Cinderella's little brother E-Book

Sven Dethlefsen

• Herausgeber: novum publishing
• Kategorie: Gesellschafts- und Liebesromane
• Sprache: Englisch

Seitenzahl: 449

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2025

Beschreibung

At the very bottom of the lamp post, where everyone pees and it stinks the most, furthest away from the light, is where Sören's childhood in post-war Germany begins. As a dreamer and late developer, education gives him a wide berth. Only his naivety, curiosity and resilience protect him from worse and help him to find a place in society despite a bad start in life. After he finished the auxiliary school with aches and pains, he then successfully completed an apprenticeship as a painter. But he also discovered other sides of life, such as social injustices and, above all, the opposite sex... An authentic insight into post-war Germany in all its facets: war invalids, the social struggle for survival and awakening, as well as free love.

Leseprobe

Foreword

In post-war Germany, Sören's childhood began at the bottom of the lamppost, where everyone pees, where it stinks the most, furthest away from the light.

As a dreamer and late developer, education gave him a wide berth.

Only his naivety, curiosity and resilience protected him from worse.

This book would not have been possible without my wife Margret´s Sisyphean work in correcting it.

But it was only thanks to my friend Marga's encouragement that I started writing.

The English version was redacted by Tanja Walter who made an automated translation sound like me.

And without the support of my friends Annette and Angelika, it wouldn't have turned out so well. Thank you very much for this.

Sven Dethlefsen, 2024

The fourth birthday

Ortrud was completely torn, she didn't know whether to laugh or cry. She had her whole family together for the first time. It was Sören's fourth birthday, the day on which everything was to change. The four of them, father Heinrich, mother Ortrud, sister Sonja and Sören, sat around the birthday table and Sören was allowed to blow out the four candles on the cake. Ortrud was overjoyed, as from now on the children would stay with them forever. The time of separation was over. But just an hour later, work called again and the first birthday party in four years was already over, because the next day was Friday, which is the main sales day in a fish store. That's when things are really buzzing. However, most of the things that were to be sold were not yet ready.

The siblings had never met before and were on their own that afternoon. They explored this new environment together. The most exciting part was the carp tank, where four big, fat carp swam around in circles. The scariest thing was a kind of aquarium in which crawling animals with pincer-like hands lived. Neither of them had ever seen anything like it. There were dead fish lying around everywhere in metal tubs, half covered in ice. But the real eye-catcher was a large iron door with a huge lever as a handle. Behind it lay frozen, whole fish with their mouths torn open, dead milky eyes, and lots of blocks of ice that were almost bigger than Sören, but totally clear so that you could see through them, and in which Sören's sister, with her distorted face, was unrecognizable. The children were still making lots of faces and didn't know whether to be scared or amused. But then Ortrud came running around the cornerand strictly forbade them from ever entering the room again. The door could only be opened from the outside and people had frozen to death in a room like this before because they couldn't get out.

Many more things that were forbidden were to follow later.

Ortrud watched the goings-on with great skepticism, as there were too many dangerous objects, such as knives that were extra sharp and forks that were extra pointy. It was exactly what she was always afraid of, namely not being able to fulfill her duty of supervising the children because customers needed her attention. That wasn't the only reason why they had put the children in a home. The place was also extra cold, extra wet and extra dark. Now, four years after Sören's birth, the children were already out of the woods and no longer so susceptible to illness.

Or were they?

This environment literally cried out for injuries, pneumonia and blood poisoning. Just as the store was full to bursting, the two discovered the door to the private area, and Sonja was already tall and strong enough to open it. And they were already out of her mother's sight. Had Ortrud really cleared away everything that could be dangerous? Just behind the door, the two of them discovered a tiny hallway from which a simple, small toilet, one square meter in size and with a small, cold hand basin, led off. Next to it was the door to the kitchen, which stood wide open, a dark, narrow tube no more than three meters deep and two meters wide. Behind it was a double-leaf door through which the sun could be seen, and it led into a small, sunny backyard. But they couldn't get this door open, it was stuck somehow. Throughthe panes, they could see lots of zinc pots and tubs and a garden hose, as well as lots of weeds and dandelions that seemed to be bursting the joints in the concrete slabs.

The next room off this small hallway was the bedroom. Here, typical features were a double bed and two large closets. In the far corner by the window was a small crib with white bars. There was a one-meter-wide carpet runner around the beds, and an ironing board was wedged between the wall and the wardrobe. Not a modern aluminium one that folded out, no, a real wooden board covered with white linen and upholstered with a woolen blanket. But it was also two meters long. The children immediately wondered who the crib was for. Sonja was very practical and immediately jumped into the bed and realized that it was too small for her. Sören saw a strange splint on Sonja's right leg for the first time. Under her long dress, this long thing from the hip down to the foot with a joint at knee height was not even noticeable. It was only when she climbed out again that he noticed her disability. Some movements were impossible and many were only possible to a limited extent. Of course, Ortrud came into the room just as Sonja was standing in bed with both feet in her street shoes. It was then loudly declared that she should please take care of her little leg - this sentence later became a running joke - and the next thing was forbidden. Suddenly, she was able to get over the bars and out of bed only with Ortrud's help.

