Words and Resilience

A book floated down the Amper River.
‎A boy jumped in, caught up to it, and held it in his right hand. He grinned.
‎He stood waist-deep in the icy, Decemberish water.
‎“How about a kiss, Saumensch?” he said.
‎The surrounding air was a lovely, gorgeous, nauseating cold, not to mention the concrete ache of the water,
‎thickening from his toes to his hips.
‎How about a kiss?
‎How about a kiss?
‎Poor Rudy.
‎A SMALL ANNOUNCEMENT
‎ABOUT RUDY STEINER
‎He didn’t deserve to die the way he did.
‎In your visions, you see the sloppy edges of paper still stuck to his fingers. You see a shivering blond fringe.
‎Preemptively, you conclude, as I would, that Rudy died that very same day, of hypothermia. He did not.
‎Recollections like those merely remind me that he was not deserving of the fate that met him a little under two
‎years later.
‎On many counts, taking a boy like Rudy was robbery—so much life, so much to live for—yet somehow, I’m
‎certain he would have loved to see the frightening rubble and the swelling of the sky on the night he passed
‎away. He’d have cried and turned and smiled if only he could have seen the book thief on her hands and knees,
‎next to his decimated body. He’d have been glad to witness her kissing his dusty, bomb-hit lips.
‎Yes, I know it.
‎In the darkness of my dark-beating heart, I know. He’d have loved it, all right.
‎You see?
‎Even death has a heart.Of course, I’m being rude. I’m spoiling the ending, not only of the entire book, but of this particular piece of it.
‎I have given you two events in advance, because I don’t have much interest in building mystery. Mystery bores
‎me. It chores me. I know what happens and so do you. It’s the machinations that wheel us there that aggravate,
‎perplex, interest, and astound me.
‎There are many things to think of.
‎There is much story.
‎Certainly, there’s a book called The Whistler, which we really need to discuss, along with exactly how it came
‎to be floating down the Amper River in the time leading up to Christmas 1941. We should deal with all of that
‎first, don’t you think?
‎It’s settled, then.
‎We will.
‎It started with gambling. Roll a die by hiding a Jew and this is how you live. This is how it looks.
‎The Haircut: Mid-April 1941
‎Life was at least starting to mimic normality with more force:
‎Hans and Rosa Hubermann were arguing in the living room, even if it was much quieter than it used to be.
‎Liesel, in typical fashion, was an onlooker.
‎The argument originated the previous night, in the basement, where Hans and Max were sitting with paint cans,
‎words, and drop sheets. Max asked if Rosa might be able to cut his hair at some stage. “It’s getting me in the
‎eyes,” he’d said, to which Hans had replied, “I’ll see what I can do.”
‎Now Rosa was riffling through the drawers. Her words were shoved back to Papa with the rest of the junk.
‎“Where are those damn scissors?”
‎“Not in the one below?”
‎“I’ve been through that one already.”
‎“Maybe you missed them.”“Do I look blind?” She raised her head and bellowed. “Liesel!”
‎“I’m right here.”
‎Hans cowered. “Goddamn it, woman, deafen me, why don’t you!”
‎“Quiet, Saukerl.” Rosa went on riffling and addressed the girl. “Liesel, where are the scissors?” But Liesel had
‎no idea, either. “Saumensch, you’re useless, aren’t you?”
‎“Leave her out of it.”
‎More words were delivered back and forth, from elastic-haired woman to silver-eyed man, till Rosa slammed
‎the drawer. “I’ll probably make a lot of mistakes on him anyway.”
‎“Mistakes?” Papa looked ready to tear his own hair out by that stage, but his voice became a barely audible
‎whisper. “Who the hell’s going to see him?” He motioned to speak again but was distracted by the feathery
‎appearance of Max Vandenburg, who stood politely, embarrassed, in the doorway. He carried his own scissors
‎and came forward, handing them not to Hans or Rosa but to the twelve-year-old girl. She was the calmest
‎option. His mouth quivered a moment before he said, “Would you?”
‎Liesel took the scissors and opened them. They were rusty and shiny in different areas. She turned to Papa, and
‎when he nodded, she followed Max down to the basement.
‎The Jew sat on a paint can. A small drop sheet was wrapped around his shoulders. “As many mistakes as you
‎want,” he told her.
‎Papa parked himself on the steps.
‎Liesel lifted the first tufts of Max Vandenburg’s hair.
‎As she cut the feathery strands, she wondered at the sound of scissors. Not the snipping noise, but the grinding
‎of each metal arm as it cropped each group of fibers.
‎When the job was done, a little severe in places, a little crooked in others, she walked upstairs with the hair in
‎her hands and fed it into the stove. She lit a match and watched as the clump shriveled and sank, orange and red.
‎Again, Max was in the doorway, this time at the top of the basement steps. “Thanks, Liesel.” His voice was tall
‎and husky, with the sound in it of a hidden smile.
‎No sooner had he spoken than he disappeared again, back into the ground.
