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Chapter Text

The basement of the Hubermanns’ house on Himmel Strasse 33 was far too shallow. Ilse noticed it right away, before having descended half the creaking steps down into the cool darkness. She ducked under an old beam and reached out to try it, only causing dust and bits of worm-eaten wood to fall into her face. She brushed it off her uniform. No, this wouldn’t do: it wasn’t deep enough to stop the bombs from tearing apart everyting that happened to be in their way - brick, stone, human. Ilse sighed. This far, none of the houses on Himmel Strasse had had a basement fit for an air raid shelter, and if she didn’t find one soon, the street’s inhabitants would have to run very far under the falling bombs to have any hope of survival. But she tried to will away the tight knot of worry that formed in her chest: she would find a basement that fit the requirements. She had to.

It was just past noon and there was no one home in Ilse’s uncle's house at number 33, so she had let herself in, thinking that it was best to get this over with instead of having to bother them about it later.

She noticed a few books stacked in a neat pile under a row of letters painted on the bare stone wall and smiled to herself. Liesel was learning to read. She could only pray that her uncle’s family would have time to find shelter if — no, when, she corrected herself and felt the knot in her stomach tighten — the air raid came.

Ilse started walking back to the stairs to leave the basement and continue her search when she was stopped dead in her tracks by a soft voice.

”Liesel?” A man's voice.

There was a shuffling sound from the other side of the basement and Ilse turned in alarm, her heart in her mouth.

By a yellow sun painted on the wall there stood a shadow of a man. Ilse wasn’t sure if she would have noticed him emerge from the darkness had he not spoken, so much was his thin silhouette engulfed by shadows and clothes that were too big for him. The darkness of his eyes seemed made from the same thing as the basement’s dust and dim corners and his youthful face was gaunt and sickly pale.

It was naked with fear.

For a moment they stood staring at each other in stunned shock. Then a paintbrush fell from the man’s grip, clattering to the floor and splattering paint all over his shoes as he cowered away from Ilse.

She stumbled backwards in sheer surprise at his reaction. Her first thought was that he might be a friend of the Hubermanns who was helping them fix something in the house, but the terror in his dark eyes said otherwise.

She took a step towards him. ”Who are you?” The fright had made her voice harsh.

The man scrambled backwards until his back was pressed against the cool stone wall.

”What are you doing here?” she continued. ”Are you a thief?”

His eyes were wide like those of a trapped animal and they flickered between her face, her uniform, the symbol on her upper arm. He was fighting the urge to scream, to call for help although he knew that no one was home. That was a selfish impulse and even in the midst of his terror, he hated himself for it.

This was it.

He could run, but the girl was blocking the stairs and looked much stronger than him: despite his pushups, his body was weak from disuse. And even if he escaped, questions would be raised as to how he came to be in the basement of Himmel Strasse 33. He could fight her, he would fight for his freedom, but what would it take to stop her from reporting the Hubermanns? He would have to kill her. On the other hand, he was sure that she wouldn’t hesitate to send him to his death if she found out what he was.

He was running out of options. If this truly was the moment when he was going to be caught, he didn’t want the Hubermanns to be associated with him.

”Yes,” he choked out in answer to her question, knowing that in dooming himself, he was saving the Hubermanns’ lives. ”I broke into this house, but please, I had no choice. I have no food, I’m starving.” The lie stumbled over itself in his haste to get it out. If he could convince her that he had no connection to the family, he could still make an escape and save both them and himself.

Ilse, who knew nothing of the internal conflict that had taken place before her eyes, couldn’t help but pity the man in front of her, absolutely terrified and so very thin, but another voice in her head silenced out all other thoughts: she had to turn him in. He had stolen from the Hubermanns, who barely had food enough for the three of them. Fury burned in the pit of Ilse’s stomach.

The sound of the front door slamming shut came from above, accompanied by voices that Ilse instantly recognized as her uncle and cousin.

”Hans!” she shouted, ”It’s me, come down here!”

”Ilse?” Hans sounded surprised, urgent.

”Papa!” Liesel, horrified.

Hans’s hurried footsteps came down the stairs but when he saw the situation in the basement, he faltered. ”Jesus, Mary and Joseph,” he breathed, his face succumbing to weariness and grief.

