Starting Over

By Laura Rittenhouse

Two women, separated by three generations and an ocean, live remarkably similar lives as they leave behind all that is familiar and begin again in new lands.

Though she doesn't understand exactly why, Maria isn't content with her lot. The prospect of exchanging dependence on her family for dependence on a husband doesn't sit well with this young woman growing up in late 19th Century Germany. Three generations later, on the other side of the Atlantic, Eva struggles with a similar restlessness; she's generally happy but never quite satisfied.

 

This book follows Maria and her great-granddaughter Eva as they face surprisingly similar choices in dramatically different decades: how to keep a roof over your head, when to abandon independence and commit to a lover, where to draw a line in the sand. The choices they make take them to new countries, open them up to heartache and leave them wondering what is enough.

 

• Language: English
• Publisher: Wings ePress, Inc.
• Release date: Jun 5, 2023
• ISBN: 9781597050296

Book preview

Starting Over

by

Laura Rittenhouse

Wings ePress, Inc.

Mainstream Novel

Published by Wings ePress at Smashwords

http://www.books-by-wings-epress.com

Copyright © 2009 Laura Rittenhouse

ISBN 978-1-59705-631-1

All Right Reserved

Smashwords Edition,

Names, characters and incidents depicted in this book are products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual events, locales, organizations, or persons, living or dead, is entirely coincidental and beyond the intent of the author or the publisher. This is a work of historical fiction and as such word usage, grammar and spelling can be depicted of the setting and should not be confused with current word usage, grammar and spelling.

No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publisher.

Electronic formats are numerous for the variety of readers now available. Due to the different formats there can be problems with fonts, spacing and words. Please realize the novel is edited and copy edited, and that these types of errors can happen after the fact.

Edited by: Sara V. Olds

Copy Edited by: Grace Kone

Senior Editor: Leslie Hodges

Managing Editor: Karen Babcock

Executive Editor: Marilyn Kapp

Cover Artist: Blaise KilGallen

Wings ePress Inc.

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Newton, KS  67114

Dedication

To Bam for keeping Mutti alive in our hearts, long after she was gone.

Special thanks to Karen for telling me to just keep writing, to Dad for reading every word I’ve ever written (and loving it no matter how dreadful it was), to Ruth for volunteering to read this book and give me honest feedback, and to Frank for never suggesting that I do something more constructive with my time.

Prologue

Maria, August 29, 1881

Eva, August 29, 1957

Hours passed. She was beyond tired. Tired of all the pain, all the pushing. She’d been told that birthing would become easier with every child, but she knew that this was going to turn out to be the most difficult. Her experience reassured her that it would all be worth it once she saw her baby–she tried desperately to hold on to that thought as she gripped the bunched-up sheets. But if one more person spouted some sentimental homily about the joys of motherhood and the pain being a small price to pay, she’d scream.

She screamed. She screamed as her world reduced to a small centre of pain. Nothing else.

Then the crying–not hers. She heard her child crying.

You have a perfect, beautiful little girl. This sentimentality seemed incredibly accurate when she saw her baby. A little girl that did, in fact, appear to be both perfect and beautiful.

She untangled her fingers from the bedding and reached out her sweaty arms. Gently, she put her baby to her breast. The crying stopped. The little thing had fought her way into the world. Perfect or not, she was on her way. She had a lifetime of experiences ahead of her. She had choices to make, dreams to dream, men to love, realities to face.

The pain was still there and the memory of the pain was horrifically vivid. She was glad that she’d soon forget the pain and only remember the joy. As if giving birth generated some lobotomizing hormones. What could possibly wipe away the past nine months of discomfort–the nausea, the swollen ankles, the aching back and that final bursting at the seams? Then she looked down at her daughter, guzzling while keeping her face and fists closed to the world, and she knew love could wipe away all that pain so there wasn’t even a memory of it.

She whispered into her daughter’s ear. Love is enough.