The living room was just as small. In addition to a typical 1950s living room cupboard with a glass door, with the GOOD coffee dishes for guests, there was also a chest, an old tube radio, one or two chairs, a folding sofa and an oval table that could be cranked up. It stood on a carpetwith fringes that had to be combed almost daily. In the corner stood a big fat Hamburg tiled stove with all the accessories. They couldn't find a second crib for Sonja.

There was no bathroom and no hot water. The sixth door was large, with two panels, which led into the stairwell.

When the two of them re-entered the store, the parents were packing everything up, the window displays and the many fish salads had to be put in boxes in the cold store overnight. Then everything was hosed down and dried with a rubber lip squeegee, clearly showing that the store had a "bloody" part, where Heinrich slaughtered live animals, and a "bloodless" part, where the finished fillets were processed. The hit at the time was a smoked matjes herring with onions, apples and whole green peppercorns, all chopped up and dressed with oil andvinegar to make a salad. Then the kitchen table was turned across the wall so that all four could fit at the table. The children sat on a corner bench made of oak, hard, dark and uncomfortable, with a cushion in the back that hung on an oak board in the same style and had accompanied Ortrud on many detours throughout the war. Then it was supper time. The remaining fish salads, eggs with pickled herring on dark bread and everything that had not been sold the day before was eaten hungrily. Afterwards, the children had to go to bed because their parents still needed time to do so many things that hadn't been finished yet.

Not one of the many fish salads for which the store was famous had been finished, and it was a long night before Ortrud and Heinrich were finished and fell exhausted into bed. Sören couldn't fall asleep for a long time, as everything was new to him. Only his cuddly blanket, his teddy and the thumb he sucked were familiar to him. Last night, he was stillin a dormitory with forty other children, who had of course were fooling around behind the nurses' backs until late at night, and there was always a little light somewhere to guide him. Here it was pitch dark and he was all alone, more alone than ever before. Sören didn't recognize the noises coming from the kitchen yet and they scared him. Eventually he fell asleep.

All the experiences of that day ran like a movie in his head: the long journey from Rönneburg to Hamburg Eimsbüttel, again the many noises, the automatic doors of buses and trains, the squeaking of the streetcar wheels on the bend. But more and more often a movie was repeated where a shark runs after Sören on its tail fins and Sören can't escape because he can't open the door because it doesn't have a door handle.

Sonja's situation was actually quite similar and yet completely different. The previous night she had shared a room with twenty old men in a clinic in Sahlenburg. Now she was lying here alone on a fold-out sofa bed. She had never seen anything like it before. The bedding was kept under the sleeping surface in a bed box, and she could feel the seam between the backrest and the seat in her back.

The light from the street lamp cast strange shadows in the folds of the curtain, and whenever someone walked past the house, close to the window, she could hear their footsteps coming slowly towards her, casting an eerie silhouette on the curtain, and then slowly fading away again. Sonja was only familiar with these old metal hospital beds where the backrest could be raised, and her leg was also pulled up in a splint and tied to the "gallows" provided for this purpose. In her dream, the silhouette did not pass by the window, but grew bigger and bigger, louder and louder and came towards her. Thenshe recognized him, it was the keeper who was winding her up on the "gallows" and he also had strange hands that looked like pincers, like those animals in the aquarium. She had woken up from this dream soaked in sweat and must have screamed loudly, because Ortrud was sitting next to her on the edge of the sofa and must have looked very frightened too, because Ortrud wanted to comfort her and hold her hand, but Sonja wanted to get away from the keeper in her dream. So they both got scared of each other.

Ortrud immediately reproached herself:couldn't she comfort her own daughter? Obviously the basic trust had been lost in these four years, she thought.

Sonja had a long and exhausting day behind her. She wasn't used to such exertion; on the contrary, she had been confined to her bed for months in order to heal. She first had to practice every step and walking small distances had to be practiced. Then there was the long journey on the special bus from the clinic to Hamburg. Her godmother Käte picked her up at Dammtor station on Moorweide and took her by cab to the fish store, where Sören was already waiting for his birthday present. Aunt Käte had always remembered Sonja´s every birthday, she had never forgotten one. She always had a little surprise for Sören too, even though she was Sonja's godmother. Auntie Käte was always loud, excited, in a good mood and adventurous. She was Ortrud's best and only friend. During the war, they were neighbors in Rentzelstraße, and her husband never returned after the war. At some point, the "Schupo", the police officer, comforted her who lived down the road.

In the middle of the night, Sören was woken from his nightmares by the infernal sound of an alarm clock. Heinrich's day began as early as four in the morning. He still had to go shopping at the fish market. Heinrich didn't have a driver's license, but he did have a three-wheeled "Tempo" as a deliverycar. So he had to rely on a friend and colleague to drive him, who could also do his shopping this way. Sören was allowed to turn around once more until breakfast was ready. Still far too early, he had a cat wash under cold running water. Now in the fall, it was getting really cold overnight and the tiled stove in the living room only seemed to be turned on at Christmas or for visitors. In this kitchen with terrazzo flooring, it was cold even in summer and even before the children were really dressed, the windows were thrown open and everything was aired out intensively. Everything and everyone had to function here, because the store opened at eight o'clock on the dot.

