#Overlord 2018 | Explore Tumblr posts and blogs

foundtherightwords · 3 months ago

Text

As the Sun Will Rise - Chapter 1

Pairing: Grunauer (Overlord) x OFC, Beauty & the Beast retelling

Summary: After losing most of his unit in a disastrous D-Day mission, Derwin Grunauer returns to his hometown near Miami, body riddled with scars and heart heavy with guilt, only to find his neighbors shunning him due to his German name. He retreats into his family mansion and remains there, unwilling to rejoin the living, until the day Alba Reyes turns up at his door with a basket full of warm bread. As the daughter of a Cuban immigrant, Alba knows something of being an outsider, and when she offers to work for Derwin as his housekeeper, it is not only to pay off her father's debt to the Grunauers, but also because she feels some connection to the reclusive young man. When that connection develops into something more, they must overcome both the town's prejudice and their own doubts to find happiness.

A/N: My inspiration for this came from these lovely artworks that reimagine Beauty and the Beast in a 1950s setting. The idea of making the Beast a World War II veteran jumped out at me, and given that "Overlord" is a World War II movie, I immediately knew I'd write this for Grunauer. I based this on the original screenplay more than the movie itself (Grunauer's full name and the fact that he's from Miami are both in the script), since Grunauer actually survives in that. The title is, of course, a lyric from "Beauty and the Beast".

Warnings: period-typical attitudes (sexism, racism, prejudice), PTSD, some violence, non-explicit smut

Chapter warnings: period-typical sexism and prejudice

Chapter word count: 5.2k

Chapter 1

"I'm so glad the sugar ration is over, aren't you?" Mrs. McLeish said, peering at the rows and rows of cakes and pastries behind the glass.

"We all are, Mrs. McLeish," replied Alba, handing the gray-haired lady her purchase neatly wrapped in paper bags. "That'll be a dollar and sixty-three cents."

"Are you sure, dear?" Mrs. McLeish felt the bags, trying to remember what she'd bought.

"Of course. Ninety cents for half a dozen loaves of bread, fifty-two cents for ten ham croquetas, and twenty-one cents for three cheese pasteles," counted Alba. There had been no mistake—Alba knew this was only Mrs. McLeish's way to weasel some discount out of her.

Mrs. McLeish started counting out her money with excruciating slowness. "My Ted has been so looking forward to your bakes ever since he came back from the Pacific, you know."

Alba smiled and reached into the display case again. "Well, here's a slice of tres leches cake, to thank Ted for his service. On the house," she quickly added. Mrs. McLeish's wrinkles immediately relaxed, just as Alba knew they would. Papi wouldn't like it, but they couldn't afford to alienate a customer now.

Mrs. McLeish was barely out of the door when the cheerful chime of the shop bell was drowned out by an obnoxious roar. Alba looked up to see a bright red Aston Martin screech to a halt across the street.

"¡Mierda!" she muttered under her breath. This bit of profanity earned her a stern look from the statue of La Cachita, the patroness of Cuba, on her altar set in a corner of the bakery. "Sorry," Alba mumbled to the statue. She tried to dip behind the counter, but it was too late. The driver, a tall, broad-shouldered man with raven hair slicked back, wearing a leather flight jacket that was too heavy for Miami in late June, was already striding toward the door. He pushed it open with unnecessary force, making the bell chime furiously in protest.

"Allie!" he declared, flashing a grin that showed his white teeth to perfection. "Just the girl I want to see."

Alba tried to pull her lips into the semblance of a smile and ended up with something more like a grimace instead. "Mr. Grant, good morning," she said. "What can I get you today?"

"Call me Gastin, dearest Allie," replied Grant, leaning against the counter. "How many times do I have to ask you again?"

"As many times as I've asked you to call me Alba, not Allie, Mr. Grant," Alba said smoothly. Grant's smile faltered, but only for a moment, before returning to full blast.

"But Allie sounds so much nicer! Allie Grant. Just rolls off the tongue, doesn't it?"

Ignoring his suggestive leer, Alba repeated, "What can I get you today? A pastelito, perhaps, or some croquetas?"

Grant shuddered. "God, no. Do you have any idea how fattening those can be, with all that cheese and butter and frying oil?"

It was on the tip of Alba's tongue to snap that he was in a shop that thrived on cheese and butter and frying oil, but she bit back the retort and simply said, a little impatiently now, "Then what do you want?"

"You know what I want, my dear Allie." Grant was now leaning so far over the counter that a bystander may think he was trying to reach into the till. "A date with you."

"I'm afraid I'm very busy at the moment," Alba said automatically.

Grant let out a derisive laugh. "Busy with what?" He gestured around the empty bakery. It was after eight; the first waves of customers had gone, which meant Grant had timed his visit to catch her specifically. He certainly hadn't driven all the way here from his swanky family mansion on Millionaire's Row for one of La Perla del Sur's pasteles.

Mierda.

"Come now, Allie," Grant continued, seizing her hand in a tight grip. "I don't understand why you keep working in this dump. When we're married, you'll have the biggest mansion on Miami Beach and never have to deal with all this misery..."

Alba's face tightened. For six months now, Grant had been hovering around the neighborhood and pestering her into going out with him, despite her making it clear that she had no time for him. She knew she was the minority in this. Most people would consider him a great catch. A war hero and the heir to a real estate empire, courting the daughter of a lowly baker, a Cuban immigrant at that? She should have been over the moon. It was true that she had been flattered by his attention at first. But she wasn't interested in finding a boyfriend, and she'd treated him the same way she did all customers, polite and friendly. Only when Grant started harping on about marriage, as if they were already engaged, that she firmly shut it down. Even then, he couldn't seem to take a hint, whether because he was too arrogant or too dim, Alba wasn't sure. So her politeness had turned into grudging tolerance and finally into barely concealed dislike. Still, he refused to leave her alone.

