Chapter 20

The Captain sat apprehensively waiting for the film to start. Too many questions swarmed around his head to fully concentrate on the goings on in the room. Vaguely he could hear Maria asking the children which film they had chosen for tonight's viewing. Upon hearing her children answer the one marked "Memories", Maria got a worried look upon her face, but the Captain was too absorbed in his own thoughts to recognize it.

Elsa was seated beside him and she comfortably rested her hand on his thigh. Shifting in his chair he looked upon the woman's face that he had had all intentions of making his bride at the beginning of the week. Try as he might he couldn't evoke the feelings that should be surging through him as it would be if it were the other lady in the room caressing his thigh. The touch, though suggestive in nature had no effect on him. It was as if a light book or something else of little significance was pressed against his skin. He could try and pass his disinterest off. He could make up a million excuses as to why he was unresponsive to the woman sitting beside him, but he knew that they would all be a lie.

Giving Elsa a reassuring smile he felt guilt ravage his heart. She was a good woman and had been a great friend to him for the past year. She had helped him come out of the darkness that had surrounded him since his wife's death. To continue to lie to her and foster the hope of a future together would earn him the award of biggest bastard of the year. He knew that now, sitting here, half listening to her small talk while his eyes begged Maria's to make contact with his.

Since this afternoon in his bedroom when he had let his hormones get the best of him and he had stolen the kiss from her he could think of nothing else but more contact with her. Even if it was only with his eyes, he longed to touch her again. The way she had felt in his arms, the feel of her lips under his, the taste of her, and the way her throaty moan had entered his mouth and sent fire throughout him. He couldn't stop thinking about it. If it hadn't been for his bruised ribs he would have given into his lust right then and there. Even a few minutes ago when they had argued over her telegram he had wanted nothing more than to push her up against the wall and have his way with her. Maybe then she would tell him all that she had held back in that conversation.

Damn that woman, he cursed. Why did she have to come into his life now and turn everything upside down? Three weeks ago he had a plan for his life. He had had it all mapped out. Marry Elsa, move to England if the Anschluss occurred, if it didn't stay in Austria settle in for old age with a good woman at his side. The plan was neat and simple, and then Maria arrived on his doorstep and his plan went to hell.

After reading her miss-delivered telegram he realized that since her arrival his plan had evolved. The funny thing was he hadn't even realized it until this evening. Now that he was thinking about it, he wasn't exactly sure where everyone had fit into place with his new plan, but one thing was for certain. The new chain of events that had formed in his mind had definitely included Maria and her children in his future. He wasn't exactly sure when it had happened or how it had happened, but he realized now that he had had no intention of ever leaving Austria without that miss matched trio included in his fold. The fact that Maria had been planning her own escape and she hadn't even thought of him hurt him more than he cared to acknowledge.

The lights dimmed in the ballroom signaling that Liam and Lynn were ready to start the film. They had set the chairs up in a semi-circle around the puppet theatre that Max had sent from town. The theatre itself was a rather large structure and with its white back drop pulled down it made for an excellent screen. This was another thing that Maria had unwittingly changed in his life. Three weeks ago he wouldn't have stepped foot in this room. The memories of his late wife in this room smiling and dancing had haunted him the most. He had dared not think of her that way for the pain had been unbearable. Now, however, a peace settled upon his soul when he thought of his Agathe. In his mind's eye he could almost see her here in this room with them, smiling upon her family's new found happiness. Maria hadn't only changed him, but she had made his children smile again. She had made them a family again and whether or not she wanted to admit it, for he could no longer deny it, she, Liam and Lynn were a part of their family now too.

Instead of having his eyes on the screen the Captain watched the object of his thoughts sitting three chairs away from him. She sat with her one leg thrown over the other, arm bent at the elbow resting her chin in her hand waiting with apprehension for the first scene to start. He could only imagine what it must be like for her to have to see her dead husband on the screen. From what she had said to him earlier in the day, he could imagine the pain she must be feeling right at that moment. What he wouldn't give to be the one that she turned to for comfort one day, was his last thought before the white on the screen flickered to a grainy image.