Ilse, misinterpreting his reaction, met him by the bottom of the staircase and began to explain, urgently. ”I’m inspecting basements for our new bomb shelters and I let myself in, I didn’t want to bother you, but I found this-” She pointed furiously to the strange man. ”This thief in your basement-”

”Ilse.” Hans held up a hand to silence her.

He looked so weary that Ilse stopped short. This was not what she had expected.

”Listen to me. He is no thief.” Hans heaved a deep sigh and glanced worriedly towards the man, who had slumped against the far wall, pressing a hand to his heart. His eyes were still wide and terrified. There were tears in them now and his jaw was clenched tightly.

Hans hesitated as if he didn’t know what to do, then appeared to come to a decision.

”Can I trust you, Ilse?” he said.

His niece blinked, taken aback, but nodded. ”Yes"

”Gut. Then please, just listen. His name is Max Vandenburg and he lives with us.”

Ilse stared at him, bewildered. She visited them every weekend — she would have known if someone was staying with them.

”Max is a jew,” Hans continued grimly. ”His father was a good friend of mine. He saved my life. I was not able to return the favour to him, so the least I can do is to help his son, in any way that i can.”

Ilse’s mind was racing to comprehend what she had just heard. ”You- you are hiding a jew.”

Hans simply looked at her warily, trying to read her response.

”But this is dangerous!”

Her uncle closed his eyes and nodded. ”I know. But we have no other choice.”

From the other side of the basement came a weak, terrified voice. ”Hans, she’s going to report me!” Somewhere amidst the terror, Max’s mind was scrambling to wrap itself around what was happening before his eyes. Hans seemed to think that the whole situation would resolve itself, but he wasn’t so sure. Still, he realized that the name Ilse was familiar to him — she was the cousin that visited every weekend, that Liesel talked so much about.

”I trust her,” Hans said calmly to Max. ”And we have to pray to Jesus, Mary and Joeph that she is to be relied upon.” He shifted his gaze to Ilse. ”I trust that you won’t report him. And you will not tell a soul.”

The initial shock of finding out that her uncle was hiding a jew in his basement had faded slightly and Ilse was struck by her position in the situation. This man’s life depended on her silence. She wasn’t sure whether or not she supported her uncle’s decision to take him in, but either way, this man was not going to be taken away because of her.

She looked into the dark pools of Max’s eyes. ”Nein,” she said softly. ”Of course not.”

Max looked towards Hans, who nodded reassuringly. The jew closed his eyes and leaned his head back against the wall, breathing deeply.

Ilse was studying him with an increasing sense of guilt. Finally, she mustered up the courage to adress him.

”I am so sorry,” she piped up. As soon as the words had left her mouth, she knew that they could never compensate for what she had put him through. She felt ashamed of herself.

Max’s eyes opened and he looked at her, his gaze unreadable. ”I thought you were going to kill me.”

Ilse was stunned by the sheer absurdity of it. ”It was not my meaning to scare you,” she said sheepishly as soon as she had regained her ability to speak. ”Again, I am sorry. For everything.”

Chapter Text

Hans sent Ilse upstairs while he stayed behind to talk to Max and she waited at the top of the basement stairs, unsure of what to do. Her mind was spinning with everything that had happened.

Muffled voices drifted up to her through the half open basement door: Max’s frightened, winded tone and Hans’s warm and comforting one. The conversation went on for a while before they fell silent. After a few moments came a gut-wrenching sob, followed by soothing murmurs from Hans. Ilse felt the knot in her stomach twist.

Soon enough, Hans returned. He put out the basement lamp and closed the door, firmly. They went into the kitchen, where Liesel was waiting. She had overheard the some of the commotion in the basement and jumped up anxiously from where she had been sitting by the table. Her eyebrows were knitted together in distress and her eyes were almost as wide as the jew’s had been when Ilse left him.

”Papa?” Her voice was like broken glass as she looked between Hans and Ilse. ”Are they going to take him away?”

Hans hugged her close to his chest. ”No one is going to be taken away. Everything is alright, Liesel. Ilse almost scared Max to death is all, but everything will be fine.” He cradled the back of her head.

