Chapter 10 - Life Underground
Partial Excerpt

Izzy went into the hiding place first, followed by Jay and me. Izzy slid in with ease, now accustomed to lowering himself into the hole. He had even constructed a small ladder to assist his entrance and exit. Once everyone was inside, Izzy planned to draw the ladder in behind us. He believed that situating the hiding place between the two potato holes would provide us at least one route for escape if we were discovered. It really wasn’t much of an advantage to have a second exit, since both holes opened into the same field, but somehow it gave me comfort to know there was a second way out. Maybe we wouldn’t all be killed if we had to run for the woods nearby.
           While Uncle Itzhak tried to bring food to us sporadically, and Mrs. Paskauskas baked bread and cooked field peas and sometimes potatoes for us when she could, there was no guarantee we would even eat, much less live, in the dank and dreary hole. Going beneath the earth to live like moles was another retreat, a further drawing into ourselves with absolutely no idea of our future. I felt as if I were entering my grave.
           Once inside, each of us began to feel our way around. Jay hovered close to me, afraid in the dark. Izzy had suggested a way for us to share the floor plan prior to going into the hole. He suggested that our family be near one of the tunnels leading to the potato holes, but not because it would be a quicker exit from danger. Izzy knew he would be responsible for scavenging for food, and being close to the entrance would allow him to leave the hiding place without having to crawl over the others. Because of his proximity to the outside, the duty of emptying the chamber pot, our makeshift bathroom, would eventually fall to Izzy as well. It seemed there was a price to pay for everything.
           Each family more or less found a space to occupy. Exhausted from the tension, we fell into an uneasy sleep. The first night, Izzy had trouble sleeping. He said he stayed awake for a while listening to the breathing and snoring of the others, thinking of the walls and wondering if his construction plan would hold. He had put Jay between us and wrapped us in the comforter. It not only felt like a safe cocoon, it was another fortress, albeit a soft one, built around our family’s lifeline.
           Uncle Itzhak came to us a day or two after we went into the pit. He brought a few raw vegetables and some leftover scraps of meat from his neighbors. It was a joyful, but sad, reunion. The scene was repeated each time he came during the long months that followed. The elation at seeing him and knowing that he still lived would disappear shortly thereafter. With each departure, we wondered if he would ever return. Every exit was a reminder that life was perilous outside the hiding place, that there was no guarantee for tomorrow, or any day for that matter.
           Like any 8-year-old boy, Jay set about exploring and finding ways to occupy himself. He crawled around the perimeter of the hiding place until he had memorized the space and set a mental picture about where each family’s line of demarcation was located. He entertained himself by discovering how fast he could scoot back and forth in the tunnels but he didn’t spend a great deal of time away from me at first. Although he wasn’t a large child, even he couldn’t stand completely erect in the hiding place or the tunnels. Every move had to be made on hands and knees, except when he entered the potato hole. When they dared, he and Izzy would crawl through the tunnels and stand up in one of the potato holes to stretch their cramped bodies. The muted light was just enough to expose the lice that continuously infested them. As they picked the lice off each other and squashed them, Jay’s knowledge of numbers grew over the months, along with the amount of blood accumulating under his fingernails from the louse execution.
           Mice turned out to be another source of entertainment for Jay. They would wait until everyone was still at night and then would begin to rummage around, looking for scraps of food. They were disappointed more than not and over time became brave and crawled over our bodies, over everyone except the three of us. When Izzy would lie down at night, he would put his arm around Jay and me, pulling us as close as possible to him. The iridescent numbers on his watch must have looked like cats’ eyes to the mice. For whatever reason, we were glad to be free of at least one plague.
           Try as he might, Jay wasn’t able to catch a mouse. I was horrified at the idea but didn’t have the heart to discourage him. After all, there were no toys for him to play with. Before coming into the hiding place, he and Rexxyx had always chased each other a little inside the barn during the early morning hours. I sometimes laughed at them poking around in the hay trying to find where the chickens had indiscriminately laid their eggs. Jay became quite astute at finding them. When he did, there was no sharing with Rexxyx; he simply cracked the shell, held the shell over his head and swallowed the raw egg as the dog ran circles around him and barked. Sometimes he teased Rexxyx by allowing him to lick the empty shells. Jay even managed to preserve some of the shells, using a string Mrs. Paskauskas had given him. With painstaking care, he pricked tiny holes in opposite ends of the eggs. After sucking the contents through a hole, he found a safe place to allow the shells to dry completely before threading them onto the string, forming a necklace. In time, it fell apart, much like his clothes did as the days turned into months in the hiding place.
           Another short-lived toy was a ball Mrs. Paskauskas constructed for Jay, whom she was particularly fond of. After her husband had killed a hog one day, she managed to save the pig’s bladder. While it was still moist and supple, she blew it up to form an odd-shaped ball. Before tying it off like a balloon, she dropped a few field peas through the opening into the bladder, thinking the peas would provide a nice rattling sound when the ball was bounced. She laid the makeshift ball in the sun and waited for it to stiffen before presenting it to Jay, who was thrilled with the new diversion and bounced it constantly. A few days later, the noise became so irritating to Lola that he slit the ball with his penknife. Jay didn’t utter a word of protest but rolled up in the comforter for a while beside me. Izzy remained silent during the entire episode, but I could feel him breathing heavy for a long time after it happened.