PART ONE

Maria, June 1896 – January 1899

Eva, June 1972 – January 1975

One

Maria, June 1896 – January 1899

Maria set down her bag and spun slowly, looking around her bedroom with growing excitement. Her sister Anna had said that she could make it her own. It was like a dream come true, a room of her own. Her own space. Peace and quiet. Even though she’d seen this room a few months ago when she helped Anna move in right after the wedding, it looked different now that it was her own. Before, it had been an unused room for storing dresses that wouldn’t fit in Anna’s wardrobe. Now, it brimmed with potential, just like Maria’s life. Sitting on the edge of her bed, she imagined her life in this house. Her new life away from home had begun. Or what had become home after her widowed father had brought that woman and her brood into the house. She could finally become who she was meant to become–whoever that was.

Maria didn’t ever want to see that brat Chrissi again. Her spoiled step-sister whined all the time to her mama that Maria hogged too much space in their shared room. A room that Maria had comfortably shared with Anna until Anna had married Wilhelm. They hadn’t whined, well not too much, when they had been forced to squeeze Chrissi into their space.

But that was all behind her–she didn’t have to share now. Not ever again. Oh, Anna was a wonderful sister for taking her in. Maria would make sure she never gave Anna or Wilhelm any reason to want to send her away. She didn’t ever want to go back to the part of town where her father lived. This side of Barmen was much nicer, and it was just about as far away from where she’d grown up–and that nasty Chrissi with her dreadful mother–as you could get without crossing the river. For now it was far enough. She’d think about where else she might like to go when she got a bit older. At fourteen she knew enough to know she had to bide her time.

So for now she was happy to put her change of clothes into her very own cupboard and place her vase on top of her table. Her mother’s vase that was now hers. Her one memento from a woman that she couldn’t remember. Sometimes, just as she was drifting to sleep, she’d hear a woman’s voice calling her "Shatzi." She thought that must be her mother’s voice and knew that, whatever else, her mother had loved her.

The sound of bird chatter drew Maria back from her thoughts. She took a deep breath to clear her head, which only sent her mind off rambling in another direction. The room smelt different than her old bedroom. Not an unpleasant smell, maybe more earthy. It was a smell that Maria knew would soon be so natural to her that she wouldn’t even notice it. The novelty of this room would probably be gone within a few days, which would be a nice thing in itself. But right now she’d enjoy soaking up its newness.

She looked across at her bed, covered in a quilt that she remembered watching Anna work on two years earlier. The light streaming through the window fell across the bed. It was an unusual, muted light, certainly different than the dimness of her old bedroom. Walking to the window–her window–framed by unadorned beige drapes, which matched the brown rug at the side of her bed, she saw the courtyard in the back of the house. A huge old oak tree stood in its centre. The sun filtered through its leaves, which was what gave the whole room that wonderful green tint. The birds that had interrupted Maria’s musings about her mother were roosting in the tree, making quite a ruckus just at Maria’s eye level. It looked like they were holding some great bird debate. Maria wondered what they could be discussing.

Maria. Anna’s voice seeped up through the bedroom floor from the rooms below and reminded Maria that her own space might not be quite as sacrosanct as she’d been fantasizing. Deciphering the topic of the avian discussion would have to wait for another day.

She bounded down the stairs, two at a time, and found her sister at the stove and her brother-in-law, Wilhelm, sitting in the front room reading. Slipping on an apron, she started stirring the pot of soup on the stove. Thirty minutes later, it was as if she’d never lived anywhere else, never had any other life. She had helped with the meal, set the table and sat ready for her first dinner in her new home with her new family.

The thought crossed her mind that they didn’t look much like a family. She was a dark, slight fourteen-year-old with her hair pinned back but escaping in its normal willful manner. Her gangly build created angles where curves should have been. In contrast, Anna always looked neat and controlled. She was light and smooth and her eighteen years evidenced themselves in that youthful maturity that is all too fleeting. She was larger and healthier-looking than Maria and altogether more beautiful. A perfect match for her strapping twenty-four-year-old husband, who looked like he would soon be one of the town leaders. His hair was darker than his wife’s, but still fair and very thick with just a touch of early grey. He held his shoulders back, not in the way of a laborer. No, Wilhelm would never be confused with a laborer. His bearing told the world he expected to give, not to receive orders. Clearly too old be their child, Maria was also too dark to look like a relative. Someone passing their window would probably think of her as a poor orphan taken in by a young couple to help around the house and to win them merit for their good works. Or at least that’s how Maria imagined them to appear and secretly held that vision to be fairly accurate. She wondered if, with time, they would grow to look more harmonious. She doubted it.