Ilse dared to step into the room. ”Hallo, Liesel.”

The girl freed herself from Hans and looked shyly at her. ”Ilse, you mustn’t tell anyone about Max. He hasn’t done anything wrong and he is very kind.”

”I won’t. You have my word,” Ilse said, smiling softly at her affectionate words.

Liesel turned to Hans. ”Can I go to him?”

With a nod from Hans, she left. As soon as the girl was out of earshot, Ilse turned to her uncle.

”Hans, I am so sorry, truly. I didn’t know.”

Hans lowered himself into a chair and exhaled deeply. He looked utterly exhausted. ”You couldn’t have known. It wasn’t your fault. You understand that we couldn’t tell anyone about Max, even our closest family and friends.”

”Of course.”

”It has not been easy. We have to keep doing everything exactly as usual to not raise suspicion — for example having you here on the weekends.”

”Oh...” Now that Ilse thought about it, the last few months, her visits to the Hubermanns had felt strained and there had been an air of fear in the house. Now she knew why. ”I am sorry for putting you under such pressure.”

But Hans simply waved her off. ”No, no. We couldn’t very well tell you to stop coming - and it all went well until today. What were you doing here anyway?”

”I was inspecting basements for work and I let myself in because I didn’t want to bother you. I thought that it was alright.” Ilse felt ashamed of herself for assuming.

Hans gave a weak smile. ”Normally, yes. But not when there is a jew in our basement.”

”I hope you know that I would never do anything to hurt him in the first place, and I would never report you,” Ilse said anxiously. ”It was all a mistake. I will keep your secret.”

”I know, Ilse. I explained that to Max. He calmed down when I told him that you are my niece and that I trust you fully.”

Ilse chewed on her lip, feeling the guilt course through her. ”Will you apologize to him from me, for putting him through all that? Please.”

”Of course. Do not worry, Ilse: everything will be all right as long as we keep silent.” Hans gave her an encouraging smile.

Relieved by Hans’s reassuring words, Ilse went home with the promise that she would come for tea that weekend, as usual. But had she known of the conversaiton that passed later that night in the basement of Himmel Strasse 33, she would not have been so calm.

”I’m leaving,” Max had said, calmly but firmly. ”I can’t put you all in such danger. If she could walk in here this easily, what’s to say that it won’t happen again?”

Hans had been exasperated. ”But Max, this is my niece, I trust her to—”

”I know,” Max’s gentle voice interrupted him. ”But what if someone else sees me? What if you’re not here? This is too dangerous, for all of us.”

”This was an exception!” said Hans, gesturing wildly. ”It will not happen again.”

”How can you be sure?”

This silenced Hans. After a couple of seconds, he sighed and rubbed his face tiredly. ”We have failed you.”

”No, no, no, not at all. Please do not think that. You have done nothing wrong — you have done so much for me. It is more than I deserve. It is just that I—”

They were interrupted by the sound of hesitant footsteps on the stairs and Liesel’s pajama-clad figure emerged. Her face was pale and tear-streaked. She went straight to Max and without hesitation, they wrapped their arms around each other, Liesel pressing her face into his chest.

”Please stay,” she sniffed against Max’s sweater.

He closed his eyes and hugged her tighter.

Hans stood watching them, brow furrowed with worry. ”Max, this will not happen again, it is not possible”, he pleaded. ”Ilse is the only one who could possibly get into the house.”

”Stay, Max,” said the girl.

Max looked around him, considering. He clenched his jaw, then nodded, ”Of course, Liesel,” and he bent down to kiss the top of her head.

Shortly after the argument had been settled, Ilse was preparing to go to bed in her home. What had happened earlier that day in the basement at Himmel Strasse 33 wouldn’t seem to leave her — even though she had tried to distract herself, Max’s words came back to her, repeating over and over in her mind: 'I thought you were going to kill me'. They had been spoken so plainly, with such complete and open honesty. She didn’t know what happened to jews that were taken away, but all of it frightened her. Seeing firsthand what it had done to Max made it feel so much more tangible and close. She could only imagine what horrors he had gone through and felt her skin crawl with guilt for making him relive them in his mind. When Ilse finally fell into a worried sleep, images of the pale jew and his terrified eyes haunted her dreams.

