Please include the PHOTO PROMPT with your story. All photos are copyrighted and may not be used outside of Friday Fictioneers without express permission and possible remuneration to the owner. Please be courteous and give credit where credit is due.
The challenge is 100 WORDS OR LESS. It’s a worthwhile challenge that teaches us as writers how to conserve and use the strongest words to tell our stories. With the number of submissions every week, this is not only a great challenge but also a consideration to other readers.
The following photo is the PHOTO PROMPT. Study it. Think about it. What kind of story does it tell you? Think outside the box.
Thank you and Shalom,
Your Fairy Blog Mother, Rochelle
PHOTO PROMPT – © ceayr
Genre: Historical Fiction
Word Count: 99
SHOAH
“Where’s Nadine?” I stamped my foot with childish impatience.
“The Juif doesn’t live here anymore.” The man hissed through pinched lips.
“Because of the Bosche?”
“No more questions.” The door slammed and he shouted from the other side. “Go away!”
________
Seventy years later sunlight flickers on ocean waves at Saint-Marc. I walk along the deserted beach where Nadine and I gathered seashells and dreams.
“Martine, swim with me.”
Shielding my eyes, I search the rippling waters. Nadine beckons. I’m warmed by her smile…and the twelve-year-old girl who choked her last in Auschwitz’s Zyklon-B showers lives forever in my heart.
.
.
**Note: Today as I post my story it is 27 January. The United Nations designated January 27—the anniversary of the liberation of Auschwitz-Birkenau—as International Holocaust Remembrance Day. A time to remember and say “Never again!”
.
To learn more about Nadine click here.
Original Artwork © Rochelle Wisoff-Fields
Rochelle Wisoff-Fields-Addicted to Purple 
So touching, nicely done. I think we underestimate the power of our memories.
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Dear Loré,
With the last of the survivors in their eighties and nineties, I fear their memories will die with them. Lest we forget. Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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So important that this history isn’t forgotten. Important story.
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Agreed, Jenn. It’s why I will seize the opportunity whenever I can. 😉 Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Beautiful piece. Had to read it a second time just because the time shift confused me the first time around. So glad I did. Nadine and all of those poor children deserve to be heard like this!
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Dear Melony,
Alas, Nadine’s story was true for millions. Since you weren’t the only one confused by the time shift, I’ve tweaked it a bit to make it clearer. That’s what receiving constructive crit is all about. 😉 Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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This had me choking from tears… Alas I know it will be repeated… not in the same way and maybe not against Jews… but humanity has a way of finding “simple” solution to complex problems… and the world is becoming more and more complex… Stories like this help us remember…
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Dear Björn,
Truly genocide against certain groups seems to be a grisly fact of life. I do see the rise of anti-Semitism in the world so I’m not so sure it won’t happen to the Jews again. It is as unfathomable today as it was to people back then. Thank you for your comments.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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So sad, I also had to read again to take in the time shift. The building in the photo made me to think of someone locked away.
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Dear Michael,
It goes beyond sad. I did tweak so perhaps the time shift won’t be so confusing. A wide space and a line don’t seem to be sufficient.
Whatever the photo makes you think of…go with it.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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touching story. Sad..
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Thank you, Lata.
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Sad story, and a good reminder of the evils that went on there.
I have managed to do a story for it this week for the first time in over a year 🙂 Hoping to be able to get back to it regularly now 🙂
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Dear Al,
You know by now, that when a prompt leads me there, I go willingly. 😉
Nice to see you back among the Friday Fictioneers. I know you’ve been busy with your own Sunday challenge. At any rate, welcome back and thank you for reading and commenting on my story.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Thanks, and your welcome. It is a time that I hope never happens again, and it should never have happened in the first place,
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It was horrific that it happened at all. It’s especially disgusting and heartbreaking that it happened to children. This child was only eleven years older than me. Many of the children, some babies, in those gas chambers, were my age. It’s upsetting even now and makes me tear up. It’s unbelievable that these monsters in human form could believe they could possibly wipe out all Jews. Powerful story, Rochelle. — Suzanne
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Dear Suzanne,
I remember the documentaries on television when I was a child. At the time the Holocaust was less than twenty years in the past. It seems that shadow was always there in those days. In some ways I wish the shadow was still there so people would never forget. Indeed, what kind of monsters could do this to anyone, let alone innocent children.
