Change [11/17] [The Sound of Music]
Change
Chapter 11
July 1946
The journey had been easy enough, the Atlantic crossing as smooth as the going had been all those years before. A glassy sea had been beneath the ship's hull, smooth and perfect until the waves broke on the shining walls of the bow. After that almost unbelievable letter-and sometimes while journeying ever closer to his homeland, Georg had still not understood why he was returning, for how could this be the truth?-he had struggled to put everything together, arranging travel to a nation still under military occupation, hoping the subsequent letters he penned were not tossed aside or lost in the postal service.
But somehow, everything had proceeded just as he had planned, though he hoped to never have to do such a thing again. It felt like planning to journey through an active war zone, not a recovering one! And perhaps Sabina had been right in her first thought to leave the children. Passing through the myriad of checks to enter the city of Salzburg, the place where they had spent those first and most beloved years of their lives, had torn him apart; how much heavier might it be on them?
It felt like every few minutes, he said something kind to his wife, thanking her that she had come with him, or reassuring her that the destruction that still reigned was not the glory of Austria. She had never left the United States, a country that her parents, themselves immigrants just as he was, had raised her to love and respect just as he had been brought up to hold Austria in his own heart. In the future, when Austria was beautiful again, as it would be sometime, he would come here with her again, show her the Mirabell Gardens, the city's cathedral, take her to every wondrous place that was in this beloved city.
Sabina was uncomfortable in this place he could see, and she had come only to be with him; he loved her even more for that, if it were possible. But she was pale, strange in the sunlight, but just as strange was how cold the air was this morning. The summer had overrun spring, yet the morning was still frozen, as though the icy dew was hidden just beneath the pliable grass bending beneath his shoes. Something, Georg decided, he needed to do something for his wife when they returned to Vermont. What he was not certain, but some kindness to repay hers, to show his gratitude. This was not her sadness, but she had come because it was his, still weighing on his heart.
When she had first seen the destruction of Salzburg, hardly able to understand the despair in her husband and children, Georg had wanted to undo everything he had that had brought her here. But that would not have happened, he knew; she had come of her own choice, to just be his comfort. Seeing that, he loved her all the more.
He did not know what the children thought of Salzburg now, with its streets twisting in ways that they did not know and their most familiar places gone. At times, even he had did not know what he made of it all. All he knew was where he was now, looking over the headstones in the city's cemetery. Sabina stood beside him, and behind him, his children, the four that he had known should accompany them. He had sent word to Liesl, Friedrich, and Louisa as soon as he had been able, but none of them had been able to make such a journey; that Liesl had been unable to do so he had expected and been somewhat pleased, as Eric and Christopher were now staying with herself, her husband, and child, but he was a bit disappointed that Louisa and Friedrich were still in the United States. Louisa in particular, somehow.
Simply looking down to the small stone that marked his friend's resting place, Georg felt lost, like he was just drifting along with nothing beneath him. All he had for support was his wife and his children; everything else, from friends to the earth itself, had been ripped away. What had Gunter said Max had succumbed to, consumption? God, it didn't matter one bit, did it? No matter how beautiful and wonderful Austria was in his memory, why had he come back, to convince himself that this place would one day be so beautiful as it had been? There was nothing left in Austria for him.
Behind her parents, Brigitta was cold as she stood motionless. Not only was her body stiff with that cold despite the summer sun, butshe was cold, almost not feeling a thing. She was not...angry with her uncle-no that was impossible, not when she had only to think of him from all those years ago to have a smile wanting to break through her staid face-but almost disappointed, as though she were missing something. She had needed to know what he had meant to say with that strange letter he had sent, yet she had had no answer from him. Had he even received her own, or had he been buried when it had even reached Austria? But whatever she had been asking after, she could never know; Uncle Max's knowledge and words had died with him.
