A/N: Still don't own any of this. Also, a big thank you to my friend Sibylle for helping me think through where this story should go next, and for being my "writing buddy."
PSA: The beginning of the chapter is hypocritical on my part. Buying cats can be wonderful as well. I am the proud and adoring owner of purebred Maine Coons. Maine Coons are the best cats EVER!
This chapter begins "Opening Windows – Part 2"
ooooooooooooooooooooo
Louisa and Brigitta ran together through the crowded, narrow streets of Dorfli, sometimes side by side, sometimes one in front of the other. They were finally getting to know their way around the little town, the little alleys and where to find sweets for their pocket change. Today, however, they were on a specific mission. "School" was out for the day and they were on their way to visit their new litter of kittens. There were four healthy little babies, still too young to be taken away from their mother, but all of the von Trapp children were counting down the remaining two weeks until they could bring their kittens home.
Georg had originally wanted only one, maybe two kittens, definitely purebred, preferably Persian. Maria had just looked at him with such a pained expression that Georg felt as though he might begin to physically shrink before her. She didn't say anything and he finally had to ask her what was wrong.
Once she started speaking, though, he felt as though he had gone back in time a few months and was standing in his backyard being chided by his soaking wet governess. "Don't you realize," she demanded more than asked, "that we are not the only ones who might be in need of a home? There must be plenty of kittens right here in Dorfli who need a good home, or else they'll be turned out onto the street. Why would you want to buy a fancy cat when some family here will be relieved to give us their kittens? And one or two? Georg, don't you realize that we have seven children? Can you imagine the fights that could break out if we have only one or two cats? All our children would want to play with them and cuddle with them and there won't be enough cats to go around!"
She paused to take a deep breath but before she could speak again Georg interrupted her. "You want us to adopt a litter of common street cats? Of alley cats?" he asked her, looking slightly pale.
"That's what I think is best for our children, yes," she responded defiantly and confidently. "They need to feel – not just know – that this is their home. And can you think of a better way of doing that then by letting them take in some poor but adorable creatures who would love them back?"
She could see the protest coming and cut it off before he had a chance to voice it. "Kittens are adorable, Georg. That's just a fact of life. They don't have to be fancy Persians to be adorable. If they're kittens, they're adorable. And the children will adore them."
Georg's lips began to twitch a little at the sides. She could tell she had won him over, but she had no idea what he found so amusing. Maria felt oddly disarmed by the fact that he was so obviously trying not to laugh and the commanding, defensive posture she had adopted immediately changed into a relaxed but suspicious one.
"Just what is so funny, Georg?" she asked. She wasn't sure she liked being laughed at when she was trying to make a point, even if it was just a point about kittens.
What she didn't know is that Georg had suddenly made a parallel between the litter of adorable local kittens and his wife, and one or two Persian cats and Elsa. Elsa might be sophisticated and glamorous – on the surface the perfect choice to be his wife and the mother of his children. But she wasn't what the children – or he – had needed. Instead they had needed the love of a common, mountain bred governess. And although Elsa and Maria were roughly the same size (as he knew better than anyone) Maria was just … more. She was so much more. She had more life, more love, more spirit … she filled up their home and all of their hearts. Elsa, try as she might, would never be enough and could never compare to Maria.
He knew better, though, than to tell Maria what he was thinking. It might not be so bad to compare her to a litter of adorable local kittens, but the subject of Elsa – and any comparison thereof – was best left unspoken.
Now, though, he had an indignant wife asking him what was so funny. He immediately got control of his expression and managed to look entirely serious.
"Nothing," he replied, and walked towards her and then wrapped his arms around her waist while she continued to look at him somewhat suspiciously. "Nothing is funny," he reiterated. "I just realized that you are right. And you, my darling wife, are very … adorable." He kissed her lightly on the lips. "Why don't you start looking for someone who has an extra litter of kittens on their hands?"
And so a few weeks later, free until dinner, Louisa and Brigitta were running through Dorfli on their way to visit their new kittens.
Maria had indeed found a litter of kittens, and the owner of the mother was only too glad to give them away once they were old enough to be on their own. All of the von Trapp children had been to visit them and names had been discussed and argued over, but only Louisa and Brigitta were old enough to visit Dorfli unaccompanied and also carefree enough to visit the kittens on this afternoon.
As for school, it had been quickly determined that there was no school in Dorfli advanced enough to teach the older children. Liesl, Friedrich and Louisa had all been in high school back in Austria, but there was no school here that really taught children past age 12.
The von Trapps had been receiving the best of educations in Austria, and so the older children, including Brigitta and Kurt, already had skills that went beyond what was being taught in the local school.
