Certain Demolitions: Play a Fantasia

4. It wasn't that Klavier was oblivious to the rumblings of war in Europe. It was just that he hadn't expected Germany's declaration of war to cause him to get expelled.

Chapter 4: The Things that Divide Us

[Status: Cannon in the context of C.D.]

1939

Outside Paris, France

Monsieur Dagort, headmaster of the St Gerard Boarding School, was in his desk in his office, flipping through the newspaper. The morning so far had been quiet; no unruly students had been sent in, no fights had occurred.

He saw the headline in the newspaper, paused, and read the article quickly. Germany had invaded Poland, and France had declared war on Germany.

"Damned Boches!" Dagort muttered under his breath. He had fought in the Great War, and spent time in a German prison camp. It would not happen again! He decided. Vive la France!

And since there was war declared, there was something else he had to do. He set the newspaper down and got to his feet.

Last year, he hadn't cared what nationality his students were, though the actions in Germany and Austria had made him roll his eyes. The school he ran was recognized as one of the most prestigious in France and the sons of both the nobility and nouveau riche were sent to the St Gerard school to be educated. But last year, politics hadn't mattered and the school had had a successful year. This year, though, things had been different. Politics did matter. Unrest had begun early and he had tried very hard to keep any Germans out of his school. He had started tripling the student fees and that had driven most of the German students and their families away.

There had been one student enrolled in spite of this. The younger son of a family of former nobles in Germany had been enrolled in spite of the fees. The older brother hadn't so much as blinked when he heard the student enrollment fee. He had just payed it. Then again, the younger sibling had been a student last year, too.

But that had been before there was a war. Dagort couldn't overlook this sort of thing anymore. He now had a new rule for his school: no Boches allowed.

(-)

Dagort finds the student in question still in class.

The students in class are hard at work on their English homework. The teacher and some of the more advanced students are helping the other students out with the homework.

Dagort spots Klavier Gavin easily enough. He's one of only two students in the classroom that are blond, and of the two young men, his hair is paler.

Klavier is kneeling in front of the desk of another student, helping him through one of the translations. Geoffery, the student he's helping, is actually Klavier's roommate.

"I have the answer." Geoffery sounded out. "I have the answer! That's it! That's the translation." He wrote it out.

"You wrote it out wrong," Klavier said, setting a silver-ringed hand on his roommate's desk. Klavier is, as always, just skirting the line on what was allowed in the school uniform. All of the young men in the school are required to wear dark suits, white shirts, and blue or green ties to all classes. Klavier is wearing the dark suit, but he wears a purple ribbon at his throat, not a tie. He still wears silver rings on his fingers, a silver earring, and his sunglasses are on top of his head.

"No! I can't have written it wrong!" Geoffery exclaimed. "I sounded it out! Answer!"

"It is spelled wrong." Klavier said, tapping his pencil on the paper. "'Answer' is spelled wrong."

"A-N-S-E-R. Answer." Geoffery told him. "What did I spell wrong?"

Klavier turned the paper around and wrote out the correct English spelling under the sentence. "A-N-S-W-E-R."

Geoffery looked dumbfounded. "But the "w" isn't pronounced!"

"Ja. Welcome to English." Klavier said. Then someone tapped on his shoulder, and he turned to see Dagort standing there. "Ja?" Klavier said, rising to his feet. He's already taller than the headmaster.

"Monsieur Gavin, you're expelled. Pack your things. You're leaving."

Klavier, and those who had been near enough to hear what was said, looked dumbfounded. "Achtung! Why? I haven't done anything."

"You haven't, but your country has." Dagort said. "Germany has started another war. And this school has a new rule: no Boches allowed. Now pack your things and get out."

Klavier was still as a stone for a moment, then he walked past the other man, out of the room. He kept his head up, and looked straight ahead.

Geoffery watched his roommate leave, then stood up and followed Klavier out of the room. When he gets out of the classroom, though, Klavier is nowhere to be seen.

He searches all the usual spots in the school where Klavier is known to hang out, then gives up and goes back to the room he shares with the German student.

When he left the classroom, Klavier had gone straight back to the room he shared with Geoffery. He had taken the key to his trunk from the silver chain around his neck, unlocked the trunk - a smaller one then the one he would take to America two years in the future - and started to pack.

