CHAPTER 9: ANTICIPATION
Everything was happening so fast, the sensations coming at Maria faster than she could absorb them. There was his taste, and the surprisingly tender shape of his mouth, and the scrape of his stubbled chin. There was the way he dragged her upward into his embrace until her bare toes danced on the ground. She nearly recoiled from the force of it, but he didn't let up, introducing one new variation after another: one moment, he was biting at her lips and at the next, he was pushing his tongue against hers.
She couldn't keep her hands from going to the back of his neck, as though she'd always longed for the chance to twist them into his thick and surprisingly soft hair. When he responded by thrusting his lower body into hers, Maria had no control over the embarrassing little groan that rose from the back of her throat.
As suddenly as their kiss had begun, it ended. Without warning the Captain lifted his mouth from hers and dropped his hands from her waist, leaving her to sway unsteadily on her feet.
"There you go, Fraulein." he said hoarsely, taking a step back from her while his shoulders heaved with the effort to draw breath. "When you go off to Vienna," he bit out the word, "try to remember one thing: if it brings you no pleasure, you've got the wrong man. Is it safe for me to assume that now you understand all the fuss?"
"Y-yes," Maria choked. "I think I do."
"You think you do?' his eyes flashed a threat, and she saw his hands twitch by his sides.
"I mean, I know I do," she said hastily.
Maria wasn't sure what she knew anymore, other than how you could want a man, the very same man you'd despised only days before, to kiss you again and again. She put her fingers to her lips, which felt so tender and sensitive she gave them a pinch.
"Don't do that," he said sharply.
"Why not?"
"Because it makes me want to-"
"All right!" She dropped the offending hand to her side. "Can I ask something else, Captain?"
He arched an eyebrow and that dangerous gleam reappeared in his eyes.
"You want something more from me? That wasn't enough?"
"I just want you to answer a question," she flushed.
Looking very pleased with himself, he crossed his arms against his chest and leaned casually against the woodshed.
"All right, then, what is it?"
"You've been with lots of women, haven't you?"
Without warning, his face shuttered closed, and the air between them filled with frost.
"That, Fraulein, is none of your concern."
"I know it's not. I was just wondering, you know, what it's like."
"I do not wish to discuss my personal affairs in this manner," he said stiffly.
"To kiss so many different women," she persisted.
Despite his annoyance, Georg had to bite back a grin.
"Kiss them?"
"I mean, I'm sure you did more than kiss them. But isn't it embarrassing?"
When Fraulein Maria wrinkled her nose, it was so adorable that, despite himself, he roared with laughter.
"Embarrassing? Is that what you think it was?"
"How many of them were there?"
"You think I counted? What kind of man would do that?"
"The kind of man who goes to bed with dozens of women," she retorted, and then looked comically shocked that she had.
"It wasn't dozens," he said, although he thought it very well might have been, "and anyway, Fraulein, despite your new-found expertise in kissing, you can't possibly understand. Let me tell you something about those women. I didn't take advantage of them. Quite the contrary. I showed them how to take their pleasure, without having to wait for some oaf to figure out things for them."
There was a long silence, one full of promise, like an unfinished sentence. The afternoon, which been so cool, so calm and still and clear, was suddenly charged with possibility, the air grown heavy, pulsing and shimmering with heat and glowing light.
"Show me," she whispered.
"What?"
"I want you to show me. The rest of it." The tremble in her voice faded as she continued. "I mean, I always thought that kind of thing – you know, kissing and everything, that it was just for men. I can see that I was wrong about the kissing – oh, please, don't laugh at me!"
"I am not laughing. Not even a little."
"I was wrong about the kissing, I admit it." Her fingers returned to her lips. "But about the rest of it - I'll find out one way or the other, you know. After I get to Vienna."
"Fraulein," he swallowed past the enormous boulder that was lodged in his throat. "Do you mean to tell me that you are asking me to –?"
"Why not?"
His little governess was a quick learner. Now that she had figured out the effect she had on him when she looked up at him from beneath her dark fringe of lashes, she wielded this newfound skill like a weapon.
"Because, that's why not. Absolutely out of the question. I couldn't possibly! I promised Reverend Mother to return you the way I found you. Untouched."
