The Whole World is Watching, Continued …Midnight Confessions …
Maria hurried along the dimly-lit downstairs corridor of the Alexander Palace, her bare feet almost noiseless, her robe billowing out cape-like behind her. Coming to a stop, she hesitated. She was an almost-married woman now; she should handle this kind of stuff on her own, shouldn’t she? Turning away, she started back along the corridor. Then she stopped and returned to her original destination. Almost married or not, this was where she needed to be right now.
Opening the tall double door to her parents’ bedroom, she crept over to the bed where Nicky and Alix lay entwined, fast asleep. Taking a deep breath to keep the tears at bay, she intoned “Mom? Dad?”
The Tsar and Tsarina stirred and, almost simultaneously, sat up. They’d fallen into bed exhausted after a longer than usual day dealing with affairs of state, wedding details, and daughters who posed provocatively for tabloid photographers. But now they were instantly awake as they always were when one of their children needed them.
“Mashka!” Alix said as she took her daughter in her arms. “What’s wrong, sweetheart?”
Maria settled in between her parents, covered her face with her hands, and wept.
“Let it out, Mashka,” Nicholas murmured, gently stroking her hair. “You’ll feel better.”
She shook her head and cried even harder. “I can’t do this! I just can’t! I –I just …” Gasping and choking, she tried to continue, but she couldn’t make the words come out.
“Oh, God, she’s hyperventilating!” Alix exclaimed. “Come on, darling, just breathe … breathe. That’s it. Now, tell us what’s wrong.”
“Everything!” Maria wailed. “I mean, I was fine until today. Then we went to the beach and, well, we were talking about how I was going away and that things would never be the same again and it just, like, hit me … I’m getting married! Oh, God!” The tears flowed afresh and she continued, “It’s like, when I’m with him, everything’s perfect. I know I love him and he loves me and all I want is for us to be together. But when I’m alone, everything’s all weird and messed up!”
“Define ‘weird and messed up,’” Nicholas prompted.
“His family, for one,” Maria murmured. “His brothers are jerks and his sister-in-law was mean to Uncle Ernie when she was married to him and she’s still mean now. His sister’s nice, but she lives in Greece. And his mom – people think she’s so great and she’s not. She’s always talking trash about people and stirring stuff up. All she cares about is that he’s marrying a daughter of the Tsar, like that makes her look good or something. She drives him crazy – he told me so.”
“There’s a lot of family history behind all that,” Nicholas sighed.
“I know,” Maria nodded. “But it’s still messed up! And then there’s his friends …”
“I’m sure they’re an interesting group!” Alix commented.
“Mom, it’s not like that!” Maria said with a sniff. “It’s just that, well, some of them have kids my age! And some of my friends have parents his age! And he even likes the same music you and Daddy do…”
“Oh no!” Nicholas gasped, turning his head.
“Daddy!” Maria wailed.
“I’m sorry,” he said, stroking her hair.
“I know … it’s just that I’m so scared!”
“Of course you are,” Nicholas soothed. “It’s a scary thing you’re doing. Marriage is a huge leap of faith! You wouldn’t be human if you weren’t at least a little apprehensive about it.”
“And all couples have problems to overcome,” Alix pointed out. “When we married, your Apapa Sasha had just died and your father had been Tsar for about three weeks. The country was in mourning and we didn’t have a wedding reception or a honeymoon. We had to live with Amama Minnie in your father’s old rooms and I didn’t speak a word of Russian and had just converted to Orthodoxy… it was rough. But it drew us together.”
Maria wiped her eyes and nodded. “I know. But I’m so afraid of it all! What am I going to do?”
Alix took her daughter’s hand and held it. “What do you want to do, darling?”
Maria gasped her way into a fresh burst of tears. “The wedding’s in two days! What choice have I got? It’s like this film we saw in history class last term. It was about 1968 and they showed these people in Chicago … like, the flippies or something?”
“Hippies,” Nicholas interjected.
“Yeah, hippies. And they kept yelling “The whole world is watching! The whole world is watching!” Well, that’s what I feel like – The whole world is watching! The whole world is watching!”
“You always have choices, Mashka,” Nicholas told her. “You just have to sort through everything and do what’s best for you. As for the world, well, it’ll just watch something else.”
“But what about what’s best for him?” Maria asked in a small voice.
“Nobody ever said the choices were easy, my love,” Alix soothed.
“But I love him!” she wailed and buried her face in her mother’s neck.
“There, there. It’s alright. S-h-h-h …” Alix cradled her daughter in her arms, gently rocking her as she did when Maria was a baby. Gradually, her sobs subsided and her breathing took on the slow, even rhythm of sleep.
“I’ve been expecting something like this,” Nicholas finally murmured. “She’s been so calm and cheerful through this whole thing – the other shoe was bound to drop sooner or later.”
“Do you think she’s serious?” Alix asked, stroking her daughter’s cheek.
Nicholas shrugged. “It’s hard to tell. We may be missing our big chance to talk her out of it.”
Alix shook her head. “No, lovy, I don’t think so. If she changes her mind, it has to be her choice and hers alone. She’d never forgive us otherwise.” She sighed and said “But nothing’s harder than seeing them torn to pieces like this and wanting to fix it for them and not being able to.”
“I know,” Nicholas agreed. “About the only thing we can do now is get some sleep ourselves.” He rose and slipped his robe on, tying the belt around his trim, taut waist. Catching up a pillow and a spare blanket, he went around to Alix, kissed her and said “I’ll camp out in the den. Goodnight, lovebird. It will all look better in the morning.”