THE NEXT MORNING MARIA woke in her new bedroom. When she opened her eyes, her mind started racing, trying to find purchase in this new life. Before it could settle, she jumped up and pulled off her cotton nightdress. She stepped into her underclothes and then dragged her heavy woolen housedress over her head and quickly reached for her hair brush. It took no time to take her hair out of its rag rollers and brush it quickly–she saved her daily one hundred strokes for just before bed. Then, as carefully as she could, she pinned her hair back, resolved to avoid looking like a scarecrow at breakfast. She slipped her feet into her comfortable felted house shoes and then trotted down to the kitchen for breakfast with the family.

Breakfast was a quiet affair. Wilhelm sat at the table with a newspaper spread in front of him, and Anna had a magazine in front of her. But Maria didn’t mind. She had plenty to daydream about, starting with how to spend her first day in her new home. She resolved to do any chores that Anna asked without complaint.

It was a humid, uncomfortable day, a day on which no one in their right mind would decide to scrub their front stairs. The kind of day where you’d avoid heavy chores and focus instead on light housework. A day on which Anna had amazingly asked Maria to scrub their front stairs. Anna had never felt the heat as much as her younger sister, but Maria had thought that today even Anna would suggest a day of rest. Still, she kept her promise. Maria smiled and went hunting for a scrub-brush and bucket without a grumble of complaint. Anna had liberated her. The least she could do was wash some stupid stones.

There were really only two steps, and they were formed from a hard, smooth rock that wasn’t that difficult to clean. When they were wet, they shimmered and Maria decided it made the front door look impressively formidable. She stood up and walked back to enjoy the effect of her labors. The door was painted a shiny black with a big brass knocker bolted into its centre. The door and the stairs were what you first noticed when you came down the cobblestoned street to the house. There was no front garden or railing, just the narrow walkway beside the street, more there to channel the rainwater onto the road than to make strolling along this unpretentious lane desirable. Maria looked up and down the street and thought this house was probably one of the more attractive ones along it. Certainly it had the cleanest front entrance. She decided it might benefit from a front window box where she could plant some geraniums like the house two doors down had done. It wouldn’t take much effort to set up, and she suspected Anna would agree to her idea. The thought of making a mark on her new home, no matter how slight, gave Maria a small thrill.

As she picked up her scrub bucket and prepared to dump the dirty water into the street, Wilhelm turned the corner, coming home for lunch. He must have seen her standing there, but he quickly pushed his nose into a newspaper and walked right past her and up the steps without even cleaning his shoes, nodding, or so much as patting her on the head. The dog at least got a pat. Wilhelm might be the one who put food on the table, but did he have to act like a little Kaiser? If she were Anna, she’d never put up with that man’s behavior. Of course she wasn’t Anna, and she wasn’t mistress of her own home. She was the little sister who was thankful for getting away from her stepmother, so she was going to do what she was told, even if that meant scrubbing dirty boot prints off the just cleaned steps. But someday, just maybe, she’d have her own steps, and if there was a man around, he’d know not to tread on them when they were wet with his dirty boots. Or, just maybe, he’d scrub the steps for her!

MARIA LOVED HER SISTER, she always had. Over the past two-and-a-half years they lived together, she had grown to love her even more. Anna was Maria’s sister, surrogate mother and best friend, and she managed it all with very little conflict. There was a long list of reasons that Maria loved Anna and a few quirks that Maria had learned to cherish, like the way Anna always looked down when she laughed, which was often. Where Anna acquired that funny habit from was a mystery, but Maria always watched for it. It made Anna seem much meeker than Maria knew her to be.

It was impossible not to love Anna’s warm and generous nature, her funny and practical personality. What Maria didn’t love her for, was that she always made Maria carry the heavy bags. It was never mentioned and always casually done, as if it was unintentional. But if there was lace in one bag and potatoes in the other, it would invariably be Anna who would carry the lace and Maria who would carry the potatoes.

