Innocence Lost

by Patty Jansen

  *     *     *

  They performed the ceremony on the rear deck of the barge in the waning light. Johanna wore the dress, which Nellie had made pretty with ruffles cut from one of the sheets and a necklace of flowers. Roald wore his royal jacket, which Nellie’s attempt to wash had only marginally improved. The crown and the staff were hopefully still in the broom cupboard in the palace, but he still had his rings, and his fingers, although quite slender, were thicker than hers. His seal.

  Nellie slid the golden ring on Johanna’s index finger, the only finger it would fit. It felt heavy and cumbersome on her hand.

  Roald stood stiff and wouldn’t look at anyone.

  Johanna was scared, cold and miserable and shivered through most of it, but inside her, she felt a seed of pride. She held herself straight while Nellie spoke all the words she had heard her father say so many times.

  She was nervous, too, and stumbled a few times.

  Johanna did this for her country, for the freedom of Saardam. If the four of them were all that was left of the free kingdom, then the four of them would do their best to find other free people and liberate their country.

  Johanna didn’t know that Roald understood much of Nellie’s words. He stared at the riverbank most of the time, and had to be prompted to make his reply.

  “I do,” sounded like a death sentence coming from those lifeless lips.

  They went inside the cabin, and ate some of the best sausages Johanna and Roald had collected from the farm, drank the wine from the captain’s cabin, but it was not until Nellie said that from now on Johanna and Roald should have the captain’s cabin, that it fully hit what she’d agreed to do. And she thought at that moment Roald understood, too. All of a sudden, she was overcome by the desire to scream at Nellie don’t leave me alone with him, but it was far too late. Nellie announced that she was tired and she and Loesie left.

  Johanna stood there in the middle of the cabin, clamping her hands around her as Roald shut the door, and bolted it. No way out.

  “We are married, now?” he asked.

  “Yes.”

  He laughed, “Heheheheeee.” His eyes twinkled with mischief. “Now I can look.”

  Johanna cringed, but there was really no way out, and the quicker this part was over and done with, the better.

  Slowly she opened the buttons of her dress and pulled the fabric aside. He sat on the edge of the bed as she wrestled herself out of her dress. Watching. She was so nervous he could have knocked her over with a single finger. He just sat and watched, his eyes wide, as she hung up the dress and slid her underclothes off, first the underdress, and then the corset. The hooks came undone; her breasts hung free. His mouth fell open, like a little boy in a sweet store. She didn’t think he had seen a naked woman before.

  With great effort, she had to force herself to cross to him. She slid the jacket off his shoulders. With a feeling of shame, she noticed that it was still not completely dry.

  “Come.”

  She had to force herself not to shudder. Her fingers trembled as she undid his shirt. His skin underneath was soft and quite tanned, completely without chest hair, and so skinny that his ribs were clearly visible. His nipples, dark brown and erect, lay flat against his chest. No man-boobs here. Apart from his tan, he didn’t look very healthy. How often did he forget to eat?

  The trousers were harder to get off and not just because she was nervous or unfamiliar with the belt buckle and fastening. He bent over to stroke her naked shoulders very gingerly with the tips of his fingers, making goose bumps run down her back. His hands were cold.

  The belt fell off and the trousers came down. He undid the string to his under pants. They fell, too, but remained suspended on a particular part of his anatomy. He grinned.

  “I’m a man, see? I know what to do.”

  She doubted it. She didn’t know herself. For all the flirting and the dancing she had done, the kiss from the Baron’s son was the closest she’d ever come to the marital bed and that bed loomed ever closer against the back wall of the cabin. The curtains fluttered with a draught.

  She sat next to him on the edge of the mattress, the sheets soft under her naked skin.

  He sat next to her and cupped her breast in his hand, a skinny, bony hand with large knuckles.

  “It’s so soft.” His chest heaved with deep breaths. His eyes, wide and mad, were on the hair between her legs. “Hee hee heeee. I know what to do,” he said.

  With one hand, he pushed her down in the mattress. Johanna forced herself to recline willingly. Best not to resist, lest he go into one of his aggressive moods. Blood roared in her ears.

  With surprising agility, he jumped on her and pushed her back into the pillows. Naked skin met naked skin. His was clammy, and slick with sweat. He thrust his hips forward, hard, and his member poked painfully into a very sensitive spot. She couldn’t restrain a yelp.

  “Ow!”

  He ignored her and kept pushing, now rocking his hips. She tried spreading her legs, but he was all over the place, smearing slime on her inner thighs.

  “Roald, stop. Stop!”

  He did, which surprised her, his chest heaving.

  “You’re hurting me.” She was shivering so much that her jaw threatened to seize up. “Maybe it’s better if you lie on your back.”

  “All right.” He chuckled.

  She clambered off the narrow bunk and waited, trying to get control of her shattered nerves while he settled himself. A wide grin spread across his face.

  She stepped closer to the bed. He grabbed her wrist and pulled her. Johanna almost fell on top of him.

  “Wait, calm down.”

  She lifted her leg over him and crouched over him. This bunk sure wasn’t made for these types of acrobatics. “Here,” she whispered, while holding his member up. The tip glistered with slime. “Hold it like that.”

  She lowered herself, found the right spot. Breathed in deeply, pushed down. There was a sharp pain and tightness as he slid into her.

  He gave a long moan, his head arched back into the pillow.

  Well, that was it, she guessed. She was no longer a virgin. But what now? This wasn’t “it”, was it?

  She slowly rocked her hips. He moaned again and gripped her thighs with white-knuckled hands, arched his back so he lifted her right off the mattress.

  “Ow, ow. That’s hurts!”

  But he was bucking and threshing like wild sea cow in a net and Johanna was being bounced about. She managed to get her knees under her, and lifted herself at the same time he arched his back. He slipped out of her.

  “Wait, Roald.”

  But he bucked and emitted a loud “Huuuuhhhh!” and something wet squirted over her right thigh.

  He fell back onto the pillow. Johanna sat there, trembling, while she watched a glob of white slime trickle down her leg.

  She guessed that was it, and it hadn’t quite gone where it was intended to go.

  “That was good,” he said. “I want more.”

  He stared up at the ceiling. His member had already gone limp. She didn’t think there would be ‘more’ tonight.

  She was shivering so much she could barely lift herself from the bed. Her upper legs were a sticky mess and when she felt the sore spot between her legs, her finger came away covered in blood-streaked slime.

  There was nothing in the cabin to wipe herself and she didn’t want to go outside like this. Nellie would . . .

  Oh, Nellie.

  The cabin faded in a haze of tears.

  Johanna managed to get her underdress back on and lay down in the warm hollow in the mattress next to him. He was asleep in moments. Johanna cried into the pillow all night.