The image flickered a few more times and then steadied itself to show a man in a room filled with some sort of equipment that the Captain wasn't familiar with. However it wasn't the background that the Captain focused on, it was the man featured in the middle of the screen that he couldn't look away from. If Liam had been a little taller the Captain would have sworn that it was him in the black and white film. They had the same face, chin, eye shape. It was Liam in the future staring back at him. The man in the film smiled, the same smile that he had seen light up Liam's face a hundred times, and then began to speak.

"Maria," upon hearing her name from the lips of her dead husband Maria's eyes closed. The Captain could barely make out her features in the darkened room and yet he couldn't look away from her. When he did glance at the screen he saw that the image of Bill was focused directly on her. Their eyes met over space and time on the screen, almost as if Bill had known when he had made this film exactly where his wife would be seated when she viewed it. Chills ran through the Captains body.

"I'm glad that you are finally watching this film…"Bill faltered here, "Well I'm guessing that you are watching this if you are hearing these words. I didn't know how to tell you that I had started this project." He smiled sheepishly at the camera, "knowing how angry you'd be, I figured what you didn't know can't hurt you, right darling. Besides, you won't discover this until I'm dead, so I won't have to listen to your mouth when you do." He gave a little laugh and then looked away from the camera for a moment when he finally turned back to it there was sadness in his eyes, "I'm sorry darling, I know youhate to hear me talk like that, but, let's face reality, I'm living on borrowed time here."

The Captain let those words sink into his skull. If he understood this correctly Maria had known that her husband was going to die in advance. The Captain wondered what it was that had taken Bill's life.

"Anyway," Bill continued from the screen, "this film isn't for you. It's for our little bundle that will be arriving soon. The other night I had the most terrible dream. I dreamt that the baby was born and I was already dead. I watched the whole thing as if I was above you, I could see you, but you couldn't see me. Then I thought, this baby isn't going to know who I am. I wanted to leave something behind so that he or she can at least meet me once in his or her life."

Suddenly the door to the room that Bill was sitting in opened and in walked a young Maria. Seeing her on the screen took the Captain's breath away. She was younger, her hair was still long then and it cascaded down her shoulders into light curls. The same way that Lynn's hair did. As a matter of fact the Captain could see a lot of Lynn in the image of Maria on the screen. Her belly was swollen with child and when she walked she waddled across the floor. She must have been due when this film was made. The Maria on the screen noticed the running camera, rolling her eyes at it she turned regarding her husband.

"I'm sorry I rigged that thing to be automatic for you." She said to the quiet Bill who looked like he had been caught cheating on his wife. "You constantly have it running now. What are you doing anyway?"She asked looking around the room for some clue as to what her husband was up to.

"Nothing, just a project I'm working on." Bill gave the camera a frightened face as if it were his conspirator, "I thought you were home. Didn't the doctor say you should be on bed rest?"

"Bill, if you think I'm going to stay in bed for the next two months you have another thing coming." Maria answered him as she fell into his lap on the chair. Bill flinched from the weight of her, but Maria didn't seem to care. "Besides, sitting in the bed makes my back hurt. Walking makes my back hurt, everything makes my back hurt. I just don't understand why I'm so big." She stressed waving her hand across her big belly. "Mrs. Fontaine two doors down from us is nine months pregnant and she isn't anywhere near as big as I am at seven months."

"Everyone is different, darling, you know that." Bill soothed his agitated wife. Oh my, the Captain could remember those days when Agathe was at the end of her pregnancies. There was nothing that could make her comfortable.

"Maybe the doctor has the due date wrong." She whined.

Bill rolled his eyes at her, "Darling, you're the one who came up with the due date, and you're never wrong." Maria threw her head back and laughed at her husband's joke, playfully shoving him in the chest.

"That is true, I am never wrong."

"Ugg" Bill moaned, "and you never fail to remind me of it."

"That's true too." She said jokingly. Watching the two of them up there on the screen, the Captain was a bit disappointed. When he thought of Maria's marriage he thought of two young teenagers that had gotten in over their heads and had only married due to their circumstances. Watching the play between them it was obvious that his assumptions were wrong. You could feel their love palpating from the screen.

