Forgotten Songs...Inclusive

"Imogen?" he asked -- when Harry stopped playing. "Might we go for a walk? Just the two of us?"

She shrugged noncommittally -- at least until Harry went over to play with Tilly and the baby -- then she stood and grabbed a shawl and made for the door off the kitchen, leaving Saul to make his excuses as he chased after her. When they were well away from the house Imogen turned to confront her old friend -- but when she saw the look on his face she crossed her arms protectively over her chest. "What is it?" she said. "What's wrong?"

He walked up to her and took her hand in his. "Show me around, would you? While we talk?"

"Why? Are you going to tell me how ashamed my father would feel if he saw me now?"

"No, I wasn't, but now that you mention it, would it matter how he felt?"

She shrugged. "What do you want to talk about, Saul?"

"The Old Man. The man in the loden cape."

She stiffened instantly, then turned to face her house. "Tilda told you?"

"She did. Years ago."

"God damn the meddling bitch!"

"What can you tell me about him?"

"What?"

"I've seen him, Imogen. He followed me all the way from Copenhagen, on the airplane and through Los Angeles. I assume he's nearby even now."

"You...what?" she asked, her voice tinged with hysteria. "You've seen him?"

"Yes, and I know for a fact that other people have seen his comings and goings, as well. You are not imagining him, Imogen. He's real. Very real. And we must know more."

"Real?" she sighed, now almost breathlessly. "Are you certain?"

"I am. There can be no mistaking the cane that I saw."

And he had the impression, if only for a moment or two, that he'd been looking at her as if she was little more than a reflection locked away inside a mirror -- and that somehow he'd just thrown a hammer through the mirror. Now the mirror shattered before his eyes and the shards were falling away, and what was left was the Imogen he'd known once upon a time, his irrepressible, brilliant best friend from Copenhagen. He looked at her and smiled -- and then, quite unable to help himself -- he enfolded her in his arms and held her as tears of relief came to them both.

And when, a few minutes later, she pulled away she was almost a different person than the disheveled housewife he'd first seen only an hour or so ago. Now her eyes were bright and searching, her native inquisitiveness shining through once again, but then she looked down at her hands -- and shook her head.

"Are these mine?" she asked, her voice full of the sudden awakening she'd just come through.

"They are. But listen closely, because I have a plan..."

"My dearest Saul," she said, kissing his cheek gayly. "But of course you have a plan. You always have a plan, don't you...?"Chapter 5

UCSF Medical Center, San Francisco 22 November 1963

Anders Sorensen was closing a belly after removing several gall stones when he was called over the intercom by an ER doc: "Doctor Sorensen, I've got a ten year old boy with a hot lower right quadrant, nausea and vomiting..."

"For how long," Sorensen said, not looking up while he finished suturing the woman's belly.

"Mother advises onset was yesterday morning."

"Damn. Aure-Rozanova's?"

"Positive."

"Dunphy's?"

"Yessir, positive. X-ray looks distended, as well."

"Ten years old, you say?"

"Yes, Doctor. Ten."

"Okay, get him prepped and send him up. Parent's with him?"

"Yessir. You want me to talk to them?"

"If you could, please. I've got another case I'll need to push back a little."

"Right. Thank you, Doctor Sorensen."

Anders looked up over his glasses at the surgical resident working with him this morning, a bright middle-aged woman named Sheila Ackerman, and he sighed. "Feel like working another case this morning?"

"Yes, of course. Would you like me to complete the notes on this one while you scrub?"

"That'd be fine," Anders said as he looked up at the clock on the wall. "Call closing complete at zero-nine-thirty, and let's talk over a couple of ideas at lunch."

"Okay, fine by me."

"I'll bring her out now," the anesthetist said.

"Fine. And Brad? Can you help on this next one? He's young, and you know how I feel..."

"Yeah, Doc, sure thing. I'm clear 'til noon."

Anders nodded as he taped the drain to the base of his incision. "Perfect. This should only take an hour."

+++++

Sorensen and Ackerman headed down to the physician's dining room after the hot appendix, but as he stepped into the dining room they were met with pulsating scenes of pure pandemonium and chaos. Everyone seemed to be gathered around the two television sets in the room and Sorensen pushed his way through the melee to see what was going on -- until he...