Something scratched at the back of her leg, bringing her out of her dark mood for a moment; it touched just below where the hem of her skirt brushed her knee, and the temptation to bend down to scratch at it-probably some sort of a biting insect-nearly overcame her. What would Uncle Max be thinking if he saw them all now, she wondered, standing around his gravestone too afraid to move to even scratch at a maddening itch, she wondered. Probably that they were all fools, although his words might not be so kind. Nothing could be the same now in Austria, like the last constant had vanished.
Brigitta no longer knew Austria, she realized that now. Glancing to her father, she winced just at the sight of him. The age that had come over him that evening so many months ago when she had seen him in the den had not left him, and if anything it seemed worse here, as if the time that had passed in the United States had run its course upon him again in Austria simply because he stepped onto its soil. Did he have anything left in this place? Brigitta did not know, and she could not think of a way to ask that. No matter, though, for Austria was no longer her father's country. Too much of what he had and loved was in America, and could never be a part of what Austria had been for him, or what it was now.
She had to desperately try to not look to her mother. "I thank you for coming," Gunter said, hardly anything in his words beside the syllables.
"Of course," Georg said. His answer was just as dry, not because he did not care, for he certainly did; how else would he and his family have escaped from Austria if not for Gunter? But there was too much here at this moment, feeling even deeper than before the loss of his friend, and being here, sensing and knowing for the first time really the pain of the loss of his country. Austria could never be his again. Sitting beside his wife on the bench in one of the three small rooms that were his family's for this time, he took her hand, squeezing her fingers. He tightened his grip on her, and he almost could not feel his own hand; he had to feel her, though, needing to just touch her.
Just where Gunter lived at the moment, he did not really know. They only had this small place because of their status as American residents, and Sabina as a citizen; at least the American occupation of the city had a positive aspect, even if he wished that those people who had once been his neighbors and countrymen might be allowed to rebuild their city as they wished.
"There was not much that he had," Gunter said quietly, just holding out the stack of papers for Georg. "No one really has too much at this point."
"Of course," he said quietly, just taking the pages his friend offered him. "But...I thank you for these."
"There is no need for thanks," Gunter went on. "Max wished for you to have them. I'm not certain what they are, you understand."
"Yes."
"I have not looked through them, no more than to be certain that he did not put one of his bills in there for you to settle."
It had been several weeks since Georg had smiled, but that was enough to draw his mouth upwards. "That is something Max might have done," he said quietly. Beside him, he felt Sabina move closer to him. Thinking of Max and bills, another memory lurched into his thoughts, of that puppet theater that Max had found for the children, and the bill for which his friend had sent to him. "Perhaps you have a grander theater, Gretl," he said, and glancing to his youngest daughter, he saw her smile, a bit bemused though. Her memories of Austria and Max were certainly blurred, but everything she must remember was pleasant, he knew, where Max was concerned.
"The summer before-we left," he said turning toward Sabina, "Max found a puppet theater for the children. I'm not certain how many productions they managed to stage."
"He sounds to have been a wonderful man," Sabina said just as softly.
"He was. And always attempting to persuade me to enter the children into different contests."
Sabina only laughed to herself as she looked out toward the children; they simply sat, quiet. "I'm sure they would have been marvelous," she said. Georg shook his head slightly. A situation like that might have been their way out of Austria-and away from this woman at his side. That was enough to settle any regretful thoughts about his choice all those years before.
Flipping through the various pages, Georg knew that what Max had set aside for him was nothing too special by the standards of most. Old letters that they had sent to one another, even a few photographs-even one of the children giving one of those ludicrous puppet shows. Who had it been who had concocted that one, Brigitta and Friedrich? He glanced to his daughter; she sat across the small sitting room beside the window, simply looking out onto the street below.
She had been listless in the past few months, most of his children had, but it was more pronounced in that girl. Nineteen years old now, and moping about like a child! More than once he had thought to approach her and simply ask what was so troubling to her, but he could not bring himself to do so. If any person were to attempt it, then it ought to be his wife, or perhaps even Liesl. It was one of these moments in which Brigitta resembled Louisa in all the ways he wished she had not. This was not the time to worry about it, not when he already had enough to trouble his mind, so much of it sitting in between his palms.
