When the World Was Ours

by Liz Kessler

  I sometimes wonder if Otto likes fixing things so much because he never fully fixed his leg after he fell out of a tree when he was five years old. He broke it in three places and had plaster all the way down his leg for the whole summer. The bones mended but he’s always had a slight limp since then. He hides it pretty well, and only mentions it very occasionally. ‘I wish I could make my leg as perfect as this shelf!’ he’ll say, but he’s not complaining when he says things like that. He’s usually hinting for us to admire his work!

  He hasn’t said anything about the way things have changed at home, but I know he’s noticed it too. I can feel it from him, even in his silence.

  It wasn’t always like this. I can’t even remember when it changed, but it seems like a really long time since I last saw Mutti smile.

  Not like Mrs Stewart.

  Mrs Stewart smiles all the time. She smiles while Mr Grunberg talks; she smiles at her husband; she smiles even while she’s talking. I make a note to practise that in front of a mirror. Smiling and talking at the same time: I bet it’s quite a skill.

  One of the men says something funny and Mrs Stewart throws back her head and laughs so heartily it’s like an infection that spreads through the carriage, making everyone around her smile and laugh too.

  I have a sudden memory.

  Mutti and Vati in the kitchen, dishes on the table still to be washed, Vati’s arm around Mutti’s waist. There is music from somewhere. A waltz, I think. My grandparents were still alive then. I remember Grandpa tapping his foot to the rhythm, Grandma smiling and nodding with the music. Vati lifting an arm and Mutti twirling around beneath it before coming back into his arms.

  The music ending, Vati taking a bow and Mutti laughing before returning to the table to pile the dishes up.

  The memory hurts in my tummy. It feels so distant now.

  I’ll ask Mutti tonight if she remembers. See if it makes her smile when I tell her. I’ll ask if she and Vati will dance in the kitchen again. I’ll tell her how pretty she used to look when she smiled. That might make her do it more often.

  I haven’t realized that I’m still staring, and Mrs Stewart catches me looking at her. Her mouth widens in another smile, this one especially for me. I feel my face burning as I quickly turn back to the boys.

  ‘Let’s remember this day for ever and ever,’ I say, holding out a little finger to each of them. ‘Let’s promise never to forget the day we were kings and queen of all of Vienna.’

  The boys grin at me and take a finger each. ‘Promise,’ they say in unison.

  Our fingers stay linked for the rest of the ride.

  MAX

  Max had never had a day like this. A day filled with so much laughter and happiness he was sure that if they opened the doors at the top of the ride he would float even higher than the wheel itself.

  It wasn’t just the laughter that filled him up inside. He could have been anywhere in the world and it would have been a perfect day as long as he shared it with his two best friends.

  Sometimes he tried to remember his life without Leo and Elsa. Even though they had only met when they’d started Volksschule a couple of years earlier, it felt as though they had been best friends for ever.

  When he did think about life before his best friends the memories weren’t happy ones. He remembered being alone in his bedroom with his hands over his ears to shut out the sound of his parents arguing downstairs: his father ranting and shouting and his mother trying to calm him down. It was always about the same thing: money. The fact that they never had enough since his father had lost his job when the company he worked for went out of business.

  Max’s mother always said that they had just enough to live on. But it was never good enough for his father. He was too proud to settle for ‘just enough’. And so he ranted and raged and blamed everyone except himself, and Max shut himself in his room and covered his ears and waited for the arguments to end.

  Kindergarten was no escape. He wished his mother would buy his school uniform from the same shop as everyone else rather than sew it from cloth that didn’t quite match and was always slightly the wrong shape. The other kids laughed at him and Max learned to manage without needing praise or friends or smiles. By the time his father got a new job and they could afford a proper school uniform, it was too late. The other children saw him as an outcast, a joke. That had changed when he met Elsa and Leo. They didn’t judge him, and they were the only friends he needed.

  But he wished his father would smile like this English couple, or talk to him and tease him like Leo’s father did.

  He wasn’t sure he could remember the last time his father had even looked at him. Nowadays he always seemed to be at work. Even in the evenings he was at meetings or with people from his office. He never talked about his job. But then, he never talked to Max much at all, other than to criticize him for one thing or another.

