I’ve seen plenty of those, too. They like us to see it. It’s part of our discipline. A reminder.

My mind wanders so much nowadays. It is the only part of me without borders made of electric fences. I envy its freedom.

Can you envy your own mind?

My mind is like those cats Greta and I used to care for. What were their names? I strain my thoughts to remember. These moments are like little tests; I’m pushing myself to check that I am still in there somewhere.

Thereza! Felix! That’s it. They would wander in and out at will.

At Auschwitz, there is only one way out.

And there is only one good thing.

Greta.

She is my miracle. She is my good thing every day. She is the only thing keeping me alive. She came here even before we did, and yet she has outlasted so many. She will outlast me. There is barely anything of me.

I lie in the night with my thoughts. Four of us packed so tightly on this bunk and I mustn’t move, not even a twitch, or the whole shape becomes impossible. We only move when all of us are ready to move, and the only gift I can give to anyone now is to let them have their dreams for a few more minutes.

We are like feral animals, huddled into each other for warmth. Babies surviving in the wild with no mother.

Mother.

I cannot even think that word without pain. Too late. I see her in my mind’s eye, her hunched shoulders as she walks away from me for the last time. Vati and Otto somewhere ahead of her in the same line. My last moment of having a family.

I have to change my thoughts before they break me.

My sleeve. My dress. Touch it. Touch it now.

Being careful not to disturb my bunkmates, I stretch my hand across to the sleeve of my dress. The crinkle of soft card under the material. I run my fingers over it like a blind person reading braille, and my thoughts are calmed.

My boys.

He came to me again, just once. Mr Grunberg. He stole a minute while the guards weren’t looking. As he came towards me, he reached out as if to shake my hand.

‘Well done on your display yesterday,’ he said.

Display? What was he talking about? I knew that the SS officers brought girls in to dance for them sometimes. Those who did it always came back to the barracks in tears and never spoke about it. But I had never been called.

I was about to tell him he was mistaken when I realized he had something in his hand.

‘Take it,’ he whispered.