Mama is the mother, she’s meant to be the sun of their family. And she acts more like the moon, reflecting back others’ light

Wilhelm pries the cork off the bottle and splashes the wine into two flute glasses. He raises the glass. “To moving on with life.”

Felix watches, hesitating, before the lure of a wineglass in hand decides for him. He raises his glass. “To stepping back into the unknown.” He sips, allows the wine to linger in his mouth before he swallows. It is a good vintage. Not what he would have expected from Wilhelm.

“Papa gave me the key to the wine cellar,” Wilhelm says, pouring himself a second glass.

“In honor of?”

A big announcement is coming, surely. While Felix writes stories about Hans and Bertha (the latest: Hans and Bertha visit their elderly relatives on a sled, bringing them pastries that Mama has ordered the servants to prepare especially for them), Wilhelm is moving on. Not only that, he deserves a charged glass.

Perhaps he is going to be one of the handful of Jews offered a teaching position in Berlin University. Maybe he is to become a minor government officer or he has been offered a place in the office of a diplomat. Something that will allow his mother to boast and mute his father’s penchant for criticizing his offspring.

“You, of course.”

Felix blinks. “Me?”

Wilhelm takes a large swallow. “Oh, the innocence of babes.”

Felix sets down his glass and paces the room. “Abandoning your dissertation and taking a dead-end job writing a children’s supplement can hardly be called moving on with life.” He turns and faces Wilhelm, surprised at the agitation filling him.

Wilhelm chuckles. “Do you know that the entire city is talking about your piece?”

He looks up. Who, exactly, reads page five of the newspaper? Other than desperate balding men, attracted by the advertisements for hair restoral cream. He rubs his own hand over his thick, curling, brown locks. His father’s heritage — Papa still has an enviable head of hair in his early fifties.

Felix reaches for the bottle and refills the glass. Wilhelm’s eyes widen. “When is the last time you were in a coffee shop? And what about shul on Shabbos?”

He blushes. “With Mama away—”

“You simply turn over and go back to sleep on Shabbos morning.”

Felix nods.

“And thus you had cholent for breakfast, with nary a coffee beforehand.”

“It was easier than I had feared.”