The "Tempo" was parked on the sidewalk for loading and unloading. Various boxes of dead fish and again these blocks of ice were dragged into the cold store and the first customers were already waiting impatiently outside the store. Many of the customers patted Sonja and Sören on the head, which Sören didn't like at all. Because these seemingly friendly women with their far too high-pitched voices were all talking at the same time and were far too curious and intrusive. They wanted to know whose children they were and where they had suddenly come from. "Did they live here too, here in this cold place, and how on earth do you do it? They have to go to school!" The children were not at all prepared for this attack. Ortrud was accused of not being fit to be a mother and began to stammer and was confirmed in her fear of having failed, and had used excuses that even her children recognized as such. For example, that the children were being looked after by their grandparents because of the business start-up and the many childhood illnesses.

Sören found this strange, as all his grandparents had died before he was born. He could sense how embarrassing it all was for Ortrud. It was the most formative time for Sören in all his development, but he had no memory of it at all, didn't know any names and who had comforted him all those years?

It was similar for Sonja, but she was already four and a half years older and still had memories from the time before the clinic, of her grandmother, uncle, Lars and Aunt Käte in Rentzelstraße. In the clinic, she had been the favorite among all these old men with tuberculosis, but was "tied" to the bed most of the time, while Sören was allowed and able to jump around.

The children were never told who ended their stay in the children's home and hospital. It seemed as if the parents wanted to eliminate this topic from the children's minds as quickly as possible.

Sonja has never been diagnosed with bone tuberculosis, but no other diagnosis has ever been made either.

In Sören's case it was a Red Cross home for war orphans, and here too there is no justification for his four-year stay.

The last year

in Hartwig-Hesse-Straße began when the children returned home to the fish store. The children didn't notice, but what caused Ortrud’s growing distress, was the ageing process and the progression of all his illnesses that Heinrich had brought back from the war. Bending down and walking became increasingly difficult and slower. He was still eight years away from retirement, but already completely “worn out”, and it was clear that he would never be able to hold on to this job until then. A third worker would have been needed dearly in the store, especially now that the children were at home and Ortrud also had to go far beyond her limits, every day and every night.

In the early days, Lars, Heinrich's son from his first marriage, regularly helped out. He did the shopping and always brought back a small barrel of salted herrings from his travels. He was also a ship's cook on a fishing trawler, even inthe same shipping company like his father. They met for many years on the Atlantic when they were traveling in the same fishing grounds. Sometimes their ships even passed so close to each other that they could wave to each other through the porthole. Lars even took a photo of it once.

Now he was missing. It was the typical "cutting of the cord" effect when Lars developed other interests than just helping his father, and he then met a very dear friend, Eva, at the fish store.

The short time he was ashore was not enough for both of them, and what had to happen, happened.

Ortrud not only became increasingly jealous of Eva, she was also disappointed and sad that she had to let him go when she had done so much for him. She had looked after him throughout the war and now he was slipping away from her.

Once Lars wanted to go dancing with his darling Eva and needed new shoes. But because he always gave almost all he earned to his mum, he had to borrow the money from Eva. This week, of all weeks, there was money missing from the store till. Actually, there was always money missing from the store till. Ortrud had the gift of imagining things that became more and more true the longer they were in her head. She was immediately and irreversibly miffed and from that day on she never spoke to him again. Lars moved out and Ortrud forbade contact with Lars for all time. Heinrich didn't dare meet Lars, not even secretly.

So Sonja and Sören never heard even one word about Lars' existence. Only Sonja remembered Lars a little from the time before she came to the store.

Saturday afternoon was "bathing day", which meant that the small zinc bathtub was brought in from the yard and filled with no more than two kettles of hot water. The same amount of cold water was added so that the children didn't burn themselves. Sonja was usually less dirty and was first soaped standing up in this tub. Then it was Sören's turn, by then the broth had cooled down completely, he was shivering and his teeth were chattering, and the washcloth, which had a thick finger in it, was used to pierce all his orifices. It was not only cold, but also painful. The evening was actually a warm, cozy family evening with games like pick-a-stick, Mau-Mau, ludo or Chinese chequers.

On Sunday mornings, while still in bed, the radio was switched on at 6am. All four of them sat in front of the box and listened to Heinrich's favorite NDR show, the harbor concert. The opening melody, "Wo die Nordseewellen trecken an den Strand", brought tears of emotion to Heinrich's eyes. As long as Heinrich lived, he listened to this show and once he even won a large gift basket because he was able to answer the prize question correctly: "If such and such a large fishing trawler fishes here and there in the Atlantic for a week, how many tons of fish will it come back with?" Everyone always listened to the Christmas greetings at sea from Norddeich-Radio, too.  

The store was always closed on Mondays and Ortrud went with Sonja first to the girls' elementary school opposite and then with Sören to the kindergarten in Müggenkampstraße.