...saw Walter Cronkite telling the world "that President Kennedy is dead."

Sorensen backpedaled from the screen, his mind reeling, falling through images of hooded klansmen in a torch filled night, the world, his world, closing in on Kennedy, then he saw gestapo agents coming down a cobbled lane towards the wharves in Copenhagen and he knew they were coming for him, pushing through crowds to get to him, to arrest -- him -- a simple surgeon. He was soon fighting for his life, pushing and clawing his way through white-coated klansmen, trying to get free and make a run for his life as images of cattle cars overflowing with emaciated Jews filled his mind. Then came onrushing echoes of endless nightmares as he felt his body giving way to a human wave, another nameless, faceless wall of humanity being herded into some kind of concrete shower facility -- and yes, there they were. Pipes overhead, painted pipes full of gas, and that, he told himself, is where my death will come from. Rusty drains set in a concrete floor painted gray...so when we die...when our bowels and bladders let go...that's where we will go...where I will go...

He felt a pinprick in his left arm and he started to cry as he fell into that bottomless well...

"I don't want to die in here," Anders Sorensen cried. "Not like this, not now, not here!"

Across the dining room an Old Man in a loden cape looked on with a deepening scowl etched across his face. No one saw him wipe away tears from a twitching eye; no one saw him leave the room. Indeed, no one remembered seeing him at all.

+++++

By September, Saul Rosenthal had settled on a little brown bungalow over in the Potrero Hills neighborhood south of the city. He purchased the house and put the title into a trust for young Harald, and even before Lloyd returned from his latest trip to Asia Saul he had moved Imogen and 'Harry' -- as the boy liked to be called -- from that flea-ridden artichoke farm back to the city. With that accomplished he set about finding a location for The Rosenthal Music Company's first international location, and the Sorensens helped him find just the right spot.

An old warehouse located nearby had caught Anders eye more than once -- and he said because the building reminded him of home, like the architects had styled the front facade in a way that would have seemed perfect along a fin de siècle Danish waterfront. Built just after the Panama--Pacific International Exposition in 1915, the main warehouse building was adorned with strong neoclassical elements of cast stone, while the main office was a fusion of styles, from classical Greek to linear Bauhaus cubism. Better still, the main office had already been divided into two principle areas, and Saul could easily see that the largest space would make a perfect showroom for the high end pianos he wanted to showcase here in this more affluent part of the city.

He closed on the building in the middle of November, and had just begun to assemble the designers and contractors necessary to modify the building to suit his needs when he learned that President Kennedy had just been shot and killed. There wasn't yet an active telephone line in the building, yet his first instinct on hearing the news had been to call Anders -- because something about his friend's behavior the past two weeks had been troubling him. He had at first seemed preoccupied with the past, and with what had happened to Europe's Jews in Poland -- not to mention all the other occupied territories -- this was understandable. Yet when he came back from services Anders was almost distraught -- but with guilt!

Guilt?

"Survivor's guilt?"

Anders had been among the very first to recognize that both he and Tilda were in mortal danger just after the Germans moved into Poland; in fact, he had departed within days. He had done his very best to convince Aaron Schwarzwald to get his family together and leave with them, but to no avail. And now Aaron was dead and gone, crushed by the gears of the Nazi war machine, while Imogen had barely made it out of Europe alive. But Anders and Tilly? They had been living not just in comparative safety -- but instead they had weathered the storm deep in the very lap of luxury. Indeed, their life in San Francisco was hardly comparable to the life they had known in Denmark. Food was more plentiful and all the other material comforts were of better quality, often much more so, and Saul had watched Anders nervously prattling on and on about Europe as he bounced around his Little Dutch House, and suddenly everything seemed to make sense.

Because he had listened to Anders talk about Kennedy. About how Kennedy was The Future. How the Cuban Missile Crisis had rattled the foundations of the post-war world order, and how Kennedy had shepherded the world out of the icy claws of yet another holocaust, a nuclear holocaust. Kennedy alone recognized the illiberal tendencies still alive in the world, forces still working to undermine democracies all around the world, so was it really a stretch to think that Anders had begun to build up Kennedy -- in his mind -- as some kind of new Messiah?

If so, how would Anders react to the news of Kennedy's murder?