Chapter Text

That Sunday, as promised, Ilse went to the Hubermanns’ for tea. Hans greeted her by the door as warmly as usual, but when she entered the kitchen, Rosa scrutinised her coldly from where she was standing by the stove.

”Guten tag, Rosa,” said Ilse anxiously.

Rosa raised a wooden spoon at her. ”Well, Saumench?”

Ilse glanced towards Hans before daring to speak. ”Well, I- I haven’t told anyone. I gave you my word that I would keep your secret.”

”In my experience, words are all too easily broken.”

”Rosa, I don’t want to see any of you taken away,” Ilse said, starting to feel nervous at the gradual narrowing of Rosa’s eyes.

Hans put his hands on Ilse’s shoulders and steered her into a chair. ”Of course, Ilse. We know that.” When Rosa turned away, he gave his niece a shrug, as if to say, ”she’ll get over it”. The softness of his kind silver eyes made Ilse believe him.

And soon enough, Rosa put mugs and tea on the table and they all sat down. But amid the idle chatter, all Ilse could think of was the jew hiding in the cold darkness beneath their feet. Finally, she couldn’t contain herself any longer.

”How is he?” she asked. From the tone of her voice, there could be no doubt who she meant.

Hans’s expression shifted and he set his mug down. ”He was shaken after his encounter with you, and worried that it would happen again, with someone less understanding. But he is alright now.” He shot a glance towards Rosa and Ilse was surprised at the softness with which her aunt returned it. “You know,” Hans said, turning back to Ilse, “he has become like family, especially for Liesel. You remember the whole affair with her brother?”

”Right. Oh. I understand.” Ilse had heard only briefly about Liesel's brother but it must have been horrible to lose him at such a young age. So she was glad that Liesel had been able to find a new one in this man, whoever he was.

”They are both very lucky to have found each other.” Hans smiled fondly. ”It is a joy to see them together.”

”I see.” Ilse couldn’t help but feel a sense of curiosity about what kind of person Max was, for the Hubermanns to take to him so. The notion that maybe even Rosa’s distrustfulness towards herself came from a place of affection for him made Ilse wonder who this man was, to gain not only Hans’s and Liesel’s affection, but Rosa’s as well. If he could ever forgive her for their first meeting, Ilse thought with a twinge of guilt, maybe she would get to find out.

Slowly but surely, the days since the incident in the basement at number 33 Himmel Strasse passed, and Ilse continued her visits to the Hubermanns as usual. With every visit, she became more used to the thought of Max sitting alone in the cold dark beneath her feet, that when Liesel was ‘going down to read’, she was going to him.

Then, one Saturday afternoon when Rosa was preparing dinner, she called to Ilse, ”Can you get Liesel? She’s down in the basement.”

Ilse started, horrified at the prospect of intruding once again into Max’s private space. From what she had gathered over the weeks, he really had been very shaken by their previous meeting, and had every right to never want to see her again. ”Are you sure?”

”You heard me, Saumensch,” Rosa shouted.

”But—”

But Rosa waved a hand at her dismissively, and reluctantly, Ilse went. As soon as she opened the door to the basement, Ilse was reached by happy voices. Making her way down the stairs, she saw Liesel sitting cross-legged on the floor, apparently telling a story to Max, who sat leaning against the wall, his knees pulled up to his chest and a book in hand. A soft smile grazed his lips, and his eyes, that last Ilse had seen them had been filled with terror, now shone with life and kindness.

Ilse didn’t want to interrupt them, but had to say something as she went down the last, creaking steps of the stairs. ”Hallo,” she said quietly.

Max’s head shot up at the unfamiliar voice and Ilse noticed that he instantly, instinctively, had reeled in his open expression and locked his face shut. He seemed to tense and press further up against the wall as he regarded her warily. Ilse cringed inwardly at his reaction.

But although Max was very much at his guard, it occurred to him that Ilse didn’t seem half as intimidating now that she wasn’t wearing her uniform. Then, in the darkness, looking at him with accusing and dangerously frightened eyes, she had been a soldier and an enemy, an instrument of Hitler — now, although hovering insecurely in the very same spot that she had been standing in that day, in her colourless skirt and woolly sweater, she was human. The embarrassment and hesitancy written plainly all over her face made him dare to hope that maybe, she could even be a good person.

