He is barely real to me anymore.

Still, he is my father, so I talk to him.

When I am done, Cecile takes her turn.

While she talks to her parents, I study the stone wall across from us.

In the fading light it looks safe and strong, like the wall of a fort.

When Cecile's parents have vanished from outside our window, Cecile closes the shutter.

Night enters our room.

We hug each other and say, "If we die tonight, may we meet in heaven tomorrow."

At last we climb into bed.

Cecile goes first, against the wall.

Then me, on the outside.

Time to sleep.

Sometimes when I open my eyes in the morning, I'm not sure where I am.

In heaven already, maybe?

I make up a way to check.

If the chest of drawers is still across the room, then I know I am in Chavagnes-en-Paillers, my new village.

No one knows what it's like in heaven, but I'm pretty sure there are no chests of drawers there.

Heaven.

Every day in Chavagnes-en-Paillers brings new wonders.

I love to listen to Bible stories and The Lives of the Saints at my school.

Our teachers tell us these stories are about real people, good people who lived in other places and times, not fairy-tale people.

Now all these real people are in heaven with God.

I hope I will meet them one day in heaven, especially Saint Bernadette and Saint Terese, who are French like me.

But one day I learn that because I'm not baptized, I can't go to heaven.

How can that be?

I want to go to heaven too!

I run to the church to pray.

The quiet and peace there, the smell of beeswax, the flickering candles, the light that shines through the colored windows ...

all these things calm me.

Sometimes, alone with God in church, I can talk to Him.

I tell God everything.

I thank Him for bringing me to the Vendee.

I tell Him I miss my mother, Madame Marie, and my cousins.

But I make sure He knows I don't want to go back to Paris.

I'm just too afraid.

Then I ask God if I can go to heaven someday too.

One day when I'm at church an answer comes.

A peasant woman comes in.

She kneels in front of the altar of the Virgin Mary, the mother of Jesus.

She talks to Mary out loud, the way I talk to God in my heart.

She calls her "Madame Marie."

Ah, so Mary has the same name as my godmother!

It's my godmother's job to protect me-she already has.

She knows so many things.

I'm sure she'll know how to fix things with Mary, and Mary will fix things with God.

That way I'll be able to go to heaven too.

Far Away.

Life seems so safe in the country.

But I know it isn't, not really.

Many people in the Vendee are afraid of Jews.

They think Jews bring trouble.

If they knew who we really were, they might tell the enemy soldiers about us.

That's why we have to pretend to be Christians.

Mama, my half-remembered Papa, Madame Marie, and Monsieur Henri, ...

they are all so far away.

I try to remember our square.

I can barely see the face of The Thinker or hear the splash of the fountain.

I know Sophie's hiding in the country, but I don't know what happened to Sarah and Henriette, to Charles, Serge, and Maurice.

Maybe they've gone away too.

Paris seems only a faraway word, light as a goose feather.

Still, Madame Raffin makes us write letters there every week.

I always write the same thing to my mother: I am in good health. I hope you are too.

Everyone here is nice. I do my homework.

If you come to visit, please bring Charlotte.

One day Madame Raffin tells me my mother will come at Christmas ...

I can't wait to see her and my doll!

But what if she wants to take me back to Paris?

I don't want to go!

The children here all play with me.

I have new brothers and sisters.

We always have as much good food to eat as we want, and I can walk to school with my friends.

We can go anywhere we want.

We can explore the village and the woods and streams all by ourselves!

I know the reason I feel safe in the country.

It's because here, I am not a Jew.

In Paris, I am a Jew.

I do want to see Mama, but I don't want to go back to Paris.

I don't want to hide from bombs and scary soldiers.

I don't want to wear a yellow star and be attacked at school.

I don't want to be afraid all the time, nearly every single minute.

I don't want to live like that ever again!

Mama Comes.

I count the days in December, and Mama comes at last.

Jews aren't allowed to travel, so she took off her yellow star.

The train was crowded with Christmas travelers.

No one stopped her to find out if she was Jewish.

My mother's coat, the smell of her hair and her cologne, her arms around me ...

these things make everything else around me disappear.

I want to show Mama my new village.

"Not yet," she says.

"First I must talk to the Raffin family.