Today, Maria was destined to be laden with cabbages. After going to the dressmaker’s to pick up Anna’s new gown for the big New Year’s Eve party, they had stopped at the near empty market. Anna had taken her time haggling over some of the biggest cabbages Maria had ever seen. The outcome of the bickering was predetermined, since Anna and the woman guarding her meager winter vegetables knew each other well and their arguments were more out of ritual than for any real price setting. But it was all part of the social fabric of Barmen, and paying the first price asked would have been seen as bad-mannered. While Anna and the stall keeper negotiated, the other vendors watched in enjoyment. Maria took the time to wrap her scarf a little more tightly against the freezing wind. This kind of weather kept most people inside, but soon Maria saw a few other intrepid souls darting between the stalls buying last minute necessities for Christmas and New Year. Maria actually preferred the market at this time of year, when special Christmas cakes were sold and the smell of gingerbread replaced the pungent odor of rotting food that so dominated the market in summer.

Her negotiations completed, Anna pointed to the box holding four heads of cabbage and sweetly asked Maria if she wouldn’t mind carrying them. Maria agreed but secretly wondered why Anna couldn’t have carried a couple of the heads herself. That dress couldn’t weigh much. And surely Anna saw that the box of cabbages started pulling at Maria’s elbows as soon as they stepped onto the deserted, icy street. But what could she say? She was stronger than her sister, and she was getting free room and board. And, besides, this wouldn’t last forever. Someday she’d...well she didn’t know what she’d do or be, but she had every intention of a future without a hint of drudgery in it.

When they rounded the corner that meant they were half-way home, Gertrude Mueller, one of the neighborhood’s most reliable busy-bodies, appeared, hidden by her giant parasol, which was pointless since the day was cloudy and grey. Maria wasn’t sure if she was relieved or irritated by the encounter. Her sister and Gertrude would talk forever, and Maria would be stuck smiling stupidly as if she cared about the latest achievement of one of Gertrude’s offspring. But at least she could set down the box of cabbages and rest her arms.

It wasn’t as if Maria didn’t like children. The problem was that Mrs. Mueller seemed to like nothing but! Maria couldn’t remember overhearing a conversation between Anna and Gertrude that didn’t slide inevitably in the direction of some adorable anecdote about children. Maria knew she shouldn’t do it, but she often found herself suspecting others of some of the worst motivations. Deep down, she believed that Gertrude was always so quick to mention her children because Anna was childless and had already been married for almost three years. She thought Gertrude could see the longing in Anna’s eyes and was somehow boosting her own ego on the success of her womb. Maybe Maria wasn’t being fair. Maybe Gertrude had no idea what she was doing and was simply one of those egotists who went through life at every opportunity satisfying their utmost pleasure in hearing their own voice. But Maria was willing to bet that Gertrude’s topics were chosen out of jealousy. Anna was clearly beautiful and Gertrude was not. Only four years older than Anna, she had lost any youthful bloom. Her face was both too full and wrinkled–a very unattractive combination. And her dull, frizzy hair perched unappealingly on top of that moon-face.

Just as Maria set her expression into a pleasant mask, camouflaging where her thoughts were taking her, she realized that Mrs. Mueller wasn’t talking about her brats at all. She was relaying the drama of the Kraft family: rich father who traveled the world buying and selling whatever, long suffering mother trying to keep hearth and home together in a pitched battle against irresponsible servants.

It appeared that one of their servants was causing them greater worries than normal. Well, not exactly the servant, more the servant’s mother. The mother was deathly ill and the servant was asking for more and more time off. Gertrude said, Can you imagine it? She shook her head and clicked her tongue to punctuate her disbelief. Last week she went to visit her mother on her regular Sunday off. Then she didn’t bother coming back until Wednesday! There was some excuse about a doctor’s visit and medicine and bed rest, but poor Hilde was left with no one to help the cook and as a result, the cook made the most awful suppers. Undoubtedly out of spite. You know how servants can be. Gertrude was rich as well as insensitive. It probably didn’t dawn on her that Anna cooked every meal herself.