Setting his wife upright on her feet, Bill himself got up from the chair. "Alright, darling, let's get you home, shall we." In a grand gesture Bill put his arm around Maria's waist bending her backward as far as her big belly would let her go. Giving the camera a quick wink, Bill leaned over Maria and whispered, "Smile for the camera, baby," and then stole a kiss from his wife. The Captains heart sank. He hadn't counted on seeing this when he had encouraged Maria's children to show one of their fathers' films.

Bill walked over to what the Captain assumed was the camera and then the image on the screen went black for a moment. When it came back on Bill was in the same room with different clothes on.

"Sorry for the interruption," he said into the camera with a shy smile, "little bundle. That was your mother as you probably already know. And I'm sure as you are watching this you probably already know that she is a handful." Bill gave a little laugh, "But I love her." Then his face got serious, "you should know little bundle that I loved your mother more than anything in this world. And though I haven't met you yet, I loved you too."

"I'm getting a little ahead of myself here, and you're most definitely confused, so let me clarify. You see little bundle, you are about to be born. The problem is, at the same time, I'm dying." The Captain could hear Maria's breath suck in from her husband's last words. "I hope and pray every day that the good lord sees fit to let me live long enough to see your birth. But I'm worried that my prayers are all used up. I'm a year past the expiration date that the doctors gave me, so I'm not taking any chances here. I'm making this film so that later on in your life you could get to know the man that I was."

Moving over to the camera, Bill moved it so that it now faced a white screen. Hearing just his words but no longer in the picture Bill continued, "I wanted to start with some old reels that I took on a different camera when your mother and I were children. There's no sound on the old camera so I'll narrate the scene's to you." The Captain could hear Maria saying something from her seat, as she was about to get up, to do what, the Captain didn't know, suddenly Bill's face came large and close up on the screen, "Maria, don't you dare turn this off. I want the baby to know about our childhood." Maria looked at the image of her late husband on the screen who narrowed his eyes at her through the camera lens. Finally she stilled in her seat and he continued on. "Didn't I tell you that she was a handful?" Bill said from behind the camera again as an image began to show on the wall in the room that he was in.

"Shut up, Bill." Maria whispered under her breath from three chairs away from the Captain.

Ironically, as if he had known what his wife's reaction would be years in the future Bill's voice came over loud and clear through the projectors speaker, "No, I won't shut up Maria."

This sent all of the children in the room as well as Max and Elsa into a laughing fit. The Captain had thought that the film would be in English since it was their native tongue. He was surprised that Bill spoke in half German and half English. Surprised and a little grateful. Since his English wasn't coming along as fast as he would like, though his children seemed to be picking up on it quickly.

Bill fidgeted with the camera some more, bringing it closer to the image projected on the wall in his room.

"Thank you Julliard," he said as he settled into a chair to the left of the display, "for putting in this editing room. Little Bundle, did your mother tell you that both she and I went to Julliard?" He paused here as if waiting for someone to respond and then continued, "Well we did. I, of course enrolled when I was seventeen after receiving my high school diploma. My diploma was only a formality though, they immediately made me instructor of the pianists. Which was fine by me, since it gave me more time to study what I really love…cinema. Your mother applied when she was fifteen. She already had a degree from Marist by that time. Yes, that's right, Marist College. I think your mother graduated high school when she was about seven." He said with sarcasm, "She is smart as a whip, little bundle, so don't think you can ever pull a fast one over on her. She's probably already thought of every possible thing that you could get into." Again Bill paused, looking back at the camera he said with sincerity, "I'm sorry I won't be there to help you get over on her. What fun we could have had. There's nothing I love more than making your mother angry." Bill laughed and looked at the floor, "She's damn cute when she's angry."

Turning his focus to the screen before him, Bill began to narrate what they were seeing. The images on his screen were grainy and the Captain could tell that this film was much older than the one that they were now viewing.

"What do we have here," Bill asked, "Aww, yes one of my father's big Fourth of July parties." On Bills screen was a gathering of people by a large outdoor pool. The people were in clothes over two decades old. The Captain figured the film must have been made just post the Great War. "Those parties were always fun. It was about the only time that your mother and I got to be children. We would laugh and play all day. It was only on holidays that I didn't have to practice and your mother didn't have to study. Oh look, there we are in the pool," Bill took a pointer to the screen drawing everyone's attention to the two kids in the middle of the grand pool. They were both younger then, probably around Liam and Lynn's age.