"Maybe I like the misery," she bit out.

Grant opened his mouth, but before he could come up with a response, an angry voice rose from the street. It was Mr. Olson, whose grocery store was across the street from the bakery, and whose front door was currently being blocked by Grant's monster of a vehicle.

"Who's the schmuck that parked his car in front of my store?" Mr. Olson shouted, waving his broom. "Move it before I smash your headlights in!"

Grant flung Alba's hand aside and ran out of the bakery without another word. Seizing the opportunity, Alba ducked through the swinging door that separated the front of the bakery from the sweltering back room, where two enormous ovens were constantly belching out steam and heat. She almost collided with her younger sister, Beatriz.

"Alba!" Beatriz exclaimed. "Where do you think you're going?"

"I need you to man the counter for me," Alba said.

"Why?"

"He's here."

"Who?"

"You know who. Señor Slick." Alba's lips curled in distaste.

"Really?" Beatriz craned her neck to look through the curtain. Alba glanced behind her. Grant was busy arguing with Mr. Olson, but she grabbed Beatriz's shoulders and positioned herself so Beatriz would hide her from view anyway.

Alba couldn't understand why Grant was so determined to woo her. She definitely wasn't as pretty as Beatriz, though they shared the same features and coloring. The same hazel eyes on Beatriz were bright and clear, while Alba's eyes couldn't seem to decide which color they wanted to be and ended up as a sort of muddy brownish green. The same dark curls on Beatriz were glossy and bouncing with her steps, while Alba's had a tendency to frizz maddeningly in the humid Florida air, so she mostly kept it under a headscarf. Beatriz's figure was all soft curves, while Alba's was straight and flat as a pond cypress.

And most of all, Beatriz, like other girls in their neighborhood, was always making sheep's eyes at Grant. He never paid attention to any of them though. Perhaps that was it. Perhaps he only set his sights on Alba because he liked a conquest.

But Alba had no time to dwell on all of that now. "Yes," she told Beatriz, "and you can ogle him to your heart's content if you man the counter for me."

Beatriz's face fell. "But Papi told me to make the delivery." She gestured to a basket, packed with loaves of bread in paper bags, a box of ham and cheese croquetas, and a box of pasteles filled with guava jam, still warm from the oven.

"Delivery? Where to?" La Perla del Sur Bakery did not do deliveries. Those who knew of their bread and pastries would line up outside its door before the opening time of six o'clock, come rain or shine.

"The Grunauer place," said Beatriz.

Alba smacked her forehead. Of course. How could she forget?

The late Dr. Grunauer had been their landlord. When they first arrived in Miami from Cuba thirteen years ago, Alba's parents, Mauricio and Ana, had found a nearly dead town, brought to its knees by two great hurricanes and the Great Depression. They had rebuilt their lives alongside the city. They had found this place for cheap, and Dr. Grunauer, a professor at the university, had only been too glad to let them have it after the crash of the land boom. Mauricio had traded his suit and tie for an apron and worked tirelessly next to his wife to open this bakery. But it was difficult to curb the ambition of a high-ranking government official, even if the coup d'état of 1933 had stripped him of his power. Mauricio had borrowed from Dr. Grunauer to buy a vacant beachfront store, hoping to open another La Perla, to be run by Alba's older brother, Rafael. Then came the war, and Rafael joined the Air Force and never came back from the Pacific, and Ana soon followed him, so that was the end of that. The beachfront property was left to languish through the war, and in the end, Mauricio had to cut his loss and sell it for cheap.

Dr. Grunauer, too, had passed away a year before the end of the war. Mauricio was not one to ever forget a debt, and although Dr. Grunauer's only son, who had come home last year, never mentioned it, Mauricio had been sending him bread and pastries and even fresh fruits sometimes, hoping that he would not call in the debt any time soon.

Now Alba snatched the basket out of Beatriz's hand. "I'll go," she said. "You man the counter."

"But—but—" Beatriz glanced at the back, where Mauricio and the assistant baker, young Frank, were busy loading trays of shaped dough into the ovens. Alba knew Papi didn't like Beatriz to be at the front alone, despite the fact that she always drew a crowd, mostly of young men—or perhaps precisely because of that.

"Bea's too busy flirting," he'd once said to Alba. "She'll mistake flan for croquetas and sell her own shoes as pastelitos next. I need you there, to keep an eye on the till and tell me when we're running low on things." And so Alba had no choice but to grin and bear it, though she didn't have Beatriz's natural charm and ease with the customers, and a day working at the till always left her with crescents of sweat under her arms, sore cheeks from having to stretch them into unnatural smiles for so long, and a raging headache.

"The breakfast rush's over, you'll be fine," Alba assured her sister. "I'll be back before lunch." She rushed out the side door before Beatriz could raise further protest and draw Papi's attention.

"Be careful," Beatriz called after her. Alba wondered if the warning was meant to be about Grant or the Grunauer place.

As she wheeled her bicycle out the back gate and down the lane, Alba saw her best friend, Claudia Barron, watering her garden, the hose curving over her pregnant belly. Claudia had spent her whole life in their neighborhood of Cypress Grove. She'd grown up down the street, dated a literal boy next door, Marty, and after Marty came back from the war, they had gotten married and moved into a house on the same street. Sometimes Alba thought she would go crazy if she were Claudia, never going further than a few miles from where she grew up. Other times, she envied Claudia her straightforward life.