Maria ignored the inane and overweight Gertrude and instead sent her mind to ponder the rudeness of the insensitive servant who found caring for her dying mother more important than peeling potatoes. She fantasized about this stern Hilde Kraft person lecturing the wayward servant for hours while making her sharpen all the kitchen knives five times as punishment. It took very little effort for her to imagine the sick mother hearing of the punishment and writing a letter to Hilde Kraft complaining that the punishment wasn’t severe enough and lamenting her no-good daughter. Then Maria visualized a lightning bolt striking them all down, bringing some sort of sense to this insane world.

She realized that Anna was departing and quickly picked up the cabbages, nodded at Gertrude with her smile intact and followed her sister like an obedient servant.

NEW YEAR’S EVE DAY seemed unnecessarily chaotic. Maria was helping Anna curl her hair, oil her skin, darken her eyes, and in general become some other person entirely. Thankfully, she knew Anna was still the same sweet person underneath all that makeup. Wilhelm walked into the bedroom, took Anna’s hand in his and bent low to kiss it. It’s a pity that you look as you do, my dear.

Oh why, Wilhelm? Anna looked genuinely distressed and turned her face back to the mirror, scrutinizing what she saw there. Please tell me what’s wrong and I’ll change it if I can.

Placing his hands on his wife’s shoulders, Wilhelm smiled into the mirror at her and said, I’m afraid that you won’t be able to affect enough change without donning sackcloth and ashes. You are going to be cursed with being the most beautiful woman at the party, and no other wife in Barmen will ever invite us to their home again. Your beauty will be the ruin of our social life.

Giggling, Anna looked at her shoes.

Maria had to admit that the little speech was pathetic but pretty. Anna may have a Kaiser on her hands but he could be a nice Kaiser some times. For the millionth time she wondered if Anna was really happy. She smiled a lot, but seemed like a totally different person when surrounded by friends than with her husband. Maria puzzled about why women put on an act for their men. Did men do the same? If so, why in the world did people ever couple? Wouldn’t it be better to be yourself and spend time with friends than to be an actor in some play? Maria wondered whether, if Anna were rich, she’d have bought the little cottage by herself, brought Maria to live with her and be done with any thoughts of men. Or was Wilhelm needed for more than his income? Was he wanted for something Maria could only imagine?

Maria fixed the ribbon around Anna’s neck and pronounced her ready for the party.

THE MORNING AFTER THE New Year’s Eve party started slowly. It was the first day of the last year of the centenary, and it was almost over before the family got up. Maria had spent the evening with friends who were rich enough to have wine but too poor to have good wine, and her head was paying the ultimate price. Of course this wasn’t her first hangover, but probably the first since her big fourteenth birthday, coming-of-age party, where she was officially pronounced grown-up. And unofficially acted as ungrown-up as imaginable. But she’d learned her lesson then and swore she’d never make that same mistake with alcohol again. Well, the lesson had lasted more than three years, not a bad result when compared to other past resolutions

Breakfast was held well after normal lunch time. No one had bothered to pull back any of the curtains, so the house had a darkened, muffled feel about it. Anna looked worse than Maria felt, and Wilhelm complained more than the two women together. So a nice meal of easy to digest potatoes and eggs was enjoyed with very little dialogue.

The quiet meal left Maria plenty of time to reminisce about the party of the night before. There had been a particularly drunk boy named Alfred at the party. Maria took an instant dislike to him, but found herself stuck on a sofa in a dark corner of a small room talking to him. Or really, listening to him. This is probably where her drinking started in earnest. But he had had some interesting things to say. It turned out that a black sheep lurked in Alfred’s family, a wayward, spinsterly aunt. Alfred had only met her a few times as she stopped in Barmen on her way to far-off and unseemly places, but he’d heard many stories about her. She traveled places no lady should ever travel alone. Having read some writings of Heinrich Schliemann, she determined to follow his lead in exploring, though not digging up, the world. Alfred, like his parents, was horrified. Maria was fascinated. To think a woman could travel to places like Greece, or unimaginably Egypt, on her own, was like a fantastic fairytale that Maria could only dream about, but never expect to realize.

Your aunt sounds amazing, she said, leaning to the side to avoid the worst of the smoke billowing from his pipe.

Amazing? The offending pipe was removed from his mouth and waved about to emphasize just how horrible his aunt was. She’s horrible. You can’t know how embarrassing it is for the whole family to try to cope with the scandal of her lifestyle.