It is a favorite soap box of mine and I’ll climb up anytime I see the opportunity. 😉
Thank you and Shalom,
Rochelle
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Your link touched upon an all too familiar theme that we find on our travels in France, that of collaboration with the occupying forces resulting in betrayal, and the heartbreak of moving to another more rural location in the expectation of safety. You do this so well, Rochelle. A fitting acknowledgement of the day.
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Dear Sandra,
Having always seen the French as the allies, I was shocked to find how many collaborated…no doubt out of fear and self-preservation. Thank you for your affirming comments.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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The movie “Sarah’s Key” really shows what the French did… I was shocked and appalled…
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Beautifully written, perfectly constructed, a masterpiece of historical fiction.
Which, appallingly, is fact.
Lest we forget.
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Dear CE,
I am delighted by your glowing words of praise.
Thank you for taking time from your travels to read and comment.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Nicely done. I am reminded of the Auschwitz tattoos when I hear political talk of registering Muslims. Most of the survivors are dead now, so it is our duty to keep the stories alive.
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Dear J Hardy,
I fear as the survivors are leaving us their stories will be forgotten. I don’t understand how, in this day and age, with films and documentation some say it never happened. It did and I will shout it from the highest mountain until I have no more breath.
Thank you and Shalom,
Rochelle
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Beautifully done, and so tragic. A good reminder for this day.
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Dear Claire,
Thank you for such lovely comments.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Heart-wrenching. Never again can’t be said often and loudly enough, especially these days where nationalism, racism, and terror rear their ugly heads again. When will we kill the dragon for good?
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Dear GAH,
A line from Hotel California comes to mind, “We stab it with our steely knives, but we just can’t kill the beast.” I suspect the dragon will die when humans are extinct. 😦 . In other words, with the state of the world, I don’t hold out much hope. Fortunately there are good people in the midst of this.
Thank you and Shalom,
Rochelle
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I’m afraid you’re right. We must keep stabbing though. Keep it weak, the beast.
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A wonderful tribute for International Holocaust Remembrance Day. Very touching and sad, to think of all those little girls (and boys) who never grew up because of this horror.
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Dear Joy,
Unfortunately Nadine was a real person who didn’t live to see her thirteenth birthday. Too many stories of boys and girls murdered.
Thank you for your kind words re my story.
Shalom and may we never forget
Rochelle
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Heart-breaking.
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Truely. Thank you for reading and commenting, Athling.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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The last few lines left my throat fighting the tears. Very well done
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Dear Boomie,
Tears are the highest form of praise for this story. And I thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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You do this weaving of fiction and fact so well Rochelle – so beautiful, so sad, so essential.
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Dear Miranda,
Such a lovely thing to say. I agree. It is essential and as the survivors are leaving us, even more so.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Such a tragic time in life, I hope history never repeats itself like this again! We must remember, and do everything to keep it from ever happening again!
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Dear Jessie,
Lest we forget. But do we really learn? Thank you for reading and commenting.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Dear Rochelle,
Thank you for sharing this story. One can only imagine the horror. Here in Sweden the state television is now showing the film Shoah.
Best wishes,
Helene
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Dear Helene,
I’ve seen parts of the film. Very hard to watch. Thank you for reading and taking the time to comment.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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A very painfully sad story! Beautifully narrated, with two heart-breaking lines here: “Shielding my eyes, I search the rippling waters. Nadine beckons.”
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Dear Vijaya,
Thank you for such touching comments. I’m glad my story spoke to you in such a way.
Shalom,
Rochelle YFBM
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i’m afraid nadine’s story keeps repeating itself in various shades and colors somewhere as we speak. we have to remain vigilant. there are a lot of evil folks in this world.
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Dear Plaridel,
Heartbreakingly true. Thank you for reading and commenting.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Lovely and heartbreaking.
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Thank you, Dawn.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Such a poignant story! I’m way too young to have experienced any of it directly, but the thoughts of what happened still make me shudder.
