ALTERNATE ENDING:
This isn't 'canon' so to speak, I just felt like making up a happier ending because really, the other one is pretty depressing. Enjoy xo
I eventually made it to France, and I did wait. I waited, and listened to the radio, and read the papers, and waited for news that the war was over.
Finally, on May 7th, 1945, the news I had been waiting for arrived. Germany had surrendered in Western Europe. But this wasn't the end of my suffering. I still had to wait for Friedrich to find me.
I waited, and waited, for years. Every year that passed diminished my hope a little bit more.
I gave up in the summer of 1950. I had lost all hope that Friedrich was coming for me. He was either dead, or had forgotten.
I was sitting in one of the cafés in Paris when a man approached me. He was tall, and in his late twenties, it seemed.
"Could I bother to ask you your name, Miss?" He spoke very politely, and though I thought I knew who it was, I didn't want to hurt myself.
So I answered, just as politely, "Gabriella Rosenberg."
He smiled. "Do you remember, about twelve years ago, a young German soldier helped you to escape from the concentration camp, Dachau?"
My breath caught in my chest. "Friedrich?" I whispered. He nodded, and I flung myself at him, wrapping my arms around his neck and kissing him all over. "I thought you had forgotten," I whispered, tears streaming down my face.
"Of course not. You're just harder to find than I thought" he said, pulling away to look at me and smiling. He ran a finger along my jaw line. "You know, you're even more beautiful than I remember?"
I just smiled and gripped him even harder around the neck. "I'm sorry I ever gave up on you," I whispered.
"I'm sorry I ever left you in the first place," he replied.