Page 205 - The Book Thief

one problem was that a person needed only to shift a few cans and remove a

drop sheet or two to smell out the Jew.

Lets just hope its good enough, he said.

It has to be. Max crawled in. Again, he said it. Thank you.

Thank you.

For Max Vandenburg, those were the two most pitiful words he could possibly
say, rivaled only by Im sorry. There was a constant urge to speak both
expressions, spurred on by the affliction of guilt.

How many times in those first few hours of awakeness did he feel like walking
out of that basement and leaving the house altogether? It must have been
hundreds.

Each time, though, it was only a twinge.

Which made it even worse.

He wanted to walk outLord, how he wanted to (or at least he wanted to want
to)but he knew he wouldnt. It was much the same as the way he left his family in
Stuttgart, under a veil of fabricated loyalty.

To live.

Living was living.

The price was guilt and shame.

For his first few days in the basement, Liesel had nothing to do with him. She
denied his existence. His rustling hair, his cold, slippery fingers.

His tortured presence.

Mama and Papa.

There was such gravity between them, and a lot of failed decision-making.