But everything in this pile of papers was something more than just the papers that were in his hand: they were the last traces he had of his friend. Georg shifted another of the pages, a clipped newspaper article that had been presented to the paper by the Nazis, requesting information on his family's location. A few weeks after they had gone. Why the time? Georg wondered, just skimming the text. The Axis had always been thorough and quick, but now they had endured such a delay? He just shook his head, passing the ragged paper to Sabina. Her spoken German was improving with each day they spent in the city, but her ability to read his mother tongue was still far from perfect. Every morning, though, she sat beside him, reading what she could from anything he found that had German written on it. But she could certainly pick out enough of those words to make some sense of it.
The next in the stack was not a paper, but the back of a sealed envelope. Damn it all, he was growing sick of all these bloody letters. Turning one corner up, he slipped a finger beneath the slightly raised flap, ripping across the first bit. "Georg," Sabina said, her voice louder than he expected.
"Yes?" he asked, looking up.
"Don't open that."
"Why not?" he asked, his eyebrows dipping together in confusion. "Max will not complain if I open some bill that he neglected-"
"It's not addressed to you," she whispered, covering his hand with her palm. She tugged his fingers away from the envelope, enclosing his hand with hers, just as he had done a few minutes before. Why did she appear so withdrawn, almost as though she were expecting anger from him. Curious, concerned even, he turned it over entirely, looking to the addressee that his wife had seen from where she sat beside him.
Brigitta von Trapp.
Georg's mouth was dry as he read that name again, Brigitta von Trapp. He turned the letter again, looking to the back, almost expecting a seal that he had not seen before. On the ground, Gretl peered at the papers, craning her neck to have a proper look at the name. "Brigitta von..." The first bit of the name escaped her mouth before she thought better, and the latter part faded to silence as she looked to her sister, confused. Just as many questions as were in Gretl's face raced around Georg's mind: how, why, when. More importantly, though, why had she not told him what she had done? That was certainly the root of this, that Brigitta had sent something to Max, probably a short letter. Then again, why?
Her father, mother, brother, and sisters were all looking to her, and beneath their raking eyes, Brigitta swallowed harshly, ashamed of the confusion on every face. Between Gretl and Kurt on the floor-the bench on which her parents sat was too short to accommodate any others-she wanted to just curl up, withdraw until no other person might see her. Even now, she looked down to the wooden floor; why did the gaze of her father's friend feel so withering as well she wondered, twisting a handful of her dark hair. Her palm was wet, soaking the strands in a few moments.
Oh, god, why had she written to him? She had never imagined that something-something like this might happen...but then it was always what she never thought of that haunted her, whether it was from the small fibs she had told as a child to the books that she let lie around once she had read them two or three times. But if she had not done as she did, she would have just wondered until she had, Brigitta reminded herself as her father began to go through those remaining papers. She still couldn't look up to him, but she heard those flutterings of one page against another. Lifting her eyes-just for a moment, not so that he could see her face-Brigitta bit her lip. She knew the resolve that she had just glimpsed on her father's face: he meant to speak to her alone concerning this, not before her siblings, perhaps not even before Sabina! Instead, he had handed the still unopened envelope to her mother, who just held it on her lap, not even touching it with more than a finger or two, and continued to look through what remained of the papers his friend had collected.
In that moment, watching Sabina, Brigitta had never felt so far from the woman who had raised her from twelve-or was it thirteen?-to this point. Sabina knew nothing of Maria, and was nothing like Fräulein Maria-how could she just let that sit in her hands, like it was only a friendly greeting? The anger was boiling in her before she knew to shove it aside, and Brigitta looked down again, not even turning to her siblings, a rush of shame beside that anger. Sabina had been nothing but kind to her in all the years that she had known her, but...she was not Fräulein Maria.
Sooner or later, Brigitta told herself, she would know. If she had passed these months without knowing this, then she certainly had the will to endure another few minutes or hours. But being so near to this answer...She just needed to know!
