so here come the big dramatic chapter. i hope you like it. thanks to those who reviewed the last chapter. it means the world to me :)
The church was stuffy with so many people in it. A few lamenting wails could be heard from some women but were quickly droned out by the preachers soothing voice.
" God works in mysterious ways. Mortals, such as ourselves, can never hope to understand his workings. But still as we lay a young girl to rest it gives us cause to question our faith. Let this tragedy not eclipse your relationship with god but strengthen it. We shall all one day join him in his heavenly pasture but you will never be saved if you lose faith and commit sin." As he stood high and mighty at his pulpit residing over all the congregation he let his eyes sweep over the true children.
One by one they rose to pay their final respects. When my turn arrived I looked. I had willed myself not to but she called to me. She was very beautiful with her hair spilling over the satin pillow. Her hands were neatly folded and she smiled a sad ignorant smile placed on her lips by someone else's hands. I wanted to stroke her hair and tell her everything was going to be alright but I didn't believe my own words. Everything was not going to be alright. The children, if you could call us that anymore, were disappearing faster than the seasons could change.
The whole service I did not cry. I couldn't bring myself to, even though I felt that familiar throbbing pain in the back of my throat. As the procession continued out to the cemetery I looked at the grass. It was waving its final goodbyes to the girl who would run barefoot on it. I couldn't look at the grass too long so I shifted my head to the skies. The clouds shifted momentarily blotting the sun into a golden drizzle, creating glorious pools of light. Wendla would have been hurrying home with blue violets for her mother right about now. Instead she was resting serenely. They lowered her into the ground and the service was over. Once again the children were left milling around, not yet willing to give their friend away to the greedy soil.
Ana tossed herself on the mound and sobbed so deeply I thought she would never rise again. Martha and Thea wrapped their arms around her and comforted her until her sobs become soft choking tears. The tombstone was beautiful. Black marble with deep engraved letters. Wendla Bergman. Died of anemia.
Anemia. Even now they couldn't face the truth. I laughed so bitterly that it finally made the tears flow. Before the first tear even left my cheek Hanschen was at my side.
" I was waiting for this." He wrapped me in a hug and I pressed my face into his dark cotton suit.
" I don't understand why."
"Because, silly, how am I supposed to be allowed to comfort you unless you look distraught." Hanschen briefly brushed my hair with his hand. I hadn't been wondering about him. I was wondering why everything had to be taken away. Why everything had to come to an end. The embrace ended as his father beckoned him over. I swayed dangerously on my feet as his support left me.
Hanschen trotted back over casting quick glances over his shoulder at his father. He shoved his hand out and puffed up his chest. I gazed dumbly at his hand suspended in mid air.
" Play along." He hissed through gritted teeth and motioned discreetly at his father. I took his hand and he bobbed it up and down with a bit more fervor than was necessary. " Sorry, he thinks this is more appropriate for a man of my age." His grip loosened and his hand flopped to his side.
" Are you ashamed of me?" The question caught both of us off guard and I quickly covered my mouth. I held my breath waiting for his reply. I knew that I was ashamed of myself but I always thought that Hanschen was proud of anything that involved himself.
" Oh no of course I am not ashamed of you its just..." He was mumbling and scratched the back of his head trying to jog the right words into his mind that would both placate me and leave him unscathed and commitment free.
" Well if you are not ashamed hug me. Right now." My forwardness shocked me but it felt right in my body. I couldn't live with being Hanschen's dirty little secret. Not when secrets could cost you your life. His eyes widened and he looked furtively back at his father who was eyeing us with distaste.
" I would really love to but father said I have to get home." He stuck his hand out again for me to shake. I pushed it away and wrapped my arms around his neck. He let them stay there momentarily but far too quickly pushed them stiffly away.
" You are making things very difficult." Rather than anger he purred in amusement. He cast a mock furious glance at me, perpetuating the show he was putting on for his father. He ran back over to his father who looked disapprovingly at me and then led Hanschen off back towards their home.
Just then mother came up from behind me. She took me and led me home and I let her. We sat down to silent meal while I tried to wrap my mind around Hanschen. He cared, that was obvious. In the last six days he had managed to sneak out and find me. He would smile and lean me onto my back until I could feel his warmth radiate through me. He would kiss me and I would kiss back, pushing Melchior's letter to the back of my mind. For those few hours he would be the only thing in the world that mattered. Conversation was often sparse when I was with him. We both knew what was supposed to happen when we were alone.