Georg was totally unwilling to send his children away to school and Maria agreed with him. They were still so new to Switzerland, and still felt the threat of the Nazis pressing in on them. Georg was determined to keep his family intact. He was also determined that his children were not going to essentially be on a long term vacation while the rest of Europe was starting to roil around them. And so he began teaching them himself. They weren't having the most conventional education, but it was enough.
Every day, Maria walked Marta and Gretl to the local school. Every day Georg met with the rest of his children, sometimes all together and sometimes in smaller groups based on age. All of the children spoke German and English fluently, so Georg worked with them on their Hungarian and started teaching them Italian. He assigned reading, worked with them on their sums, and gave lectures on history. Sometimes he expected essays back. Sometimes he would give them a series of sums and the children worked on them later in the afternoon or evening. He divided them into different levels for sums and Hungarian, but they were all beginning Italian. He also kept them all together for history lectures. Sometimes there were other, unexpected lessons thrown in there, such as occasional nighttime lessons when he taught them about the stars and celestial navigation.
At first Georg held private lessons with Friedrich in which he began to teach military strategy. He knew his son was becoming a man, as he had proven on their trek through the Alps, and Georg wanted to educate and mold him as a man. However, Kurt wanted to join in on the lessons, and then surprisingly Brigitta did as well, and soon it was another group lesson.
The highlight of the day, for Georg and for the children, was Debate Hour. Everyone came together, Georg would throw out an issue or a question, and inevitably a lively and spirited debate would follow with Georg serving as moderator or instigator. The only rules were that only one person was allowed to speak at a time, there was to be no interrupting or yelling, and everyone had to participate. His intention was to teach his children to think for themselves, to fully form thoughts and to articulate them. Everything they were learning came in to play in Debate Hour – what they had been reading, what they had learned from history or military strategy – everything.
For their part, Marta and Gretl were beginning to enjoy the local school. It was so different from the school Marta had been attending before they left Austria, and Gretl had never before attended a full day of school, so it was a novelty. Not all of the children were kind to them from the beginning, some were jealous or mean, as children can unfortunately be. Some were suspicious of this new family, having adopted their parents' views on them. More than once Marta or Gretl came home from school in tears. But they were always met by Maria, and she always managed to dry their tears and send them back the next day with no meanness in their hearts towards the other children. As a result Marta and Gretl were beginning to make friends.
And so the von Trapps were beginning to continue with their lives, and the children were continuing with their education.
The unexpected, undesired and as yet unacknowledged consequence of Georg's home schooling, though, was that Maria had begun to feel very insecure. She knew that Georg was older, more experienced, more educated, more distinguished in every way. But she hadn't realized how much more educated her older children were than she was. Maria could sew and cook, she could certainly sing and had learned how to read and compose music from her mother, but she had only attended school until she was 12 and that had been a very small school. She wasn't advanced in doing sums, she didn't know as much about history, and she spoke only German and passable Hungarian.
Maria was suddenly embarrassed at how poorly educated she was. It was a new feeling, and an unwelcome one. She had never before felt that she needed to apologize for who she was. She had apologized for her actions many times, especially back at the abbey, but never for who she was or where she came from. When she lived in the mountains her entire life was up there. She worked, she sang, she studied music, she took care of the animals. Most of all, she wandered freely through the mountains, not embarrassed and not judged by anyone, including herself. When she had joined the abbey, the nuns had accepted her for who and what she was. Backgrounds and previous education were not important. What was important was her dedication to God and her spiritual education. Then she went to the von Trapp villa and was there to be a governess until school began, not an educator. She had originally recognized that her purpose there was to get the children reconnected with their father, to remind them how to be children again, and to bring the family back together. She had also originally recognized Baroness Schrader as the appropriate wife and mother to this family until her own heart had led her in another direction.
Throughout the brief engagement she had been so happy, so immersed in her new role in this family and so in love for the first time in her life, that she hadn't had much of a chance – or reason – to think about herself as separate from or in comparison to her new family. There had been a few things that did make her think about this difference, such as her discomfort in spending Georg's money to buy herself clothes – nicer clothes than she had ever owned before - and her struggle with herself to acknowledge that as the future Baroness von Trapp this was appropriate. And of course there had been the whispers of comparison from Georg's friends. Not Max of course, never Max. He had accepted her with open arms, acknowledging her as the perfect partner for Georg and the right mother for the children. Of course given her love of music and her influence over Georg he had probably seen her as a potential ally in getting the family to sing publicly, but he had never made her feel uncomfortable in any way. It was the other so-called "friends" that Georg had made in Salzburg and throughout Austria who were friends more with his status and rank than with the man himself that could make her feel uncomfortable. But then the children would be there wanting her attention, or Georg would be there making her feel so secure in his love for her that all discomfort or thoughts of comparison would flee.
