But it didn’t. It never has. And now the time has come to reclaim at least some of what I lost.

As I wipe sudden tears away, my eyes alight on a little boy, perhaps three or four years old, who is lying on the floor, scribbling in a coloring book at the feet of a woman three seats away from me. His hair is curly and chestnut brown, just like Ben’s was when he was a little boy, and when he glances up at me and smiles, my heart skips, because for a second, the years are erased, and I see my son just as he looked all those years ago. I must stare for too long, though, for the little boy’s eyes widen in confusion, then in quick succession, he frowns and bursts into tears.

His mother looks up from her magazine. “Jay, sweetie, what is it?”

“That lady.” He points at me. “She was looking at me funny.”

I look at the mother in horror. “I’m very sorry. I didn’t mean—”

“No, no, he’s just upset because I wouldn’t buy him candy for the flight,” the mother says quickly. “Jay, honey, be polite.” She smiles an apology, and I can see that she’s exhausted. I remember feeling like that with Ben in his first few years, too, wondering whether I’d ever feel like myself again. But here we are, decades later, and I still have no idea what that’s supposed to feel like. Who am I, anyhow? The student? The forger? The dutiful wife with no past? The tired old librarian who should see the writing on the wall and retire? Maybe I’m none of those people, or perhaps I’m all of them.

I shake off the unanswerable questions and force a smile. “He reminds me of my son.” When the woman’s forehead creases, I clarify, “Well, my Ben is fifty-two now, but a long time ago, he looked very much like your little boy.”

“Ah.” The woman nods and ruffles her son’s hair. He has already returned his attention to his coloring, trading a red crayon for a turquoise one to color a cow that reminds me of one of the characters in Click, Clack, Moo, a picture book I’ve been recommending to library patrons for the past five years. There’s something almost miraculous about seeing a child’s eyes light up when you hand him a book that intrigues him. I’ve always thought that it’s those children—the ones who realize that books are magic—who will have the brightest lives.

“Does he like books?” I ask abruptly. “Your son?” I find myself hoping fervently that he does.

The woman looks at me again, but her expression is more guarded now. “I read to him most nights,” she says slowly. She adds, “He’s too young to read himself,” as if I might not realize that a preschooler likely isn’t yet flying solo through chapter books.

“Of course. I’m a librarian, you see,” I tell her, and her face softens a bit. “I just meant, well, it’s always nice when children love books. Books change the world, I think.”

The woman nods and returns to her magazine, effectively ending our conversation. I look at my watch—five minutes until we’re due to board—and then out the window, where our fat-bellied jet shimmers on the tarmac in the afternoon sun. I tap my feet, jiggle my shoulders, try to shake off the nerves. I feel like a fish out of water, a fish who has no idea how to swim to the place she needs to go.

My eyes settle on little Jay again. I made so many mistakes with Ben when he was small, mistakes that can’t be undone, because they formed the very core of who he is. I wish a better future for Jay, but the thing is, parents make all sorts of errors, because our ability to raise our children is always colored by the lives we’ve lived before they came along.

I feel a surge of guilt. I can’t leave without telling my son, even if he has never really seen me for who I am. That’s my fault, not his. I dig my cell phone out of my purse and dial his number. I take a deep breath, waiting as his phone rings twice and then clicks over to a recording of his voice. I frown. He has sent me to voice mail.

I waver before hanging up. It’s for the best. What if he talked me out of this? What if he insisted I come home? Would I have done it? Would I have traded my past away once again, ignoring the siren song of Aurignon? I might have, and I would have regretted it forever.

A tinny voice comes over the loudspeaker. “Now boarding, Delta Flight 2634 to New York JFK from gate 76.” My heart thuds as I stand. The passengers around me begin to move toward the queue, jostling to get the best position in line, but I hesitate. This is it. If I board this flight, there will be no going back. My connection time in New York is short, and I’ll be too busy rushing to my Berlin gate to reconsider.

“Ma’am, do you need extra assistance with boarding?” A solicitous Delta employee appears at my shoulder, peering at me with the wide eyes of a twentysomething. “Perhaps a wheelchair to help you down the jetway?”

“No, thank you, I can take care of myself, dear,” I say with artificial saccharine, though I know my annoyance is with Ben and young people everywhere, not just her. “I don’t have a foot in the grave just yet.”

My phone begins to vibrate just as she shrugs and walks away. I dig it out of my purse and see Ben’s name illuminated on the caller ID. I hesitate, my thumb hovering over the screen. Then, before I can stop myself, I reject the call and turn the phone off.

I can’t turn my back on the past any longer. And so I put one foot in front of the other and join the queue snaking toward the plane. It’s time.

Chapter Sixteen

November 1942

By the time the leaves finished falling that November, the Germans and Italians had invaded the free zone, and all of France was under Axis control. Now refugees could find no more safety in the south than they had in Paris, which meant that those arriving in Aurignon had even less time to waste; they needed to get quickly across the Swiss border. And there were more of them than ever trying to make the journey, which was an increasing problem.

In August, the Swiss had closed their borders and then opened them again before finally slamming them shut—officially, anyhow—on the twenty-sixth of September. Now Switzerland would only accept elderly, pregnant, or sick refugees, as well as unaccompanied children and families with children younger than sixteen. Border controls had tightened, and to make it to Switzerland, those trying to flee had to travel through an increasingly dangerous chunk of France.

Despite the fact that Mamusia had begged her to reconsider, Eva had decided to stay in Aurignon for at least a few months to help Père Clément, and Mamusia had grudgingly stayed with her—a decision that had inadvertently become more permanent with the closing of the Swiss border. Now, even with spotless false documents, a woman in her twenties and a woman in her forties would be hard-pressed to enter Switzerland, which meant that Eva and Mamusia were effectively trapped.

“How will we get your father out now?” Mamusia moaned sometimes at night after murmuring her nightly prayers, as they lay beside each other in the small boardinghouse bed. “What have you done, Eva?” It was enough to keep Eva endlessly treading the deep, dark waters of guilt. Still, she couldn’t turn her back on the work, which became more vital by the day.

Eva and Rémy spent nearly every day together, working as fast as they could, but they couldn’t keep up with the increasing demand. It wasn’t just Jews who needed papers anymore, either. At least once a month, their network received a wounded pilot, usually from Britain, sometimes from Canada or the United States, who could barely speak French, and increasingly, the young people working for the Resistance found themselves in desperate need of cover identities and false papers to avoid the service du travail obligatoire, the STO, which required men between eighteen and fifty and unmarried women under thirty-five to be available for forced labor in Germany. For a man under twenty-five, it was relatively easy to buy a year or two by fabricating papers that listed him as under eighteen, but for the men who looked older than teenagers, it was more difficult; they had to establish a trail of papers identifying them as farmers, students, or even doctors, which exempted them from being shipped east. Women were easier; they weren’t usually called up, but in case they were, they simply required invented husbands whose paperwork trails would hold up to scrutiny.

But the false papers that meant the most were the ones they crafted meticulously for the children. Their book of names was growing by the day.