  So days like these, times with his best friends, they were the most precious things that Max had – or could ever want.

  ‘Come on, Triple Trouble,’ Leo’s father said as they filed out of the carriage together, with a wink to show he didn’t really think they were trouble. Max smiled. He liked it when Mr Grunberg made jokey comments. His father never made jokes. Since he’d started his new job he had become obsessed with efficiency and discipline. He once told Max that jokes were a waste of important time, only indulged in by people with nothing better to do.

  Mr Grunberg believed the opposite, Max could tell. He was like an always-full happiness machine that gave out laughter tokens to anyone who passed by.

  ‘Ah!’ The lady Mr Grunberg had been talking to clasped a hand over her mouth. She said something in English and pointed at her watch.

  ‘Everything all right?’ Leo’s father asked.

  ‘We miss meeting!’

  ‘What meeting was that?’ Mr Grunberg asked.

  ‘We plan to catch tram after big wheel. Go to talk,’ she replied. ‘Too much fun, so we forget about it!’

  ‘What’s the talk?’ Mr Grunberg asked.

  ‘Um. It’s difficult in German. About tooth,’ the man said, pointing at his mouth.

  ‘Mr Stewart is dentist,’ the lady added. ‘Talk is about – what is the word?’ She pointed under her teeth.

  ‘Gums?’ Mr Grunberg suggested.

  ‘Yes. Bad gum.’

  ‘Gum disease?’

  ‘That’s right,’ the man said.

  ‘Oh. Well, that does sound exciting!’ Leo’s father said before turning round to the children and pulling a face that made them laugh. Max laughed the hardest. He loved the way Mr Grunberg made them all feel included, as though they were all part of the same gang. He couldn’t get enough of that feeling.

  ‘Maybe we will be in time for end of talk…’ the woman said, raising an eyebrow at her husband.

  ‘Or maybe we miss the talk and stay at the fairground,’ the man replied.

  His wife clapped her hands. ‘Wonderful idea!’ she said. ‘Yes!’

  ‘Well, now that’s settled, you must stay with us a bit longer,’ Mr Grunberg said. ‘And maybe you could come home with us after we’ve all had enough of the fair.’

  The couple stared at him. ‘Home with you?’

  Mr Grunberg leaned in as though he were sharing a state secret. ‘You have not experienced the real Vienna until you have tasted my wife’s Sachertorte,’ he said. ‘Leo, you don’t mind sharing your birthday cake with two more guests, do you?’

  ‘Not at all, Papa,’ Leo replied.

  ‘How about you kids – any objections?’ Mr Grunberg addressed Elsa and Max.

  Max wanted to ask how much cake there was going to be. He’d had tea at Leo’s house a few times but he’d never had Mrs Grunberg’s Sachertorte. Leo had told them how wonderful it was, though, and he was nervous that there might not be enough to go around now that there were two more to feed – and he was terrified he might be the one to lose out.

  But then Elsa spoke for both of them. ‘We
don’t mind at all, Mr Grunberg,’ she said, and Leo’s father was ruffling Max’s hair in a way his own father never did, and saying, ‘Good kids. Maybe we can go for a ride on the Steamer as a treat before we go home,’ and the warm feeling Max felt suddenly meant it didn’t even matter if there was a bit less cake to go around.

  The only thing that really mattered was that, later, as he and his friends jumped on the boat and sat together watching the city go by, the bonds of their friendship felt as deep and as wide as the Danube itself.

  LEO

  It was Saturday morning a few weeks later and I was awake and dressed before my parents. That never happened! Except it did today because I couldn’t sleep. I was too excited. Max’s father was taking Max, Elsa and me swimming at the Amalienbad.

  In his car!

  No one we knew had a car! I couldn’t decide which I was more excited about: riding through Vienna in a car, spending the morning with my best friends or the diving boards at the Amalienbad. It was a close call.

  I had my bag ready, with swimming trunks rolled inside my towel, and I sat waiting near the window so I could look out for them. Mama was in the kitchen, baking. Papa was upstairs in his studio.

