Star-Crossed Souls Slow Dancing
He isn't sure what the sermon's about because the only thing he can see is two pigtails, held up with pink ribbon, dusting the top of the pew.
She's happy to have another face to let her mind think of during church, more than ghosts of the past, harbingers of death. She's happy to have something alive to think about.
He steps up behind her father, and she moves around her mother, and they try not to blush.
"How's school going?" she asks, hands folded in front of her.
"Well enough…" He doesn't like to think about it, really; he's taken to watching Herr Sonnenstitch walk about the room and hearing Melchior in his head, the arguments and the echoes of punishment, and he finds it difficult to concentrate.
"And your piano lessons?"
He flushes deeply because any thought of the piano brings up thoughts of—well, enough to make it difficult for him to walk about. He tries to keep his mind clear, focuses on the pastor over Anna's shoulder, and swallows thickly. "Alright, I suppose. I just need to remember to practice more."
"That's what Frau Hollmann keeps telling me. I imagine singing is easier than practicing piano though. At least singing you can do anywhere."
She speaks so easily and he's starting to get a little jealous. He coughs lightly and kicks his toe against the ground.
"Anna?" Her mother turns and Georg feels eyes, cold and unwelcome, scrutinize his face.
"Yes, Mama. Goodbye," she says and Georg doesn't have time to look up and mutter a farewell in return before she's gone, good Sunday dress swaying behind her, and it's all Georg can do to keep his mind off that skirt.
Otto punches his shoulder as he comes up behind him, a grin sliding over his face, and Georg feels a little sick.
"I saw you talking to Anna Lotzer," he says with a wink. Georg shrugs Otto off and starts on the way home, ignoring Otto's jeers as best he can.
"But Anna, really. Georg Zierchnitz?"
Thea's nose wrinkles as she tosses the petals of a flower into the lake, watches them float lazily along the top of the water. Anna tugs her skirt about her knees and settles back against a tree, watching Thea's hands.
"He's nice."
She hasn't been in the mood for Thea and her nose-wrinkling since she stared at Anna in shock that day Anna asked if she'd like to come with her to leave flowers on Wendla's grave.
"But she sinned, Anna!" she had whispered fiercely, her eyes flashing. "She shouldn't even be in the church graveyard. How fitting they should put her there next to Moritz; both of them are damned anyway."
Anna had collected her flowers and sat between Wendla's and Moritz's graves until the sun sank below the horizon, watching the sky turn to golden and pink and purple.
"I really don't see where you get that idea from, Anna. Georg Zierchnitz. Of all people!" Thea throws the stem into the water. Anna doesn't answer as she watches it float away gently. Instead, she starts to hum to herself, fingering the hem of her dress.
The day is starting around them, sunlight warm and yellow. Her basket sits between them, pages in a book on his knees ruffling in the wind. To their left, Ilse is laughing, hair swaying in the breeze, a male's shirt dusting the tops of her thighs. Martha picks flowers at Ilse's feet, the trio of girls somehow stumbling into Georg's space. Anna sits by him though, eyes darting over to watch her friends, wondering where the years are taking them, as she feels every change of his breath beside her like an earthquake across her senses.
When he talks, it's as if he's afraid to break this shell that the air has formed around them, and really she can't find it within herself to blame him.
"Fraulien Grossenbustenhalter says I'm almost ready."
A smile slips over her features and above the laughter of the girls, she can hear her heartbeat in her chest. "You play piano beautifully."
If Anna were looking at Georg, she'd see the blush tip his cheeks, and he ducks his head, picking self-consciously at the grass. "Not as beautifully as you sing… Your solo at church was wonderful."
It's her turn to blush, and silence descends on them slowly once more. A cloud moves lazily across the sun, the heat hanging about their shoulders, and though nothing is happening, it feels as if everything is changing between them.
Suddenly there's sharp laughter closer than it was before and then water falls on their laps, spraying their faces. They leap up, Georg's books scattering to the ground, his voice calling out in shock and her mouth open in a silent combination of surprise and laughter. They look up to see Ilse and Martha by a small stream, grins splitting their faces, and Anna and Georg exchange a look before they run after the two girls.