‎Sitting on the floor of the mayor’s roomful of books, Liesel Meminger heard those words. A bag of washing
‎was at her side and the ghostly figure of the mayor’s wife was sitting hunch-drunk over at the desk. In front of
‎her, Liesel read The Whistler, pages twenty-two and twenty-three. She looked up. She imagined herself walking
‎over, gently tearing some fluffy hair to the side, and whispering in the woman’s ear:
‎“There’s a Jew in my basement.”
‎As the book quivered in her lap, the secret sat in her mouth. It made itself comfortable. It crossed its legs.
‎“I should be getting home.” This time, she actually spoke. Her hands were shaking. Despite a trace of sunshine
‎in the distance, a gentle breeze rode through the open window, coupled with rain that came in like sawdust.
‎When Liesel placed the book back into position, the woman’s chair stubbed the floor and she made her way
‎over. It was always like this at the end. The gentle rings of sorrowful wrinkles swelled a moment as she reached
‎across and retrieved the book.
‎She offered it to the girl.
‎Liesel shied away.
‎“No,” she said, “thank you. I have enough books at home. Maybe another time. I’m rereading something else
‎with my papa. You know, the one I stole from the fire that night.”
‎The mayor’s wife nodded. If there was one thing about Liesel Meminger, her thieving was not gratuitous. She
‎only stole books on what she felt was a need-to-have basis. Currently, she had enough. She’d gone through The
‎Mud Men four times now and was enjoying her reacquaintance with The Shoulder Shrug. Also, each night
‎before bed, she would open a fail-safe guide to grave digging. Buried deep inside it, The Standover Man
‎resided. She mouthed the words and touched the birds. She turned the noisy pages, slowly.
‎“Goodbye, Frau Hermann.”
‎She exited the library, walked down the floorboard hall and out the monstrous doorway. As was her habit, she
‎stood for a while on the steps, looking at Molching beneath her. The town that afternoon was covered in a
‎yellow mist, which stroked the rooftops as if they were pets and filled up the streets like a bath.
‎When she made it down to Munich Street, the book thief swerved in and out of the umbrellaed men and women
‎—a rain-cloaked girl who made her way without shame from one garbage can to another. Like clockwork.
‎“There!”
‎She laughed up at the coppery clouds, celebrating, before reaching in and taking the mangled newspaper.
‎Although the front and back pages were streaked with black tears of print, she folded it neatly in half and tucked
‎it under her arm. It had been like this each Thursday for the past few months.
‎Thursday was the only delivery day left for Liesel Meminger now, and it was usually able to provide some sort
‎of dividend. She could never dampen the feeling of victory each time she found a Molching Express or any
‎other publication. Finding a newspaper was a good day. If it was a paper in which the crossword wasn’t done, it
‎was a great day. She would make her way home, shut the door behind her, and take it down to Max
‎Vandenburg.
‎“Crossword?” he would ask.“Empty.”
‎“Excellent.”
‎The Jew would smile as he accepted the package of paper and started reading in the rationed light of the
‎basement. Often, Liesel would watch him as he focused on reading the paper, completed the crossword, and
‎then started to reread it, front to back.
‎With the weather warming, Max remained downstairs all the time. During the day, the basement door was left
‎open to allow the small bay of daylight to reach him from the corridor. The hall itself was not exactly bathed in
‎sunshine, but in certain situations, you take what you can get. Dour light was better than none, and they needed
‎to be frugal. The kerosene had not yet approached a dangerously low level, but it was best to keep its usage to a
‎minimum.
‎Liesel would usually sit on some drop sheets. She would read while Max completed those crosswords. They sat
‎a few meters apart, speaking very rarely, and there was really only the noise of turning pages. Often, she also
‎left her books for Max to read while she was at school. Where Hans Hubermann and Erik Vandenburg were
‎ultimately united by music, Max and Liesel were held together by the quiet gathering of words.
‎“Hi, Max.”
‎“Hi, Liesel.”
‎They would sit and read.
‎At times, she would watch him. She decided that he could best be summed up as a picture of pale concentration.
‎Beige-colored skin. A swamp in each eye. And he breathed like a fugitive. Desperate yet soundless. It was only
‎his chest that gave him away for something alive.
‎Increasingly, Liesel would close her eyes and ask Max to quiz her on the words she was continually getting
‎wrong, and she would swear if they still escaped her. She would then stand and paint those words to the wall,
‎anywhere up to a dozen times. Together, Max Vandenburg and Liesel Meminger would take in the odor of paint
‎fumes and cement.
‎“Bye, Max.”
‎“Bye, Liesel.”
‎In bed, she would lie awake, imagining him below, in the basement. In her bedtime visions, he always slept
‎fully clothed, shoes included, just in case he needed to flee again. He slept with one eye open.
‎The Weatherman: Mid-May
‎Liesel opened the door and her mouth simultaneously.
‎On Himmel Street, her team had trounced Rudy’s 6–1, and triumphant, she burst into the kitchen, telling Mama
‎and Papa all about the goal she’d scored. She then rushed down to the basement to describe it blow by blow to
‎Max, who put down his newspaper and intently listened and laughed with the girl.