"How's Marty Junior?" Alba nodded at Claudia's belly.

"Kicking up a storm last night. It's this heat, I don't think he likes it." Claudia raised a quizzical eyebrow at the bread basket. "Where are you going with those?"

"Delivery to the Grunauer place."

"Some sweetener for Gruesome Grunauer, eh?"

"Don't call him that," Alba said, rolling her eyes.

"It fits him, though. Like father, like son. He's been back for what, a year? Yet nobody's seen him. He's locked himself away in that mansion with all those snakes and gators." Claudia shuddered. "I wonder at your dad, letting you go there alone. Why can't he or Frank go?"

"They're busy," Alba said shortly. "I have to go now."

Without waiting for Claudia's goodbye, she got on her bike and rode away. Claudia was a good friend, but she could be an awful gossip sometimes. "Gruesome Grunauer", indeed! Yes, it was true that Dr. Grunauer had always been rather strange. With his balding head, owlish eyes, and quiet, mumbling voice, he reminded Alba of a mad scientist, like Victor Frankenstein or Dr. Jekyll, and she, like the rest of the neighborhood kids, had been slightly afraid of him. The nickname had started when they found out he raised snakes and other reptiles on his land, and it stuck. There was a rumor that he even kept an alligator. Every Halloween, the kids always dared each other to go to the Grunauer place to get a glimpse of this alligator.

And then there was Mrs. Grunauer too. Apparently she had been bedridden, and nobody had ever seen her. When she passed away, shortly after Alba's family moved to Cypress Grove, people had whispered that Dr. Grunauer had poisoned his wife.

During the war, those childish rumors had persisted and taken on a more malicious tinge. The war hadn't been easy for Dr. Grunauer with his German name and German accent, and some people had even turned against the Reyes for their association with him. And now, with the old man dead and his son back at the mansion, more rumors had surfaced. They said young Grunauer had been badly injured in the war, and those injuries had left him disfigured. It didn't help that he never set foot outside of his home.

Alba never subscribed to the local rumor mill, but she couldn't help feeling a slight sense of trepidation as she rode her bike down the back lane that followed along the Tamiami Trail. Alba preferred this shortcut, which ran right through the cypress swamp west of the city. She had always loved the swamp, loved seeing the bald cypresses rising from it like majestic giants, their trunks dripping with ferns and orchids, loved watching the herons and egrets that waded amongst their roots, loved the thrill of sighting an alligator floating lazily over the dark water. Even with the occasional blare of a truck horn from the interstate in the distance, it still provided a quiet spot in the busy city.

This morning, though, Alba paid no attention to the beauty of nature. Leaning on the pedals, she only hoped that she'd made enough of a head start that Grant wouldn't be able to follow her in his car. She wondered how the Grunauer place had changed. She knew where it was, of course, though she'd been too much of a wimp to come right up to its gate. In her childhood memory, it was the grandest house she'd ever seen, as grand as the Palacio del Valle in her hometown of Cienfuegos back in Cuba. She also wondered what young Mr. Grunauer would be like. Though they were roughly the same age, young Grunauer had never been a part of the Cypress Grove gang—he had been sent to a boarding school in Jacksonville even before Alba arrived, and none of the kids in the neighborhood knew him.

Soon, the lane branched off into two even smaller trails, little more than footpaths lined by willow and cocoplum bushes. Rolling her bike down the right trail, Alba finally came to a clearing. The willows and cocoplums gave way to magnificent oaks covered in Spanish moss that stood on either side of the path like sentinels, guarding the mansion of her memories. It stood back from the path, a little aloof, a little wary, a queen surveying her empire, its white walls shining like a mirage against the dark canopies of the trees surrounding it. A porch held up by tall columns ran around the house, shielding it from the sun and prying eyes. A beautiful frangipani stood in the back, its branches, dotted with star-like blooms, reaching toward the house as if in adoration. If those oaks were the sentinels, then the frangipani was an attendant bowing down to the queen.

Alba shook her head. Such flights of fancy were usually Beatriz's purview; Alba herself was more likely to notice that the yard was overgrown, the porch needed sweeping, one of the window shutters was sagging, and the paint was chipping. A swing full of dead leaves creaked on rusty chains on the porch, adding to the overall abandoned air of the place. As she drew closer, she also saw a sign hanging crooked on one of the oaks, with "BEWARE OF DOG" scrawled across it. This mundane little detail dispelled any fanciful impression she had of the house, and instead of the palace of her childhood, now she only saw a sad, neglected place.

Alba looked around cautiously. There was no sign or sound of the dog she should beware of. Emboldened, she wheeled her bike past the rank of oaks and leaned it against the porch. The front door had no bell—Dr. Grunauer probably had gotten rid of it after the kids played too many games of ding dong ditch, and nobody came out here now—so she knocked instead.

No answer. She knocked again, louder, calling out, "Hello? Anybody home?" From somewhere deep inside the house, there was a bark. Although it was deep and rumbling, it wasn't the bark of a dog one should beware of. It was not ferocious or angry, only rather annoyed, like that of a dog that had been wakened up from a nap.