Then there was their honeymoon. She had spent that time too immersed in her husband and their new intimacy to worry about other people. Besides, she was in a city where she knew no one, where everyone met her as Baroness von Trapp rather than as the governess who married the Captain.
So it wasn't until now, when her family was trying to settle into some semblance of normalcy, that she began to see how different she was – in background and education – from her husband and her children. For the first time in her life Maria was embarrassed about who she was as opposed to an action she had taken. She didn't know how to handle this feeling or the issues that were behind it. Instead she walked Marta and Gretl to school, she picked them up again, she played with her children and sang with them, dried tears and loved her husband – for she did love him – she loved all of them – with all of her heart. But inside of her heart a shadow had begun to grow, an unfamiliar shadow. She began to doubt herself. If it had been any other kind of shadow she might have known what to do. She could have spoken with Georg and shared how she was feeling, she could have sat in on some of the classes, she could have seen the ways that they valued her. She could even have bolstered her own confidence as she did on the day that she was traveling to the villa for the first time. But the problem with doubt is that one begins to doubt the feeling itself and how to deal with it, or even if one should deal with it. And so Maria kept a smile on her face and a song always close at hand. If she faltered, no one recognized it yet. If she turned away from her husband at night after a quick kiss he could think back on all that she had done during the day and conclude that she must be tired. And if she pretended to be asleep but instead stared out into the dark night feeling like a poor excuse for a wife and mother to this wonderful, sophisticated, educated family, no one knew.
And so for better, for worse, the von Trapp family had begun to settle in to Dorfli. They couldn't wait to bring home their new kittens, and Louisa and Brigitta were taking this afternoon to go visit the furry little babies.
Georg was in his office. Classes had ended for the day. Maria was off somewhere doing something with the children – he wasn't sure where or what. He was standing at the window looking out into the mountains, but for the most part he'd been pacing back and forth in his office. He felt confined. Trapped.
It was ironic. He'd finally achieved what had once seemed so unlikely: safety and stability for his family outside of the reach of the Nazis. But it wasn't enough anymore. Looking at the mountains he could feel the press of the Nazis. Hitler was going to do his damnedest to overwhelm Europe, Georg had no illusions about that. Yet despite Switzerland's borders and professed neutrality it was still in Europe. Should they have gone to the United States? Had he settled too easily? Should he uproot them now? He couldn't – not when he'd so recently promised them they wouldn't have to leave soon. Had he made a mistake?
And worse, there was a war brewing. He had no doubt about that, and no doubt about Hitler's intentions both in terms of war and in terms of persecution. Yet here he was, a man of military skill and might, holed up in a small Swiss town with his family.
"Damn it!" he swore, slamming a copy of the first volume of Mein Kampf down on the desk. He had already read it. The insanity that was so evident in it was one of the reasons why he had been so adamant against joining the Nazi party. Now he had procured a few more copies and was having the children read it. It made for some good Debate Hours, but in general they all agreed that it was a poorly written, poorly constructed volume and were similarly appalled at the ego and superiority that dominated the book.
But Georg knew that this was far more than a family debate. He knew the rest of the family did as well, but for him it was becoming all too real. How could he, as a man of good conscience, stand back, safely in hiding, and let this persecution come to fruition?
He had fought in a war. He was no coward, and yet he felt like one. The world seemed to be crumbling around him. Austria was gone – it was a part of Germany now. A part of Hitler's Germany. It wouldn't take long for Hitler to invade other parts of Europe. People of good character were going to be heavily persecuted – probably even killed – simply for their race or their political views or for any other reason. Not many of them would have the luck or skill to escape as he had, and yet here he was in his comfortable office, doing nothing.
"Damn it!" he swore once again. Georg had never felt useless before, but he felt trapped, useless and irrelevant.
Maria was outside with Marta and Gretl, listening to them talk about school. On the surface she was smiling and encouraging them to go on. Below the surface she was berating herself that the only children she didn't feel less than, in comparison, were her two youngest.
They all jumped the first time they heard Georg swear. Marta, easily startled and still insecure, began to look teary. Maria immediately hugged and reassured her. "Oh, don't worry darling. Your father is only feeling frustrated. There's nothing wrong, and no one's in trouble."
Inwardly she snapped at him 'Keep your frustrations to yourself, Georg! Stop scaring the children!' She had felt his suppressed frustration for weeks now and knew how helpless he felt, but what was the point in upsetting the children like this? He would hear about this tonight, she was sure of that.