"But I'm not going back to Nonnberg," she argued. "You know that. And we are married, after all."
From the day she'd arrived in Aigen, Fraulein Maria had been nothing if not persistent. It was one of her most admirable, if maddening, qualities, he remembered, but with a sinking feeling. Only now did Georg realize, too late, that she had turned the tables on him.
Already, the idea was starting to seem dangerously reasonable. There was no denying the connection between them. When he'd had her in his arms, if her response had been clumsy, it had also been fearless. This whole situation was partly his doing, for having flirted so irresponsibly with her all summer, and as long as they agreed that their hearts were not part of the bargain, why not?
If you thought about it, Fraulein Maria had actually done a great deal for him, reconciling his children to him and leading them out of Austria, and wasn't this something he could give her in return? After all, another man could leave her with a baby. Or a gruesome disease. He knew how to avoid both, and how to make her comfortable and put her at ease. It was an honor, really, the trust she was putting in him.
"Never mind," she broke into his thoughts, her cheeks gone pink with embarrassment. He had taken too long to respond, and the moment was lost.
"Just forget about it, Captain, would you? I shouldn't even have brought it up. I'm sure I can figure things out on my own. I'll just have to find someone else to help me. Of course, he won't be my husband."
She shuffled back into her shoes and stalked off, while his mind raced ahead to another solution. It occurred to him that surely he could show the little governess a thing or two about pleasure without taking things to their logical conclusion. He was quite certain he had the willpower to manage it. It would be a noble sacrifice, to be sure, but a worthwhile one.
She would be warm and soft and perfect.
"Wait! Hold on, Fraulein."
She kept moving. In another few steps, they'd be too close to the cottage to continue this conversation.
"Maria!"
At the sound of her given name, she went perfectly still, but didn't turn around, forcing him to make an indecent proposition to her back.
"You're right. If anyone's going to lead you into temptation, it had better be me. I have another idea. I can't – ehrm – I can't do as you ask, not exactly, anyway, but I could show you a thing or two."
She turned to face him, looking utterly, fetchingly bewildered.
"I don't understand."
Georg had a rich and bawdy vocabulary, but nothing suitable for this occasion. "Of course you don't," he said confidently, "but you will. All you need to know is that it will be spectacular." Of that, he was suddenly quite certain.
He waited for her to call him on his arrogance and high handedness, but her boldness had vanished, leaving her bashfully fidgeting with her skirt. What a joy it would be to kiss and touch her everywhere!
"Where?" she said.
"Where would I – oh! You mean where we would meet, not where will I - well. There's a little cave, about twenty paces past the waterfall, on the left. You can find the entrance just behind a stand of birches. I'll wait for you there tonight, after everyone is asleep."
"All right," she said shyly, "I think I can manage that."
She turned back toward the cottage before he stopped her again.
"Fraulein? I mean, Maria."
"Yes, ehrm - Captain?"
"It's just this once, you understand. And it doesn't mean anything has changed between us. We're just good friends, correct?"
"Oh, for heaven's sake," she shouted at him. "I thought we agreed to put all of that behind us!"
Then she stomped off toward the cottage, leaving him to wonder if he'd ruined his chances.
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He chopped wood for most of the afternoon, and then spent the last hour before supper readying the cave, and himself. He even took the time to shave, and the whole time, he was tense with uncertainty about whether she was going to follow through. The little menace! He ought to have kept his mouth shut!
Vienna?
Put her innocent charms up against the deplorable bores that thronged its glittering salons? A depraved lot, all of them. Why, she wouldn't last a week there! Golden-haired and freckled, long legged, awkward as a colt, strong and supple, cheerful and patient and kind, with a voice like an angel's: she belonged here, with the trees and birds and flowers.
Up until now, the cave had been his refuge, the place he went out of a desperate need to escape her tempting, tormenting presence. But there was no escape to be had, for she had stolen inside him like a dangerous vapor. Tonight, if all went as planned, the cave would fill with the sights, sounds and scents of the little governess. He would do his best to give her pleasure, to make her happy.
If, that is, he didn't throttle her first.
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Could this be happening to her?