He was alone in the building now that the last architect had just left, so he was a little surprised to hear the front door open and close again. "Sorry...we are not yet open..." Saul had just started to say -- when he saw the Old Man walking into what would soon be the main showroom -- and yet in that moment Saul grew very angry.

Until he saw the expression on the Old Man's face, and the sorrow in his eyes.

"What's wrong?" Saul asked, innate compassion stirring him to act according to his nature.

"Grandfather," the Old Man sobbed. "Something dreadful is happening..."

The incongruity of the Old Man's words penetrated Rosenthal's consciousness. "Something is wrong with your grandfather? Is that what you are telling me? But...he must be -- how old? And I am sorry, but that can not be..."

"You..." the Old Man gasped, suddenly struggling to breathe. "You are..."

"I am what?" Saul cried. "Who am I to you?"

"You are my grandfather," the Old Man said -- just as he clutched his chest and fell to the floor.

Chapter 6

San Francisco California 24 December 1963

Tilda Sorensen fought through the feeling again, pushed it aside as best she could. Of suffocating under the weight of all Anders accumulated miseries, of his divergent, almost messianic need to return to the Old World so that he could slay all his demons. But...what demons were waiting back there to consume him? And where did these demons reside -- if not only in his mind?

Saul had mentioned 'survivor's guilt,' something he'd only recently learned of when he'd talked to survivors of the holocaust in Tel Aviv. How some who'd been interned and who'd lost family or friends during that time, and who had somehow survived their ordeal, returned to freedom only to find all their waking moments consumed by feelings of anguish and, yes, guilt. Could it really be so simple? Had Anders simply internalized all the grief he'd felt about the people the two of them had left behind when they fled Copenhagen, and now, somehow, had all that angst metastasized into what for all intents and purposes looked like a psychotic break?

Had Saul's recent visit sparked some of this? But then, what of Imogen? The Sorensens had not often visited the Callahans since they'd moved down to Monterrey Bay -- but then Saul returned to their lives, again. So, had Saul been the catalyst? Because John Kennedy sure hadn't played such an outsized role in Anders life; in fact, prior to three years ago they'd never even heard of the man -- so to put all this down to Kennedy's assassination was sheer folly...

But Saul had hastily departed after the assassination, returning to Copenhagen after some sort of unsettling news had sent him packing on the very next train to Los Angeles.

And then Lloyd Callahan returned from Japan. And, apparently, without any sort of preamble at all Imogen had picked him up at the commercial wharf and taken him straight to their 'new' house in Potrero Hills. What a commotion that must have produced!

But tonight was Christmas Eve and the Callahans had invited her to the new place -- and after endless deliberation she'd not been able to come up with any sort of convincing reason not to go. Besides, it would be Ted's first Christmas Eve dinner party, and at ten years old perhaps it was time to let that happen. Beyond time, really. Anders had simply shunned anything and everything to do with Christmas, his anger stemming from the endlessly crass materialism of the buildup to the actual day. In the Sorensen house Saturday morning cartoons had become cause for real concern, as the house was flooded with commercial jingles advertising a nauseating parade of warlike toys, from G.I. Joe to some kind of board game called, for God's sake, Battleship! Even the networks' evening programming was overrun with Prime Time Specials featuring Hollywood has-beens hosting one variety hour after another, each one complete with at least one house-drawn sleigh pulled by a team of massive Clydesdales, and all this snow covered hooey magically appearing in Sunny Southern California, complete with falling snowflakes -- which, if the rumors were to be believed, consisted of low-speed fan-driven mashed-potato flakes!

"Not in my Goddamned house!" Anders shouted when commercials for talking dolls flooded his living room.

Only this year -- Anders wasn't at home. He was still on that awful extended business trip; at least that's what Tilly told their neighbors when his absence was duly noted by nosy hausfraus. Even so, within a few days there had been an undercurrent of rumor spreading around the neighborhood, and this bothered Tilly to no end. 'Bothered' -- because she dealt with inpatient psychiatric patients day-in and day-out, and while she had always, in family conferences, tried to downplay the stigmatization families were going through, she had never really experienced it -- not on a first-hand basis, anyway. Now it was fair to say she understood their feelings all too well, and the sense of marginalization she felt transferred quite readily to Anders -- as anger. And just to shake things up a bit more, there was always the Callahans' Christmas Eve dinner to consider, as well.

