When she was a child, she attended catechism. Her mom rarely missed Sunday Mass, but her dad never went to church, using the responsibilities at the inn as his excuse not to go. He always said that his contribution was making toys for Santa to bring to children in hospitals and shelters. Every year they went all out, decorating and celebrating Christmas and Easter at the inn.

Through the years, none of it made her feel particularly religious.

Maybe because her parents didn’t talk about God or Jesus? But they did talk about kindness. If anything, they placed their faith in kindness. She wonders about the real Waclaw, the one who gave her dad his identification, the cross, and the Bible. What happened to him?

Now Mikayla understands her parents better. When she was a child, there were moments when her father went out of his way to help guests, from making bag lunches for their picnics, to buying their favorite snacks and putting them in their rooms, to picking up items at a pharmacy. Mikayla felt that some guests took advantage of him, and it enraged her. But her father insisted that a small kindness could transform a person’s life, even save it. If only she had understood then.

Mikayla’s gaze drops to her mom’s exposed arm. Her gnarly finger rests on her stomach, and Mikayla wants to reach out and hold her hand, but she doesn’t dare in fear of waking her. Did her father ever hold her mom’s hand? She can’t remember. They weren’t ones to show affection, at least not that way.

More memories flood back. The time Mikayla left for school without letting Mom know. Hearing her frantically call for Mikayla as she ran after her, barefoot in the snow. She grabbed Mikayla, shook her, pulled her into her, screaming, “Don’t ever, ever, ever leave the house without saying goodbye!”

She always needed to know where Mikayla was, what she was doing, whom she was with, and when she would return. If Mikayla came home a minute late, there was hell to pay. Mikayla learned. If a movie ended at nine, she said nine-thirty. She padded time and arrived home early. Mom always waited up for her, staying busy by knitting, sewing, polishing, baking, or cleaning.

“Hi Ma. I’m back,” she’d say. Her mom would nod. Mikayla would say goodnight, and only then would her mom go to sleep, though she never slept for long. Mikayla would wake to her mom covered in flour and the smells of freshly baking breads and breakfast treats.

Her mom’s quirks and habits were Mikayla’s normal.

Mikayla could never have imagined, not in her wildest dreams, that her mom had spent some of her childhood in a concentration camp. It explains so much, yet she can’t help but feel that her mom is a stranger. And just as she thinks it, her mom stirs.

“Mikayla?”