Sonja was accepted at school straight away, but Sören had a longer wait at the kindergarten. The mornings went by far too slowly for Sören, as he had no one to play with. School wasn't a bed of roses for Sonja either. She was the biggest, fattest, dumbest and ugliest pupil in the eyes of her classmates. This was because she had only been taught twice a week in the afternoons by a volunteer pensioner teacher for the last four years due to her illness and her deficits were just too big. Sonja could also become a little annoying when she wanted something to snack on, and even more so when she was hungry. The cooks at the clinic loved, understood and spoiled Sonja. Even the old men always had something for Sonja to snack on. There was never enough money, especially not for clothes. They got them from the Red Cross clothingstore. Even Sören was ashamed to wear "cheap studded trousers" instead of brand-name jeans and didn't want to go out in them. But the worst thing was when Ortrud took Sonja's food away and forced the food into Sören because he looked undernourished and always refused to eat. The jealousy that arose from that never really healed between the siblings.

Sören's first playmates were the "still alive" carp in the large pool. The landing net, which was tied with coarse mesh, had a broken mesh and Sören had great fun catching the carp with it, lifting it out of the basin and turning the landing net around until the carp fell through the hole back into the basin. At Christmas, Sören had wanted to get the carp drunk and had his sights set on the last unsold one. He had also organized a remaining sip of red wine from somewhere. Every time the carp surfaced to breathe, Sören poured a small sip of red wine into its mouth, and each time the carp made its rounds faster and faster. At some point it floated lifelessly on the surface, and of course there was a scolding and the next day´s meal was "carp blue". Those crawling animals with those funny "pincer hands" were called lobsters, Sören had learned in the meantime, and came from Heligoland, but he was afraid of them and left them alone.

Again and again, the parents managed to "get rid" of the children, or rather, they knew very well that it was always too cold, too wet and too dangerous in this store, especially for the two of them. So Sören soon had a stay with children´s care in Trittau, where the "malnourished" ones were especially fattened up and, as always, these trips started from the moor pasture opposite the train station. He had the very first muesli in his life, which he absolutely loved. Especially as he never liked the jam sandwich that his mother always stuffed him with in the morning, against his will and far too early. His stomach was still asleep. Sören didn't know where Sonja was during this time, although she also urgently needed special nutrition, a diet. Back at home,he had tried in vain to make the muesli palatable to his mother, but Ortrud hadn't understood him or hadn't wanted to or hadn't been able to understand him. At some point, she had mixed oatmeal in water, which was nowhere near to his taste.

But then the waiting time at kindergarten was finally over and the two of them were "out" from under their parents' feet for hours, at least temporarily. There were lots of little excursions, often to playgrounds, but also to lakes, paddling pools and the river Elbe.

Sometimes in the summer, the neighbor's daughter would come into the sunny courtyard behind the kitchen and splash around with Sören in one of those zinc tubs. She was blonde and blue-eyed and a few years older than him. He was totally in love with her and she had a decisive influence on his image of women, his prey pattern for all the girlfriends that were to come.

But Heinrich became increasingly ill and slow, and his hands became more and more shaky. Work became increasingly difficult for him. The war, the grueling battle for Stalingrad, the four years of captivity in Siberia, the jaundice, the syphilis and all the as yet unknown diseases took their toll.

The debts and bank loans had just been paid off. From now on, they should have been able to put aside a small fortune for their retirement. Instead, they gave up the business completely penniless. How Ortrud managed it all is unimaginable. She wound up the business, rented a new social housing apartment, packed and organized the move, and found a part-time job as a sales assistant in a small drugstore in Weidenallee, very close to the new apartment.

The first year

In Amandastrasse, there was a completely new high-rise building with seven floors and an elevator. The two-and-a-half room apartment on the second floor had 64 square meters, a full bathroom with an almost endless supply of 80 liters of hot water, central heating, a kitchen with a built-in pantry and space for the oak corner bench. There was no fridge yet, but there was a washing machine in the communal cellar, right next to the drying room. There was also a 6-square-metre storage room there, which also had space for the potato box.

Right across the street, on Martastrasse, new apartments also had new occupants. The work on the underground car park wasn't finished yet, and the excavated deep black topsoil was piled up right next to it to form an almost ten-metre-high mound of earth that was another thirty meters long and twenty meters wide. Sören was unstoppable and climbed up the hill in his freshly laundered Sunday afternoon outfits. There were already other children there who were busy digging. Sören and his new friends had probably dug the deepest hole of his entire life. It was one and a half times deeper than Sören was tall and he could only get out by digging holes opposite each other in this narrow tube, which he used as a climbing aid. He was completely happy and dirtier than ever. The light grey coat with the white stand-up collar was unrecognizable as such. His parents wanted to take a little walk with Sonja and Sören to the ice cream man, but none of them recognized Sören when he stood in front of them. When Ortrud did recognize him by his voice, she immediately burst into tears, as she had immediately recognized the depth of the damage. She would never get these brand new clothes clean again and they had to be thrown in the bin. They had only recently been bought on credit and still had to be paid off over a period of months. Ortrud was really desperate.

