She made her way quietly down the hallway and into the living and bedroom.
“Max?”
The whisper was soft, clouded in the throat of sleep.
To begin with, there was no sound of reply, but he soon sat up and searched the darkness.
With Papa still in her bedroom, Liesel sat on the other side of the fireplace from Max. Behind them, Mama loudly slept. She gave the snorer on the train a good run for her money.
The fire was nothing now but a funeral of smoke, dead and dying, simultaneously. On this particular morning, there were also voices.
THE SWAPPING OF NIGHTMARES
The girl: “Tell me. What do you see when you dream like that?”
The Jew: “… I see myself turning around, and waving goodbye.”
The girl: “I also have nightmares.”
The Jew: “What do you see?”
The girl: “A train, and my dead brother.”
The Jew: “Your brother?”
The girl: “He died when I moved here, on the way.”
The girl and the Jew, together: “Ja—yes.”
It would be nice to say that after this small breakthrough, neither Liesel nor Max dreamed their bad visions again. It would be nice but untrue. The nightmares arrived like they always did, much like the best player in the opposition when you’ve heard rumors that he might be injured or sick—but there he is, warming up with the rest of them, ready to take the field. Or like a timetabled train, arriving at a nightly platform, pulling the memories behind it on a rope. A lot of dragging. A lot of awkward bounces.
The only thing that changed was that Liesel told her papa that she should be old enough now to cope on her own with the dreams. For a moment, he looked a little hurt, but as always with Papa, he gave the right thing to say his best shot.
“Well, thank God.” He halfway grinned. “At least now I can get some proper sleep. That chair was killing me.” He put his arm around the girl and they walked to the kitchen.
As time progressed, a clear distinction developed between two very different worlds—the world inside 33 Himmel Street, and the one that resided and turned outside it. The trick was to keep them apart.
In the outside world, Liesel was learning to find some more of its uses. One afternoon, when she was walking home with an empty washing bag, she noticed a newspaper poking out of a garbage can. The weekly edition of the Molching Express. She lifted it out and took it home, presenting it to Max. “I thought,” she told him, “you might like to do the crossword to pass the time.”
Max appreciated the gesture, and to justify her bringing it home, he read the paper from cover to cover and showed her the puzzle a few hours later, completed but for one word.
“Damn that seventeen down,” he said.
In February 1941, for her twelfth birthday, Liesel received another used book, and she was grateful. It was called The Mud Men and was about a very strange father and son. She hugged her mama and papa, while Max stood uncomfortably in the corner.
“Alles Gute zum Geburtstag.” He smiled weakly. “All the best for your birthday.” His hands were in his pockets. “I didn’t know, or else I could have given you something.” A blatant lie—he had nothing to give, except maybe Mein Kampf, and there was no way he’d give such propaganda to a young German girl. That would be like the lamb handing a knife to the butcher.
There was an uncomfortable silence.
She had embraced Mama and Papa.
Max looked so alone.
Liesel swallowed.
And she walked over and hugged him for the first time. “Thanks, Max.”
At first, he merely stood there, but as she held on to him, gradually his hands rose up and gently pressed into her shoulder blades.