But when we were separated Melchior would bloom into my mind. I would conjure his worry about my bruises and his excitement when he could explain something new in his attempt to broaden my view of the world. I remembered him reading in the church pew. These memories tortured me. I would lie squirming in bed, pained by the bruises and memories. Just before I would be granted sleep I would promise myself I would tell Hanschen I still loved Melchior. Even as I made the resolve Hanschen's voice would drift into my head and ask who was the one who was still here.
Mother slammed her cup on the table and glared at me. Startled, I gazed wide eyed and innocent at her. I had forgotten where I was and who was with me as Melchior and Hanschen quickly drained from my thoughts.
" Honestly you ask to get beaten! Father asked you a question and all you can do is gaze off daydreaming!" I gaped as tears sprang to mother's eyes and she looked miserably between the two of us. Father just grumbled and took the dishes from the table even though I hadn't taken a single bite.
I awaited punishment but it never came. Father retreated to the living room a bottle in each hand. Before he could come back I escaped into my room. I wavered in the door way unsure of what to do. Lunch had been held late due to the service. My clock read three in the afternoon. Mother undoubtedly would still serve dinner promptly at six thirty. That left me with three and a half hours to be confined to my room with my wishes and memories.
I slouched onto my bed and searched under the pillow. I pulled Melchior's letter out and read it for the hundredth time. My eyes always hovered on the final sentence. He would be here tonight. The reality of the situation shook me and I realized I didn't know what to do.
I ran to my desk and pulled out a pen and paper. I began frantically writing a letter to Melchior expressing my worries and fears. I told him how Hanschen cared and how I thought he could take care of me. When I got to the closing I didn't know how to end it. My pen hovered above the fleshy white page and I waited patiently for the final farewell to spring out. I read the letter again and in pure frustration I crumpled it up and threw it away.
I ran to my bed and buried my head deep with in the pillow, drowning out the world. The silence and my own pounding heart beat brought me around. I looked at the garbage pail which was filled to the brim with identical balled up wads of paper. I frowned at my failed attempts at writing to Melchior. Each one held a different fear or a different joy. Some spoke of how I couldn't wait to run away with him while others spoke angrily of how he could leave me alone. Each one was different but I hadn't been able to sign my name on any of them. They were destroyed, unfinished, because if I did finish them it meant no going back.
If I didn't show up what would happen? Hanschen would continue our secret meetings until eventually he realized he didn't truly care or we were caught. If I did go.... the unknown pulled at me. If I did go I would be opening myself to uncertainty. I glanced at the clock. Four fifteen. Time seemed to be dragging painfully slow. I tried to be grateful that midnight was not rushing to me but I couldn't muster it. Instead it was like waiting for your own execution.
My best bet was to see how things unfolded. I curled up deep into the covers despite the hot weather. I tried to believe that if I closed my eyes everything would just go away. I squeezed them shut and opened them again. The crisp white sheets gaped back and I knew there was no avoiding my future.
****
At six thirty sharp mother called me out for dinner. I scrambled out of the tangled sheets. I hadn't realized I had fallen asleep until I had woken up. I sat shaking at the end of my bed. Wendla had been in my room only moments ago. She had been sitting at my desk reading Melchior's letter. She cried but she was smiling.
" Go to him. He needs you. He loves you." She sat shimmering for only a moment and then disappeared. I closed my eyes knowing it was only a dream. Mother called again and I made my way out to the dinning room.
They had already started eating and I lowered myself cautiously into my seat. I ate quickly feeling my pulse race, knowing that in a few hours Melchior would be waiting for me and I would have to make a decision. All through dinner father eyed me hungrily waiting for me to do something wrong. His piercing eyes placed even more anxiety on my already quaking shoulders.
Finally the meal was over. I went to go retreat to my room once again to wait out the final hours but before my hand touched the knob father called out and told me to retrieve my bible. I winced but new I had no choice but to obey. Melchior's letter stood neatly propped up against my bible and I tried remembering if I had put it there. Before I could ponder too long father's impatient call rang out again. I snatched my bible from the desk and carefully placed the letter back under my pillow.
Father sat menacingly in his huge arm chair gazing into the crackling fire. Even though the weather grew increasingly warmer father insisted on having a fire every night. He would sit stoking it occasionally until it seemed the whole room would soon be engulfed in flames.
I stood a few feet away, my heart hammering and anxiously trying to jump out of my chest. Father had never done this before and its newness frightened me.
" Sit and read it. Learn what you are supposed to be doing." He didn't look up from the fire but lazily pointed to a spot close to it where I was meant to sit. This punishment didn't seem so bad but that is what made it all the more terrifying. There had to be more and I waited with rising fear as to what it might be.
