Silvery Moonlight
~*~
Voices coming from the next room awoke an exhausted Maria early the next morning.
She sighed as she pulled herself from the comforts of her bed into the slightly cold – as it always seems to feel in the morning, no matter how warm the temperature – room. The sun was shining brightly through the now drape-less windows and she smiled as she remembered what she had in store for the day.
~*~
Breakfast was quite the affair that morning. The children were unusually rambunctious – she guessed it was like this when the Captain was not there to oversee the goings-on of the meal – and it took her quite a few tries to be able to hush them into hearing her plans for the morning.
At first, their faces revealed their excitement; however, the delight was shadowed over when Freidrich said,
"Father would never let us do that," and the children all glanced uncomfortably at one another.
No, Maria thought, their father would not let do this. But, wasn't that the basis of its appeal? She turned it over in her mind for a second, playing with the idea of canceling the whole escapade altogether and spending the day lounging about the estate. This thought only lasted a mere second, however and she soon grinned at the children, sheepishly.
"You're absolutely right," she stated finally, "however, your father left me in his charge and I think that taking a picnic lunch to the mountains is the perfect way to spend a beautiful summer day, so you'll have to trudge along. I order you to." Brigitta was the first to smile, but she was soon followed by Gretl and slowly but surely all of the children were grinning happily.
"I've never had a picnic before," Gretl admitted.
"'Course you have, silly. We went years ago. Remember?" Kurt prompted. But, of course, Gretl did not remember and to her, this picnic was as good as a first and just as exciting. She was soon bubbling with comments and questions and requests and she was positively pestering the older children until Maria surprised them with the play clothes.
Then they were struck speechless.
They were, naturally, all wearing their uniforms and the play clothes scared them somewhat. The picnic, they knew, was a distinct disobeying of their father's rule and they felt the least they could do was keep their uniforms as a grasp onto the rules they were forced to follow so stringently.
However, Maria insisted and so, one by one, the children took an outfit from her and ascended the staircase to change.
This was going to be quite an adventure.
