years, and because the storm had been so powerful, the rain had washed away part of the roof and soaked into the dried dirt.
My father and I had buckets, rags, and sponges, and we began wiping, scrubbing, and gathering the muck. At one point, my father looked up at me. His face was smeared with dirt. Because I felt sorry for him, I said that I would clean up the rest. But in response, his eyes wide and determined, my father spoke of how much he had suffered in the Spanish prison. ‘Cleaning this attic is a joy and great fun.’ He flicked muck into my face and we laughed. Then I threw muck into his face, and he didn’t laugh . . . at first.
I grimaced, realizing that I had just retaliated against a general, but then he wiped his face with a rag, saluted me, and smiled.
We endure. We bend like the trees in an angry wind. We learn fortitude. We fling muck back at the sorrows of our lives and laugh. We are sometimes happy and sometimes not. But in between there is victory, solace, and contentment.
As we continued to mop up the mud and dust in the attic, my father said, ‘I’ll be going to Paris for a few weeks. The war will be over soon and there will be delegations of business people and military personnel from each country to organize the rebuilding of Europe.’
At that point, I knew that I had a fugitive’s spirit. Hava and I had tried once to escape the horrors of indignity and failed. Now that the war was almost over, I felt within me again that urge to break free from the war, from the fear, and from the internal oppression I felt. I wanted to go to Paris with my father.
During the war I found it desperately hard being alone without Hava, and without my father. Belgium was still in the grip of sorrow and hate, and I felt the instability of my soul at the war’s end.
‘We need to begin rebuilding,’ my father said as we climbed down from the attic. ‘You are safe in Brussels, Simone. The war is coming to an end. Can you manage here alone for a few weeks?’
‘But, Papa,’ I said, nearly pleading. ‘I’ve been confined to this house for four years. I’m 22 years old and I have barely been out of Brussels. Can I come to Paris with you?’
‘No. I will be on a military train, and it’s February. It’ll be very cold. There’s no heat, no fuel, and very little food. No. It’s out of the question.’ As we made our way down to the kitchen to clean our hands, I continued to argue. ‘But I won’t get in the way, and I’ll be able to continue my search for Hava!’
‘Simone, it’s a military train. No civilians will be allowed.’
I stepped away and walked back upstairs, to my father’s bedroom. There I unhooked one of his early uniforms from his closet, a corporal’s uniform, which I carried back into the kitchen. I placed his old green corporal’s uniform against my body and said, ‘I can wear this.’
My father looked at me with a slight grin. ‘You know, Simone, there are no women in the Belgian army.’
‘But you’re a general. I’ll be your military attaché. No one will stop us.’
And no one did stop us, as my father and I stepped onto the train to Paris filled with officers in their serious uniforms. No one stopped us as we ate at the American military canteen, where I had white bread for the first time in four years.
In the excitement of Paris and the reparations, I was slowly putting the war behind me, and forgetting about planes, and bombs – but I could not forget Hava.