My fingers shaking, I fumbled nervously with the pages, all the while my eyes remained locked on father's hand. I skimmed the pages trying not to flinch when father breathed. The bible had always been a comfort to me but with father looming ominously close I could find no solace in its wise words.
" They deserved it." Father began talking to the fire, never once looking towards me. " They all deserved what they got. That Moritz deserved it. He failed." Father laughed quietly to himself. I swallowed the words that suddenly tried to escape my throat. Losing my temper with father would accomplish nothing. My heart beat marked out the seconds and I focused on its ever present thumping. " Wendla too. That little viper. Should have listened to her mother. Got what was coming to her, the little bitch." Father smiled, pleased with his slander. I had taken to staring into the fire also, forcing myself to see what father saw in the licking flames. I saw nothing but hate. " And little Melchior..." he paused to cackle as if something particularly funny had struck him.
" What about him?" My voice was as dry and cracked as the wood in the fire place. Every nerve in my body was alive with a popping rage. How dare he. How dare he even say their names. My fingers itched as the bible felt weighted in my hands. I grasped at it trying to hold my very last bit of sanity.
" He deserves everything he ever gets. He deserves to rot in the flaming pits of hell, and he is going to. If I have to see to it myself." Father took the fire poker and left it sitting in the flames. I squeezed the bible so tightly I could almost feel the words etching themselves into my hands. I closed my eyes but I could still see the flames dancing just beyond my eyelids. There was no escaping the fire or father.
" He is a good boy." Father hadn't heard me and continued on his rant.
" The only thing I don't understand is how you are still alive. Why hasn't god dragged you down there with them. They're probably just waiting for you to join them. That little whore and that insane freak of a boy are probably just waiting for you. Well they won't have to wait long."
" She was a good girl. He was a good boy." I whispered the words to myself trying to reverse the tainting words father had said. I wanted to leave. To get up and walk to my room and block out the entire world but I was paralyzed.
" Do you know what hell feels like?" Father still hadn't glanced at me. I wasn't even worth looking at.
" Like this. Hell must feel like this." I closed my eyes again. Oblivious I had even spoken, I heard father move. He stoked the fire again but still didn't remove the poker from the racing blue flames. I opened my eyes and he was looking directly at me. My heart stopped and the world fell into silence as I looked into his eyes. With a rush, as if someone had spun the globe on its axis, things came back to life.
" Would you like to know what hell feels like?" He pulled the now orange glowing poker from the flames. I watched his hand as it waved the poker around as if it were a fancy new toy. " Might as well prepare for what awaits you, you sinning worthless waste of life."
Father stood towering. He was so tall and I tried to see the flames just past him. He didn't take a step towards me just stood with the poker poised, waiting for his permission to inflict pain. The bible was my lifeline. It rested so peacefully in my hands that I could almost pretend everything was normal. A cinder from the poker fell onto the page and burned a small hole. I looked up to see father just above me looking down.
" They were good people. They deserved a good life." Every word was a harsh breath of air exploding from my lungs. I didn't want them to come out but they couldn't stay in. Father laughed and that laugh made my skin feel alive with waves of hate.
" Good people? Good people?! The only thing they deserve is a good long roast in h..." Father toppled to the floor. I had hit him. I had stood up and pushed him with all my might. Never had I struck another human being and even in my blind rage I felt ashamed for having sunk to his level.
He howled, enraged at me. The adrenaline and hate wouldn't allow me to cower in the corner. He struggled to rise up from his back but I pounced onto him bible in hand. His huge breathing mass beneath me felt like a mountain and I struggled for air in the thin atmosphere. He looked at me and I saw every ounce of loathing he could muster in his blood shot eyes.
" It is about time. Now I have a reason to kill you and send you to hell myself." He smiled and tears exploded from my eyes. He took the poker he had managed to hang onto and went to hit me with it. The bible in my hand felt so real and palpable unlike what was going on around me.
" I will see you there." I smacked father as hard as I could with the bible. It struck his jaw with a world shattering thump. He moaned and let the poker fall. It fell against my arm and in a split second burned through my cotton shirt and onto my skin. I shook it away with a cry of panic. The devil had grabbed me in that moment but I had broken free. A small pool of blood had formed on the floor. Enough. No more. It was over.
I scrambled off of father and hugged the bible to my chest. I watched and cried as father's chest steadily rose up and down. He tried to talk but I think I had broken his jaw. I watched in horror as he flopped around in wild pain. I had caused this. I hugged the bible closely to my chest.