”Rosa wants you in the kitchen, Liesel,” Ilse said as gently as she could, to not alarm Max any further. She felt her skin crawl under his gaze as the guilt rose in her body once again.

”Alright, I’m coming.” The girl stood up and brushed the dust off her skirt.

Ilse tried not to look at Max — her presence clearly made him uncomfortable — and followed Liesel up the stairs. To her shame, she found that she was relieved to be out of reach of his dark eyes.

When Ilse was visiting a couple of weeks later, Rosa asked her to get some conserves from the basement. Her protests were met with a sharp ”I’m making soup, do I look like I can go down myself?” and Ilse didn’t dare to protest.

This time, Ilse figured that it would be best to announce herself so as not to frighten him yet again. She opened the basement door. ”Hello? Um- It’s Ilse, I’m coming down,” she called.

There was a ruffling sound, followed by an ”Alright.”

When Ilse had reached the bottom of the stairs, she caught sight of Max standing in a corner, looking at her, unease written all over his features and pooling in the depths of his eyes.

She flashed him an apologetic smile and hurried towards the shelf where Rosa kept the conserves. ”I’m sorry for disturbing you.”

”No, no, it is alright,” Max said. ”Please do not worry.” Still, his dark eyes didn't leave her for one moment as she rummaged through the conserves, found what she needed and crossed back over the basement floor.

Ilse didn’t dare to look behind her as she stepped quickly up the stairs. It felt wrong to close the door to the basement, shutting out the world from Max and leaving him alone in the dark and damp. She felt her heart break a little when she thought of him sitting there alone, day in and day out, the kindness she had seen in his eyes when he had been talking to Liesel extinguished. Ilse wondered when he had last breathed fresh air or felt the sun on his face. She wished he wouldn't have to live that way.

Now that Ilse was let in on the Hubermanns’ secret, Rosa seemed to have made a habit out of sending Ilse down into the basement to fetch her all sorts of things whenever she was around. It always made Ilse uneasy to intrude upon Max, especially keeping in mind their first meeting and the fact that they had barely exchanged two sentences since then.

But one Saturday when Ilse was tasked with bringing Rosa the big stew pot that she stored in the basement, something happened that broke the pattern of their stiff interactions.

Max kept his usual watchful distance as Ilse lifted the heavy pot down from its place at a top shelf, and as usual, Ilse hurried back towards the stairs to leave him to himself again. But halfway up the steps, she was stopped by Max’s voice.

“Wait, sorry… You are Ilse, right?”

She turned to face him, surprised. ”I am. And you are Max?”

”Yes.” Max’s gaze was steady on her face. The wariness that he usually displayed seemed to Ilse to have been replaced with a sort of tentative curiosity. “Liesel talks a great deal about you.”

She smiled, taken aback. ”Well, you too. She spends a lot of time down here.”

”She does. Too much maybe - it would do her good to go outside and play football with her friends more often. Although I am happy for the company.”

Ilse nodded, trying to come up with something to say. She was thrilled that Max was talking to her, that he had given her this chance to start over. But something was nagging at the back of her mind, something that had prevented her from starting this conversation with him before. She took a deep breath - it was now or never.

”Look, I wanted to say, I really am so sorry for that time when I went down here and - I didn’t know, and I would never have said those things if I had known who you were, I’m so sorry.”

Max studied her for a moment, then his gaze seemed to soften and he said, “You couldn’t have known. I suppose you were only trying to protect your family.”

“As were you.” Ilse remembered his desperate lie, the absolute terror in his dark eyes. “And yourself, of course”

Max had given a half-chuckle at Ilse’s implication that the Hubermanns had become his family, and at his own sudden realisation that it was true. “Yes.”

They fell silent, neither of them knowing what to say. Then, after a few heartbeats, Max seemed to pull himself together and said with a polite smile, ”Well, I won’t keep you down here any longer.”

Ilse nodded goodbye and turned around to return to Rosa. But as she did, she miscalculated the weight of the heavy pot that she was carrying and it toppled dangerously in her arms.