Alba reached for the door handle. It turned with some protest. She pushed the door open and stepped into a cool, dark front hall. Something crunched under her foot, and Alba looked down to find more dead leaves strewn across a hardwood floor that hadn't been swept in God knew how long. A door on her left was ajar, showing what looked like a living room overlooking the oak-lined drive. Next to this door was a staircase, its top disappearing into the dimness of the second floor. On the top of the stairs were some strange, pale shapes that looked like logs or a rolled-up carpet that somebody forgot to put away. Sunlight from the open door behind Alba couldn't penetrate the gloom, and thoughts of snakes and gators swirled around her head, making her hesitant to step beyond the little patch of light.

"Hello?" she called out again, her voice lost in the profound stillness of the house. "I'm from the bakery. Is there anybody here?"

There was that bark again, more excited than annoyed this time. In the hallway beyond the staircase, a huge shape emerged, silhouetted against the darkness. It was a dog, she could see that. The biggest dog she'd ever seen.

Alba stood rooted to the spot. She only had the presence of mind not to scream. Screaming would only agitate it further.

The shape came into view. It was a great boarhound, so dark and glossy that it appeared little more than patches of shininess in the dark. It stalked toward her on paws as big as dinner plates, eyes glinting, nose sniffing, tail lifted in alert.

Then, slowly, that tail moved side to side.

Alba couldn't believe her eyes.

The huge dog was wagging his tail. He'd stopped by the bottom of the staircase, seemingly trying to make up his mind about her, but clearly he didn't see her as a threat.

"Here, boy," Alba said shakily, reaching out a hand.

The dog ran to her and almost bowled her over in his eagerness to sniff the bread basket she was carrying. She tried to lift the basket out of reach, but it was quite difficult—when stood on his hind legs, the dog could easily reach her shoulders. "Down, boy," she said. The dog sat and looked up expectantly at her with his liquid black eyes. Alba gave him her hand. He licked it. "Oh, you're just a big softy, aren't you?" she said, laughing in relief and kneeling to rub his ears.

"He's an idiot," said a voice above her.

Startled, Alba looked up. What she'd thought was a roll-up carpet turned out to be a leg encased in khaki pants, and the logs were the arms. A person was lying on the top of the staircase.

"Who are you?" he said. She couldn't see his face, but she could hear the scowl in his voice.

"Alba Reyes," she replied. "I'm from La Perla del Sur."

"La what?"

"The bakery. I'm Mauricio Reyes' daughter. We rent your store in Cypress Grove?"

There was a groan, and the shapes moved. The man was sitting up. The dog gave a little woof and bounded up the stairs to join him. Alba involuntarily craned her neck, trying to get a better look. His face was still half-hidden in the gloom, and in the light shining through the window at the landing, she could just make out a shock of sandy brown curls and a pair of dark, dark eyes. There was no sign of those disfiguring injuries that she could see.

As those eyes met hers, fragments of memories flitted through her mind—a pair of brown eyes, schoolyard noises, the sudden, bright pain of a split lip, and a voice, asking, Where did you learn to punch like that?

Before she could grasp it, the memory was gone, like the reflection on the surface of a pond being broken up by a pebble. The eyes on the top of the stairs were scowling at her again.

"Good morning," she said uncertainly.

***

Derwin Grunauer was not having a good morning.

He'd woken at five, as usual. Even though he could now sleep in as late as he wanted, the habit developed after eight years of boarding school and three years in the army was hard to shake. He hadn't gotten up though. What would be the point? He had nowhere to be, nobody to see, nothing to do.

But Otto, who seemed to have a sixth sense of when his master was awake, had scratched at the door and whined, demanding to be let out, so Derwin had reluctantly gone downstairs, opened the door, and gave the dog his breakfast. For himself, he hadn't wanted any. His pantry had been empty since the day before, but he loathed picking up the phone to call the grocer. He knew he had to, eventually. Either that or starve to death, and Derwin didn't think he was brave enough or desperate enough for that. And so he'd made himself a cup of coffee with the dregs left in the pot and gone upstairs to mentally prepare himself, otherwise he would start panicking and stammering on the phone like an idiot.

Then his treacherous leg had tripped at the top of the stairs, making the cane fly out of his hand and sending him sprawling face-first across the steps. The fall hadn't hurt that bad—he'd been climbing as fast as his leg allowed, which was not very fast at all—but it had drained him of whatever energy he had, and left him angry and despondent. Angry at himself, at his throbbing leg, at the world in general. And despondent at life. He'd turned over and remained there, ignoring Otto's attempts to pull him to his feet. There was no point in getting up. There was no point to anything. He wished he could have stayed there until he melted in the heat and dissolved into the floor. Eventually, Otto had given up and returned to the kitchen to clean up the remnants of his breakfast.

He hadn't heard the knocks.

It was the smells that hit him first. The heavenly, warm, yeasty smell of freshly baked bread, the rich, savory smell of fried ham, and the buttery, sugary smell of pastries. His stomach growled.

Great. He was so hungry that he'd started hallucinating.

Then he heard the voice. Olfactory and audio hallucinations might be a bit much, so he cracked open an eye and looked for the source of the sound.

Somebody was standing in the front hall. No, not just somebody. A young woman. Wearing a sleeveless blouse and a sensible pair of slacks and sandals, with strands of her dark hair falling out of her headscarf. Sunlight was streaming in through the open door behind her, framing her like a halo as she looked up at him, her mouth falling open in surprise. She was too far away for him to make out the color of her eyes, but he could see that they were light and bright, fixed on him with none of the suspicion and hostility he was used to from other people, only curiosity.

Otto was licking her hand too. Traitor.