" Forgive me father for I have sinned." I begged forgiveness. As I shivered with the bible close to my heart mother came running in. I watched as she ran past me and knelt next to father. She cried and threw herself across him.
" What have you done? What have you done to him?" She wailed as if I had killed him and the blackest part of my soul I wish I truly had. " Get out of here. Don't ever come back. I swear to god if you do I won't stop him..."
" You never have stopped him." I stood and ran out the door, leaving everything I had ever known behind. I left all the abuse and hate and sleepless nights behind to be welcomed by what I only knew as blackness.
The night air was warm. It wasn't how night was supposed to feel. Night was supposed to be cold and bracing and unwelcoming but this night felt alive with human heat. I ran and ran and ran not sure where I was meant to go. There was no where to go.
I found myself bellow the streetlight where Moritz had shot himself. I knelt in the middle of the pool of light and opened the bible I had clutched. I searched the pages looking for guidance but found only parables with no mention of a way to go. My arm burned fiercely and I prayed for an answer.
A cool wind broke through the heavy cover of summer air. It pulled at me and wrapped me in its relief.
" Please. There is no where for me to go. Show me." The wind pulled at me and caused me to rise to my feet. It brought me peaceably down the road and up towards the church. As I continued to walk I looked and saw Hanschen's house sitting ostracized from the other unknown residences. Ignoring the wind that pulled at me I walked to the front door and knocked. To my surprise Hanschen answered the door. I had been expecting, almost hoping, it would be his father. He looked at me confused to find me on his front porch in the middle of the night.
" What are you doing here?!" He stepped out and closed the door behind him. " You have to go. Father will be very upset."
" Run away with me." I kissed him. Every bit of my desperation channeled into him.
" What? I can't you, know that." He had broken the kiss with a shake of his head. He looked at me as if I had finally gone insane.
" You said you cared. You care about me. Isn't that enough?" I clutched at his hand unwilling to let him go.
" I do but this... this is just too much." Hanschen's father hollered telling Hanschen to get back inside. He looked forlorn between me and the door. His perfect exterior had been cracked and he was left just as frightened as I was. " You know I don't like surprises. I told you that."
" Do you love me?" I dropped the bible and grabbed his other hand and placed it on my chest as I had done with Melchior. He didn't say anything. I kissed him as passionately as I could manage with my naive lips. " Do you love me?"
His silence spoke eloquent volumes.
" Melchior said he loved me." The lie sounded stupid on my tongue. Melchior had written his love. I didn't know if it meant the same thing but it was enough. And I had settled for enough plenty of times.
I turned away because I still blushed when ever Hanschen saw me crying. He put a hand on my shoulder. It stayed there a very long time. It tethered me to him and I hoped he would spin me around and run away with me.
" I wish I could." His voice was so very much like the old Hanschen. The Hanschen who didn't know I existed. The Hanschen who taught me about swimming. I guess I just wasn't working for him. He turned and closed the door quietly behind him, locking me out of his life.
Motionless I waited for him to come back. I wanted him to come back. I wanted any reason for me to not have to run again. The wind began to pick up. It moved me away from Hanschen's front door and tumbled me along the road. My child hood town passed by me for what probably would be the last time. Everything was splayed out as it should be and my mind was ridiculously quiet. Father was out of my life and mother's disappointments were gone too. Hanschen had left me, turning his back because society turned it for him. I was left with my bible and my worn out heart. Ghosts of the past began to whisper out from the shady stars. Each step I took, I took towards more innocent days. Away from the clergy and the parents and all the aches of adolescence. The world was clean and virgin as I walked along prodded by the wind.
I had forgotten everything and reverted back to myself. My fifteen year old body felt spry and alive. I had no decisions to make besides keep walking and that decision was made by the wind. It pushed me up to the church. Fog had sunk around my ankles and I felt as if I was walking through a warm fluffy snow.
The cemetery sprawled out before me. The wind had pushed me here and my feet had followed obediently. Midnight had to be hours away. There never would be a tomorrow. Not after a night like this. A few tears slipped out but they were older tears. I wiped them away. It took me a moment to realize that the crying moans I heard were not my own. Suddenly the church bell tolled midnight. It was time.
NOTE: sorry for its uber longness. it kind of got away from me. please let me know what you think. didn't get alot of feedback for the last two chapters so even if you didn't like it let me know so i can make it better. only one chapter left. reveiws make the world go round :)