  Finally, on the dot of ten o’clock, the car came around the corner and on to our street.

  I bounced out of my chair so fast it made Mama jump. ‘They’re here!’ I yelled as I grabbed my bag.

  ‘Wait. Let me give you these,’ she said as I ran into the kitchen to say goodbye. She handed me something in a small paper bag. It was warm.

  ‘What’s this?’ I asked.

  ‘Kipferl. Cookies for after swimming.’

  I threw my arms around her waist. ‘Thanks, Mama.’

  She kissed the top of my head. ‘Have fun with your friends,’ she said.

  Papa came to the door with me. Max had thrown the back door of the car open and was grinning like an idiot. Elsa was on the other side and waved me over. ‘Come on!’ Max called. ‘Let’s go!’

  Papa walked me to the car then approached the front window where Mr Fischer was sitting. Mr Fischer didn’t even look at him. He mustn’t have noticed him.

  ‘Shuffle up, then,’ I said to Max.

  Papa was tapping on the front window. Eventually, Mr Fischer opened it a crack.

  ‘How are you?’ Papa asked him. ‘We haven’t seen you for a while.’

  Papa had only met Mr Fischer a few times. The first time was when we had only just started at Volksschule. Mama and Papa wanted to meet my friends and their parents and it had been a nice evening. Papa and Mr Fischer had drunk wine and sat talking together. Mrs Fischer complimented Mama on her cooking. We all laughed a lot. It was a happy sort of evening. Mama said she was sure that they were going to become firm friends.

  The next time they met was in the park when we bumped into them a few months later. Papa was all big smiles as usual, but Mr Fischer had seemed a bit stiff. Papa dropped a jokey hint about it being their turn to host us for dinner and the Fischers nodded and said they would invite us soon.

  But they never did, and the firm friendship never happened. Mama worried about it, questioning why, and wondering if we had offended them somehow, but Papa said it was just one of those things and that everyone was busy nowadays.

  But now, the way Mr Fischer was sitting stiffly in his seat, barely looking at Papa, I found myself wondering if Mama was right.

  ‘I am well,’ Mr Fischer replied curtly. ‘We need to go now.’ Then he turned his head back to me. ‘Get in, boy, and shut the door.’

  I raised my eyebrows at Max and Elsa as I squeezed in beside them. Elsa gave a big shrug. Max just rolled his eyes.

  And then Mr Fischer started the engine and, as the car growled into life and trundled down the road, the three of us were back in our own world, talking non-stop, teasing each other, sharing cookies and secrets, and I forgot everything else.

  Almost everything.

  I couldn’t help noticing Papa’s face as he waved us off. He smiled as he always did – but it looked different from his usual smile. His eyes didn’t twinkle. His eyes looked sad. I wondered if it was because of how Mr Fischer had spoken to us and I couldn’t help asking myself the question it looked as if Papa was asking himself too.

  What had we done wrong?

  ELSA

  I think the Amalienbad is the most beautiful building I have ever seen. I don’t know which I like more: the perfect symmetry of the changing cubicles, layered in rows, one above the other; the deep, sparkling blue of the water; the light fanning through the windows in the domed ceiling – or the variety of swimming costumes all around me!

  The boys are busy lining up for their turn on the diving board and I’m sitting on the side of the pool, feet dangling in the water, watching a group of older girls near me. One of them has a costume that looks as if it’s made from white silk. The other has one with the thinnest shoulder straps and large printed flowers all over it.

  I feel frumpy in my plain, black costume.

  ‘Elsa! Elsa!’ Leo is calling to me. He’s next on the diving board. ‘Watch me!’

  Turning from the girls, I watch as he spreads his arms out and, without seeming to make any effort, arcs perfectly into the water. He swims underwater all the way to me and breaks the surface, wiping his hair off his face. ‘How did I do?’ he asks, grinning as he treads water in front of me.

  ‘Hmmm. Maybe seven out of ten!’

  ‘Seven! Meanie!’ Leo replies and splashes my legs. ‘Come on,’ he says, grabbing my feet. ‘Get in!’

  ‘Hey! My turn!’ Max calls.