In an instant, Max had stepped forward and caught it before it fell. “Here, let me help you with that,” he mumbled, lifting the pot and handing it safely back to Ilse. But as he did, his hand brushed hers for a moment, surprisingly warm in the damp basement, and Ilse could feel herself flush.

“Thank you,” she stammered, furious at herself for blushing like a schoolgirl, and hurried up the stairs.

As Ilse closed the basement door behind her, she was surprised by the relief she felt at finally having had a proper introduction with Max. She could see now why the Hubermanns all liked him so much. He was perfectly polite and friendly, and there was something in his dark eyes that intrigued her. The hopeful curiosity that was budding inside Ilse’s chest whispered a hope that her missions into the basement wouldn’t be as awkward from now on as they had been, that now, they could talk like this and maybe get to know each other. She could use a friend.

Suddenly, her musings were interrupted by an irritated exclamation of “Saumensch!”

Ilse had entered the kitchen.

“Is your head in the clouds, give me that pot.” Rosa took the stew pot from Ilse and promptly began pouring in the vegetables that she had been chopping. “Give me a hand here.”

Ilse helped Rosa lift the pot to the stove and began stirring the soup, but her thoughts were somewhere else - with the dark-eyed man beneath her feet. She couldn’t help but wonder what he thought about her and whether he really meant that he could forgive her for their first meeting. Either way, Ilse was very happy that they were speaking now.

She found herself almost looking forward to the next time Rosa would send her down into the basement.

Chapter Text

One Sunday when Ilse knocked on the door of Himmel Strasse 33, no one answered for a while, so she knocked again, starting to wonder whether they were all out. It was a beautiful sunny day and where Ilse was standing on the front steps, a golden sunbeam fell right on her face. Although at least one of the Hubermanns always used to welcome her into their home for her weekly visit, she wouldn’t blame them for wanting to enjoy these rare hours of sunlight.

Inevitably, as it seemed whenever she thought of the Hubermanns these days, Ilse’s mind strayed to Max. The last couple of weeks she really felt that the awkwardness between them slowly had melted away, and now, she could always look forward to a polite chat with him during her visits. Ilse was still overjoyed that he even wanted to speak to her.

She realised how absurd she must have seemed, trying to make friends with a jew hiding from Hitler in a basement, for whom it would mean death if someone let as much as a whisper slip about his whereabouts. All the same, there wasn’t anything wrong in trying to brighten his days a little, was there? At least Ilse thought that Max seemed happy to see her when she visited, but maybe she was imagining things: they had only talked a couple of times after all. She found those dark eyes hard to read at times, partly because the intensity of their gaze made her feel flustered somehow, as if it could see everything going on in her mind and how happy it made her to spend time with him.

Ilse was brought back to reality and the warmth of the sun by the sound of hurried footsteps from behind the door, and had just time to realise what a contrast this warm sunlight must have been to the dampness of Max’s basement, before the door was opened, revealing Liesel. Judging by her shortness of breath, she had just ran up the stairs from the basement.

“Hallo Ilse,” she said, “I’m sorry if you had to wait, we were down in the basement and I didn’t hear you at first before mama yelled at me to go and let you in.”

“It’s okay,” said Ilse as she shrugged off her coat. She poked her head into the kitchen to say hello to Rosa, standing as ever at the stove. “What were you doing anyway?”

“We’ve had a water leak in the basement. Half the floor’s flooded-” She lowered her voice before continuing, “-and we’ve had to put poor Max’s mattress on top of some old boxes to keep it dry. Go down and see for yourself!”

As Ilse descended the basement stairs, it took a moment for her eyes to adjust to the darkness compared to the sunlight outside, but when they did, she could see that Liesel hadn’t been exaggerating. The source of the problem seemed to be one of the pipes along the ceiling, and although Hans, barefoot and with his pants rolled up around his calves, was in the process of wrapping it tightly in rags, it was still dripping considerably.

Max was perched in the only dry corner of the basement, on his hands and knees trying to soak up some of the water with a towel. When he spotted Ilse, he sat back on his heels and gave her a sort of apologetic but amused look. “Hallo, Ilse,” he said.

