((A/N: This is a (or is it an? Because really, wouldn't it be 'a', since the o in "oneshot is like, a w? Sorry. Rant over.) oneshot, and will always be a oneshot. Okay, I'm sorry if the story is completely crappy; I'm just writing this to help with my writer's block and nothing more. But I will edit and revise if I get enough complaining reviews, I promise you that. Okay, long author's note over. Enjoy the fanfic, peoples. R&R! Also, I give credit to Markus Zusak for writing the original, and much better book, The Book Thief. Yes, this is my disclaimer. Lastly, I give credit to one of my friends. Why? She's the reason I got this idea. It's a variation of it; it's just strayed off from the idea… a lot. XD SO, AGAIN JUST TO REMIND YOU. R&R. -long author note almost over-
DISCLAIMER: I DO NOT OWN THE BOOK THIEF. OTHERWISE, I WOULD BE A MAN. AND I AM NOT A MAN. I AM A GIRL. AND I LIKE NOMS.))
How about a kiss, Saumensch?
How about a kiss?
Why is it that we do not realize how much we love another until they die? Why is life so cruel?
Thoughts, like a twister in the country, swirled around Liesel Meminger's head as she sat in the asphalt, crying into Rudy's tattered shirt.
A hand rested on her shoulder. It, however, was not I. It was a man from the LSE.
"Do not cry, young girl."
She continued.
Why did she not say goodbye?
The book thief, heart shattered, sprinted down the street once again.
"RUDY!" she shrieked.
She could not grasp the truth- Papa, Mama, and Rudy were gone.
Everyone was gone.
Not in war. Not in a different country.
*** THE FINAL DUDEN DICTIONARY MEANING ***
Tot- Dead:
No longer living; deprived of life.
Related words:
spiritless, gone, passed away.
Fat, salty tears rolled down the book thief's face and onto the rubble.
The same three names were repeated over and over, a broken boy with lemons for hair still in her arms.
Everyone was gone. Every single person. Max, Papa, Mama, and Rudy. All gone.
"Rudy," she whispered once more, barely audible to the LSE members and herself.
"It will be okay," a man, who sounded exactly like her foster papa, said. No, it will not be okay.
We all knew she thought that. She did.
"Papa?" the girl rasped, clinging to the last hope. "Papa?"
It was not Papa.
Humans, I had noticed, tend to trick themselves into believing things that are completely untrue. For instance, there was Liesel, who thought that her dead father was still alive and breathing.
But now, I realize that it was not trickery.
It was only hope. Poor, deceiving hope.
Hope has always been the cruelest factor in life ever.
*** THE REASON WHY***
It lies.
The little black book still in my hands, I lingered on the destroyed Himmel Street. And I watched.
Choked sobs could be heard in the distance as the morning sun came out from the horizon. Was the night ending? Or was it just a new day, with old troubles and worries still attaching on?
"Where have you been, sun?" the book thief wanted to ask. "Why were you hiding?"
The sun, I'll bet, was hiding from the death- from me.
Who would want to see death? Who would want to see me?
The answer is nobody.
So I left. My duty was calling me elsewhere, anyways. And I could not bear to see any more of the book thief's mourning.
• • •
The next part of this small story- how did I even get it?
She told me just yesterday. Not just a portion. In fact, she told me everything.
"Komm," the mayor coaxed. "You can sleep in our house tonight."
They just didn't understand what it was like to lose so many. They had only lost one son, while Liesel lost the people that had made most of her life.
And with that, the book thief ran out of sight to the remains of the Amper River's banks and sat on the dead, dry grass, hugging her knees.
Papa and I, she thought, we used to skip stones here, and read, and while I did that, he would play his accordion.
But there would be no more summer afternoons of reading and listening to the sounds of Papa's accordion. No more time with Papa. No more teasing from Rudy. No more Watschens from Mama. No more stealing with Rudy. No more reading in the basement.
They were all gone.
The tears couldn't stop coming, no matter how hard she tried to stop them from spilling onto her dusty body.
*** A SMALL FACT ***
If it were possible for people
To die on the inside
I would have collected her soul,
Right there,
Right then.
But I didn't.
Her soul was a blank canvas, different artists coming to splatter small drops of paint on it until one threw the entire paint can. And the canvas fell over.
Before she knew it, the mayor and his wife had caught up to her.
"You can sleep in our house tonight," the mayor repeated, as if Liesel had forgotten. But she hadn't.
Liesel remained silent, nodding dumbly.
Was it really worth it anymore?
Was it really worth living?
The girl had confined to me that she, like Michael Holtzapfel, wanted to die because she had lived. It was another one of those "Why did I live and they die?" survival stories. As always.
They all had thought that.
Only a portion have lived. So many ran into my arms and clung to me as a last hope.
Others regretted their decision.
Liesel Meminger was one who lived.
As the girl, defeated, retreated into the mayor's house, Ilsa Hermann's coaxing hand was on her back.
It didn't help.
But in the end, there is always a beginning.
When one door closes, another is opened, some say.