He was still working on this when the door to the room opened. Klavier turned and saw that it was jut Geoffery, and so he turned back to what he was doing.

"You're not really leaving are you?" Geoffery asked.

"What else would should I do?" Klavier asked. He had already changed out of his school uniform, and was in black pants and a purple, button-down shirt, along with a black vest embroidered in gold and silver. He was wearing the re-styled livery collar with the ornate "G" hanging from it.

"I don't know, but you shouldn't let him throw you out."

"If he doesn't want me here, then I will go home." Klavier said.

"He shouldn't get to make you leave just because he doesn't like the country you're from."

"There's no point in staying where I'm not wanted. Besides, I need to make sure that Kristoph is alright. I have to go home." Klavier told him.

Geoffery sat down on his bed. "I'm sorry."

"It isn't your fault." Klavier told him.

"But it isn't your fault either." Geoffery replied. "Is there anything I can do to help?"

"If you could find a newspaper, I would appreciate it." Klavier said, pausing his packing. "I would like to know what has happened."

Geoffery nodded and slipped out of the room. He returned a few minutes later with the Paris newspaper that he had taken, without permission, from the school library. They read the article about the declaration of war.

There was nothing else either of them could say.

(-)

When he's finished packing, Klavier leaves the room and goes to the headmaster's office. There's one last thing he intends to do before he goes.

The headmaster's secretary isn't at their desk, and Klavier taps on the door matter-of-factly for a moment before he walks in. The headmaster is sitting at his desk, writing furiously. He looked up when the door opened. "What are you doing here? You're supposed to be leaving."

"I am. But there's something I have to get back from you first. You took substantial fees from my brother Kristoph for my enrollment here. Since I've been here barely a month, I'm here to get those fees back."

"Those monies are forfeit!"

"No, they are not. You will return them. You have no claim to costs for a service that you agreed to provide and then reneged on. You were paid for a year of my education, room, and board, and you have not provided that. Your claim to the money is the only thing that's forfeit." Klavier replied.

Dagort glared at him. Klavier stared right back. Finally Dagort caved, opened a drawer on his desk, and pulled out the school checkbook. "You weren't the one who paid the fee."

"No, I wasn't. You can make that out to Kristoph Gavin." Klavier said. "And make sure that he can can draw that money at a bank in Munich."

There was silence in the office other then the scratching of teh headmaster's pen on the check. Then he finished, tore it out of the book, and reluctantly handing it to Klavier.

"Thank you." Klavier said. He folded the check, put it in his vest, and left the room.

Two days later, he arrived back in Munich.

(-)

In August of 1939, Klavier had begun his second year at one of the most prestigious schools in France, studying the arts and music. Kristoph, meanwhile, had been studying the newspapers back in Germany with growing exasperation. He was not a stupid man by any measure, though, so he kept his exasperation to himself.

And then it was September, and Klavier was on the doorstep of the ancestral Gavin home, guitar case in hand and suitcases on the step beside him. "They expelled me." He told Kristoph when the older man answered the door.

Kristoph said nothing. They both knew that Klavier's being home had nothing to do with his grades, and everything to do with the fact that Germany had invaded Poland which was allied to France. Instead, he picked up his little brother's suitcases. "Well don't just stand there with the door open." He demanded, and Klavier darted inside, closing the door behind him.

[A/N:] This is the stuff I think about when I get bored. I had actually toyed with the idea of having Klavier explain some shortened version of these events to Trucy or someone in C.D. proper, but I couldn't think of a good way to squeeze that in, and so here, have the longer version.

The scene at the end is from the second chapter of C.D. I was trying to look up French names for this chapter, and along the way discovered that Kristoph - other then the fact his name is spelled with a "K" and not a "C" - has the proper German variant of the name Christopher. Which just makes me wonder again what exactly the translators were getting at when they were translating, or, more specifically, why they decided to walk back the German thing later on.

Anyway, here, have another update for Fantasia. Boche is another ethnic slur for Germans. I think there's really nothing else that I need to mention here but as always, if you have any questions, let me know.

Please review!

1-19-18