© 2003, 2005 Manuel Erickson
It was Monday, June the fifth, nineteen forty-four.
In the living room of our Lauder Avenue home in Toronto, my six-year-old brother, David, and I played a game of war. Small model soldiers, tanks and aeroplanes substituted for our version of World War Two. Mom and Dad were out for the evening, leaving Wilf, our fourteen-year-old brother, in charge. Taking a break from his homework, Wilf came in and said, "Time for bed, David." Being older, I was allowed another hour. Then I went to bed and slept almost instantly.
The upstairs hall light created a beacon through the crack of the slightly open door, nudging me awake. I heard someone climbing the stairs. The door opened to the room David and I shared and Mom entered. She sat on my bed and touched my shoulder. I turned onto my back, lifted my lids and smiled at her.
"The radio said the invasion of Normandy has begun," she whispered.
"Then will the war be over, soon?" I asked.
"Yes, soon." She said the last word with a choke.
"That's good, Mom," I said, yawning. "I'm glad." I sat up and hugged her. The scent of her perfume lingered a moment, and I smiled as I breathed in its sweetness.
She squeezed my shoulder. I thought she dabbed at something in her eye as she left the room. She went downstairs and put out the hall light from there, and I fell asleep.
It was just after midnight, Tuesday, June the sixth.
Both Mom and Dad knew I had been following the see-saw progress of the world conflict in the Toronto Daily Star. At only nine years of age, I could read the maps and knew what had been happening overseas, especially to the Jews. I knew about the German dictatorship and about the concentration camps and the crematoria. I understood that if the Nazis won, all the world's Jews, including our family, would be murdered.
It's hard to speculate - more than sixty years later - about why she woke me with this news. My guess is that Mom knew that I knew Hitler had to be defeated.
- Approx. 355 words
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