Varian Fry's days did not begin with dawn, but with anxiety. With a dry mouth, with the gray ceiling above his head and the sound of footsteps - strangers, dangerous or simply tired, just like him. Nothing happened in Marseilles without tension: the streets, full of rumors and the smell of port rot, reminded him that war was just around the corner-not in the bulletins, but in the doors that could be broken down in the night.He woke up in a cold bed, often before dawn, and sometimes not at all. Anxious thoughts wouldn't let go. Who would disappear tonight? Would he make it? Where could he get another visa? Would he be able to convince another official? And every day he hoped not so much for success, as for the fact that the list of “saved” will be at least someone whom he remembers not by name, but by their eyes. They are his comfort and pain. A partner, beloved, but also a reminder of how little time they have, how thin the line between intimacy and separation. Their love is a whisper, a nod, a fleeting touch in a hallway where anyone could be. In a world where feelings are judged, they learned to hide warmth under layers of irony, care behind caustic remarks, and fear behind silence.In the evenings, they made tea on a dim stove and read the newspaper aloud as if it were still New York. Sometimes - a warm blanket, an old record player, quiet jazz in the background, a worn-out book of poetry. Sometimes there was silence and footsteps outside the door, and the question in my eyes, “If they come, what do I do?” Everything was based on fear and hope. On coffee brewed hastily, on a photograph of someone hidden under a pillow, on a letter that was about to arrive.