If Anders heard about that he'd lose it completely.

Anders had finally broken down and purchased a new Buick just weeks before the assassination, a silver Riviera replete with navy leather interior and even a wood grained center console, and Tilly loved driving around the city in the car, enough so that she had finally decided it was time to go out and get her driver's license. She wasn't a self-assured driver, not yet anyway, but she was cautious and careful enough to make it just the few miles to the Callahan house in Potrero Hills for Christmas Eve.

Lloyd Callahan, despite all her apprehensions, appeared to be -- on the surface, anyway -- quite happy and not at all perturbed by the new house thrust into his life, and Harry was now apparently fascinated by 'the girl next door,' who he had taken to calling Looney-Junes. Lloyd had invited a handful of single officers from his ship to join them for dinner, and the atmosphere was actually quite festive, and Ted seemed to dote on Harry, following him around the house at breakneck speeds.

Imogen was busy in the kitchen, making some kind of American style Christmas Eve dinner, so Tilly joined her there and they talked about Saul and Anders and all of life's new complexities, and after dinner everyone gathered in the living room around a huge Christmas tree and listened as Harry played, of course, several Gershwin tunes, then a few Christmas classics -- just because -- then that was it.

Whatever Tilly had been expecting, the experience turned out to be a far lovelier thing than she'd imagined it might be, and as she was driving home she looked at Ted looking at all the houses with Christmas trees in living room windows and she wondered what he felt about Christmas.

"That was a nice dinner, don't you think?" she asked when they were still a few blocks from home.

"It...was, yes. But it feels kind of strange, you know?"

"Strange? You mean, like an outsider?"

"Outsider?"

"Oh, that means something like, well, you're on the outside looking in, like maybe you don't really belong."

Ted nodded. "Not belonging. Yeah. It felt kind of like that."

"But you know that Harry and Imogen and even Lloyd love you, right?"

Again, Ted nodded. "Say, you think we could, I don't know, maybe like drive around and look at the lights for a while?"

"It is...it is pretty, isn't it?"

"Yes. Pretty. It's interesting, too."

"Interesting?"

"I wonder why it's such a big deal. Decorating houses, putting up trees and decorating those, too."

"Where would you like to go?"

"I don't know, maybe just drive around a little. See what we can see, you know?"

"I saw that Harry gave you a Christmas present. Did you open it yet?"

Ted nodded again. "Yeah. A bunch of short stories by Mark Twain. He said it was his favorite when he was my age."

"That was nice of him. You still like him, don't you?"

"Harry? Yeah, he's great. There's supposed to be a good park near their house and he wanted to know if I could come over this weekend and throw the football with him, maybe with June."

"Okay. I can drive you over if you like."

"Ooh, there's a nice one," Ted said as they passed an old ornate Victorian fitted out in solid white lights. "Well, I was kinda hoping maybe I could take the cable car by myself."

"You ready for that?"

"Yup. Harry and June do that all the time, ya know?"

"Okay. Maybe we can give it a try to together this weekend, see how you do on your own?"

"Mom? You think Dad would be too upset if we put up a Christmas tree?"

Tilly smiled. "Maybe -- if we call it a Hanukkah bush? Maybe we can even do some presents next year?"

Ted looked out the Buick's window as they passed house after house adorned with all kinds of festive decorations, and for the first time in his life he really did feel like he was on the outside.

And he hated the way that made him feel, more than anything he had ever known.

Forgotten Songs From An Imaginary Life

Part II: The Broken Road

Chapter 7

Brentwood Heights, California December 1966

Tilly Sorensen didn't wait for the ink on her divorce papers to dry; she took a position at the UCLA Medical Center that included a teaching position in the medical school and with her walking papers in hand she didn't looked back, not even once. With her generous settlement, including full legal custody of Theodore, moving wasn't an issue so late in 1964 she moved down to Los Angeles and bought a small house just across the 405 from the medical center. She learned of two excellent private schools nearby and enrolled Ted at the one closest to home, and within a few months they had both settled into their new routines.

On the last Friday of each month Tilly drove Ted out to LAX and there he hopped on a PSA 727 for the short flight up to San Francisco. He spent these weekends with his father except when the Forty-Niners played home games in the autumn, and he came up for all these games because his father had season tickets.