Chapter 11
July 1946
The journey had been easy enough, the Atlantic crossing as smooth as the going had been all those years before. A glassy sea had been beneath the ship's hull, smooth and perfect until the waves broke on the shining walls of the bow. After that almost unbelievable letter-and sometimes while journeying ever closer to his homeland, Georg had still not understood why he was returning, for how could this be the truth?-he had struggled to put everything together, arranging travel to a nation still under military occupation, hoping the subsequent letters he penned were not tossed aside or lost in the postal service.
But somehow, everything had proceeded just as he had planned, though he hoped to never have to do such a thing again. It felt like planning to journey through an active war zone, not a recovering one! And perhaps Sabina had been right in her first thought to leave the children. Passing through the myriad of checks to enter the city of Salzburg, the place where they had spent those first and most beloved years of their lives, had torn him apart; how much heavier might it be on them?
It felt like every few minutes, he said something kind to his wife, thanking her that she had come with him, or reassuring her that the destruction that still reigned was not the glory of Austria. She had never left the United States, a country that her parents, themselves immigrants just as he was, had raised her to love and respect just as he had been brought up to hold Austria in his own heart. In the future, when Austria was beautiful again, as it would be sometime, he would come here with her again, show her the Mirabell Gardens, the city's cathedral, take her to every wondrous place that was in this beloved city.
Sabina was uncomfortable in this place he could see, and she had come only to be with him; he loved her even more for that, if it were possible. But she was pale, strange in the sunlight, but just as strange was how cold the air was this morning. The summer had overrun spring, yet the morning was still frozen, as though the icy dew was hidden just beneath the pliable grass bending beneath his shoes. Something, Georg decided, he needed to do something for his wife when they returned to Vermont. What he was not certain, but some kindness to repay hers, to show his gratitude. This was not her sadness, but she had come because it was his, still weighing on his heart.
When she had first seen the destruction of Salzburg, hardly able to understand the despair in her husband and children, Georg had wanted to undo everything he had that had brought her here. But that would not have happened, he knew; she had come of her own choice, to just be his comfort. Seeing that, he loved her all the more.
He did not know what the children thought of Salzburg now, with its streets twisting in ways that they did not know and their most familiar places gone. At times, even he had did not know what he made of it all. All he knew was where he was now, looking over the headstones in the city's cemetery. Sabina stood beside him, and behind him, his children, the four that he had known should accompany them. He had sent word to Liesl, Friedrich, and Louisa as soon as he had been able, but none of them had been able to make such a journey; that Liesl had been unable to do so he had expected and been somewhat pleased, as Eric and Christopher were now staying with herself, her husband, and child, but he was a bit disappointed that Louisa and Friedrich were still in the United States. Louisa in particular, somehow.
Simply looking down to the small stone that marked his friend's resting place, Georg felt lost, like he was just drifting along with nothing beneath him. All he had for support was his wife and his children; everything else, from friends to the earth itself, had been ripped away. What had Gunter said Max had succumbed to, consumption? God, it didn't matter one bit, did it? No matter how beautiful and wonderful Austria was in his memory, why had he come back, to convince himself that this place would one day be so beautiful as it had been? There was nothing left in Austria for him.
Behind her parents, Brigitta was cold as she stood motionless. Not only was her body stiff with that cold despite the summer sun, butshe was cold, almost not feeling a thing. She was not...angry with her uncle-no that was impossible, not when she had only to think of him from all those years ago to have a smile wanting to break through her staid face-but almost disappointed, as though she were missing something. She had needed to know what he had meant to say with that strange letter he had sent, yet she had had no answer from him. Had he even received her own, or had he been buried when it had even reached Austria? But whatever she had been asking after, she could never know; Uncle Max's knowledge and words had died with him.