It's a game of chase and tag, no real rules anywhere, and mostly it's all about running until their lungs scream for air. Anna grabs hold of Ilse's hands and they spin each other as Martha and Georg stop for breath, sharing smiles. Ilse spins Anna away from her, skipping off to take Martha's hands, and Anna winds up twirling into Georg.
Her hands hover above his arms, her heart thudding in her chest for a new, unfamiliar reason. He's frozen, staring down at her with wide eyes, his hands shaking because they're so close to her hips—an automatic reaction when she came at him—and he can feel her body heat through her dress.
It could've been days but really it was probably only a few seconds, enough for Ilse and Martha to notice and start giggling to themselves, rolling their eyes at Anna and Georg, frozen in the imaginary hold of a lover's embrace. Somewhere a bird chirps loudly and it's enough to snap Georg out of it, bringing Anna along with him as he suddenly licks his lips and steps backward, hands falling to his side and curling into fists. Anna's hands still over in the air, reaching out to him as he stumbles.
"I'd better go," he mutters, opening his mouth to say something else, one foot getting caught behind the other. In the end he just turns and hurries to grab his things, haphazardly collecting them under his arm and running off.
Ilse and Martha come and take Anna's hands, pulling her toward another sort of dancing game, but Anna's lost the heart for the game, and her eyes keep trailing off in the direction that Georg ran.
He finds her with flowers in her hand. The wind blows dust across the road, a fine layer settling over their shoes. Her hair flies gently around her face, eyes turned down to watch the motion of her feet as she walks quietly down the road. He finds that his stomach is lurching with a heavier sensation than usual when he stops, putting on a shy smile.
"Hello, Anna."
She stops as if startled, eyes wide, as she looks up, hand holding tighter to the stems of the flowers. "Oh, Georg."
She relaxes but only slightly, shoulders still tense, and he steps toward her, head tilted and breath unsure because he tastes a tension in the air that's bigger than the two of them.
"Where are you off to?"
She bites her lip and he notices how pink they are, like her dress, but his eyes find hers as they gaze into the distance, moist and full of dark emotion that seems to rumble through them like the echoes of thunder.
"The graveyard. It's been a year since…" She turns her eyes to her feet again and Georg lowers his eyes as well, hands folded in front of him. "I'm taking flowers to them," she says gently, her wrist twitching to hold the flowers out from her slightly.
He watches the flower, finds his own mind crowded with the ghost images of faces that had only just faded from his mind. Her dress flutters about her legs in the wind, and when she speaks, she speaks to the road.
"Would you like to come?"
He hasn't been to the graveyard since the second funeral, and his skin crawls as his mind takes a split second to think. It's with a voice he doesn't recognize that he answers quietly, "Yes."
He turns and they start walking together, in silence, but this moment is far past what hangs between them. Their minds turn thoughts over like rocks, looking for what new things might lie beneath the cold, hard stones of the past. She finds small, study determination coated in a thick layer of hope. He finds fear of what has passed, fear that it might happen again, and buried in there, the seed of fear that he might cause it to happen to someone else, another child, his child.
They reach the graveyard with the weight of the past year around their shoulders. Upon Moritz's grave, flowers crowd the bottom of the stone. On Wendla's, a single small daisy rests in front of the inscription, a note tied around the stem. The wind ruffles the paper and Georg can almost read F.G. in black ink. The same rests on Moritz's grave.
Anna splits her flowers in two, handing some to Georg as she reaches out and sets hers on Wendla's grave. Georg finds a spot on Moritz's grave, feeling awkward as he kneels in the grass, his mind frantically trying to make himself forget what must fertilize the soil his knees are pressing into.
They stand again, silently, the wind their only company, and in a quiet moment their hands fold together, fingers locking gently in the embrace of two souls caught up in a world that seems to be swallowing them both. They pay their respects, each lost on their own tide of thought. Anna's voice is small.