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Dear Martin,
While I was born after the fact, being Jewish and the child of second generation Americans, I grew up in the shadow of the Holocaust. My mother told me of family members who had perished. I was admonished from a very young age to remember what “they did to us.”
That being said, I believe anyone born after 1945 has still grown up in that shadow. Not that massacres haven’t happened before or since. But Media made it reality. It was systematic and sinister. May none of us ever forget.
Re my story, thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Very sad. And it is a lingering sadness, really.
I guess some people always live on through memories.
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Dear Vinay,
Too sad and too often repeated.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Such a powerful story, Rochelle. You’ve brought to light a personal tragedy in Nadine – one suffering little child, not just a statistic among the anonymous millions. This is how we can make sure the horrible history of that time will be remembered, so keep it up.
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Dear Margaret,
I’m sure you know by now that if a prompt inspires me in this direction I will follow. 😉 It is easy to forget when it comes to statistics, isn’t it? But when a statistic has a face it’s a little harder.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Beautifully constructed Rochelle. May we never forget the horrors that have gone before.
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Dear Louise,
Try as we might to remember, the horrors continue. It’s sort of like a game of whack-a-mole.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Poor Nadine and all the others like her. When I clicked the link you provided I discovered that hers was such a short and tragic story.
You told her story beautifully.
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Dear Ali,
The most tragic part of my ‘fiction’ was the truth of it. I had to write for her, she spoke to my heart in a tangible way.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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A very touching story. I followed the link to read about her. Sometimes hearing big numbers is totally meaningless while seeing an individual life can bring out the enormity of the inhumanity of the Holocaust. We need to remember Nadine and others, see their haunting smiles, so we remember the people and not just cold numbers. Thank you for the beautiful story!
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Dear Trent,
Thank you for your beautiful comment. Too many faces…more than statistics.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Never forget.
A beautiful story……and yes, we must keep the memories alive.
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Dear Lillian,
Than you for those lovely affirming words.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Beautiful story, Rochelle. I’m so glad there are still people writing about the Holocaust. I worry more and more that people forget.
I currently live in a city (BIalystok in north-eastern Poland), which was majority Jewish before the war. The few that survived moved to the US or Australia. There are some that work to keep the memory of Jewish Bialystok alive. It is important to remember.
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Dear Ula,
Thank you for what I consider to be one of the most precious comments I’ve received this week.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Beautiful story, made even more so by the link you provided. Like others said before me, hearing individual accounts like this makes it even more real and tragic rather than just seeing the huge and horrific numbers our history books tell us. May we never forget, and may it never happen again.
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Dear Tiffany,
It’s easy to become desensitized by the large numbers, isn’t it? Not so easy when it’s face.
Thank you for your affirming comments.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Large numbers can be just that: numbers. But a personal account will always hit home.
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War, prejudice and genocide all seem to be a part of the human condition. I can’t understand how anyone can see other humans as somehow less, but it hasn’t stopped with the downfall of Hitler. Another thought provoking and well characterised story.
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Dear Jennifer,
I am stunned by what the human race is capable of. Evil prevails despite the end of Hitler. I mentioned to another commentor earlier that it’s rather like a game of whack-a-mole. Beat one down and another rears its ugly head.
Thank you for coming by.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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A beautiful and sad story Rochelle. I fear men have not remembered the lessons we learned from that great war. May they be reminded by stories such as yours and brought once again to a mind of peace.
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Dear Joe,
We can but hope and pray. In any case, I’ll keep telling these stories. Whether in flash fiction or novels.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Don’t ever stop. They are needed.
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This story breaks down the unimaginable horror of the holocaust into a bite sized horror that is still not easy to swallow. Beautifully told!
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Dear Ansumani,
Broken down into bite size pieces makes it even harder to swallow. Hundreds of children…easy to become desensitized. One child with a name and a face. Up close and personal.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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The holocaust is a subject that I (like many no doubt) find very difficult to read about or watch documentaries. As a parent I find forcing myself to watch the suffering of children simply too much to bear, yet I followed the link to read about this little girl. I knew what to expect, but was compelled by the image of her innocent face. In Europe now we face a human crisis of truly horrific proportions and monstrous unspeakable acts are being committed against the young, even in the refugé camps on our very borders, but the calculated, systematic process by which this young girl was transported across country borders with the sole intention of her murder in a nazi death camp leaves me at a loss to comprehend. You always know how to make us think and the thoughts your stories provoke linger long after we have finished reading.