Something scratched at the back of her leg, bringing her out of her dark mood for a moment; it touched just below where the hem of her skirt brushed her knee, and the temptation to bend down to scratch at it-probably some sort of a biting insect-nearly overcame her. What would Uncle Max be thinking if he saw them all now, she wondered, standing around his gravestone too afraid to move to even scratch at a maddening itch, she wondered. Probably that they were all fools, although his words might not be so kind. Nothing could be the same now in Austria, like the last constant had vanished.
Brigitta no longer knew Austria, she realized that now. Glancing to her father, she winced just at the sight of him. The age that had come over him that evening so many months ago when she had seen him in the den had not left him, and if anything it seemed worse here, as if the time that had passed in the United States had run its course upon him again in Austria simply because he stepped onto its soil. Did he have anything left in this place? Brigitta did not know, and she could not think of a way to ask that. No matter, though, for Austria was no longer her father's country. Too much of what he had and loved was in America, and could never be a part of what Austria had been for him, or what it was now.
She had to desperately try to not look to her mother. "I thank you for coming," Gunter said, hardly anything in his words beside the syllables.
"Of course," Georg said. His answer was just as dry, not because he did not care, for he certainly did; how else would he and his family have escaped from Austria if not for Gunter? But there was too much here at this moment, feeling even deeper than before the loss of his friend, and being here, sensing and knowing for the first time really the pain of the loss of his country. Austria could never be his again. Sitting beside his wife on the bench in one of the three small rooms that were his family's for this time, he took her hand, squeezing her fingers. He tightened his grip on her, and he almost could not feel his own hand; he had to feel her, though, needing to just touch her.
Just where Gunter lived at the moment, he did not really know. They only had this small place because of their status as American residents, and Sabina as a citizen; at least the American occupation of the city had a positive aspect, even if he wished that those people who had once been his neighbors and countrymen might be allowed to rebuild their city as they wished.
"There was not much that he had," Gunter said quietly, just holding out the stack of papers for Georg. "No one really has too much at this point."
"Of course," he said quietly, just taking the pages his friend offered him. "But...I thank you for these."
"There is no need for thanks," Gunter went on. "Max wished for you to have them. I'm not certain what they are, you understand."
"Yes."
"I have not looked through them, no more than to be certain that he did not put one of his bills in there for you to settle."
It had been several weeks since Georg had smiled, but that was enough to draw his mouth upwards. "That is something Max might have done," he said quietly. Beside him, he felt Sabina move closer to him. Thinking of Max and bills, another memory lurched into his thoughts, of that puppet theater that Max had found for the children, and the bill for which his friend had sent to him. "Perhaps you have a grander theater, Gretl," he said, and glancing to his youngest daughter, he saw her smile, a bit bemused though. Her memories of Austria and Max were certainly blurred, but everything she must remember was pleasant, he knew, where Max was concerned.
"The summer before-we left," he said turning toward Sabina, "Max found a puppet theater for the children. I'm not certain how many productions they managed to stage."
"He sounds to have been a wonderful man," Sabina said just as softly.
"He was. And always attempting to persuade me to enter the children into different contests."
Sabina only laughed to herself as she looked out toward the children; they simply sat, quiet. "I'm sure they would have been marvelous," she said. Georg shook his head slightly. A situation like that might have been their way out of Austria-and away from this woman at his side. That was enough to settle any regretful thoughts about his choice all those years before.
Flipping through the various pages, Georg knew that what Max had set aside for him was nothing too special by the standards of most. Old letters that they had sent to one another, even a few photographs-even one of the children giving one of those ludicrous puppet shows. Who had it been who had concocted that one, Brigitta and Friedrich? He glanced to his daughter; she sat across the small sitting room beside the window, simply looking out onto the street below.
She had been listless in the past few months, most of his children had, but it was more pronounced in that girl. Nineteen years old now, and moping about like a child! More than once he had thought to approach her and simply ask what was so troubling to her, but he could not bring himself to do so. If any person were to attempt it, then it ought to be his wife, or perhaps even Liesl. It was one of these moments in which Brigitta resembled Louisa in all the ways he wished she had not. This was not the time to worry about it, not when he already had enough to trouble his mind, so much of it sitting in between his palms.