Once a year, the children were given new clothes. The procedure always worked like this: Ortrud went to the Alsterhaus with Sonja and Sören. The first thing they had to do was go to the credit department on the third floor. This was always the most unpleasant part of the process for Ortrud. She had to grovel and serve and explain how she was going to pay back the loan, and she had to bend over backwards in front of her children, as she already knew that she would have to scrimp and save for this.

From Sören's point of view, it was a festive day for Sonja. In the fall, she got at least two dresses for the winter, or pants, coat and shoes, thick underwear and stockings. Sören had to go everywhere and wait patiently. It took hours, because it turned out that what Sonja wanted was too expensive, and Sonja didn't like what Ortrud could afford. Out of ten dresses that Sonja tried on, nine were not affordable and the tenth was not right for the coming season. The same was true of all the other items. When it was finally Sören's turn, everyone was exhausted and tired, and the money had run out. Nevertheless, there was still enough for a pair of trousers. The highlight of this festive day was that everyone went to the café on the fourth floor and ate a large mixed fruit sundae with cream. Every time, really EVERY TIME, Sonja knocked over the empty glass cup when she got up so that it broke with a loud crash. Everyone turned around and Sören was ashamed of Sonja and this miserable family. The same shouting and crying every time. In the end, everyone was crying. Three days later, half of Sonja's clothes had to be swapped because she hadn't made sure they were big enough, as they were still supposed to fit in six months' time. But each time Sonja came back from the exchange with clothes that she couldn't afford before.

Soon there was no longer enough money to pay the installments at Alsterhaus and from then on the children were given new clothes by the Red Cross. A pension for Heinrich could not be expected for at least another seven years, and Ortrud still had to sue for four years with the help of the VDK (Association of German War Victims) fora reduced earning capacity pension or even a war veteran's pension. Until then, the four of them lived on Ortrud's part-time wage as a sales clerk in the Steegemann drugstore in Weidenallee, near Margaretenstraße. The clothes they wore made them look like "ragpicker's foster children". The clothes were always clean, in good condition and as good as new, but they looked very, very, very poor.

No cut, no fit and definitely no branded clothing. Instead of Wrangler or Lee, they wore studded trousers. Sonja and Sören were teased for this on the street and they were ashamed of their poverty. Although this was a working-class district, every dustbin driver or unskilled worker brought home three to four times their wages and Ortrud was also unhappy. But the children didn't notice any of this. Peter lived directly above Sören with his grandparents. His mother was divorced and the issue of child support had not been resolved for a long time, but he always wore the latest and greatest clothes. His father was a mooring man, a really dangerous job in the harbor, because the big ships that lay in the roadstead, i.e. not at the quay for loading and unloading, were moored at the "Dugdalben" until they were loaded and then sailed out again. The mooring man, the "Fassmooker", went there with a small boat and then had to tie the thick rope to the Dugdalben to prevent the ship from drifting away. The Hamburg dialect alone, with all these special expressions of the port, fascinated the two of them when they visited Peter's dad in the harbor. The two of them did this very often, because every time there was a treat, usually a Coke. Peter's mother was a cleaner at the police barracks on the corner of Sedanstrasse. It was a huge red-brick building with several blocks and an even bigger barracks yard, where they often saw the riot police marching. Here they always got a mark from their mother to buy sweets. But the best thing wasthat they found an old, disused police cap in one of the garbage cans. Ortrud was always anxious when someone unknown rang the doorbell. She only opened the door after she had looked through the peephole and then only with the bolt before she opened it completely. Now she put this police cap on the hat rack on the coat rack and opened the front door completely free of fear.

In fact, one and the other scrounger turned around and ran off as soon as they saw the police cap. Ortrud was delighted with this find.

Peter was two years older than Sören and already went to an elementary school for boys, and Sören was really looking forward to having a great friend at this school when he started school there too. At the moment, he didn't even have a place at kindergarten. He didn't know why, but it was very likely that it didn't fit into his parents' budget. But it could also be that his father shouldn't be at home alone and neither should the children. Because when Sonja came home from school, who now went to the elementary school for girls in Altonaer Straße, Ortrud was still at work. So it often happened that Ortrud sent her husband to the weekly market on Schlump in the morning to do a bit of shopping so that he could still get at least a little exercise. Sören had to go with him so that nothing happened to him and the boy was supervised, and he was always a good help when it came to carrying things home.

A normal person would need thirteen minutes to walk this distance, about one kilometer. Heinrich, however, only took mouse steps and needed to catch up every fifty meters and he also wanted to look in the shop windows. If they managed the outward journey in an hour, they were already really fast. As a professional chef, he started a huge discussion at every stall at the weekly market about the freshness and quality of the produce. The fish seller asked Heinrich: "What are you doing with my fish?", "I'm talking to him", "And what?" "I asked him what the weather was like at sea.""And what does he say?", "He doesn't know because he's been ashore too long." They all laughed, except for the fish seller. On the way back, the two shopping nets slowly filled up, those typical 60s neon-colored, practical items that could be cuddled together so incredibly small, but they grew with every item they packed.