Maria's confident chatter about making a life for herself in Vienna had been meant half in jest. How could anything possibly prepare a girl like her – a mountain girl who'd spent three years living in a convent - for a life of champagne, red dresses and diamonds? Yet at the time, it had seemed crucial, somehow, to convince him that she was quite serious about the whole Vienna undertaking.
And he had taken her at her word! In the midst of her idle talk about Vienna, as fanciful and naïve as one of Brigitta's stories, something had shifted between them, almost as though she had, without trying, taken the upper hand from the Captain. When she looked up at him, trying to read his face, the look he'd given her in return nearly sent her up in flames. Which in turn had further fueled her confidence, stoked her burning curiosity, and led her straight into his trap. Or had he fallen into hers?
"I showed them how to take their pleasure," he had said. What did that even mean?
All summer, she had felt his pull, a magnetic force nearly overpowering. While here in the forest, she had learned enough about him to have abandoned her vague, girlish crush on the Captain, but apparently not enough to stay out of trouble. That kiss had ignited something in her, something reckless, something fierce and wild. And if the Captain's sudden and headlong pursuit of her was intimidating in its intensity, it was also completely irresistible. The thrilling and unsettling image of him at the waterfall, his powerful body turning toward her, and the expression he'd worn – yes, she was too far gone to back out now.
She reminded herself it wouldn't be a sin to go with him. They were married, after all, put together by Reverend Mother herself. Three years ago, Maria had readily chosen a life of chastity over marriage, which might be a sacrament in God's eyes, but which in her experience, promised only conflict and cruelty. So she hadn't been lying to Captain von Trapp about her lack of interest in marriage, but there was no denying that their current circumstances were convenient. A girl's first time was never easy, she knew that, and she also knew in her heart that he would never harm her.
Maria had only one regret, a small one: when he had refused to discuss his colorful past, she wished she'd demanded an answer to one last question about the women he'd been with after his wife died: how could you do that, if you loved your wife so much? While Captain von Trapp's heart might be broken, apparently the rest of him worked quite fine. Maybe after tonight, she'd understand the answer to that question without having to ask him. After tonight, she might be a different sort of person entirely.
She was also perfectly, deliciously aware that their last exchange had left him dangling, and when the Captain returned to the cottage for supper, freshly shaved and clean-shirted, Maria savored the unfamiliar and sweet ownership of the upper hand. Conscious of his unwavering attention as she directed preparations for the meal, she took a great deal of pride in her composure, careful to give him no hint of the nervous flutter of curiosity and excitement that beat, like the wings of a butterfly, in her chest.
"Friedrich, stir the fire, please."
The Captain's eyes followed her around the kitchen.
"Kurt, Marta, set the table, will you?"
Captain von Trapp just a little bit too close to her as she piled apples in a bowl.
"Louisa, please stir the soup. Liesl, unwrap the cheese."
When she went to slice the bread, he was there to hand her the knife, letting his fingers brush against hers.
"Gretl, you may put the cake on the table, but carefully, please."
With soup steaming on the stove, and cake freshly out of the oven, and all the activity, the cottage grew stiflingly warm. When Maria went to push the door open to the evening air, the Captain was suddenly right behind her, using his height and breadth to urge her through the door and across the porch until her hands met the railing. His hands bracketed hers, boxing her in from behind, and his breath tickled her ear.
"You haven't changed your mind, Maria, have you?"
He slid one booted foot between her two feet and edged them apart. Maria had no idea why, but this gesture turned her knees to jelly.
"Captain, someone's going to see!"
"No one will notice a thing, unless you make a fuss. Although you seem to have liked making a fuss, remember?" he purred. "Perhaps I ought to kiss you again, as a reminder."
He lifted the damp curls from her neck and pressed his hot mouth to her nape, until she felt the sensation, bright and sharp, flooding throughout her body. She tried not to respond to that touch, but it was impossible to keep still.
A puff of laughter against her skin.
"If you're trying to get me to stop, you ought to stop squirming like that. It's not helping your cause. Just slide a little to the right, if you wouldn't mind."
"Are you mad?" she choked, struggling for breath.
"What I am not is patient. I want to kiss you again. I am going to kiss you again, so here's your choice, Maria. I can do it right here, where you fear we are in plain sight, or you can slide a few steps to the right where you can be certain no one will see us. Do it. Now. Please."
