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