Still, Derwin refused to let himself be taken in. A lack of animosity didn't necessarily mean kindness. When he came home last year, after several months in St. Mary's Hospital in Portsmouth and a longer stint at the VA Hospital up in Bay Pines, where they'd tried and failed to get his leg back to working conditions, Derwin hadn't expected much. His father was gone, killed by the strain and loneliness of the war, and they had never been popular in town to begin with. He'd only hoped to settle down and have a quiet life. Yet somehow, what he found was even less than what he'd expected. People turned their backs on him in stores and restaurants, whispering to each other and pulling their children close wherever he went past, calling him Kraut and Jerry and worse. All because he had the misfortune of bearing a German name.

This young woman, whoever she was, probably hadn't heard much about him. The moment she did, she would turn and run, like all the others. And when she said she was renting the old store in Cypress Grove, it fell into place. She was his tenant. No wonder she was friendly. She couldn't afford not to.

"My father asked me to bring you some bread," she was saying.

Derwin's stomach growled again, so loudly that he was sure the young woman heard it from all the way at the bottom of the stairs. He grimaced, mortified.

The bakery... yes, he remembered now. In the past few months, he'd been finding bread and pastries outside his front door with a note saying "Compliments of La Perla del Sur Bakery". He'd been wary, but then he'd come across the name on his monthly bank statements and realized they were just trying to be nice to their landlord. The bread was good, and the pastries were phenomenal. Plus, it saved him from having to go to the store. They had tried knocking at first, and when he never answered them, they just left everything on the porch, like a silent offering to some faceless deity. Once, he hadn't found it until days afterward, when the bread had gone soggy in the humidity and the pastries stale. He'd eaten them anyway.

His love for pastries didn't stop him from feeling annoyed with this young woman for invading his space, however.

"Are you OK?" she asked after a while, when he didn't say anything or make any move. "Do you need help getting up?"

He grunted a refusal.

"Should I bring these into the kitchen for you?" she continued, lifting a wicker basket to show him. The mouthwatering smell intensified.

"No need," he mumbled. "Just set them down there."

"Where?" The woman looked around the front hall. There was no place to put anything, except for a side table piled high with mail that Derwin couldn't bring himself to open.

"Anywhere."

"Your dog may get into them."

"I don't care."

"I'm going to put them in the kitchen," she said in a voice that invited no further argument, and before he could stop her, she was walking briskly down the corridor. She tossed a piece of pastry to Otto, and he immediately followed her, tail wagging. Traitor.

Grumbling under his breath, Derwin pulled himself up by the banister and limped his way downstairs. If he didn't catch her in time, this woman may go through the entire house, and he couldn't have that.

He stumbled off the last step and almost ran straight into the woman, who was coming back from the kitchen.

"Sorry!" she exclaimed, catching his arms and helping him stand up straight.

Their eyes met, and Derwin found his breath caught in his throat for a moment. He'd been right—her eyes were light, bright green, gleaming like a forest pool in the shade, where the leafy canopy above is reflected in the quiet depth of the water.

Those eyes flicked briefly to the scar on his left cheek, before turning away, not out of disgust as Derwin had expected, but rather of embarrassment. She took a step back and let go of his arms.

"I've put the bread in your bread box," she said (I have a bread box? though Derwin). "I'm not sure when you want the pastries, so I've put them in your fridge. Heat them in the oven before you eat them, they'll taste better. The guava pastries will go great with some coffee."

That was probably the most anybody had ever said to him in over a year. Derwin stared at the young woman, not knowing what to say. She gave him a smile—quick and uncertain, but a smile nonetheless—and walked out with that same brisk, graceful stride, still followed by Otto, who was gazing at her adoringly.

"Otto, stay," Derwin said sternly when the dog looked like he wanted to follow the woman out the door. Otto reluctantly obeyed.

"Oh and, don't set the oven higher than two hundred degrees when you warm the pastries, or they'll get burned," the woman said over her shoulder, before closing the door behind her. A moment later, Derwin heard her bike rattling down the drive.

He glanced at Otto, who met his eyes with a wistful, reproachful look. "Don't look at me like that," Derwin said. "I didn't chase her off."

Leaving Otto in the front hall to whine and watch the figure on the bike disappear behind the oaks, Derwin limped into the kitchen to retrieve the pastries. She was right; they tasted much better warm, though he wouldn't offend them by pairing them with his dishwater coffee. Otto soon gave up his vigil and came into the kitchen as well, looking inconsolable. Derwin took pity on the dog and shared the ham croquettes with him.

"Just because she gave you pastries doesn't mean that she's your friend," he told the dog.

Otto always fell in love with anyone who showed him the smallest bit of attention. It was a terrible habit.

Chapter 2

So here's the Grunauer fic that I promised! It's my longest to date (82k, 20 chapters plus an epilogue), so I'm going to post it twice a week. If you want to be tagged when I update it, let me know, or you can just check back here every Tuesday and Saturday!

#joseph quinn #joseph quinn fic #grunauer #grunauer overlord #overlord 2018 #grunauer x ofc

41 notes · View notes

foundtherightwords · 2 months ago

Text

As the Sun Will Rise - Chapter 11

Pairing: Grunauer (Overlord) x OFC, Beauty & the Beast retelling

Chapter warnings: racism

Chapter word count: 3.6k

Chapter 1 - Chapter 2 - Chapter 3 - Chapter 4 - Chapter 5 - Chapter 6 - Chapter 7 - Chapter 8 - Chapter 9 - Chapter 10

Chapter 11

And try again they did. In the next several weeks, Derwin and Alba went on more outings, not just in Cypress Grove but further into the city as well, sometimes even venturing as far as downtown Miami. They went shopping for groceries and books and records, picked up packages from the post office, and ran other errands. Derwin managed to have whole conversations with clerks and cashiers without falling into a panic. He found it much easier to talk to people when they didn't know who he was, didn't turn cold or hostile when they heard his name.