While her mind was busy rebelling against being ordered around, and her heart was considering the matter of kisses, Maria's treacherous feet obeyed.
When they were safely out of sight, he turned her around, eyes sparkling with wicked merriment. With great care, he wound one of her curls around his finger and tugged, pulling her toward him, slowly, so slowly, until he had brought her mouth to his.
It was a different kind of kiss, disappointingly short and not demanding at all, more of a luring kiss, like a promise. When he was finished, he let her go with a deep chuckle that vibrated throughout her body.
Maria had completely lost the upper hand to her Captain. If, of course, she'd ever really had it in the first place.
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Supper went by in a blur. Gretl was reassuringly back to normal, and in the aftermath of her accident, the rest of the children were both jubilant and unusually kind to each other. Maria picked at her food, struggled to follow any one of the six conversations going on at once, and failed to answer any question directed at her. Fortunately, the overall level of chaos allowed her behavior to go unremarked, except by the Captain, who needled her throughout the meal.
"Haven't we forgotten to thank the Lord, Fraulein?"
"Have another slice of cake, Fraulein. We need you to keep up your strength, you know."
"Do you always put jam in your soup, Fraulein? Is that something they taught you at the Abbey?"
He teased her so mercilessly that Brigitta burst into tears, while Friedrich reproached him, "Fraulein Maria is still very upset, Father, must you go on this way?"
After that, he sent the children outside and volunteered to do the dishes himself.
"I didn't know you knew how to wash dishes," she snapped, but he just laughed.
"We didn't have kitchen maids on submarines, you know. And I wanted to keep an eye on you so you don't slip away," he said, but smugly, as though he knew it wasn't necessary, as though he understood perfectly well that by now, her skin was crawling with anticipation.
Dreadful man.
"Here's the last one for you to dry," he said, extending a plate toward her, but when she reached for it, he snatched it away and took her hand instead, drawing a finger across her palm that sparked a line of fire she felt to the tips of her fingers and toes.
The hour remaining before bedtime ticked by with agonizing slowness, but at last the Captain, as he had every night during their time in the forest, summoned his family to his side, took up the guitar, and sang them the edelweiss song.
"I'm off. I'll see you later," he said, striding toward the door.
"You mean, tomorrow, Father, don't you?"
"Yes, Marta. Exactly. I'll see you tomorrow."
And then, with the very quickest of winks sent in Maria's direction, he was gone.
She did her best to keep her mind clear and her hands steady as she led the children through face-washing and tooth brushing and prayers, with special thanks offered for Gretl's safety.
But the whole time, she felt the trail of that finger as though it had been burned into her palm, and the unsettling sensation of his foot pushing its way between hers.
We need you to keep up your strength, you know.
After settling the youngest girls in the big bed, she mended Kurt's socks while listening to Brigitta's latest story idea, before announcing, casually,
"Such a lovely evening. I think I'll take a walk myself."
The children were still wary and solicitous after the morning's terrible fright. So when she added, "It might be quite a long walk, so you needn't wait up for me," Friedrich sent a reassuring smile her way before returning to his card game with Liesl.
How long would the whole thing take, anyway? she wondered.
Maria carried a small lantern, but the dark forest pressed in on her from every side. As she made her way through the forest and toward the cave, every small sound – animals rustling in the underbrush, the rush of the treacherous creek nearby, night insects buzzing – was amplified into something menacing. Or perhaps it was her fear of what waited for her in the cave.
I am not afraid, she told herself.
By the time she neared her destination, her heart as pounding so loud in her ears that she could no longer hear the insects' drone, the rustle of leaves, or even the roar of the waterfall.
The familiar baritone made her jump.
"There you are!"
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For those who commented on the "Easter eggs" in the last chapter:
Congrats to those who remembered that IRL, Kym Karath (Gretl) threw up on Heather Menzies (Louisa) during filming of the rowboat scene.
And kudos to those 50 Shades fans who recognized the lines:
"I mean, just look at me."
"I am."
(There are things I love about FSOG but I can't see myself ever writing fanfic about it).
Thank you very much for your reviews, and Mr. Augiesannie says thank you too.
Hold onto your hats! Time for the rating change!
I don't own TSOM or anything about it.