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place on the table. When I sat down, I expressed my thanks. As I began to eat, she ruffled my hair. “You look so much like your mother.”
    I swallowed the bite of potato, dabbed my lips with my napkin, and looked up at her. “Have you heard from her?”
Aunt Anja’s face fell slightly. “Your father is not so well.”
    I let out a breath, but then continued eating. He had been ill for quite some time now. Just as my aunt always told me, worrying about it wouldn’t help him recover.
    “Don’t worry, dear. He’ll be fine.” She paused, then, “And when you’re playing for the elite in Berlin, you’ll have enough money to make him well again.”
    Saying nothing, I smiled at her. When I was finished with my meal, I washed up the dishes. As I passed through the sitting room on the way to mine, my uncle mumbled, “About damned time.”
    Alone in my room, I moved to my piano and began to play. The sheet music was in front of me, but I didn’t need it. I’d always had a way of learning the music easily enough. I made no mistakes, and the ability to play flawlessly left my mind with ample time to think about the day, and more importantly, think about the tall man with the violin. The man whose eyes seemed to see into the core of me. Whose hands were more beautiful than any work of art. Whose smile was sure to haunt me.
Chapter 3
     
Berkeley, California
1951
    T
HE more I think about the German janitor, the sicker I feel. The idea of a Nazi living and working this close to me makes my stomach clench and all the hair on my body stand on end. I know not all German soldiers believed in the politics of the Nazis, but they fought for Hitler and his politics. It was because of their service that many of my friends were killed. It was because of their protection that those horrible camps were allowed to exist.
    I try to put it out of my mind and simply enjoy my morning coffee. I try to remember that without participating in the war, I would be back in Oklahoma, making bricks or worse, doing nothing. It is a hard thing to remember today that I am happy pursuing higher education. For the past few days, I have been obsessing about the man at school.
    My dreams have progressed to outright nightmares. It is only four in the morning and yet I am up. Many of my friends in arms took to drinking to quell their dreams. While I enjoy a beer or a stiff glass of whiskey, I know they are poor substitutes for healing, but still, sometimes I fight to ignore alcohol’s call.
    Coffee and cigarettes are also poor methods of healing, but I can think clearly, which is my best armor against the thoughts that plague me. The enclosed porch I added onto my house last year is my sanctuary. Since leaving the service, there was very rarely heavy labor in my life. There was a particular sense of satisfaction I derived from carrying the lumber from the bed of my truck to my house as Charles and his friend sat in chairs on the grass and sipped cocktails.
    I was filled with gratitude when the porch was completed. My time overseas gave me the funds to purchase this house and modify it. The screened enclosure allows me to sit and ponder the world, letting the night surround me, but not leaving me exposed.
    Charles thought it would be perfect for entertaining—still does—but I am not a man who entertains. There are times when I wish I could be carefree like him. Perhaps if I was as a younger man—a man who had seen less suffering, a man who maintained honor and hope.
    Hope. I sit and think on that for hours. I am not a hopeless guy. I have faith that everything will be okay, but that faith does not make the journey any less harsh. I wonder after all these years what kind of world I live in when it produces such skewed thoughts as those that created what I saw overseas. Is this world worth a hill of beans when there are mad men around every corner, waiting to inflict supreme suffering on another?
    Can I live in the same town with one of them? Can I live