The only time he felt awkward was when he and Alba were mistaken for a couple. It happened more than once, particularly when they went shopping for furnishings. Alba decided that the upholstery around the house was too faded and frayed, so she convinced Derwin to accompany her to several furniture stores and fabric shops to select the replacements. "After all, it is your house," she said.

The clerks at these stores, however, only saw a pair of newlyweds.

"How nice of you to come along with your missus," a saleswoman at a fabric store cooed at Derwin. "You must tell me your secret, dear," she went on, addressing Alba. "My husband can hardly tell a pillowcase from a throw rug, let alone shop for them with me!"

Both Derwin and Alba blushed to the roots of their hair and tried to explain themselves, stumbling over each other's words, "Oh no—we're not—she's not—he's just—" But the saleswoman had bustled off to find a book of fabric samples for them. They glanced at each other with helpless, embarrassed grins.

Occasionally these excursions would run late, and they would stop for a soda at a drugstore or a bite at a diner. Derwin was aware that anyone seeing them would think they were on a date, but Alba didn't seem to mind. She insisted on paying for herself and never acted any differently than when they had lunch at home, and Derwin tried to tear down his castle in the air. Of course she didn't think of him that way. He was her employer, nothing more.

On a particularly hot day in late October, the sun seemingly working overtime to make up for an unusually wet season, Alba took Derwin to the VA hospital downtown for his monthly check-up. As they were leaving, Derwin's eyes caught the billboard outside a movie theater across the street, advertising big screens, comfy seats, and air conditioning. The thought of driving for forty minutes in the old tin bucket under that scorching sun became a lot less appealing, and he eyed the billboard longingly.

"What do you say?" he asked Alba, pointing at the theater. "We can kill a couple of hours in comfort and drive home later in the afternoon, when it's cooler."

"Sure!" Alba said eagerly. "I haven't been to the movies in ages."

They picked some costume romance called Forever Amber, simply because of the long runtime. Derwin bought popcorn and candy for them both, feeling proud that he had done it without any prompting or encouragement from Alba.

The movie was quite long, and at some point, Derwin completely lost the plot. It was just a bunch of people with big hair, big hats, and bigger lace collars—both men and women—talking and swooning dramatically at each other, and he had no idea what they had to swoon about. But he didn't care. In the cool, darkened theater, with its flickering screen and the smell of popcorn in the air, he could forget himself and his troubles.

And then another scent, sweeter and more familiar, replaced the smell of popcorn, and Derwin felt a slight pressure on his side. He glanced to his left and saw that Alba had fallen asleep with her head on his shoulder. Poor thing. She must be so tired, waking up early to work in the bakery before coming to the house and working there all day. He sat still, not daring to move, listening to her quiet, steady breathing, wondering if she was dreaming and what she was dreaming of. On the screen, Linda Darnell was shrieking at Cornel Wilde, and Derwin almost shouted at her to be quiet, to let Alba sleep.

A curl had fallen over Alba's forehead. It tormented Derwin—he wanted to brush it away but was afraid of waking her. He looked and looked at it, and, unable to take it any longer, he reached out his right hand. Before his fingers touched her hair, Alba stirred and opened her eyes. Derwin quickly withdrew his hand like a pickpocket caught in the act, as Alba sat up straight and covered a yawn.

"You're right, this is a comfy theater," she said, blinking up at the screen. "Which husband is she on now?"

"Number three, I think."

"Won't be long before the end then. She can't have more husbands than Scarlett."

Derwin wondered if Scarlett was some infamous woman in Cypress Grove, but an old biddy was glaring at them across the aisle, so he kept quiet.

Later, as they emerged onto the pavement still warm with the day's heat, glowing orange under the setting sun, he said, apologetically, "I'm sorry the movie is so boring."

"Oh stop it, you're not the director." Alba grinned to show that she didn't mind. "But yeah, Amber is so annoying. What a Scarlett O'Hara rip-off!"

This time he had to ask. "Who?"

She stared at him. "You've never seen Gone with the Wind?"

He shook his head sheepishly. And then, just so she wouldn't think he had been living under a rock—though sometimes it did feel that way—he added, "I've heard of it though."

"OK, as soon as I find a place that still shows it, we have to see it," Alba said. "Now that's an epic romance. There's a drive-through theater near Cypress Grove that showed it all the time, back in '42. From the roof of the bakery, the screen is just about visible, and Beatriz and I climbed up there most nights, after Papi had gone to sleep..." Her eyes turned hazy with remembrance for a moment, before she snapped them back to the road. "Anyway, if we can't find Gone with the Wind, then we'll go see a Hitchcock movie next time. At least he's never boring."

They got into the car. Alba started the engine, and continued, "But even if the movie's a dud, I did have a nice nap and I can't remember the last time I ate so much Whoppers and popcorn, so thank you for that." She reached across the seat to pat Derwin's hand.

He longed to take that hand and bring it to his lips, but she had pulled back, and he squeezed his own hands in his lap. She'd said next time. There would be a next time. And his castle in the air, which he had tried so hard to tear down, started building itself back up again, stone by stone.

