the devil’s arithmetic

Hannah frequently criticized her relatives for hanging on to old memories of the war. As Hannah is getting her head shaves, she begins to learn the power of memory. Memories are a part of us.

I cannot remember, she whispered to herself. I cannot remember. She's been shorn of memory as brutally as she'd been shorn of her hair, without permission, without reason...Gone, all gone, she thought again wildly, no longer even sure what was gone, what she was mourning.