Not for the book thief. In fact, she believed that she was stuck in a room without any form of escape. She didn't know if she wanted to escape, either.
• • •
"Would you like to read?" the mayor's wife asked, desperately trying to make Liesel feel more at home.
***WHAT SHE WAS REALLY ASKING***
Would you like to try and forget?
Yes. She did.
Many of them had asked this: What is worse? Dying, or the guilt of surviving?
Her foster father had asked this. And now, Liesel herself was asking it, also.
It has never been answered over the centuries I have been in my line of work. Emphasis on never.
Liesel nodded once again, making her way to Ilsa Hermann's library.
One thing that surprised the girl- the pile of clumsily ripped The Last Human Stranger still on the floor.
"I'm sorry," Liesel said, ashamed of her actions once again.
"Why?" Frau Hermann asked, also once again. "Do not blame yourself, Liesel. It is not your fault."
"I know," Liesel muttered. "It is the Fuhrer's fault…" She trailed off.
"Do not say that in this household around my husband," the lady said with a piercing whisper.
It was just like the day she stole The Shoulder Shrug all over again.
As fragile as a flower, Liesel started to cry once again.
"I'm sorry!" the mayor's wife exclaimed, confused about the book thief's sudden outburst.
"No," Liesel, in between tears, said. "It is just… I cannot bear the sadness any longer."
A soft, warm hand landed on the book thief's shoulder.
And it said everything that needed to be said.
• • •
As I have said before, Liesel rarely dreamed when sleeping in the Hermann household. Perhaps it was because it was not home to her. Or the grief that had struck her was so overwhelming that even the nightmares would not come.
I am going to tell you of an instance where she did dream.
That night, the stars were out. It was a perfect night for dreams, in a strange sort of way.
The moon was like a candle lit in the darkness, the surrounding stars its melting wax. And the flicker of a flame let the book thief find her way in the dream.
• • •
The dream started off like this: A snowball crashing into the book thief's face.
It did not have mud in it. It was just an ordinary snowball.
"Saukerl!" Liesel laughed, picking up a pile of snow and throwing it back at Rudy. With that, a snowball fight commenced on Himmel Street, glorious laughter floating around in the air, as if nothing would ever go wrong in their lives ever again.
And in the dream, it was true. Nothing was wrong- at all.
The scene changed, and soon, Liesel was sitting in the kitchen with Mama, Papa, and Max. Papa played his accordion, everyone's smiles as bright as the sun, to use a cliché term. Even Max seemed happy for once, doing his crossword puzzle as usual. The music brought them together in that one dream. As Rosa cooked, Hans told Liesel and Max jokes, causing uproarious laughter. Happiness was spread all around the small, cramped kitchen. Love was passed around. And if they dropped it, they could just pick it up and be forgiven.
In the next bit of her dream, the book thief is sitting on the bank of the Amper River, skipping stones with Rudy.
"Liesel," he mused. "Are you afraid?"
"Of what?" she laughed.
"The bombings, of course," Rudy answered.
"Yes," Liesel said, picking up a stone from the ground. "But at least we'll stay together, right, Saukerl?" She laughed lightly, nudging him softly with her elbow.
"Right, Saumensch," he chuckled in response, throwing his stone. It bounced over five times.
"Hey, you two!" a familiar voice shouted.
***SOMETHING LIESEL SHOULD HAVE NOTICED***
Arthur Berg moved out of Mochling.
"Anybody up for stealing?" the pimply-faced teenager asked, throwing a stolen potato up in the air and catching it in his right hand.
"Sure… why not?" Liesel replied, her grin growing even wider. This was the life. The weather in Mochling had become much nicer that day, too. The sky was painted, and the clouds were like cotton balls glued in the air, and that day, Liesel reached out and grabbed one, grabbing onto her dream and unable to let go.
In the final parts of her dream, Liesel was in the mayor's library with Ilsa Hermann for the first time once again. Her fingers ran along the multi-colored books in the room of happiness. In life, happiness is a fragile, dying bird which anybody can accidentally kill.
In dreams, however, the bird is alive and well, stuck in a cage where it cannot escape. And that is what you want it to do in most people's cases.
The book thief took The Whistler from the shelf once again, and opened the book, dusty from not being read in a long time. Her hand felt the spine of the small book, savoring each moment she could stay in her dream that she wished was a reality. Flipping each page, her eyes scanned every single word, taking the words, devouring the words, until the entire chapter was finished. And then she repeated.
A cool, summer breeze came in from the window, and Liesel smelled the scent of the grass. Ilsa Hermann came in with a bag of laundry, as if her mother were never fired.
As if Hilter had never taken over.
"Everything will be okay, Liesel," the mayor's wife said with a smile that could have made the book thief's entire day.
***WHAT HAPPENED AFTER THAT***
The book thief woke up.
Smiling for the first time in a week.
They may not be here anymore, Liesel realized, but that does not mean that I cannot think about them. That does not mean that they will be taken away from my heart forever.
The heart.
It tells you what to do.
And in this case, the book thief's heart told her to forget.
She did not.
But that did not mean she mourned, either.
Everyone was in her heart and mind, forever.