"Mama, Mama! Klaus is going to live with his mother."

Antonia stammers, "What? What?"

I say, "Yes, Antonia, it's my duty to go live with her."

Antonia cries out, "No!"

Then she says, "Yes, you should go back to your mother."

The next morning Antonia and Sarah go with me. We stop on the corner of the street, my street. Antonia kisses me and hands me a key.

"Here's the key to the apartment. You can keep coming whenever you want. I'll keep your room for you."

I say, "Thank you, Antonia. I'll come see you as often as possible."

Sarah says nothing. She's pale and her eyes are red. She looks at the sky, the blue cloudless sky of a summer morning. I look at Sarah, this little girl of seven, my first love. I will have no other.

I stop on the other side of the street in front of the house. I put down my suitcase and sit on it. I see the young girl arrive with her basket and then leave. I remain seated; I don't have the strength to stand up. Around noon I begin to get hungry; I'm dizzy and my stomach hurts.

In the afternoon the nurse arrives on her bicycle. I cross the street at a run with my suitcase and grab the nurse by the arm before she has entered the garden.

"Ma'am, excuse me, ma'am. I was waiting for you."

She asks, "What's the matter? Are you sick?"

I say, "No, I'm afraid. I'm afraid of going into the house."

"Why do you want to go into the house?"

"It's my house, my mother's. I'm afraid of my mother. I haven't seen her for seven years."

I stutter and tremble. The nurse says, 'Take it easy. You must be Klaus. Or are you Lucas?"

'I'm Klaus. Lucas isn't here. I don't know where he is. No one does. That's why I'm afraid of seeing my mother. Alone, without Lucas."

She says, "Yes, I understand. You did well to wait for me. Your mother is convinced she killed Lucas. We'll go in together. Follow me."

The nurse rings and my mother shouts from the kitchen, "Come in, it's open!"

We cross the veranda and stop in the living room. The nurse says, "I've got a big surprise for you."

My mother appears at the kitchen door. She wipes her hands on her apron, looks at me wide-eyed, and whispers, "Lucas?"

The nurse says, "No, it's Klaus. But Lucas will probably come back too."

Mother says, "No, Lucas won't come back. I killed him. I killed my little boy and he's never coming back."

Mother sits down in one of the living room armchairs and trembles. The nurse rolls up the sleeve of Mother's bathrobe and gives her an injection. My mother lets her do it. The nurse says, "Lucas isn't dead. He was transferred to a rehabilitation center, I told you already."

I say, "Yes, to a center in the town of S. I went to look for him. The center was destroyed in a bombing, but Lucas isn't on the list of the dead."

Mother asks very softly, "You're not lying, Klaus?"

"No, Mother, I'm not lying."

The nurse says, "What's certain is that you didn't kill him."

Mother is calm now. She says, "We have to go there. Who did you go with, Klaus?"

"A woman from the orphanage. She went with me. She had relatives near the town of S."

"Orphanage? I was told that you'd been placed in a family. A family that took very good care of you. You have to give me their address. I'm going to thank them."

I begin to stammer: "I don't know their address. I wasn't there very long. Because, because they were deported. Then I went into an orphanage. I had everything I needed and everyone was very kind to me."

The nurse says, "I'm off. I still have a lot to do. Would you see me out, Klaus?"

I walk out to the front of the house with her. She asks me, "Where were you these seven years, Klaus?"

I say to her, "You heard what I told my mother."

She says, "Yes, I heard. Only it wasn't the truth. You lie very badly, my little one. We checked the orphanages and you were at none of them. And how did you find the house again? How did you know your mother had moved back in?"

I am silent. She says, "You can keep your secret. You undoubtedly have a reason for it. But don't forget that I've been taking care of your mother for years. The more I know, the more I can help her. When you show up out of the blue with your suitcase, I have a right to ask where you've been."

I say, "No, you don't have the right. I'm here, that's all. Tell me what to do about my mother."

"Do what you think is best. If possible, be patient. If she has an attack, telephone me."

"What happens when she has an attack?"

"Don't worry. It'll be no worse than it was today. She cries out, she trembles, that's all. Here, here's my telephone number. If something goes wrong, call."

Mother is sleeping in one of the living room armchairs. I pick up my suitcase and go unpack in the children's bedroom at the end of the hallway. There are still two beds, two adult-sized beds that our parents bought just before the "thing." I still haven't found a word to describe what happened to us. I could say drama, tragedy, catastrophe, but in my head I simply call it the "thing" for which there is no name.

The children's bedroom is clean, as are the beds. Mother was obviously expecting us. But the one she is waiting for most eagerly is my brother Lucas.

We are eating silently in the kitchen when suddenly Mother says, "I don't in the least regret having killed your father. If I knew who the woman he wanted to leave us for was, I'd kill her too. If I hurt Lucas it was her fault, her fault entirely, not mine."

I say, "Mother, don't torture yourself. Lucas didn't die of his wound. He'll come back."

Mother asks, "How could he find this house again?"

I say, "The way I did. I found it and he'll find it too."

Mother says, "You're right. At all costs we must stay here. It's here that he'll look for us."

Mother takes medications in order to sleep and she goes to bed very early. During the night I go look at her in her room. She sleeps on her back in the big bed, her face turned to the window, leaving the place that had been her husband's empty.

I sleep very little. I look at the stars, and as at Antonia's I thought about our family and this house every night, so here I think about Sarah and her family, about her grandparents in the town of K.

When I awake I find the walnut-tree branches outside my window. I go into the kitchen and kiss Mother. She smiles at me. There's coffee and tea. The young girl brings fresh bread. I tell her that she doesn't need to come anymore, that I'll do the shopping myself.

Mother says, "No, Veronica. Keep coming. Klaus is still too small to do the shopping."

Veronica laughs. "He's not that small. But he won't find what you need in the shops. I work at the hospital kitchen and that's where I get the things I bring here, you see, Klaus? At the orphanage you were spoiled when it came to food. You couldn't imagine what you have to do to find something to eat in the city. You'll spend your whole time lining up outside shops."

Mother and Veronica have quite a bit of fun together. They laugh and kiss. Veronica tells stories about her love life. Stupid stories: "So he said to me, so I said to him, so he tried to kiss me."

Veronica helps Mother dye her hair. They use a product called henna that restores its old color to Mother's hair. Veronica also tends to Mother's face. She makes "masks" for her, she does her makeup with little brushes, tubes, and pencils.

Mother says, "I want to look nice when Lucas comes back. I don't want him to find me ratty, old, and ugly. Do you understand, Klaus?"

I say, "Yes, I understand. But you'd look as nice with your hair gray and no makeup on."

Mother slaps me. "Go to your room, Klaus, or go for a walk. You're getting on my nerves."

She adds to Veronica, "Why didn't I have a daughter like you?"