Good Lord. What’s scandalous about being interesting.

A woman traveling alone amongst savages isn’t interesting, Alfred said as he clamped his pipe back between his teeth, making his whiskers jerk up and down.

I suppose if she was an uncle she’d be interesting then? Maria asked, eyebrows raised.

Puffs of smoke shot from Alfred’s pipe as he thought about Maria’s question. Then he removed his pipe as he leaned his head back, blowing smoke towards the ceiling in what he probably thought was a learned manner. After his long exhale, he looked at Maria and said, She’d be eccentric, maybe even adventurous if she were a man, but she’s not a man. Don’t tell me you don’t see the difference.

Sorry, I think she sounds fascinating. Is she in Barmen now? Can I meet her?

Heavens, no. he exclaimed, frustrated that this silly girl pursued this conversation much further than he’d ever intended it to go. Unfortunately, she’s heaping more humiliation on the family name in Syria, scratching around the desert on the back of a camel.

In the flesh or in Maria’s imagination, it made no real difference; Alfred’s aunt had planted the seed of a restless longing that found very fertile soil in Maria’s mind.

While cleaning up the breakfast dishes, Anna relayed all the gossip from her party. Who wore what, how Anna was praised by all the men, how her husband stood proudly by her side and how Gertrude prattled on about the latest escapades of little Joachim or Johannes or whatever his name was. Maria was fascinated that her smiling boredom mask was so effective. Clearly Anna had no idea Maria found Gertrude and all things Gertrudinal dull, dull, dull!

She was lost in thoughts of the evils of alcohol when she heard a sequel to the fairytale of The Unappreciative Servant and the Long Suffering Kraft Family being told. Apparently the cook–who would no doubt be nominated for canonization–was left with the children on New Year’s Eve because the indolent, heartless servant was back offering her mother soup or clean sheets or in some other way wasting her time. It seems that this was the final straw. Obviously, it was. How in the world could this continue? The hue and cry was out for a new parlor maid–good with kids and potatoes. The wayward servant was enjoying her last days of idleness.

And with that, an idea popped into Maria’s mind. She could be the next downtrodden servant in the Kraft empire. She could be the one being talked about by cabbage-carrying women. She could be in Service. She could have an income and be really independent. The independence that came from living with her brother-in-law and sister was divine compared to living with her father and his wife, but working for the Krafts would put her in new world of independence.

Before opening her mouth, she decided sleeping on the idea would be best. Or at least mulling it over until all were in less pain.

The next morning’s breakfast was back to normal. Wilhelm prepared for work. Anna talked about going to visit one of her friends. Maria dreamt of her future in Service. Now was as good a time as any.

Anna, do you remember mentioning the dilemma the Kraft family are in yesterday? Maria asked this as casually as possible so as not to foretell the end of the conversation.

Of course I do. I might have been the worse for drink, but I wasn’t stupid. Well, maybe a tiny bit stupid. The giggle and down-cast eyes followed on cue.

I was thinking that I might like to apply. Count: one, two, three, four... Oh bother. One of them should say something.

Wilhelm slowly folded up his paper and set it aside. Then he cleared his throat and spoke, not particularly casually, Is this in some way implying that I am not providing adequately for my family? Double bother. He’d opted to wear his insulted persona, which was even worse than his ignoring persona.

Don’t be silly, Maria consoled. You care for me like your own sister. I have everything I want and a loving brother and sister. But I’m seventeen now and I would like the chance to try to be on my own a bit. Well, obviously not on my own as I’ll be living with the Krafts, who by all accounts are an excellent family. No such accounts had met Maria’s ears, but she had heard that Mr. Kraft was wealthy and she knew that in this circle that made him excellent enough.

After a short pause where no one stepped up to fill the conversational void, she continued, And I’d still be near. I think they give time off on Sundays and I could come back and visit, and we’d stay as close as ever. You’re going to have to get used to living without me soon enough anyway because I’m bound to fall hopelessly in love and be lost to you forever.

That’s what I’m afraid of, Wilhelm snapped. Without supervision there’s no telling what you’ll do. You might make light of it, but it’s a big city out there, and you’ve been very sheltered.