Hans looked up and wiped the sweat off his brow. “Ah, welcome, Ilse. I’m afraid today won’t be a very nice visit,” he said “We’ve been down here since the morning trying to keep this damned pipe from leaking.”

Despite herself Ilse couldn’t help chuckling at how ridiculous her uncle looked standing in the middle of the flooded floor as she tiptoed along the wall to Max’s dry corner. “Well I’m sorry you’ve been stuck inside, it’s such a beautiful day!” 

Regret immediately seized her as she remembered Max. She was just about to apologise when she saw that he had perked up at what she said. Something wistful had come over him. “How was it?”

“What?”

“Outside. Would you describe it to me?” His gaze contained such a deep longing as it locked on Ilse’s that she was sure she couldn’t deny him this even had she wanted to.

“Well, it- ” She hesitated, suddenly flustered. “This morning I woke up to some sun for what felt like the first time in months and when I went outside the sunlight was really warming - like the warmth of the sun was... almost holding me, very gently. It made everything look so alive, and even the people I met on the way here looked happy. I always feel that the sun suddenly makes everything feel so much lighter, and easier. Sorry, I don’t really know how to describe it-”

But Max was looking at her in a way that made her forget anything she had meant to say. He nodded and closed his eyes for a moment. Even Hans had stopped working and was leaning against the wall listening to Ilse, a soft smile in his silver eyes.

Ilse shrugged, feeling nervous. “I don’t know…”

She nearly jumped when Max reached out to gently touch her arm. “Thank you.” His expression was full of sincere gratitude.

Hans, who had returned his attention to the leaking pipe, finally gave up trying to get it to stop dripping when about half of his carefully placed rags fell off. “Well, this isn’t going to work. I think we need to find a better way to wrap this, just so it holds until we can have someone come and fix this.” He sighed, rubbing his forehead. “Do you think you can help me, Ilse? I’ll need someone to hold the pipe.”

“Sure.” She made to remove her shoes, but blushed when she realised that Max was looking at her: it wouldn’t be quite proper to remove her stockings in front of him. Gingerly, she slid them down her calves and put them atop a wooden crate. Max had discreetly looked away.

Ilse stepped into the water and went to her uncle.

“Alright, if you hold this here… Jesus, Mary and Josef-” Hans gestured to Max. “Come here Max, I need your strength too.”

Max got to his feet and removed his sweater, leaving him in a white tank top, before he made his way across the floor to them, making little jumps between dryer spots. “Of course,” he grinned, “but I’m warning you - I’m not that strong.”

Hans answered his smile. “Oh come on Max, I’ve seen you do your pushups.”

Max shrugged and positioned himself next to Ilse, putting his hands under the pipe on the other side of the leak. She found herself flushing for the second time that day at the sight of his toned arms.

Hans began unwrapping the pipe and as rag after rag was removed, water came leaking out in spurts onto them. One gush went into Max’s face and he spluttered, unable to do anything as he was holding up his side of the pipe. Ilse laughed and earned an amused snort from him.

Eventually, Hans secured the last rag around the leak and stepped back to make sure it wasn’t dripping anymore. “Alright, I think we did it.”

Ilse could finally release the pipe and massaged her arms, trying to shake some life into them again. Beside her, Max breathed a sigh of relief and ran a hand through his wet hair.

The sound of the stairs creaking drew their attention as Rosa poked her head into the basement.

“Ah, so now you show yourself,” Hans teased.

Rosa ignored him with a grudging smile and studied the pipe for a moment. “Well, that’s a relief,” she sighed. “We’ll still need to dry all this up so that Max can sleep in here tonight, but lunch is ready - you can finish this after some food.”

Ilse and Hans followed Rosa upstairs, but Ilse stopped her uncle before they reached the kitchen. “Hans, I need to ask you, what did Max mean by asking me to describe the weather?”

“Oh, he does that to Liesel almost every day - he likes to imagine the outside and, well... to try to remember it. You know, he hasn’t left the basement since he came to us.“ He smiled and clasped Ilse’s shoulder. “It’s nice that he asked you today.”

A little perplexed but very pleased, Ilse followed him into the kitchen.