But if you're only one meter twenty tall, you have to bend your arms so that the net doesn't drag on the floor, or you have to reach into the mesh. At the time, only Sören knew how much the thin nylon cut into his hands. The way back always took twice as long as the way there. Not only because Heinrich was getting more and more exhausted and his steps were getting shorter. At Brockmann's, a delicatessen, roughly at the level of Elisabeth Hospital, it was only half a mouse's stride. Right next to it was the nurses' home and just at that moment, Sister Trude came out. She was the one who had given birth to Sören and his sister by caesarean section and was as happy as a child to see the boy again ... "And how big he's grown." She always had a sweet and childlike smile when she saw him. But his arms got longer and longer and the stupid thing about these nets is that you can't put them down like a solid bag. With the open meshes, the food was right in the street dirt. And there were lots of dogs in this area. Far too many.

Sören often had to go to the toilet himself by now, and then it was always a race against time and his father's speed. They always made it at the last minute, except once, which was "shit". As so often, Sören was wearing short leather trousers and the thin shit ran down his leg, down into his sandals and then dripped onto the road. The trail of devastation stretched from Weidenallee all the way down Amandastraße, through the stairwell and into the apartment. Cleaning back up to the street was a real gauntlet. Just then,as agreed, all the other children who lived in the house came back from the playground and thought it was really great that Sören had shat his pants.

The neighbor's children

Eva, who was Peter's age, and Angela, who was Sören's age, lived on the sixth floor with their single mother. There was never any talk of a father. But because their mother often had men over and occasionally came home late in the evening slightly drunk and sometimes had a black eye, the neighbors in the house were gossiping viciously about her. Ortrud was also one of those who didn't like it when her children played with Eva and Angela, and even less so when it was behind closed doors in the sixth-floor apartment and Ortrud couldn´t keep an eye on the children. Peter and Sören were often at their place because they always had the newest small single records that were the latest trend at the time. For example Gus Backus: "Da sprach der alte Häuptling der Indianer"... Although Sören was still really young, he found Angela highly attractive from day one. She was very similar to the pop singer Manuela, who sang "It was only the bossa nova that was to blame".

Ronald, the boy next door from the second floor, enjoyed that Sören had shat hispants.

It was around this time that he no longer wanted anything to do with Sören, as he felt betrayed by Sören. After playing together with these small, metal Matchbox cars between the beds in Ortrud's bedroom, one car was suddenly missing. If he had said anything straight away, they could have looked for and found the car together. But Ronald had only complained to his parents in the evening and then came with his father to find the car together behind a bedpost. As luck would have it,this model was a cab. Just like Ronald's father drove one, a Mercedes 190 with those round fenders in black.

Monika and her little sister Birgit, both neighbors' children and playmates since moving into this house, were also glad that this hadn't happened to them. Monika was two years younger than Sören, but thought he was a big boy. Her father was a self-employed master carpenter and also the janitor.

Sören was sent down to the first floor from time to time to get the key for the laundry room.

Even Achim, whom they all called Schmiddel and who rarely visited his grandma, had burst out laughing, as usually he was a candidate for such a slip-up himself.

Thank goodness Peter wasn't there today, that would have been really embarrassing. But just three days later, Peter approached Sören about it, as the gossip had even reached him at his mother's house in Dulsberg.

Sören had plenty of playmates, as there were also lots of children his age in the neighboring houses. They usually all met up in the afternoons at the new children's playground in Martastraßen Park. The brand new slide, which was the highest in the whole neighborhood, led directly into a large pile of sand, into the sandpit and invited them to take part in spectacular artistic slides. There was also a climbing frame, a seesaw, a small merry-go-round and three swings. Everyone wanted to be the biggest, fastest and strongest, even when peeing. Sören was often the youngest and smallest on the playground, but when it came to competing to pee over the wall of the public urinal, he was right at the front.

That's when he met Jan. When playing, he was a convinced "Indian" and also lived in Amandastrasse with his two brothers and his single father. Sören actually played a cowboy and considered the "Indians" to be the losers and preferred to be on the winning side. But from then on, sneaking up and making himself invisiblewere the order of the day. Jan was clearly better at this than Sören. At some point, he got bored of shouting "bang bang, you're dead" with a piece of wood in his hand when no one wanted to fall over and be dead. "In reality, you didn't hit me." "Yes, I di-id."

Soon they were going from hedge to hedge together as stealthy, invisible "Indians", and you had to expect an attack behind every tree. Suddenly it was also about wrestling and physical strength and cutting the opponent's throat with a rubber knife. As Jan was a year younger, Sören was a little further ahead again. At some point, the two of them discovered the entrance to the underground Isebek Canal. This was a small stream that had fallen victim to the growing city. From Eimsbütteler Marktplatz to Christuskirche, it had been built over with apartment buildings. Only in Waterloo-Straße, in a backyard, was it possible to sneak in and out of this inhospitable underworld. Here they could even sneak unnoticed and invisibly from one end of the district to the other. These round tubes were about one meter in diameter and the boys were about ten to twenty centimeters taller and of course had to walk the whole way bent over. But the Isebek still flowed through it, and only in dry summers could they walk through without getting their feet wet. And when it rained, the water rose enormously and the surface water from the road ran through the gullies into this tube. Then "being invisible" was no longer really fun.