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Dear JWD.
Actually, it was that picture of Nadine that prompted me to write and share her true story. It’s incomprehensible to me.
Thank you for your comments and compliments.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Haunting yet lovely.
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Thank you, Alice.
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The stories of what happened to the Jewish children during the holocaust are so hard to bear but we can not forget them. I remember reading Eli Wiesel’s “Night.” I was so horrified by what he described of the concentration camp, how the children were killed. I woke up in the middle of the night crying about it to my husband. It was so hard to believe that people could commit such terrible acts.
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Dear Deborah,
Not to be facetious, but I read “Night” in one night. Hard to put down and, at the same time, agonizing read. Unfathomable.
Thank you for taking the time to read and comment.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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A tragic story. Thank you for sharing it Rochelle
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Thank you, Laurie. 😀
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So many children lost – an everlasting tragedy.
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Tragedy indeed, Liz. Thank you for reading and commenting.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Nadine was seen recently on a rubber dingy between Turkey and Greece. She waved.
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Cute, Patrick. I hope you waved back.
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Dear MH (I dared)
Every victim has a story. Thanks for telling this one through the eyes of one who felt the pain personally. Well done.
Lloyd
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Dear Lloyd,
I could only imagine this one. If she did have gentile playmates, what must they have thought?
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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A timely and touching reminder.
Visit Keith’s Ramblings!
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Thank you, Keith.
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Thank you for sharing such a moving story…real life. We must never forget indeed! It is through gifted storytellers that will publish novels and screenplays that must continue to share these stories. The world must never forget.
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Dear Cheryl-Lynne,
As long as I’m alive, I will write these kinds of stories. As time passes, people do have a tendency to forget. However, inadvertently, the Nazis left many “mementos” didn’t they?
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
PS. From Silt and Ashes is available. 😉 (Me being pushy)
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Oh, wonderful! I will order it today.
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My daughter had ‘The Boy in the Striped Pajamas’ in her school syllabus and so we also watched the movie together. It was a sad one to watch and you have recreated that atmosphere here.
“. . .only the victims and survivors can truly comprehend the awfulness of that time and place; the rest of us live on the other side of the fence, staring through from our own comfortable place, trying in our own clumsy ways to make sense of it all.”
― John Boyne, The Boy in the Striped Pajamas
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Dear Subroto,
I have a copy of the movie but haven’t watched it yet. Sometimes those movies are difficult for me to watch.
Thank you for commenting. I’ve missed you, sir.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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You do this so well, Rochelle. I am always learning new things with you!
Your rendering of Nadine is so lovely. We get a “two-fer”! Great story AND lovely art!
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Dear Dale,
I learn a lot myself when I do these types of stories. Glad you enjoyed the sketch as well. 😉 And thank you so very much for saying so.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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😊
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Such a moving piece, Rochelle. I especially enjoyed the last part with her reflecting on the beach. Yes, never again. Your stories are so important to continue to tell, especially as history can be distorted. Well done.
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Dear Amy,
I’m amazed when I research how many stories there are that I’ve never heard before. But then there were six-million people, not including the disabled, the Gypsies, LGBT and anyone else who didn’t fit the Aryan mold or had the audacity to stand up against the Third Reich. I’ll keep telling them when I find them.
Thank you.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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A beautiful acknowledgment of a painful history… you’ve brought these characters to life, and honored those gone. Nicely done, Rochelle!
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Dear Dawn,
If you clicked on the link below the story you know that Nadine was a real person who lived a tragically short life. She spoke to my heart and I couldn’t not tell her story. Thank you for your affirming words.
Shalom,
Rochelle
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Moving story Rochelle. I learn so much from your replies in comment section. Very patiently
you reply to each and everyone with same interest. Thanks for the link. Always love to read new things. That sketch is beautiful.
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Dear Indira,
You’re very sweet to always read and leave comments. If I’ve taught anything my mission’s accomplished. Thank you for noticing the sketch, I was beginning to think it had become invisible. 😉 (Artist’s ego)
Shalom,
Rochelle
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