I

The family room was cramped. Too small for a mother and her three children and the crooked branch the older son had sawed down for a Christmas tree. Everywhere Felix Wolfe turned there were pine needles, tinsel, and the faces of his family. Each child stared eagerly at the trio of modest parcels under the spindly branch, waiting for their mother’s blessing.

“Make sure you don’t tear the paper,” she instructed them. “We need to save it to use again.”

Martin, as the oldest, went first. His gift was the smallest and held a secondhand pocket watch. Felix opened his own parcel with delicate fingers, carefully unfolding corners and smoothing out creases to find a toy car. It wasn’t new—there was a dent in the far right door and some scratches on its bright red paint—but Felix didn’t mind. New toys, his schoolteacher had said, were selfish and took away materials the Führer needed to win the war. Metal was needed for Mausers and bullets, not child’s play.

Adele tore at the edges of her parcel. Inside lay a doll, with yellow yarn hair and eyes made from the blue buttons of one of their mother’s old silk blouses. The doll’s dress was made from scraps of its cobalt fabric, sewn with cramped stitches and care.

Felix knew, as soon as his twin stopped and stared at the gift, that she was unhappy. He always knew these things.

“I made other dresses,” their mother said. “You can change her clothes every day. And I’ll teach you how to braid her hair.”

Adele’s own plaited pigtails whipped her cheeks as she shook her head and shoved the box away. “I don’t want a doll! Why can’t I have a car like Felix?”

Their mother’s mouth pinched. Her eyes went all shiny, the way they sometimes did when she read their father’s letters from the front. The sight twisted Felix’s stomach.

“Here.” He pushed his own present toward his sister. “You can play with my car.”

Adele’s eyes lit bright as she grabbed the toy. She started making motor sounds and pushing it across the floor. Martin was busy winding his watch. Felix wasn’t really sure what he should do without his car. At least his mother was smiling again, wiping her eyes as she watched her children playing.

“There’s one more gift,” she said.

All three Wolfe children froze. Felix looked under the tree, but there were no packages left. Perhaps they were getting oranges. Or maybe their mother had saved enough rations to bake gingerbread!

Their mother made her way through the room, dancing through bent paper and children’s limbs and forgotten toys. She reached the door to her bedroom and placed her hand on the latch. Her smile was wider than Felix had seen it in a long time.

The door opened. Standing at the edge of the bedroom, arms outstretched, was their father, still wearing his army uniform. His field cap slouched over sun-pale hair as he knelt down to greet his children.

Adele was the first child to barrel into his arms, with the delighted shout of Papa! Martin—since he now owned a pocket watch and was practically a grown man himself—tried to contain his excitement to a firm handshake. Felix hung back, taking in the sight of his whole family together: Mama grinning by the doorway, Papa pulling both Adele and a not-really-reluctant Martin into a bear hug. Felix’s heart warmed while he watched them, brighter than the cinders in the wood-burning stove.

He wanted to capture this moment, hold this feeling inside him forever.

“Felix! My little man!” His father smiled. Even with two children in his embrace, his arms were long enough to reach out for his son. “Did you look after this lot? Keep them out of trouble?”

Felix nodded as he joined the hug.

Their father explained that he was home for good. The war was winding down on the Eastern Front, and the army no longer needed him. He didn’t have to say good-bye to them anymore.

No more good-byes. The warmth inside Felix stoked and flared. After years of letters from the front—and Felix always fearing that the next would spell out his father’s death—the Wolfe family was together again.