The two spent an entire afternoon lying in wait on a canopy of an underground parking garage, armed with a small 20 to 30 cm long metal pipe, one centimeter in diameter, and a pound of peas. They got the shiny silver tube from the hardware store "Stark" in Margaretenstraße for a few pennies and took the peas from home. From the safety of their cover, they used this blowpipe to shoot at everything thatwas too slow to get away. At first they only shot at bags and coats from behind. But they soon became more confident and courageous and even shot at a hat. It made such a nice bang. This went well until they were discovered, and only because they were laughing their heads off at the reaction of the "victims". But the laughter had given them away and they could be located. That's when things started to get dicey and they had to put their feet up to avoid being caught up. But they had planned their escape route, quickly made themselves invisible and disappeared into the Isebek Canal.

Again, Ortrud was of course totally horrified to see how dirty the boy came home again. But she was even more worried about Heinrich.

Heinrich became more invalid and that quicker and quicker.

Shopping at the weekly market in Schlump had long been out of the question. His steps became even smaller, slower and increasingly wobbly, so that he needed a wheelchair. Although he got the lightest, narrowest and cheapest wheelchair, it didn't fit through the narrowest of all doors, the one to the toilet. It was fine for a while and Ortrud was able to help him on her own. But soon Heinrich could no longer manage these four small steps to the toilet and every time Heinrich had to go, everyone was needed. Sonja and Ortrud were then on the inside of the toilet and pulled Heinrich out of the wheelchair by his arms and shoulders, and Sören stayed on the outside behind the wheelchair and had to hold on to it so that Heinrich could fall back again if the "girls" couldn't hold Heinrich, but also because the wheelchair kicked Heinrich in the heels as soon as he shifted his weight. Then they had to turn Heinrich on the spot so that he was standing in front of the toilet. By the time they had undone all the buttons, belts andpants and he was able to sit down using all his strength, it was already too late and he shat in his pants. For as long as Heinrich could, he had prepared lunch every day, and it was not uncommon for it to be oversalted. Having cooked for around forty people over the years, he was used to putting a whole handful of salt in the potatoes. Then he said: "Mouse, that's right about the salt, only there are not enough potatoes."

Heinrich's pension was still not paid, and Ortrud had to continue to sue in the next higher instance. It was becoming increasingly rare for the half-day's salary to last until the end of the month. There was no bacon in the turnip puree and Heinrich had cooked pork rinds to add a bit of flavor. The children didn't even notice that the scraps were from the butcher.

When all the food was used up, there was hard, dried bread. There was always a cloth bag in the pantry in which the bread that could no longer be cut was collected. At the end of the month, this bread was soaked in water. This worked best with white and gray bread, but if there was nothing left, black bread was also included.

Heinrich soaked the bread overnight and only poured off the excess water the next day, then kneaded the soggy bread and used the few leftovers to refine, season and bind it. Sometimes there were also eggs and raisins, sugar and nuts, flour, maybe even baking powder. The cake was most delicious when a few apples were also cut into it. For baking, there was a special baking tin, round and made of aluminum, with a screw-on lid. Once filled, it was placed in a large pot of boiling water and cooked in a bain-marie. In this family, it was always the large tub that was also used for washing clothes. In winter it was served with a warm cherry sauce and in summer with a cold vanilla sauce. But that was the luxury version.

The best time was when Ortrud was doing her ironing, then Sören would fetch his little teddy bear and his cuddly blanket, sit down opposite her on the corner bench and wish his mother would tell him fairy tales. She was particularly good at that. It was a thousand times nicer being told than being read to. Ortrud's imagination inspired her to new heights and variations every time, so that the fairy tales were always more exciting than before.

Ortrud also enjoyed this peaceful, intimate time together with Sören. As a child, she had always wished for this relaxed, calm and unagitated time herself and never got it. Although her mother was a progressive kindergarten teacher, she never had the leisure to create such a homely atmosphere for her children in this hectic business environment. Actually, Ortrud also fulfilled her lost desire for warmth and security in this way. This only became possible when she gave up the fish business. Ortrud had always made special mention of the variety of fairy tales and their storytellers. Sören got to know and distinguish between different cultures and storytellers at a very early age. Not only the Brothers Grimm, but also the dark stories of Hauf and the light ones of Andersen, Sören was soon able to distinguish between them. The stories from The Thousand and One Nights also often kept him awake for a long time because he couldn't wait to find out what happened next and fantasized about the ending to himself at night.

He reacted extremely emotionally to all the fairy tales and fidgeted impatiently on the corner bench until the fairy tale finally found its happy ending. The deeper meaning of these stories was lost on Sören. But his sense of justice developed during this time and grew enormously.

