Albrecht had told Friedrich that the big grand house hadn't been his family's. It never had been; one day his father had just turned up at their home – a flat in Hanover, almost as lavishly decorated with expensive furniture and dthings that his mother bought or that were brought to their home –, a big grin on his face, and told Albrecht's mother to pack things, only the necessities, and clothes, of course, and whatever they'd need, because they were going to move into a bigger, more beautiful home.

Albrecht had remembered his mother's cry of delight when she had seen the rooms, one more splendid than the other, and then she had turned and looked at his father, "what a wonderful surprise!" and he had hugged her, and kissed her, and she had giggled and for a split moment Albrecht could see the girl that she had once been.

He had just stood there, and then his father had ruffled his hair, good-naturedly, and said, "So, does this agree with you as well?"

"Who lived here before?" he had asked, and his father had withdrawn his big warm hand and shrugged. "They wanted to move somewhere else."

"And they left all this behind?" he inquired. His father sighed. "You're sometimes too damn inquisitive for your own good, Albrecht. But yes, they left all this behind, they were in a hurry to get out. – Don't you like this house? Do you want to go back to Hanover, is that what it is? There's even enough space for your books here," he said, and coldness spread throughout his voice.

Albrecht nodded as his mother shot him a worrying look. "No, father, it's a beautiful house." And that was all what he ever said about it. When he found a picture book that had slipped behind the shelves in his room, leafing through it and stumbling onto the name 'Jacob Levenstein' in neatly printed letters in the front, he didn't say anything, either.

But he said something to Friedrich when they were walking across the wintry field, the snow swallowing the sounds of their feet. "I never lived in a real home all my life," he said. "Or at least I don't remember it. It has always been other people's homes, other people's riches and glories. I never felt at home anywhere."

Albrecht could feel Friedrich looking at him, and he was glad for the sparse light of the full moon. Then Friedrich said, "You can live anywhere you want when you're grown up, Albrecht. You could live in a little comfortable house with a garden all around it, and you could have a dog, a little spaniel and I would be your neighbour, dropping by for a visit every other day."

Suddenly Albrecht had to close his eyes, feeling something spill down his cheek and to hide it, he took a long gulp out of the bottle.

"Yes, that would be lovely," he said as he had found his bearing again, quickly wiping his cheek.

"And it could happen, who knows?" Friedrich said.

Albrecht closed his eyes, wallowing in the warmth and hope in Friedrich's voice. He didn't have the heart to tell him that it would amount to nothing. Only to a burnt-down, decrepit and haunted ruin, something no one sane would want to live in.