"My goodness," Max said, "that looks like Liam and Lynn in that pool."

The young Bill in the pool with the young Maria kept dunking her head under the water. When he was done dunking her, she would come up for air and he would splash water in her face. From the expression of her face one could tell that the young Maria was getting very angry and after a vicious dunk she went under the water without resurfacing. The young Bill being oblivious as to what was about to happen to him churned the water keeping himself in place waiting for his victim to come up for air. Suddenly the boy began to twist around in the water as if something had him by the legs. A moment later a triumphant little Maria came to the surface twirling above her head what looked to be boy's swimming trunks. Swimming quickly to the exit of the pool Maria took her souvenir and ran across the yard. The camera remained focused on the Bill in the pool who was now yelling something over and over again. The Captain assumed he was yelling for her to bring his shorts back. Off in the distance the camera caught sight of Maria tossing the swimming trunks high up in a tree.

"Your mother and I didn't always get along." Bill laughed watching the memory on the screen. The scene flickered once again and now they were looking at an image of Maria and Bill a little younger than before. She was in a white, in what appeared to be wedding dress with a vale and he was in a suit. "This was our first communion." Bill clarified. The young Bill was talking rapidly into the camera and shaking his head back and forth vehemently. The young Maria looked like an angel standing there in her white dress with a bundle of flowers in her hands. Finally giving in to whoever it was that was ordering him to do something from behind the camera, the young Bill rolled his eyes and then leaned over kissing Maria on her cheek. Before he pulled away however, the little sprite pulled Maria's pigtail in a violent tug. This caused Maria to push the young Bill hard in the chest. In a matter of moments an all-out brawl broke out between the two young people. The scene ended when whoever it was behind the camera turned it off, the Captain assumed to break up the fight.

"Nope we didn't get along at all." Bill said.

The screen flickered once again and they were taken to a grand parlor room. Once again there was a young Maria and a young Bill in the middle of the room. Sitting at the piano was a lady with long dark hair.

"That's my mother," Bill said, the sadness in his voice evident. She died when I was thirteen." The lady smiled into the camera and the Captain could see that she had been a beautiful woman. The camera flickered over to a large man sitting in a corner chair in the parlor. His eyes were like ice. "Oh, Maria, I'm sorry darling I didn't know that he was in this reel. I thought I had cut him out of everything." Bill said into his own camera. You only saw the image of the man for a second, but in that brief period of time you could feel the evil coming off of him. Before the Captain had time to wonder out loud who the man was Liam beat him to the punch.

"Who was that man, Mother?" The boy asked.

Maria's eyes were frozen on the screen. The Captain couldn't see into them, but he knew that they were filled with fear from her body posture.

"My father." She replied, her voice dead and flat.

The woman at the piano began to play. The two children were shoved into the center of the room by Maria's looming father. Barely touching Bill, he rather roughly placed his young daughter into the spot he wanted her in the middle of the floor. Turning back to Bill's mother behind the piano he gave her a questioning look, with a nod of her head he turned back to his daughter and wagged his finger in her face demanding something of her. Little Maria looked up at her father with cowering eyes and nodded her head at the man.

Then Bill said the words that the Captain was already thinking in his head, "If the man wasn't dead already, I'd kill him myself."

The two children on the screen began to reluctantly dance together.

"What is that dance you are doing, Mother?" Lynn asked.

"The Laendler." The Captain replied for Maria. He had recognized the dance right away, for as a child he too was forced to learn it. Although, he didn't kick his partner in the knee's as young Bill was doing on the screen.

Bill gave a throaty laugh and then turned to his running camera, "I bet you are wondering right now why on earth you ever married me Maria." Looking back at his own screen he continued, "I guess I was pretty horrible to you when we were younger."

The screen flickered once more and now the two children were some years older. Although the years could only be a few, they both had matured greatly over that time. There was a sadness that lived in each of their eyes that stole the light that had been there earlier.