"Do you ever wonder what happened to him?"
Georg starts, turns toward Anna with a curious glance. "Who?"
Her eyes are still on the graves. "Melchior."
The question knocks him off guard and he swallows quickly, turning his eyes back to the ground. This is when emotion chokes him because this is what's been eating at him, and he gives his shoulders a shrug. "I—Yes. Sometimes."
She doesn't reply but he knows she nods her head, and he can feel in it that she needs more from him, something more like an answer, something she can find comfort in. "I like to think he found a place where he could fit in… He was always… outspoken." He finds a brief smile touch his lips and a slight laugh at his failure to find a word to properly describe Melchior. She half smirks as well, nodding her head once more.
"I admired that about him."
Georg's reply is soft. "Me too." It's a world of silence before he replies. "I always wanted to be more like him."
Her fingers tighten ever-so-slightly around his hand and comfort floods his soul. It's odd, but that strange thickness that filled the air whenever they were around each other before has gone, and he finds only comfort, companionship in the warmth of her hand in his. He hears sniffling and turns to find her crying, tears slipping down her cheeks and spilling onto the ground.
"Anna, you're crying."
She blinks as if surprised to learn this, wiping half-heartedly at her cheeks. He reaches for her handkerchief, and it's before he can think about it that he dabs at her cheeks. Her eyes swim in water as they turn up to find him, and his lips slips between his teeth as he half-smiles, wiping at the tear that's about to fall from her chin.
Before he understands what's happening, her arms are folding around him, her head tucked against his shoulder. This is comfort, innocent, the need to feel the solidness of the other to chase away the emptiness that's been forming within their souls over the past year. She pulls away slowly and their arms drop to the sides, unspoken understanding that something has changed and maybe—maybe it's going to be okay.
Anna turns her eyes to the road, clearing her throat. "I should be heading back."
"Shall I walk you?" The words fall faster than he intends, before he can think about it, and when she shakes her head, her pigtails brush her shoulders.
"No… I'd rather go alone." Her eyes turn up to his with a quiet smile. "But thank you."
He nods and she turns, leaving the cemetery and the graves behind with their bright necklaces of color. He watches her until she disappears down the road.
Chewing his lip, he turns back to Moritz's grave. He thinks of Melchior, touches his mind on homeless and poor—but Melchior is strong, and he holds out the hope that he might be doing well on his own. He entertains the thought that he might even be writing his own book, and it's with a ridiculous smile Georg thinks he'd like to be the first to write a commentary on it.
He finds himself on his knees before Moritz's grave and this time the ground doesn't feel quite so foreign. His fingers reach out and trace the letters of the inscription, his head tilted. Her arms still hang about him, the ghost of her hair tickling his cheek. The stone beneath his fingers is cold, hard, lifeless, and it starts to burn his fingers. He pulls his hand away.
"Moritz, I—" The words die in his throat and his fingers curl into a fist. He can't remember what he was trying to say, can't pull the words out through the sudden sensation that steals through him like an icy grip.
It's with a flash he remembers walking away from here after the funeral, remembers laughing with Otto. Bitter words spilled from his throat then, and he recalls them with something like distant, muted horror. Anna's eyes loom in his mind, her pain, and he remembers Moritz's eyes, scared and skittish, and always searching.
He swallows down the lump in his throat and tries to fight back the bitter want to cry, to let out this feeling as easily as Anna had done not a second before. He reaches his hand out again, lets his fingers rest over Moritz's name.
The words come easy now.
"I'm sorry."
He'll have his arms around her again soon, and she'll start to relish the way her head fits against his shoulder. Flowers become a tradition, every year, their fingers entwined. They hold up the fragments of the past between them, fill in their own holes with them, but the last few missing gaps can only be filled by the other.
It's something like happy ever after, with two graves and the whisper of loss dancing between their shoulders. It's a happy ever after because they've seen what an unhappy ending looks like, and they promise themselves, each other, that they won't let that happen to themselves—or their children.