Then they heard him swear again. Again, the girls jumped. That was it. Maria decided to send the girls inside and tell him to get himself under control.
"Why don't you two go up to your room and keep thinking of names for the kittens?" Maria suggested. "You can tell us at dinner." "I'm going to go check on your father," she continued a little more darkly. She kissed each of them in reassurance and walked with them inside.
Georg was still fuming in his office when he heard a knock on the door. He could immediately tell it was Maria and looked upward in exasperation. For some reason she had started knocking on his door over the last few weeks and he didn't have the first clue as to why, nor was she forthcoming about it. He loved the woman with every inch of his being but she could be maddening sometimes. He turned towards the window again which put his back to the door. "Please come in," he said with exaggerated politeness.
He heard the door open and close and could feel her standing behind him. He knew he was being incredibly rude by keeping his back to her but didn't want to turn and look at her. She was so beautiful – so appealing – especially when she was angry. And for some reason she had been too tired for much intimacy since they'd really gotten settled here, despite the help they had. He didn't want to turn around, he didn't want to want her so much especially since he knew he'd probably be rejected again that night.
"May I help you?" he asked, again with exaggerated politeness. He heard her sigh heavily in frustration before she said "You can help the children." He still didn't turn around but he was curious as to what she would say next. This was not what he'd expected. "If you could possibly refrain from swearing," she continued with an edge of sarcasm, "it might frighten them less."
Georg immediately felt terrible. Here he was, failing at the one thing he was doing: protecting his family. He turned around, feeling guilty and ready to ask whom he had frightened, but the look on her face made him rock backwards in his boots instead and fold his arms across his chest.
"Georg, I know you are frustrated here. You have made that clear in every possible way. But the fact is you are here, with us. You're not at war. I'm sorry if that upsets you, but please don't take it out on us so much."
Georg sighed to himself. It was the same old argument – the same one he had had with Agathe so many times, so many years ago. She just hadn't understood why it was not only necessary for him to go to war, but why it was also necessary to distinguish himself as he did. She couldn't understand that he was a man who could never do less than his best, especially for a cause that he believed in. And if that put him in jeopardy, then that was his choice to make. She had never understood this side of him, and now apparently Maria didn't either. He turned his back to her again. "Please give them my apologies," he said.
What Georg didn't understand and couldn't see was that Maria was completely different from Agathe in this way. She loved her husband's convictions. She loved his conscience and morality, and she loved that he was a man of action, willing to do whatever it took to stand up for what he believed in. Although their narrow escape had been terrifying, she was so proud of him for refusing to join the Third Reich. As she had once told Max, she could never ask Georg to be less than he was. She began to tell him that, to tell him that she could understand how a man both of conscience and action would be frustrated in this current situation, but she never had the chance.
"Georg, if you are going to be here with us than be here. If not – "
He cut her off, not able to help the words that came out of his mouth. "I could say the same to you." He instantly regretted that he had said it, but he was too angry and too stubborn to take it back.
Maria caught her breath. "What precisely is that supposed to mean?" she asked him.
"I think you know," he snapped. "Maria, I don't know where you are, but you're not here anymore. Not all of you, anyway, and I think you know I mean that in many ways."
He turned around and saw to his chagrin that she looked like she had been slapped. Without a word she turned and walked out the door.
Georg felt like he had been punched in the gut. It was actually difficult to breathe. He sat down at his desk and put his head in his hands. He didn't know what was bothering Maria so much these days, but it was clear to him that something was wrong. He had meant to ask her about it, to discuss it, and instead he'd accused her. Once again, he felt like he was failing. He was trapped, unable to do anything to help while this disease was starting to ravage Europe, and now he couldn't even maintain his own family, tell his wife how much he loved her, or even explain his frustration to her.
Outside of his office, Maria sank slowly to the floor. What had happened to Georg? What had happened to her? Why couldn't they communicate anymore? Why couldn't she cross this education and class barrier and tell Georg how much she loved him? She could understand – at least she thought she could understand – why he was so frustrated, but why wouldn't he let her help or even talk to him?
His barrier of politeness – and now frustration as well – seemed more impenetrable now than it had back in Austria because now she was plagued with doubts about her suitability as his wife. Now she wondered what kind of mother would compare herself to, and feel inferior to, the children who she loved so very much? She put her head in her hands and wished she could talk with the Reverend Mother. She couldn't, but there was someone she could always talk to. Once again she reached out to God as she prayed "Please help me."
That one prayer contained all of her doubts and insecurities, all of her love for Georg and her children, and all of her helplessness at watching Georg's frustration.
Now there was nothing to do but wait for an answer.