Panzerfaust

Chapter 42 - Delirium

November 20th, 1945, Charlottenburg, near Berlin, Greater German Reich

'Mama, mit Liebe!' 

Armin von Fölkersam mumbles to her with a shy smile on his little face as he hands her a booklet wrapped with a blue ribbon. His stepfather stands behind him, with reassuring hands on the tiny shoulders. 

'Not quite like how we practiced young man; but there's a first try for everything.' Otto Skorzeny strokes up a hand on the boy's dark hair, then kisses his wife on the lips. 'Alles gute zum Geburtstag, liebe Sophie.' 

'Vielen Dank. You boys are the sweetest! What is this?'

Dried leaves and flowers are pressed and glued to the pages of the booklet, each with a little story in Otto's dynamic handwriting and Armin's tiny fingerprints in colourful shades. 

'You're going to have to fill the rest of the pages tho. With another little fingerprint soon.'

Placing a large hand on her even larger belly, he takes the seat beside her by the breakfast table. 

'Greta! Look what my boys made for me.' 

'Lovely.' The older woman muses as she sets the tray of sizzling sausages before them on the long table. Sophia was overjoyed when the landlady agreed to accompany them to their new Charlottenburg home - and not just because of her heavenly pastries.

'Sausage? I thought you made donuts.' Pouting, she pokes the meat before her with a fork.

'You can have as many donuts as you want after you finished your Wurst.'

Her husband across her opens the morning newspaper with a crank, head disappearing into the material as Greta fills his mug with steaming coffee. 

Sophia catches a glimpse of them in the mirror lining one side of the room; the Head of the House; strong and sturdy, the light of the morning sun playing with the silver lines between his dark locks, baby Armin's glacier blue eyes on his cereal and her; blond and heavily pregnant.  Just like Otto said on the day he first made love to her in her office; they do look perfect together - and in a week or so, a blond little girl will join them from her womb. 

'Any news we should care about?' 

'The British forces joined the Duce's in Italian Libya against the Arab resistance in the Fezzan desert.' Otto turns a page with indignation. 'It was about time; those Brits were so eager to sign a truce with us after the Fall of Moscow, yet they were half as eager sending troops to help us. '

'How does one fight in a desert?' Sophia asks, thoughts far away from the Sahara. 

'I've been asking 'feldmarschall Rommel for years, but all does is showing me his tan.'

'So have you been thinking about names? I like Anna. Annie, in German.' Cutting down a piece of the wurst, she dunks it in the sweet bavarian mustard. 'Annie Skorzeny sounds great.' 

'Mussolini has a daughter named Anna Maria. What about Silke?' 

'Silke Skorzeny? I thought you don't want our children to be bullied.'

Dark blue eyes appear over the edge of the newspaper with indignation.

'Csúnyán visszaélsz a jóindulatommal mostanában, asszony.'