When the World Was Ours - Hardcover

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Liz Kessler has written over twenty books for children and young adults. Most of these are middle grade books featuring mermaids, fairies, time travel, and superpowers. She lives in the UK.

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1. Leo

Leo

I could see the whole world! Or at least the whole of Vienna, and that was my world.

My two best friends, Max and Elsa, stood beside me, their faces pressed to the glass next to mine.

“Look at the tiny people!” Max exclaimed, pointing down below us as we rose higher and higher into the sky.

“The buildings look like a toy town!” Elsa said.

I couldn’t even speak. I was too afraid that if I opened my mouth, some of the joy inside me might slip out, and I didn’t want to lose a single bit of it.

It was my ninth birthday and the best day of my life, bar none.

When my parents had asked me last week what I wanted to do for my birthday, there was no contest. I wanted to ride on Vienna’s Ferris wheel: the Riesenrad. We had lived in Vienna almost my whole life, but I’d never been on it. Whenever I asked, Mama would always say I was too young and that I’d be afraid to be so high up. But I wasn’t scared at all. I think Mama was afraid herself, really, which is why she decided she wouldn’t come with us.

“Your papa will take you to the fairground,” she told me. “I’ll stay home and prepare a wonderful birthday meal for you. What cake would you like?”

“Sachertorte!” I replied without hesitating. Mama made the best Sachertorte in Vienna. She had a secret recipe, passed down from Omama, my grandma.

I crossed the days off on the calendar in the kitchen. The week crawled by slower than the snails at the bottom of our garden.

But now at last my birthday was here, and the Riesenrad ride was even better than I’d imagined it would be. It was a cold October day, but bright and sunny and we could see for miles and miles.

The carriage rose higher and higher. We would soon be in the clouds!

Max leaned his forehead against the window. “I feel like the king of Vienna,” he said. The glass fogged up as he spoke.

I knew what he meant. Climbing high above the city made me feel invincible. Vienna was ours to share. A whole city spread out just for Elsa, Max, and me. All the other people in the carriage had faded into the background. Even Papa. He was sitting reading a newspaper and frowning. He was missing the best thing in the world!

We didn’t care. The fact that the adults were missing out only kept more of it for us. Our city, this carriage, our friendship—that was all we needed.

It was always like that with us three. We’d been best friends since the first day of Volksschule—big school—two years ago. We had been seated in a row of three, Elsa in between Max and me like she was now. I can still picture us: me with my tie done up so tightly I could hardly breathe; Elsa with her plaited hair and pink ribbons and her pencil case with shiny beads; Max in his trousers that were just a little too short and his shirt that was a little too big.

We looked at each other that first morning and smiled, and it was as if we knew it straightaway: we were a team. When the boys pulled on my tie, when they laughed at Max’s ankles sticking out of the bottom of his trousers, when the girls made fun of Elsa’s fancy ribbons—none of it mattered because we had each other.

“If you’re the king, I’ll be queen,” Elsa said now.

“What about me?” I asked. “It is my birthday, after all.”

“We can have two kings!” Elsa replied. That was so like her. Always wanting to be fair to everyone.

“If you’re the queen, that means you have to marry one of us,” Max said. “So who will you choose?” He gave Elsa a look as he spoke. A look that I’d seen between them sometimes recently. I always pretended I hadn’t noticed. It felt like a secret they shared. A promise that excluded me. I told myself I was imagining it. They would never exclude me. Nothing would ever come between the three of us.

Elsa giggled. “I could never choose!” she said. “I’ll marry you both, of course.”

That was good enough for me.

Max folded his arms and narrowed his eyes as he pretended to think. “Okay, that’s an excellent plan,” he said, nodding his agreement.

“Hey, kids.” Papa folded up his paper and cupped his ear. “Can you hear that?”

We strained to listen. Other than the soft chatter of the other people in the carriage, I couldn’t hear anything. “What are we listening to?” I asked.

Papa laughed. “Nothing! That’s just it. It’s the sound you hear when the carriage stops.”

He was right. The big wheel was still and now we were on top of the whole world. For a moment, I wondered if we might stay there forever. I hoped so.

Then I remembered Mama’s Sachertorte waiting for us at home and decided that forever might be a little too long.

Papa had stood up and was getting his camera out of his jacket pocket. He rarely went anywhere without a camera. Papa was Vienna’s finest family photographer. That’s what it said on his shop window anyway.

“Come on, let’s take your picture while you’re on top of the world, eh?” he said.

The three of us squashed together in front of the window.

Papa lowered his camera and frowned. “Not there,” he said. “The sun is right behind you. You’ll be nothing but shadows. Come here.” He waved a hand toward the door at the far end of the carriage. “Stand against this so the bright sky is in front of you.”

We shuffled to the end of the carriage and squeezed in toward each other.

Papa looked at us through the camera’s lens. “Perfect,” he said. “We have to get the picture just right. And you know why that is?” he asked.

“Because a picture paints a thousand words,” I replied, pretending to yawn. Papa said the same thing every time he took a photo.

He laughed. “That’s right. And believe me, this will be a picture to paint a thousand words—all of them happy ones as well!” he said. “Now remember, whatever you do, don’t smile!”

Max frowned. “I thought people always smiled in photos.”

“Not in my photos,” Papa replied in a mock serious tone. “I don’t allow it.”

Elsa let out a giggle.

“Ah ah! No laughing either!” Papa warned.

Elsa giggled again. I could feel my own face twitching into a smile.

“I said NO smiling!” Papa said again. By this time, everyone in the carriage was laughing, not just the three of us.

Click, click, click went the shutter.

“Beautiful, fantastic, wonderful!” Papa called as he photographed us, talking to us just like I’d heard him talk to his clients. When he’d finished, he lowered the camera. “I’ll choose the best photo and give each of you a copy, so you’ll always have a memory of this day. How does that sound?”

“It sounds wonderful, Papa,” I said. “Thank you!”

“Good. Now then,” he said as he put his camera back into his jacket pocket, “I think I saw at least one of you smiling. And you know how I punish smilers?”

Elsa shook her head. Max bit his lip. I knew what...