***

Alba glanced at Derwin across the aisle. They were at a used bookstore downtown, having driven all the way here to track down a specific copy of some German poetry collection. Derwin's translation of the Robert Frost poem had been enthusiastically received by his professor, and they were now collaborating on a bigger project to translate German poems into English and vice versa. Derwin wanted this collection for reference, but none of the local libraries carried it.

Alba had never seen him so excited. The translation project had rekindled something in him, and as he pored over his books, his whole face glowed with a passion that was entirely different from his usual scowling intensity. She imagined that before, Derwin read poetry to forget himself, but now he read to find himself again. Even his movements had changed. He still had to depend on the cane, but he walked around the house with brisker, more decisive steps, his back straight, instead of stooping and limping from shadow to shadow. And he was a lot more confident as well. After the incident at Olson's, she took care not to leave his side again whenever they went out, but he no longer needed her to hold his hand through a conversation. Well, not literally hold his hand, though she would've gladly done that.

It was amazing how a sense of purpose could transform a man. In fact, he had changed so much that Alba was sure he was ready for the next step. Claudia and her husband Marty were planning a trip to the beach, the last one before the winter season began and tourists descended on Miami, and they had invited Alba and Beatriz and Frank, along. With Claudia's permission, Alba had extended an invitation to Derwin as well, but to her disappointment, he'd turned her down. She wished she could persuade him to change his mind—it would do him a lot of good to form some real connections—but she didn't know how. After what happened with Mrs. McLeish, Alba didn't blame Derwin for wanting to steer clear of Cypress Grove and its people. She'd even asked Frank to fix the roof, afraid that a new person would cause a repeat of the scene at Olson's and jeopardize Derwin's precarious progress.

Still, she was proud of how much he'd changed and grown, strange as it was to feel proud of someone on whom she had no claim. As she watched Derwin between the dusty shelves full of books, Alba wondered, not for the first time, how best to describe who they were to each other. Technically, he was her employer, but he never treated her as such. If anything, she was the one that bossed him around. So what were they? Friends? She could be happy with that, except... except sometimes she would catch a glimpse of him like this, bent over a book, brow furrowed in concentration, while the sun shone through the shop's front window and brought out the gold in his hair, and a curl fell across his forehead, making her fingers itch to reach out and brush it away, and then she would realize that perhaps she wanted more.

But could there be more between them? And did Derwin feel the same? He was certainly very kind to her, but she couldn't tell if it was because he did have feelings for her but was too shy to let her know, or because he was simply being nice, or worse, because he needed her help.

As if he could feel her eyes on him, Derwin looked up and gave her one of his lopsided grins that made her stomach do a backflip. "Find anything interesting?" he asked.

"Just this." She held up a slightly moth-eaten copy of On the Origins of Species. Ever since Derwin brought up college, Alba had been trying to polish up on her science and biology, and was reading any biology book she could get her hands on. "You're ready to go?"

"I think I'll be a little longer," he said, scanning the shelf in front of him. "They have a really impressive selection of poetry. Do you mind?"

"Not at all. Take all the time you need."

Alba paid for her book and sat down on a bench by the door, intending to read while she waited for Derwin. However, her idle glance landed on something in the shop window opposite that chased all serious thoughts of biology and evolution from her mind. After a quick shout to let Derwin know where she was going, she nipped across the street for a closer look.

It was a dress. Not just any dress though. Made of yellow crepe so bright that it looked like it was woven from sunlight itself, it was a floor-length evening gown, with long sleeves slightly puffed at the shoulder, a gathered waist, and—her favorite part—a row of covered buttons that ran from the deep V of the neckline to the daring slit in the skirt just below the waist, showing an underskirt of gold organza underneath. Displayed next to it was a beaded handbag and a pair of gold dancing shoes to complete the look. It was the most glamorous thing she'd ever seen.

She was gazing at it like a kid outside a toy store on Christmas, when Derwin came up behind her. "Thinking of buying it?" he asked.

Alba turned around with a sheepish smile. "No, only admiring."

"Why not? It looks pretty."

"Exactly. It looks pretty. But where on Earth would I wear it? There's no point." She sighed and turned back to look at the gown wistfully.

Behind her, Derwin was looking too, though at her or the dress, she couldn't tell. "Haven't you ever bought something impractical?" he asked. "Just to own something pretty, just so you can look at it?"

Alba shook her head. As a kid back in Cuba, she'd had a closet full of pretty dresses, with lace trims and velvet bows and satin sashes. The prettiest of them all was the one Mami had made for her First Communion, a tiered and ruffled confection of the smoothest, shiniest white satin. Most of those dresses had been left behind when they moved to America. She'd soon outgrown the ones they had managed to take with them, so those had been handed down to Beatriz, and Alba had gotten used to wearing Raf's old shirts and shorts. She wore dresses now occasionally, but they were practical cotton ones with big pockets and knee-length skirts that allowed her to move around easily. There was no place in her wardrobe—or her life, for that matter—for this dress. Yet she couldn't stop looking at it.

"I think you should buy it," Derwin continued. "It really suits you."

Alba looked at the little price tag tastefully hidden by the sleeve. It wasn't as expensive as she thought, but even then, the whole ensemble would cost her two weeks' worth of paychecks. "I can't afford it," she said flatly and started to walk away. To her surprise, Derwin grabbed her arm and held her back.

"May I buy it for you then?" he said. "Consider it an early Christmas bonus."

She stared at him, wondering why he was so dead-set on her owning the dress. To be fair, it was gorgeous, and she would be happy to have it just hung in her closet so she could look at it from time to time. But for some reason, she felt uneasy with the idea of Derwin buying her a dress. It was a familiar, intimate gesture, and it would only confuse her already confused feelings about him.