They were seated on a hill top, having a picnic. The camera swooped down the hill to the right and one could see a marvelous mansion nestled in a valley of rolling hills.

"That's the house where I grew up." Bill said. "The hill that we are sitting on right now was the divider between your mother's house and mine. We used to picnic up there all of the time with Aunt Adelaide after your mother came to live with us. She must be the one running the camera," Bill finished.

The camera was really focusing on taking in the landscape, but every once in a while it would turn on Bill and Maria. They sat closer than necessary on a blanket with the basket of goodies lying in front of them. Bill was nibbling on some bread, his eyes focused on Maria, who stared off in the distance at nothing in particular. She looked a shadow of herself, emotionless and lifeless. A few times Bill tried to engage her in conversation, but she simply shook or nodded her head at him. Letting out a frustrated sigh, he turned to the camera operator, and shrugged his shoulders at her.

"The reason I'm showing you this, Little Bundle," Bill said his voice filled with emotion, "is that once a long time ago your mother went to a very dark place. There were reasons for her journey there, reasons that I'll leave to her whether or not she wants tell you. But it took me some time to persuade her to come home again. I worry that after I'm gone that she will go back to that place, only this time I won't be here to bring her back."

From behind the grown up Bill a door slammed in the editing room that he was in. Entering onto the screen was the very pregnant Maria looking angrier than ever. She glanced at the glowing images on Bill's screen and then back to her husband.

"What the hell is this, Bill?" She yelled.

"Maria," he gasped running his fingers through his hair. The Captain felt sorry for the man. He himself had only faced half the wrath that Bill was about to get on the screen.

"Maria, what are you doing here? You're supposed to be home, in bed, resting! You never listen." She still doesn't, Bill, the Captain told the man on the screen in his head.

"What am I doing here? I think the better question is what the hell are you doing here?" She pointed in the direction of Bill's screen.

"I wanted to leave a legacy for the baby, you know, in case…"

"In case of what?" She asked, her fury evident in every word.

"In case I'm not here when the baby is born. I wanted him or her to know who I was."

"By telling him or her about my past?" She questioned, "How does my past have anything to do with your legacy?"

"Maria, it's not what you think. I'm worried about you. I worry that when I'm gone you'll…"

"Why do you have to talk this way Bill? You know I don't like to talk about it." She yelled her anger pitching her voice higher and higher.

"Maria, what's going to happen is going to happen, you can't hide from it."

"You don't think I know that Bill? You don't think I think about it every single goddamn day? But unlike you, I want to live the rest of your days with you and not worry about what will happen when you're gone. I'm the one being left behind you know!" She shouted into his face.

"And I'm the one who's going to miss out on everything. I'm the one who will never see our baby grow up. I'm the one who has to accept the fact that one day you'll find another and raise our child with him. My child will call another man Daddy." Bill slammed his fist down on the piano that took up the majority of the small studio room along with all the editing equipment. "Do you know how that makes me feel? The thought of you with another man! It drives me insane!" He screamed pushing his weight into the piano that flew across the room.

"Bill," Maria sighed taking his head into her hands, caressing his tears away, "I will never love another. You know that. There's only you, baby only you." She pulled a sobbing Bill to her kissing his cheeks his forehead, and finally his lips.

"No Maria," Bill said pushing her away from him so that he could look into her eyes. "I don't want that life for you. Promise me that you will forget me when I'm gone and move on. I don't want you to pine over me. I want you to be happy in your life. I can't rest thinking that I left you with a life of solitude."

"Oh Bill," Maria said shaking her head, "I can't promise you that. I don't think that I could ever love someone else."

"At least promise me that you'll try, Maria."

"I promise," she finally said just before the screen went black.

Thank you all for the wonderful words of encouragement you have all given me thus far. I hope that you are all still enjoying the story. I had better hopes for this chapter, I was going to include a song at the end, but then I thought against it. I hope this didn't disappoint. It was supposed to give you some insight into Bill and Maria's past, though I'm not too sure I succeeded. I wrote this in a half stupor being hopped up on all sorts of prescriptions since my son felt the need to share his strep throat with me this week. At this point I'm not even sure what I wrote made any sense at all. Please let me know what you think.