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He took off at a run again and found Walter outside the apartment building staring up at the sky, watching the clouds of black billowing westward on the breeze.
“What’s going on?”Jan asked.
Walter cupped a hand to one ear.“What?”
“Are you okay?”Jan shouted this time.
Walter nodded.“My ears are ringing.”
“Come on.We have to get inside.”
The two of them jogged up the stairs, taking them two at a time.They burst into the apartment and found everyone wide-eyed and peering out the windows.
“What’s happening?”Nacha asked, her face white.
“The Germans want to squash the uprising.They’re sending in theLuftwaffe.We should get to a bomb shelter.”Jan set his gun down by the door and slipped off his backpack.
“But it’s not safe.We’ll be seen.The Germans will take us to an extermination camp,” Antoni objected, rubbing both hands over his face.“We should stay here.It’s safer than going outside.”
The sound of approaching planes buzzed on the horizon.Jan rushed to the windows and looked out.ALuftwaffesquadron approached, hanging low over the city like buzzards.
“They’re coming back,” he said.“Everyone, find somewhere to take cover.”
“In our room,” Nathan suggested.“It doesn’t have windows.”
“Good idea,” Mama said.
She ushered everyone into the room, then shut the small door behind them.It was cramped and dark in the room, not enough space for anyone to sit or lie down.So they all stood, pressed up close to one another.
Nacha was beside Jan.He could sense her presence, but couldn’t see her face.Suddenly her hand was in his, her fingers sliding their way across his palm and winding through his fingers.His heart skipped a beat as he closed his hand around hers.
The warmth of her touch sent a thrill up his spine even as the scream of engines shot by their apartment.The entire building shuddered.Then the boom of bombs dropping to earth shook the air.
“That was close,” Mama whispered.
Nacha began to hum.
Soon they were all singing the anthem “Poland Is Not Yet Lost.”The words brought a lump to Jan’s throat.He stood straight and tall, singing alongside his family and loved ones with Nacha’s hand firmly in his own as bombs fell over Warsaw.