"No, thanks," she said. "If I wanted to, I would get it myself. But it'd just mold in my closet anyway," she added, not without some regret. To her relief, Derwin didn't push it.

On the way home, they stopped at a diner for some late lunch. While they were perusing the menu, Alba tried bringing up the beach trip again. "It's just the five of us and the baby," she said. "And Marty has found this really secluded place, so there won't be anybody around. We can bring Otto too. Has he ever been to the beach?"

"Listen, I appreciate it," Derwin said reluctantly, "but I don't think I can just yet. Sorry."

Alba tried not to show her disappointment. "It's OK," she said, reaching across the table. "You don't have to apologize."

The waitress came bustling up to their table, causing Alba to quickly withdraw her hand. "Hi!" the waitress said brightly. "Y'all ready to order?"

"Um, yes," Alba said, cursing inwardly. "I'll have the chili and a side of cornbread, please. Derwin?"

Before Derwin could give his order, the door of the diner opened again. A black couple, probably in their thirties, elegantly dressed, walked through. The waitress looked up. Her face went pale underneath all the freckles. "Excuse me for a minute," she said and ran toward the back.

A moment later, the manager, a bully of a man, came out and went stomping to the black couple. He towered over them.

"You can't come in here," he said to the couple, his voice low, almost like a growl.

"We're not looking to sit down," explained the husband.

"We're just going to order and go," the wife chimed in. From their clothes and their manner, it was clear they were out-of-towners, probably from up north.

"It doesn't matter," the manager said. "You can't come in."

"But—there's no sign," the wife protested.

"There's no need for a sign this side of town, is there?" the manager snapped. Then he swallowed and apparently tried to compose himself. "I can see that you're not from around here, so I'm going to let this slide. You people will be happier in Overtown or Lemon City." The way he said you people made the phrase sound like a horrible slur. "Go, before you disturb our customers."

The wife cast a glance around the diner, seemingly on the verge of tears. Alba didn't know where to look. She kept her head bent over her menu, like a kid trying to avoid getting called up in class, while a flush crept over her face, burning her, stinging her insides with shame. After staring at the manager for a moment or two, the husband took the wife's hand and walked out again, their chins raised, their backs straight. The door slammed shut behind them.

"Sorry about that," the waitress said, clearing her throat. "May I take your order?"

Alba looked at Derwin and was astonished at the change on his face. He was still looking at the receding figures of the black couple, his face pale, his jaws clenched, his fingers clutching at the menu as if wanting to crush it.

"I'm sorry, I've lost my appetite," he said abruptly, getting to his feet. "We're going." He took his cane from under the table and limped to the door as fast as he could, so Alba had to scramble to follow him, leaving the waitress to stare after them in bewilderment.

She caught up with him at the car. "What's wrong?" she asked. "You OK?"

"I'm fine. Can we just go home?"

She started the car without another word. When they were about halfway home, Derwin spoke up, "I'm sorry for making you skip lunch."

"We can have sandwiches at home." She glanced at him. "Want to tell me what happened?"

It took a while for him to answer. "I just realized how lucky I am," he said slowly. "When people turn their back on me, I can leave. I can go somewhere else, where they don't know my name. Hell, if worse comes to worst, I could even move to a new city and change my name. But there are people out there being treated horribly because of the skin they were born with. Something they cannot change. They have to live with it every day. Where's the justice in that?" His eyes were bleak as he looked out the window. "I thought we went to war to change the world for the better, but then I came home and nothing's changed at all. So what did we kill ourselves for? What was the point?"

"So people will know that things need to change. So people will keep fighting and changing things for the better." Raf had told her something similar before he left for the Pacific. She'd asked why he would fight for a country that never quite accepted them, and he'd said "So others will have a better chance of being accepted." Now she continued, "Because they will change, you see. They are changing. Little by little, and slowly, but it is happening."

He turned and stared at her for a long time. She could only see him out of the corner of her eye, but she could feel the warmth of his gaze on her. Then he reached out and took her free hand in his. He'd never done it before; usually, it was her that reached out to him.

"See, this is why I said that dress would suit you," he said. "Not in a sartorial sense, but in a personal sense."

"What do you mean?"

"That dress is like the sun. And so are you."

Something in his voice made her breath hitch. She turned to him, but before she could think of anything to say, a car swerved in front of them, and she had to wrench her hand out of his to grip the steering wheel.

They were silent for the rest of the way. As Alba pulled into the drive, Derwin suddenly said, "I'd love to go to the beach with you and your friends."

Her heart leaped. "Oh, I'm so glad!" she said, then added, "If I'm pushing you too much—"

"No, you're not. I just decided I needed the change as well." With those enigmatic words, he went into the house with his purchase from the bookstore under his arm. "Besides, I think it would do Otto good to get out of the house once in a while," he added, stopping to pet an ecstatic Otto, who always greeted them after every trip as though they had been away not for a mere few hours, but for months and years. "He's getting a little stir-crazy."

Chapter 12

A/N: I have a lot of opinions about "Forever Amber", can't you tell? :))

Also, this is the dress I have in mind for Alba - it's from "The Guernsey Literary and Potato Peel Pie Society", and when I saw it, I just thought it would make the perfect late 1940s version of Belle's yellow dress.

Taglist: @kitkat80

#joseph quinn #joseph quinn fic #grunauer #grunauer overlord #overlord 2018 #grunauer x ofc

23 notes · View notes