Blue Glass

Manfred

All alone at my desk in the hunting lodge, I am suddenly overcome with ennui. It's a rare occurrence, one that makes me ask: why now?
As if God had somehow deigned to give me an answer, her face somehow materializes in my head.
I left after she did, ironically. I figured hunting would be a good way to escape, to experience the wilderness. But even the forest evokes memories of her, after what happened in the Nonnensbuch.
My heart clenches up at the thought. Just that memory alone brings back a name: Wahlstatt. And that name brings back a deluge of all the misery that has made me into the man I am today—or rather, the boy trapped in the body of a man assuming the personality of a hero.
The boy sleeps for most of the time. He has been asleep ever since I left Wahlstatt, since I passed through the gates of that horrible academy forever. But since the day I kissed Lea for the first time in St Nicholas field hospital, the boy has awoken from his slumber, to ask me, Manfred, warum?
Ich weiß es nicht, is all I can tell him. I don't know.
He plagues me now, with his constant questioning, and with his presence comes all the memories that I have spent the years before the war trying to block out: the ridicule, the shame, the emotional agony, the loneliness. Strange that all this should occur when I'm around Lea, who is the only salve in the world I require to heal me.
Lea, Polldi, Leopoldine Schwarz. Dark hair, dark eyes, pale skin, and, of course, her dry sense of humor that never fails to make me smile. I wonder why my past will not leave me alone around her. Maybe it's because we have been taught to be indifferent to women both physically and mentally. We as soldiers have to harbor love only for our Fatherland—no one else.
May you teach me to shoot?
I almost laugh out loud as I remember that. I can almost imagine Lea and I standing pressed up against each other, her holding the rifle, aiming at an imaginary target in the trees while I stood behind her, my hands covering hers, steadying her hold on the weapon. She would be so warm, so...so...
I shake my head, suddenly ashamed. The boy in me stirs, confused by the deluge of alien feelings swirling in the pit of my stomach.
You'll go blind if you work yourself into such a state where you need to do something about it.
She would pull the trigger. The recoil would send her flush against my body, closing whatever distance, breaching whatever gap lay between us, separating us. Our frames would fit together, like two puzzle pieces, like a broken piece of glass being glued back into a mirror. Her body would be so warm and soft against mine, and I would instinctively feel my blood start to boil.
I bit back a scream of frustration at the sudden spike of pain, the kind of pain that comes with unfulfilled desire, ricocheted through me. I groaned, burying my face in my hands to muffle the sound.
I wanted her so badly it hurt me, killed me that I couldn't have her. And the intensity of my desire for this girl, who was eight or nine years younger than me, was what disgusted the soldier in me, the boy in me, the most. I had never, ever felt such strong feelings for a woman, any woman, before, and now they washed over me like a tidal wave, exhilarating me and terrifying me at the same time.
Men are supposed to be sexually powerful, especially in front of a woman. That is the sort of stuff girls get their heads full of before they get married or even as they grow up. You are anything but that. You're still a cadet inside, getting teased for your big lips. Stop trying to grow up!
I self consciously pressed my lips together, bile rising in my throat as yet another unpleasant memory assailed me. When I was a cadet, a room elder had taken it upon himself to tease me for having full lips. He took his joke one step further by taping a paper-mache figure of a Negro with comically inflated lips to my locker. I had been thoroughly incensed. I ripped the figure down and hit the older boy square in the face. His friends chased me all over the school for that during the thirty minutes we had to ourselves. Later that night, I shuddered to think of what might have happened to me if they had caught me.
Would Lea even understand if I told her why I continuously pushed her away all the time? Would she understand what my past really was all about?
I'd like to think that she would.
I would tell her everything—everything but about her. For she is a forbidden topic, a topic I've put away since 1913. I've forgotten about her ever since the war broke out, and now more than ever, I want her out of my life.
She will always be there—my mother decrees it. And I would disobey anyone, even my own superiors, but never my mother. I just can never bring myself to.
There is a pencil and paper on the table next to me. I pick the pencil up and press the tip to the paper, leaving a perfect gray spot on the pristine white surface.
Then I write her name: Leopoldine Schwarz.
I write it again: Polldi Schwarz
Then: Lea Schwarz.
Lather, rinse, and repeat. Over and over and over again until the paper is full and I have to flip it over. And with each stroke of the pencil comes a memory of her, reaching deep into my soul, electrocuting me in every way possible, making my blood sing, sensitizing my nerve ends, making my head spin with this strange new emotion called desire.
