“No. Not yet, anyway. But if the German children won’t play with Gisela and the American children won’t play with her, she’s going to be miserable.”

“Let’s just give it a little time. We can start with her lunch—if eating our food is really such a big deal, we’ll go to the grocery store right now and buy some American food.”

“I don’t even know what American children eat.” I winced.

“Then maybe we need to find you an American friend,” he said pointedly.

And all of a sudden, I remembered Avril Walters.

“Mama!” I heard Gisela cry from the front yard the next morning.

“Sofie, can you come here, please?” Jürgen called. I was in the bathroom doing my hair and I sighed, frustrated with the interruption. What were they doing back already? They’d only walked out the front door a few minutes earlier. Avril Walters was due in an hour and I needed to wash the dishes before she arrived.

“What is it?” I called, as I walked to the front door. I glanced in at Felix, who was sitting just a foot away from the television—eyes wide as he stared at the screen. He seemed determined to sit in front of it every waking moment. I wasn’t thrilled about that but reassured myself that at least he was hearing some English.

I found Gisela sitting on the doorstep, resting her forehead in her palm. She gave me a miserable look.

“What is it?”

“Look,” she muttered. “It’s not just the kids at school who hate us. It’s everyone.”

Jürgen was at the side of the road, standing with Claudia and Klaus. Several other neighbors had come out of their houses too to see what the commotion was about. It was a beautiful day—blue skies and bright sunshine.

But no one was looking up at the sky because everyone was staring at the road. I left Gisela on the doorstep and went to see what the fuss was, but my heart sank as I came closer.

In crude red letters almost as high as the narrow road, someone had painted the word NAZIS. The graffiti had been carefully positioned right at the mouth of the street—centered right in front of our house.

“I can sort this out—you head into that safety protocol workshop,” Jürgen told Karl as I approached. “But, Claudia, since Sofie isn’t quite up to speed with American road rules, would you mind driving Gisela to school with Mila?”

Jürgen gave her a hopeful look. Claudia muttered something under her breath about it being the first and last time, but the next thing we knew, she was backing out of her driveway with Gisela in the back seat.