Page 87 of Hearts of Resistance
Sophia took a little sip of champagne, smiling to herself when she thought about that day. After recovering enough to travel to London, she’d stayed there until the war had ended. As soon as she was able she’d returned to Berlin, anxious to find news of Alex.
‘I never believed I’d find him,’ she said quietly. ‘We’d planned to meet outside a church near my old apartment. I was so scared of being back there after everything that had happened and what we’d done, but I also had this feeling that I wanted to see the Germany I’d loved as a child. And I desperately wanted to find Alex if he was still alive.’ She cleared her throat, emotional as she relived the events. ‘Only, the Berlin I remembered was gone. It was in ruins. I don’t know why, but I wasn’t expecting to see the city like that.’
Rose and Hazel were watching her closely, hanging off her every word, and she smiled as she remembered the moment she’d finally crossed paths with him again. She would tell them some of it, but some parts were for her and Alex alone.
She looked around, the wind slapping at her cheeks. She’d sat too long. When she’d told Alex that she’d never forget him and never give up on seeing him again, she’d meant it. He was the love of her life and he always had been, and if she had to sit here all day for the next three months waiting, then she would. But the not knowing was heartbreaking, as was the devastating thought that he was gone and she had no idea, that he’d been reduced to ashes and yet she sat every day waiting to see his smiling face.
She’d told him that one day, when she returned to Berlin, she would wait every day from noon to late afternoon, for two months. What she hadn’tanticipated was how very long that was, how long each minute felt, the hours passing by as an almost impossible stretch of time.
Sophia stood, her mind miles away. It had been a long time since she’d allowed herself to think about her mother, the memories long buried to make way for happier ones from her childhood. But being back in Germany had brought everything flooding back, waves of memories and sadness hitting her like a gale-force wind to the chest. And her father ... She shook her head and started to walk, as if the action itself would rid her mind of him. If she saw him now, or any of the Nazis she’d known and hated, she would simply cross the street and ignore him. If she didn’t do that she’d probably murder him. The thought had crossed her mind, making him pay for what he’d done to her beautiful mother, to the wife who’d been so loving and loyal to him, the woman he should have done anything to protect.
‘Sophia!’
Sophia stopped, every thought she’d been turning over in her mind falling away. Had she imagined someone calling her name?
‘Sophia!’
She slowly turned, eyes shut, not wanting to get her hopes up, to believe that ...
‘Sophia!’
‘Alex?’she whispered, his name barely leaving her lips. She opened her eyes, heart full ofhope. And then she saw him. ‘Alex!’
Sophia ran faster than she’d ever moved in her life. She sprinted towards him, eyes locked on the man’s frame as he moved towards her. His hair was too long, his cheeks brushed with stubble, but she knew it was Alex. She would never forget the way he moved, his height, the way his smile stretched his cheeks wide.
‘Sophia!’
His arms opened as she ran into him, screaming as she thumped hard against his chest, holding on to him tight.
‘Oh, Sophia, I can’t believe it’s you.’
‘I’ve waited every day,’ she sobbed into his chest, ‘for three weeks I’ve been here. Waiting for you.’
She couldn’t let go, couldn’t take her hands off the man she’d fought so hard to protect and spent so long away from. She’d thought it would be awkward, that he might be nothing like she remembered, that she’d perhaps imagined how she truly felt about him. But how wrong she’d been.
Alex put his hands on her shoulders and pushed her back a little, staring down into her eyes. His vibrant green-brown irises were dancing. His face was gaunt, cheekbones hollow, but his happiness at seeing her was written all over his face.
‘It’s taken me a long time to get back to you,’ he said, stroking her cheek with his thumb and slowly lowering his face to hers. ‘But I kept imagining this.’
He brushed his lips against hers, his touch so soft as their mouths moved slowly, softly together. Sophia sighed into him, kissing him back, her arms still looped around his neck. She could have kissed him all day, was lost in his touch, amazed by the years that had separated them and how it now felt as if they’d never spent a day apart.
‘I’ve missed you,’ she murmured when he finally pulled away, his mouth still so close that she could feel his breath against her skin. ‘I thought you were dead, I thought I was never going to see you again.’
‘You look beautiful, just as I remembered you,’ he said, his mouth covering hers again, hands at her waist.
‘How did you get back? What happened to you?’ She sighed and placed her cheek to his chest, listening to the steady beat of his heart, feeling him breathe.
‘Can we go somewhere safe?’ he asked quietly. ‘I don’t like being here in the open.’
She nodded and reluctantly lifted her head. It must be surreal for him to be here, out on the streets of a city that had taken everything from him, a city that had held him hostage in her apartment because of its hatred forwho and what he was. She’d fought for him, but she’d never come close to understanding how he felt.
‘I have a room, the place where I’ve been staying. We’ll be fine there.’
She held his hand tight and smiled up at him. It had been such a long time, and yet now it felt as if they’d never been apart. They walked in silence, through the ruined streets like they had never been able to do as adults together, hands clasped together. Sophia was no longer fearful, prepared to spit on the cobbled stones at any Nazi she knew and passed, but she didn’t want to live with so much hatred bubbling inside of her, and she knew that Alex wouldn’t, either. He’d lived with it long enough.
‘Sophia, I need you to know that I can’t stay here. I can’t be back here,’ Alex said in a low, quiet voice.
She gripped his hand even tighter. ‘I know.’ The possibility of staying in Germany, of seeing her country become great again, had seemed real only moments earlier. But now she was with him, she knew how childish the thought had been. Besides, she’d made peace with being French, and she didn’t mind staying that way.