  I slide into the water and we both cling to the side as we watch Max walk to the end of the board. He looks so small compared to the boys waiting behind him and I see them looking at him and sniggering. My heart fills with pain for him – but he hasn’t noticed the boys. He’s too busy concentrating on his dive.

  Max raises his hands in perfect straight lines above his head, slowly bends his knees, crouches forward and…

  SPLASH!

  He bellyflops into the water. The boys behind him don’t even hide their laughter now. Luckily Max is still underwater, and by the time he reaches us they’ve moved on to their own dives.

  ‘Ten out of ten!’ I say as he reaches us and grabs the side of the pool.

  ‘You’re just being kind,’ Max says.

  ‘No. It was great.’ Leo agrees with me so quickly that I’m sure he must have seen the older boys laughing too. Then he pulls himself out of the water and grabs a ball from the benches on the side. ‘Here, let’s play with this.’

  We swim to a quiet part of the pool and throw the ball between us, racing to be the one to catch it, laughing each time one of us misses it and takes a dunking, playing dolphin rides and bulldogs and every other game we manage to squeeze into our hour.

  Too soon, someone blows a whistle and it’s our turn to get out.

  ‘Let’s come again next week,’ Leo says as we make our way up to the changing cubicles.

  ‘And the week after that,’ Max agrees.

  ‘And every week after that for ever,’ I add.

  The boys each hold out a hand and I do the same, and we link fingers in a promise that we will always, always do everything together, no matter what.

  MAX

  Max gave his hair one last rub and hung up his towel and swimming trunks in the airing cupboard before going to join his parents.

  He and his friends had agreed to meet at the park after lunch and he wanted to eat and get back out to play as quickly as possible.

  He was heading downstairs when he heard raised voices from the kitchen.

  Max froze on the bottom step. His father was clearly in the middle of a rant and Max suddenly wasn’t in quite such a hurry to join his parents.

  ‘You should have seen his face when he saw me!’ he heard his father say. ‘He thinks he’s such a big shot. With his fine waistcoats and his shop – thinks he’s better than the rest of us. They all think that!’

&nbs
p; Max heard his mother say something in reply. He didn’t hear what she’d said, but a moment later his father was off again.

  ‘Well, he hasn’t got a car, has he? So he can’t be as great as he wants you to think. Shows you what they’re like, all of them. Making out they’re one thing whilst underneath, they’re another thing completely. Liars, the lot of them. Sneaky, nasty, dirty, rotten—’

  ‘Oh, do please STOP!’

  There was a moment of silence. Max could hardly believe it. His mother never spoke back to his father – but she had done this time. He edged closer to the kitchen.

  ‘I know what he is. I know how you feel about them. But he’s the father of our son’s best friend,’ his mother was saying. ‘Can’t we just leave them be for now?’

  His father was talking about Mr Grunberg? Max couldn’t understand. He must have got the wrong end of the stick. Everybody loved Leo’s father. He was none of the things that his father had just said.

  Either way, the ranting seemed to have stopped, so it was safe to go in.

  Max softly pushed the kitchen door open.

  His father was in front of him, his face red with rage. ‘Come in properly if you’re coming in!’ he yelled at Max. ‘Don’t tiptoe in like a scared mouse. Enter the room like a man! And sort your hair out. Where is your parting?’

  Max’s mother crossed the kitchen to stand by his side. ‘Leave the boy alone,’ she said. ‘It’s not his fault.’

  ‘What’s not my fault?’ Max asked.

  His mother put a hand on his arm. ‘Nothing. Come on. Let’s have lunch. You can do your hair afterwards.’

  ‘Can I do it later?’ he asked. ‘I’m going back out to play after lunch.’

  ‘Play?’ his father burst in. ‘Who with?’

  ‘Leo and Elsa,’ Max replied.

  His father’s face turned an even deeper shade of red. ‘Do you not have any other friends?’ he asked. ‘Are they the only ones you can play with?’

  What was Max to say? No. He didn’t have any other friends. But he didn’t want to admit that to his father and be a disappointment to him yet again. Besides, even if he had a hundred other friends, he’d still choose to play with Leo and Elsa. ‘What’s so wrong with them?’ he asked.