I agree, which is why I need to try to gain some experience as safely as possible. And this seems a better way than marrying the wrong man and regretting it. Not everyone can make the kind of choice that Anna did with as little experience. She knew she wasn’t being sincere because, though Wilhelm was a good provider and had what looked to be a bright business future, she found him too distant to be the kind of man she’d ever marry. But she was sure neither Wilhelm nor Anna knew her real feelings and so she had gambled that a bit of flattery might aid her cause.

The ever practical Anna finally made her contribution to the conversation. But you have no experience in Service. I don’t see why they’d offer you the job.

Once again, I agree, Maria rushed to answer. It’s unlikely I’ll get the job, so most of this discussion is probably wasted. But let’s be honest–everyone must enter Service with no experience. And I think the way you’ve allowed me to help out here and taught me to keep such a beautiful home has been great experience, which I’m sure the Krafts would see themselves. Maria felt mild surprise when her sister and brother-in-law didn’t burst out laughing at that obvious pandering. She’d feared she might have been pushing the flattery angle a bit far even for Anna and Wilhelm.

So you think you won’t get this job, which you are sure will prepare you for a long and happy life, said Wilhelm. But you are nonetheless willing to apply for it and make my name as a bad provider all around town just on principle. I’m not sure I can agree with your principles, but I’ll agree with whatever you women decide. Maybe it is time you got out and saw what the world is really like. He stood up and snapped his meticulously folded newspaper under his arm. I’m going to be late if I don’t leave now. Good bye, my dear. Good bye, Maria. All Hail, Little Kaiser.

Before Anna could react, Maria asked her, Anna, can you help me find out exactly how to apply for this job? Do I write a letter or arrange an appointment or what?

There was a pause while Anna stared at the door Wilhelm had just exited. She turned back to Maria and said, I’ll ask Gertrude, I think she’ll know. Dear, sweet, malleable Anna.

And with that, it was settled. The rest was mere formality. A letter was written, an appointment was made, an offer was given.

NOT SURPRISINGLY, MRS. Hilde Kraft was not the dreaded woman deserving of lightning strikes that Maria had envisaged, but rather a nice and possibly inept mother of two with one on the way. As for the miscreant servant, she was happy to leave with a good reference. Her mother wouldn’t last to summer and she’d find a new position then.

On January fifteenth, after the holidays, Maria was to start life as parlor maid to the Krafts. Her responsibilities would be cleaning the children’s room, assisting the cook and helping Mrs. Kraft with errands–she hoped not carrying boxes of cabbages. It sounded like a bit more than a parlor maid’s role, but Maria was in no position to argue semantics. She was on her way. She’d taken the first big step in what she resolved would be an interesting life.

Two

Eva, June 1972 – January 1975

That was the last of it. Eva had spent all day unpacking the kitchen, bathroom and her bedroom. They were as settled as they’d ever be. A new life for her mother, the next phase of her own life. New phase, same town. They’d moved so close to where they used to live that she wondered why they’d bothered to change houses at all. Nothing was really new–same old suburbs of Seattle, same old life.

Her stepdad wasn’t a bad guy. There were no melodramatic stories to tell anyone about her tortured existence at his hands nor, unfortunately, about the new and thrilling life he’d introduced her to. It was all rather boring middle class. Boring and irritating. She wanted something to happen to her that would feel fresh and interesting. Instead, it felt like all she was doing was killing time until she could strike out on her own and do whatever it was she was going to do.

Eva. And with her mother’s call, this new phase of her life began.

What? she shouted back at the same volume and tone.

Don’t yell at me across the house. Come here when I call you. Ah, the egalitarian mother beckons.

Eva trundled down the hall and said as politely as she could, Sorry, what do you want? She stood two feet from her mother, displaying not a bit of attitude. Displaying a lot of dust and dirt and unbrushed hair, but no attitude.

Don’t use that tone with me, young lady. Tom and I are going to order pizza and thought you might like to pick your favorite. So much for no attitude. Did she actually fail at hiding her attitude, or had her mom finally developed that sixth sense that she always pretended she had? More likely, she was tired from moving and just wanted to grumble at someone. That someone could either be