Chapter Four: The Day the End Began:

I should have seen the end coming for a long time. I guess I was too young and naïve to grasp it then. I should have picked up on it on that day in class. The end of life as I knew came the morning that I asked Lyle about our enemy. My brother and I walked into the school like we normally did. Our classes are split into two sections. Lyle is on the second floor while I stay on the ground floor. That is where the kindergarten to second grades is. Third to fifth grades are on the second floor. My class is on the east side of the front part of the hall. Lyle and I walked into that hall on that unforgettable September morning. The morning started out normal enough. My brother let go of my hand. He looked at me with that smile like he normally did.

“Behave yourself, Claudia,” he said. “Try not to get into any fights today, okay?” I made a jokey-sour face at him.

“I won’t!” I protested. Lyle smirked at me.

“We’ll see,” he said. I frowned at him still. He never believes when I say that I won’t. (Usually, he is right about that, however. I am bit of a fighter. I always have been. So, it is easy to see why Lyle picks on me about it to this day. Don’t tell him I said that!) Lyle just laughed at me.

“Have a good day, you hear?” he said after that. I nodded at him.

“You too!” I said back. He waved me off before walking over to the elevator. I stayed where I was until my brother disappeared from view. Once he was gone, I looked over and my classroom and walked inside.

The bright colors always blind my eyes when I walk inside. The designers that did this room were a little too happy with the yellows, reds, sky blues, pinks, and lavenders. I hate it! The pink is the worst. I hate pink! It’s just too girly! I was a bit of a tomboy back then. I blame it on Lyle and all of his friends. You see, we didn’t really have that many kids in our old neighborhood. There weren’t many girls in our neighborhood either. So, I was pretty much alone for the most part. I just hung around Lyle and his friends to keep from getting lonely. They didn’t really enjoy having me around because I was a little girl. But, I considered myself as much of a boy as they were.

“Don’t you have any other little friends to play with?” River asked me one day while were playing in the creek. I shook my head.

“Nope,” I said.

“Why do you follow us around?” Jack asked. I shrugged at him.

“Dunno,” I said.

“Don’t mind Claudia!” Lyle cut in. “She scared away any girls her age because she acts like a little fighting dude!” I pouted at him.

“Jerk!” I yelled at him. I kicked Lyle in the shin after that. He wailed in pain as the boys laughed at him. It’s always like that.

I braved the bright colors and walked into the class right. All of the kids sat around talking and making jokes. I felt so out of place here. Everyone here spoke German. I’m a Brit by birth. All of my classmates had blonde hair and blue eyes. I have deep dirt orangeish-brown hair to my neck and green eyes. Lyle has short dark brown hair and green eyes. We can speak German rather clearly, but when we talk, we have an English accent. That is from Kat and Aunt Maggie. They were English, so they passed it onto Lyle and I. Easy to see why we felt so awkward in our classes.

I took my seat next to Elsie and Frieda. They pretended to ignore me at first. They always do that to me. No matter, I only see them in class anyway. I just sat in my seat and listened to the conversations around me. Everyone talks in German in my class, but lucky for me, I understand German perfectly. Today, it was just typical things that little kids like to talk about such as games, movies, toys, and comparing parents. However, today I heard talk about the war. That really caught my interest. They too didn’t know if the enemy was coming to invade Germany or not. They seemed scared as well. Now, this kind of talk was more like it! I listened on intently.

However, talk came to a grinding halt when the bell rang. I sat there pouting as my classmates sat up silent in their seats. The teacher walked into the classroom. My face changed into a look of concern when I saw her. Usually, the German fruitcake would be over the top happy. So much so that I heard some of the grown-ups say that they wanted to give her a depressant to calm her down some. Kat didn’t say it out loud, but I saw in her eyes that she agreed with them. But today, Mrs. Daecher looked rather serious and emotionless. Uh-oh, something must be wrong today. The teacher sat down at her desk.

“Good morning class,” she said, sadly.

“Good morning, Mrs. Daecher,” we said back. I raised my hand right after that. The teacher looked up and saw me.

“Yes Claudia?” she asked. I lowered my hand.

“What’s the matter, Mrs. Daecher?” I asked without missing a beat. The others students looked on in curiosity. She didn’t answer me at first. We all waited on still. Mrs. Daecher sighed aloud at last. She clutched her hands together as they began to tremble and turn white.

“It’s all over,” she murmured. “It’s all over. It’s just… all over…” Whispered flooded the classroom. I looked on at her oddly.

“What are you talking about?” I asked. “What’s all over?” Mrs. Daecher’s eyes grew wide with fear.

“We have been invaded!” she yelped. “The enemy has taken over Germany this morning!” The whispers grew heavy with panic. I raised an eyebrow at her.

“Who is the enemy?” I asked her. Mrs. Daecher looked at me confused.

“You don’t know who the enemy is?!?” she asked in shock. I slowly shook my head. The teacher still had a shocked look on her face. She looked at my classmates.

“Does anyone else know who the enemy is?” Mrs. Daecher asked. Silence sat heavy on all of us little kids. The teacher sighed in distress.

“Okay class,” she said. “I will tell you what is going on in this country today.” So began the lecture about this far-right wing party that I didn’t really seem to know or care about at the time. I tried my best to at least look like I was listening at the time. (What do you at expect from me at the time? I was a little kid and Mrs. Daecher was talking about boring grown-up stuff. So get off of me!) I wish I would’ve really paid attention that morning. If I did, I would’ve had a better understanding of how bad things were soon to get for all of Germany.