But everything in this pile of papers was something more than just the papers that were in his hand: they were the last traces he had of his friend. Georg shifted another of the pages, a clipped newspaper article that had been presented to the paper by the Nazis, requesting information on his family's location. A few weeks after they had gone. Why the time? Georg wondered, just skimming the text. The Axis had always been thorough and quick, but now they had endured such a delay? He just shook his head, passing the ragged paper to Sabina. Her spoken German was improving with each day they spent in the city, but her ability to read his mother tongue was still far from perfect. Every morning, though, she sat beside him, reading what she could from anything he found that had German written on it. But she could certainly pick out enough of those words to make some sense of it.
The next in the stack was not a paper, but the back of a sealed envelope. Damn it all, he was growing sick of all these bloody letters. Turning one corner up, he slipped a finger beneath the slightly raised flap, ripping across the first bit. "Georg," Sabina said, her voice louder than he expected.
"Yes?" he asked, looking up.
"Don't open that."
"Why not?" he asked, his eyebrows dipping together in confusion. "Max will not complain if I open some bill that he neglected-"
"It's not addressed to you," she whispered, covering his hand with her palm. She tugged his fingers away from the envelope, enclosing his hand with hers, just as he had done a few minutes before. Why did she appear so withdrawn, almost as though she were expecting anger from him. Curious, concerned even, he turned it over entirely, looking to the addressee that his wife had seen from where she sat beside him.
Brigitta von Trapp.
Georg's mouth was dry as he read that name again, Brigitta von Trapp. He turned the letter again, looking to the back, almost expecting a seal that he had not seen before. On the ground, Gretl peered at the papers, craning her neck to have a proper look at the name. "Brigitta von..." The first bit of the name escaped her mouth before she thought better, and the latter part faded to silence as she looked to her sister, confused. Just as many questions as were in Gretl's face raced around Georg's mind: how, why, when. More importantly, though, why had she not told him what she had done? That was certainly the root of this, that Brigitta had sent something to Max, probably a short letter. Then again, why?
Her father, mother, brother, and sisters were all looking to her, and beneath their raking eyes, Brigitta swallowed harshly, ashamed of the confusion on every face. Between Gretl and Kurt on the floor-the bench on which her parents sat was too short to accommodate any others-she wanted to just curl up, withdraw until no other person might see her. Even now, she looked down to the wooden floor; why did the gaze of her father's friend feel so withering as well she wondered, twisting a handful of her dark hair. Her palm was wet, soaking the strands in a few moments.
Oh, god, why had she written to him? She had never imagined that something-something like this might happen...but then it was always what she never thought of that haunted her, whether it was from the small fibs she had told as a child to the books that she let lie around once she had read them two or three times. But if she had not done as she did, she would have just wondered until she had, Brigitta reminded herself as her father began to go through those remaining papers. She still couldn't look up to him, but she heard those flutterings of one page against another. Lifting her eyes-just for a moment, not so that he could see her face-Brigitta bit her lip. She knew the resolve that she had just glimpsed on her father's face: he meant to speak to her alone concerning this, not before her siblings, perhaps not even before Sabina! Instead, he had handed the still unopened envelope to her mother, who just held it on her lap, not even touching it with more than a finger or two, and continued to look through what remained of the papers his friend had collected.
In that moment, watching Sabina, Brigitta had never felt so far from the woman who had raised her from twelve-or was it thirteen?-to this point. Sabina knew nothing of Maria, and was nothing like Fräulein Maria-how could she just let that sit in her hands, like it was only a friendly greeting? The anger was boiling in her before she knew to shove it aside, and Brigitta looked down again, not even turning to her siblings, a rush of shame beside that anger. Sabina had been nothing but kind to her in all the years that she had known her, but...she was not Fräulein Maria.
Sooner or later, Brigitta told herself, she would know. If she had passed these months without knowing this, then she certainly had the will to endure another few minutes or hours. But being so near to this answer...She just needed to know!