           Toys and food weren’t the only scarcities. Water was at a premium, and not a drop was wasted, rendering tooth brushing, baths, and laundry as unnecessary amenities. Mr. Paskauskas and his wife would occasionally bring a small pail of water outside and leave it near the potato-hole entrance. They were afraid to make the trip too often, because they also had to leave bread or other food at different times. They had staked Rexxyx near the hiding place, thinking he could be their excuse if ever questioned about carrying food or water so far from their house. I often wondered if Rexxyx drank from the pail before we did.
           One of the most degrading things we had to endure in the hiding place was having no privacy, especially for bathroom privileges. A single bucket held everyone’s waste and leaves or whatever we could find to use for toilet paper. It was usually stored near the potato-hole opening, as much to keep someone from turning it over as to have it close to the entrance for Izzy’s convenience in emptying it.
           The lack of bathroom privacy proved minor when compared with medicinal needs. Since my parents had been taken in the Riga selection, I had suffered with unrelenting migraine headaches, especially when I cried a lot. Sometimes they lasted for days, and I couldn’t bear to even lift my head or sit upright. Again, God bless him, Itzhak provided relief. He was able to sketch the area of my head that hurt and, on rare occasions, bring medicine from one of his friends. Izzy was also plagued, but with another malady. He was in dire need of a dentist, and ultimately began suffering from an abscessed tooth. Mrs. Paskauskas was able to make him a tea and garlic poultice that drew the infection out of his gums and finally gave him relief after weeks of suffering. My monthly cycles had already ceased due to lack of nutrition, and now it seemed that I would have even less to eat. It made me wonder if I would ever be able to conceive, or do anything normal, again.
           Some nights we were able to recapture a hint of our former lives. When we dared, on very rare occasions, a few of us ventured outside the hiding place. We didn’t all go out at once. When we did go above ground, we were careful not to push too hard on the trap doors that kept the few loose potatoes in place over the tunnels. We would inch the door forward and crawl over the few remaining potatoes. It was very awkward, but it was worth it to be able to stand up and stretch. I was always amazed to see that the stars and moon were still in place. It helped me feel almost normal, even if it was for only a few minutes.
           A couple of times I went into the farmhouse, but none of the others did. It wasn’t that they weren’t welcome, but it would have been another way of endangering the farm family even more. Over the whole time we were there, I couldn’t have gone inside more than two or three times. Once I took a few pieces of clothing to wash. All the others had no extra clothes. Even though it was dark, they didn’t want to stay naked while I laundered their clothes. I would have had to stay outside the hiding place for hours in order for them to dry on the hearth. I was the only one who had any extra clothes, and all I had was a second dress and apron. I wouldn’t wear them. Instead I waited for the day that I could dress in them after our liberation.
           I remember one night in particular. I was coming back to the hiding place from the house, and suddenly I heard a noise. I fell to the ground and held my breath. It took me a long time to realize that the sound wasn’t the dreaded Gestapo but a fast wind blowing through the trees. I finally managed to crawl back to the potato hole and wiggle myself inside it.
           The months spent in complete darkness seemed endless. We all seemed to be in a coma. Days and nights became synonymous. The only way we knew the seasons had changed was when Izzy or Itzhak told us the trees had begun to sprout again or brought apples for us to eat.
           When we first entered the hiding place, we tried to carry on conversations, even though they were stilted at best. There was still lingering animosity over Lola’s girlfriend being there instead of one of Izzy’s family members. Sometimes we spoke of Leibel and Nese, the Gillman family members who had been executed. Discussion of that topic was rare, though, and when it was broached, there was always a heated discussion followed by a tense silence for several days. After a few months, no one dared to speak of them any more or of hardly anything else. It seemed as if we turned all our attention toward just breathing, just existing for another day. I was almost relieved when we stopped talking. Tempers were so short that I was really afraid things might get out of hand. When we went into the hiding place, Izzy had given the handgun to Lola. Sheina kept the bullets in her dress pocket. Izzy kept the hand grenade near us. I guess Izzy reasoned that we would be better able to defend ourselves if there were two men with weapons. Maybe each one could leave through a different exit.
           As the months wore on, there was nothing to say, nothing to do but endure the dark tomb-like existence, wondering if we would just lie there and starve to death. Sometimes I passed the hours by imagining what Jay’s bar mitzvah would be like and which synagogue it might be held in. I even planned the menu for the meal that would be served afterward. At other times, I just hoped to live to see another sunrise. The worst times for me were when Izzy was gone. While he was out foraging for food with Uncle Itzhak, he sometimes heard radio reports and, just as he had in the ghetto, he would bring word back to the inhabitants of the hiding place. Like the ghetto inmates, we hung on Izzy’s every word, hoping for an end to the war but afraid it wouldn’t come in time to save us.