I don't want to do it. I was always told i would go blind if I did. In Wahlstatt, we were made to sleep with our hands above the blanket to ensure no one would dare to do anything of the sort. There were a few daredevils who attempted it, and those who got away with doing it, but those who were caught were publicly shamed in front of the entire school the next day over breakfast, more often than not a bland, tasteless porridge.
But I can't control myself anymore, and this isn't Wahlstatt; the urge is too great. It's sick, it's bestial, it's primal, it's disgusting, but if I am to ever get sick or go blind, I can proudly tell myself that it was all for Lea.
I turn all the lights off, every single one, so that I am in pitch blackness. The night is still and silent, almost like the world is holding its breath as the sky, the stars, the earth prepare to witness what defiling acts Germany's premier fighter pilot is about to commit.
The blankets cocoon me, embrace me tenderly as I slide beneath them, covering my face. And in that dark void, I let her face assault my mind with all its might, and I react accordingly.
It is absolutely exhilarating. It is disgusting, liberating, and totally electrifying at the same time. I am shocked that I alone am capable of pleasuring myself in such a way, and at the same time the fact that a mere woman could bring me so low as to perform such a base, lewd act nauseates me.
This heady mixture, this cocktail of desire, fear, repulsion, and shock is the very thing that eggs me on to do it more, to cast everything aside for once and just be a man, a man thinking of the woman he loves. I am no longer Manfred Von Richthofen, no longer Herr Rittmeister. I am no longer Manne-Manning. I am no longer an aviator, no longer a national hero, I am just...
Her face. Dark eyes, dark hair, pale skin. Her lips, her open mouth as we kissed, her hands on my shoulders, her fingertips beneath the bandage swathing my head. Her body against mine, my arms wrapped around her slight frame, breathing in her scent of lavender perfume, of jasmine and red wine, of antique wood—of opulence, of sophistication.
My eyes roll back in my head. I am so convinced for a moment that I will punch myself in the groin from how fast my hand is moving. I'm disgusted I even know how to do it properly. One of the cadets in my platoon had told us in a hushed whisper that "wrapping your fingers around it and moving your hand up and down will take you to paradise on earth." That cadet ran away later that year; we never saw him again. I never put his words to the test—although a few of my comrades did and reported glorious, earth shattering results. I was never one to try things of that nature; I never did. Not until now.
I can't breathe anymore. The cavern beneath the blanket is burning hot. Sweat rolls down my face, matting the edges of the bandage on my head to the side of my face. Still, I am too ashamed to raise my head above the covers.
My lips part in a low, bestial moan, one that curdles and ignited my blood at the same time. The painful, agonizing tingle blossoms into an excruciating itch, and I rock back and forth, my breath hissing out between my teeth.
I can't breathe...can't breathe...
Lea...
I want her. I want her so bad it hurts. More than any pain I've ever felt, even more than when I was shot in the head.
You've got to stop, you've got to stop. You'll go blind; you'll get sick; you—you—
Her lips part in a smile before my eyes, her eyes brimming with happiness, and yet, there is still a heartfelt sorrow behind all that joy, a sorrow that only I understand...
I want you. I want you so much it hurts.
The itch in my lower body intensifies, intensifies. Everything gets hotter, sweatier. I can feel everything around me ten times more than I used to. My head drops back on my neck; I part my lips in a moan that I hastily muffle with my free hand and then—
I love you. I love you. I love—
Everything goes black before my eyes. Blackness, followed by stars exploding into the inky obsidian that veils my vision. I am on fire, I am combusting. I am turning to dust. I am fading away forever. Blood no longer courses through my veins anymore, only lust, desire, and need, crackling through my body like an electrical current before they all converge where my hand is and then there is nothing but pleasure and bliss, bursting through me and all around me like a solar flare...

It's over. The world has stopped spinning, everything is as it was. I throw the blankets off and make a mad dash for the washroom.

The cold water hisses down the drain, and with it, all my thoughts about Lea. I eradicate all the evidence of what had transpired by hand and leave the blanket hanging on two chairs to dry, praying it'll be dry by tomorrow.

She's a lowborn girl! The boy spits venom at me as I curl into fetal position, now blanket-less, on the bed. Shame on you, for allowing yourself to be swayed by her! You're no cadet!

I want you. I want you so bad it hurts.

You're disgusting!

Disgusting...am I disgusting?
Sleep comes before I can come up with an answer. 

Ok, ok, I'll admit it. I just wrote a chapter depicting the Red Baron beating it undercover. ;) but don't worry, as this is just the prelude to what happens in previous chapters. Not that I'm saying that there will be raunchy sex scenes or anything like that in the upcoming chapters(that's reserved for Beauty and the Beast, and even then I'm on a short leash XD) but...we'll cross that bridge when we get to it, how about that?
Enjoy!
I love you all
XOXO
Amal
PS: Warum: why (in German)
Also, who is "she" /"her"? ;)