The city had become a gilded cage, its once-vibrant streets now choked by the mechanized tread of Panzer divisions and the sharp echoes of jackboots on cobblestones. They were everywhere—those fair-haired conquerors with their crisp uniforms and clinical cruelty—loitering at café tables where Parisian intellectuals had once debated philosophy, their laughter like the cocking of pistols in the quiet dawn. You learned to navigate this new topography of fear with the precision of a cartographer mapping minefields: the way the Feldgendarmerie would materialize at intersections to inspect papers with fingers still smelling of gun oil, how the black Mercedes staff cars glided through the boulevards like hearses carrying the still-living to their fates. And then there was him, with his cornflower-blue eyes and wolfish grin, always finding excuses to linger near your apartment building, his compliments falling like grenades at your feet. You turned away each time, your silence a weapon sharper than any resistance knife, your hatred a living thing that curled around your ribs like barbed wire.

That afternoon, the knock at your door had been different—softer, almost hesitant, the sound of a man unaccustomed to waiting for permission. The autumn light slanted through the lace curtains, painting the floorboards in delicate filigree as you approached, your stockinged feet silent against the wood. When you opened the door, the world tilted on its axis. There stood Standartenführer Franz, a silhouette cut from the very fabric of the Reich’s nightmares, his SS uniform immaculate down to the razor-sharp creases in his trousers. In his hands—those hands you’d seen in newspaper photographs clasped behind his back during executions—nestled a bouquet of white lilies, their petals trembling like the wings of captured doves. The flowers were obscenely beautiful, their fragrance clashing violently with the scent of his leather gloves and the faint metallic tang of blood that seemed to follow all these men like an invisible shroud.

“Fräulein,” he murmured, his voice the rich, cultured baritone of a man who quoted Goethe between death sentences. The afternoon sun caught the silver Totenkopf at his cap, the hollow-eyed skull grinning at you as if privy to some private joke. Behind him, the courtyard lay unnaturally still, even the sparrows holding their breath. You noticed absurd details—the way his knuckles whitened around the stems, how a single drop of moisture from the flowers had fallen onto his polished boot like a tear.

In that suspended moment, you understood the true horror of war. Not the guns or the ghettos or the midnight arrests, but this—the way monsters could play at being men, could offer flowers with hands still warm from signing execution orders. The lily stems were cool and smooth as bone when you took them, your fingers brushing his for a heartbeat too long. His glove was warm. Human.

From an open window above, a neighbor’s curtain twitched. The lilies in your arms might as well have been a death sentence in bloom. Franz adjusted his cap, the shadow of the SS eagle sliding across his face like a premonition. “A beautiful day, is it not?” he remarked, as if commenting on the weather rather than the end of the world.

The door closed between you with a whisper of finality. Outside, the sound of his polished boots faded down the stairwell, each step a measured beat in the Reich’s endless march. You stood there, clutching the lilies like a bride holding a bouquet of grenades, their perfume now mingling with the scent of your sweat-slick palms. Somewhere in the city, a church bell tolled. Somewhere to the east, the Russians advanced. And in your trembling hands, the lilies began to weep.