Betrayed

• Sjanica Van Eck, Grade 5
• Short Story
• 2022

Guns crackled behind me, the trees branches groping at my hands in hope of slowing me down, my mothers necklace cold against my warm throat. Everything was against me, even Mother Nature. As I ran past a tree I saw something glisten in it. As suddenly as a gun shot two hands slammed into me pulling me down. Everything disappeared into darkness. Never had I been so lonely, I was surrounded by people yet it felt like I was all alone in a dark room with no light and with no sense of direction.

A sudden hush fell over the room. I thought that these were my own people, my own kind, but when I saw that flag I realised what was really happening, I realised all of my hopes meant nothing, it was useless. A man stepped out into the doorway.’I see what all of you mean. This is just a poor German boy who got lost in that snow storm.’ Then it hit me, ‘ You are Adölf Hitler and I am not from this selfish country!’ My sudden outburst was followed by a uproar. People were shouting out things like, ‘ Help me, this boy is a spy!’ And ‘ Hitler this boy, he is a spy, you must do something about it you cant just leave him!’ The last exclamation that I heard was the most hurtful, it turned all of the heads in the room to me, they were probably deciding what to do with me .

Hitler was evil, pure evil. I always thought that if you ever see Hitler in real life that you were cursed. But as everything turned into a blur I realised that Hitler was actually very smart, but not smart enough to outwit me. As they left left the room in silence I waited impatiently until I could no longer hear their echoing footsteps outside. I searched for my pocket knife when I felt it, it felt like something was fitted perfectly in place. I silently cut the ropes that bound my legs and arms together. I was determined to escape from his clutches.

As I weaved in and out of the labyrinth of passage-ways I remembered that the whole reason I came here, to find out what happened to my parents. I stopped in my tracks as quick footsteps came down the corridor. I slipped into the nearest room and something caught my attention. There were voices in the room but I only recognised the one and it was Hitler’s. There was one word that caught my attention and it was my name. Then I realised who was in the room with Hitler, it was my parents. By the sounds of it they were fine by themselves. I turned and left and the room and forgot all about them. I forgot about the war and just lived my life, my parents didn’t need me and I didn’t need them. As I grew older I realised this, that war has no point in it.