She had to repeat all these stories over and over again, and Sören always had lots of questions about them. "Why is it that always the poor girls are picked up by the rich princes? Is Sonja also something like Cinderella? Why am I not a prince? Are there also princesses who have taken a poorman? Why are there never any little brothers in fairy tales?"

The Bremen Town Musicians soon became his favorite fairy tale. Sören couldn't understand that these four animals had all worked all their lives and were chased off the farm in old age without any gratitude or respect and had to flee into the forest to survive without a home. The fact that the thieves, criminals and cutthroats had a house in the forest without ever having worked for it was something he could not accept. Ortrud was always touched by how emotionally Sören reacted to these injustices and how he greeted the end of this fairy tale with relief when the robbers were driven out of the house and the town musicians simply took "their" home.

Ortrud had to put an end to this poverty and hunger and decided to sublet the small, 8 square meter room to students and at the same time provide Sonja with much-needed extra tuition. And so Miss Heidi from Hinterzarten became the first student to sublet. She was still very young and enjoyed taking part in family life.

She often played board games with the whole family after supper until "bedtime". Sometimes just with the children.

Suddenly, on top of that, a pair of artists appeared at the door. Sören didn't understand whether this was an accidental overlap, an overbooking or Ortrud's intention. Because they were staying in the living room. This meant that the parents and children, four of them, not only slept in one room, but lived there. Sören had a crib, Sonja had a wall-mounted folding bed and Ortrud and Heinrich had their double bed. Four people in 16 square meters, and seven in 64 square meters with only one toilet in a small bathroom.

Abby and Bob La Fleur performed Latin American dances at the Moulin Rouge on the Reeperbahn and regularly appeared there three to four times a year for about a week. Abby was a petite, small, black dancer from the Bahamas,and Bob was a tall, muscular man from Vienna who played the drums. They had what was probably the biggest station wagon Sören had ever seen, a Citroën DS 21. Sometimes Sören was sent to the cigarette machine, but he could only get one brand of cigarettes because he only knew Hand B. The other letters hadn´t been taught yet.

There was even a small gang in Altonaer Straße, something like a street gang; its leader, Walter, was known for his brutality. He was the first person Sören knew who even punched people in the face with his fists until it bled. For some reason, Sören always avoided Walter and took a long detour around his territory. Before he knew it, Walter came out of the second backyard on Altonaerstraße with four other boys and beat Sören, tied him up, dragged him into his yard and tied him to the only tree in the dark yard.

Sören already knew this scene from Winnetou 2, but believed that his last hour had come. What was most depressing was that none of the adults crossing the yard noticed his fate or heard his whimpering. Even when they burned the hair in Sören's nose with burning cigarette butts, they thought: They just want to play.

As so often, Sören hadn't arrived in time for lunch and Heinrich was already angry about him. Sonja reported that she had seen a group of boys disappearing into the courtyard out of the corner of her eye when she came home from school. But she didn't know if her brother was among them. If so, that would be a bad sign, as she knew about Walter's brutality and about Sören's respect for him. Without another thought, Sonja ran out of the apartment and into Altonaerstraße and saw from a distance how five boys were standing around a tree and all peeing at the same time. She didn't see her brother, however, but instinctively knew immediately that he was standing in the middle. Sonja approached the group slowly, picked up a metal child's shovel that was just standing there and recognized Sören in the middle. Now she rantowards the boys and shouted loud and clear: "Leave my brother in peace." The boys were startled, not only because a girl saw their small genitals, but they were unarmed and all had an open fly and their dicks in their hands. They, and Sören too, had never experienced a bigger surprise and ran away, even Walter. Sören was so pathetically embarrassed, not only was his arm bleeding and he had slight burns on his nose, he was also pissed up to his knees. But the worst thing was that a girl, especially his sister, had freed him. What would the other boys think of him? He would rather have died, but then Sonja untied him and he trotted after his sister with his head hanging down. Thank goodness they hadn't met anyone else. At home, he had to go straight into the bath. But even Heinrich couldn't help but smile, as he had experienced much worse in his own childhood.

Sonja slowly got better and better at school, both in lessons and in her standing in her class. At first, her height and strength only had disadvantages, especially as she also wore leg braces and was not at all fashionably dressed. With tutoring, she soon made friends. Renate also lived in Amandastrasse, in a backyard. Her mother was a hairdresser, which was particularly important at that age. Sonja was soon one of the first to have a tousled 'beehive'. She also got better and better at meeting the demands of fashion. When it became known that she was the one who had not only beaten off five boys but also Walter to free her brother, she was truly integrated into the class. Only Ortrud thought Sonja looked slutty and did everything she could to make sure she didn't go out on the street like that. By the time these leg braces were no longer needed, one could already guess that this ugly duck was hiding a handsome swan. Cinderella after all? Every now and then she had to look after Sören and integrate him into her activities. So she played mother and child, stuffedSören into some baby carriage and picked up her friend. If Sören wasn't lying still and sucking his thumb, her hand would sometimes slip. So they pushed through Schanzen Park for hours and Sören couldn't move, or else!