It had been five years since he had buried his wife and now he sat on the porch overlooking his yard. He was happy with the life he had made in the United States. He had children and they had given him wonderful grandchildren. But then there were nights that he sat outside and thought about things, a drink in his hand. Something to dull the pain, because there was always pain and anger. His heart would thump dully in his chest, it refused to stop, it had made a promise to continue and it would. So, he sat on the porch watching life pass him by, the children playing in the streets, lovers walking by arm in arm. That made him smile, life made him smile.

People who had been through the same thing as him, could recognize something in his eyes. Whenever he would lock eyes with one of these people that knew about loss, they would nod to him, a silent communication that only people like them could understand. The nod merely said “you have seen much death, it hurts you, I know because I am the same as you”.

The wife that his children knew was to them, his first but he had had another. His first wife though, she never made it out of Germany. She never made it across the ocean, she had lived and died in her homeland. He had never known love like he had known with her.

Little things would remind him of her and they would crush him. He would stumble or walk away, clutching at his chest. Hiding somewhere to weep in privacy, pulling the locket she had worn from his pocket and stroking it. He had never told anyone about her, she had been his secret until his second wife had found him, sitting in the backyard, silently weeping. She had asked him what was wrong and he had given her the whole story. Bless her soul, the woman loved him even more after that. She never said anything about his grief, would only put a comforting hand on his shaking shoulders. He had loved her and had grieved her as well. He had wondered why he had to continue on while the beautiful women in his life, so much deserving of it than he was, would disappear from the world that needed their kindness.

When his first wife had died, the world needed kindness most of all. But the sheer darkness of the world had extinguished her beauty. Unwanted, the day of her death came back to his mind. The pain in his heart came forward, making its appearance as it always did at the beginning of this play. A play that seemed to never leave town, never to put anything up else on the marquee.

It had been the late 1930s, the oppressive regime of Adolf Hitler had made life hard for so many but them. Mostly, this was because of the fact that he was not Jewish, he was able to retain his job though he faced constant harassment from his fellows because of his wife. Raids had begun on synagogues and the homes of the Jews. Other Germans making themselves rich by taking over businesses and stealing the wealth of their neighbors. He wondered how people could be this cruel to one another. It didn’t seem possible that anyone could do so much harm willfully with no more thought than scratching one’s nose. How these people could show no remorse as they destroyed families.

Letters had stopped coming from her relatives. She feared the worse but he had told her that there was no reason to do so. Later, this thought would haunt him, that if he had merely read the signs things could have been different. His second wife had told him that thoughts like that would chew his heart out, like worms in an apple. She had told him that he did all he could. He had asked her what he did and she said simply “you lived”.

It had been a cold day in November, the morning had dawned bright and beautiful. A fact that would later make him think that fate was mocking him. She had been sitting at the table crying.

“What’s wrong?” he asked her.

“You have to get out of this country,” she had told him flatly.

“I’ve been thinking about that. I think it is time that we left.”

“I can’t leave with you.”

“What? Why not?”

“Haven’t you heard? They’re restricting travel passes to Jews. I can’t leave.”

“We’ll find a way.”

“There is no way.”

“There has to be one.”

“There is one, you have to leave me here.”

“That’s not going to happen. I love you and I’m not going to leave you to these animals.”

“You can’t stay here, they’ll come for us and if you stay then I’ve killed you.”

“Then I’ll die by your side.”

“I can’t let that happen.”

“Then we’ll flee together, we’ll give it our best shot. But I can’t leave you behind. I’d die without you.”

“Don’t say that, you need to live, no matter what happens, you need to live for me.”

He pulled out his pocket watch. It was getting late, he had to get to work.

“I have to go do the shopping,” she said and got up from the table.

She pulled on her jacket, the yellow star bright in the morning light. He pulled on his as well and the two left the apartment. On the street, she kissed him, then she turned to the left and he turned to the right and went to work.

It was late in the day, the sun was beginning to set by the time he got home. When he arrived, he lit a lamp and called his wife’s name. There was no answer, his mind welled up in fear that she had been taken while he had been gone or while she was shopping. His eyes fell to a large shape on the floor and he realized that she had come back and then left again.

She was lying on the floor in front of him, a bottle of pills spilling out of her hand. She was pale, cold. He fell to his knees and rolled her over. Tears burned his eyes and he held her in his arms. He began to rock and continued to cry.

“But I love you, I love you, I love you,” he repeated over and over hoping that it could bring her back somehow.

Time lost all meaning on that floor. He didn’t hear his neighbor come through his open door. Didn’t hear his neighbor’s gasp of surprise and only came back to his senses when he put a hand on his shoulder. The man looked up at him.

“She’s gone,” his neighbor said to him.

He laid her down gently and as soon as he had he wanted to pick her up again. He could barely stand, his neighbor saw this and helped him over to a chair. He sat down and the two men talked.

“I can take care of the body,” his neighbor said. “I can’t promise a burial but I can make sure that she’ll be safe from them.”

The man stared at his neighbor’s chest. There was no star there. Here was a compassionate soul in a sea of hatred.

“What do you plan to do?” his neighbor asked.

“Live,” he had replied.

It was three days later after setting his affairs in order, he left his hometown and then Germany. He had come to Europe with nothing, fallen into bad crowds and come out of them. He had risen in business and had moved to America after the war. He told no one that he was German, he worked on getting rid of his accent. He had no love for his homeland, the place that had been his home, no more. There was nothing there that made him return. The only piece of Germany he had loved had eventually been burned in someone’s backyard. His neighbor after the war, bless his soul, had found him. The two men had drank into the night, until the pain ebbed away. He had presented him with a box of ashes, claiming that it was his wife. The man had gone to the park near his home, a beautiful place and had spread them there.

Now he sat, an old man nearly ninety and wondering why he was still here. He got up and went inside. He put the glass in the kitchen to be washed. He then climbed the stairs and went to bed. This part was getting harder every day. But he laid down, his head hit the pillow and in a few hours he was gone.