Question: I use some Dutch in the story. If you many of you find it distracting let me know. My grandmother immigrated her about the same time that I set this story. I am modeling the Dutch/English slippage off of her. Some words she never said in English.

Disclaimer: I own nothing but the OC.

AN: Thanks for the support. Please Review

They walked down the sidewalk side by side in silence. Steve made sure to stay between her and the busy street like a gentleman. He was scared he would embarrass himself so he stuck his hands in his coat pocket and focused putting one foot in front of the other. He occasionally risks a quick glance at his pretty companion.

It had been two days since Steve had knocked on Else's door to tell her off about her music. Two days of being harassed by Bucky to close the deal and take the pretty girl form 3B on a date. So here he was on a warm summer afternoon escorting her to the restaurant Bucky had recommended.

He tried to appear as casual as his nerves would allow. 'Stay calm, she invited you; she's not just some friend of a girl Bucky is seeing. Stop grinning like a fool.' It was safe assumption that Steve was not used to being on a date without Bucky in tow. "Nice…nice weather today."

"Mhmm." Else agreed and sniffed the daffodil Steve had given her when she greeted him at her door. It was such a lovely flower she decided to take it with her. She was content to allow her new friend set the pace for their conversation. She wondered if it was possible to reach out and touch his nervousness as it rolled off of him in waves. She was thankful that he was brave enough to ask her out to dinner. She had been bold on their first encounter and was afraid she had spooked this petite young man.

"So…uh… I hope you like Italian. Bucky said it's the best Italian in all of Brooklyn."

"Bucky?"

"Yah, Bucky, he's been my best friend since we were kids in hell's kitchen. He lives down the block but he spends more time at my place than his own. You will probably see him soon enough."

"I would be delighted to meet your friends." She says. He falls mute again. 'Okay, she wants to meet Bucky, that's a good thing, showing interest in my friends. But Bucky has a way of charming women. I don't want her comparing me to him. I will definitely fall short in the physical categories. Perhaps I should put that off indefinitely. Doubt he would allow that to happen.'

He swallowed a lump in his throat and opens the door of the restaurant for her. "Sure." He mumbles in response.

They were seated at a booth in the back and Steve did not fail to notice the second looks they were getting from the staff and patrons, nor how those looks lingered on Else. 'She is lovely. I bet they think she is my cousin or something. How could a guy like me be out with a girl like her? 'Stop it Steve, be confident, lovely girl, lovely night, don't ruin it with all this self-doubt.'

Today her face is smudge free and radiant. Eyes alight trying to absorb the entirety of their surroundings. She wore a pale blue cotton summer dress that buttons up the front. She has her hair tied back with a matching ribbon. She had stuck his silly daffodil in her waistband. It would have looked silly on any other woman, but she made it look vogue. He tried to capture the image in his memory. Perhaps later tonight when he was alone he would try and put it down on paper.

"So Else, what is it that you do?"

"O Mr. Rogers don't ruin a perfectly promising evening by talking about work. There has to be better questions in that head of yours you seem to live in." She teased.

Startled, he tried again, "Ok, …. Umm Why do you like Opera music?" She smiled like he told her that all the stars were diamonds and he would dedicate his life to procuring them for her.

"Ah, that is a better question, but one infinitely more difficult to answer." After a short interruption when they ordered their food, Else tried to answer it. "I think it's because it is the background music to all my favorite memories. My father was an enthusiast. He had a large collection of 78's. He said it there was nothing quite like it or its equal. The theatre was a curious place, magician's trick-boxes where the golden memories of dramatic triumphs linger like nostalgic ghosts, and where the unexplainable, the fantastic, the tragic, the comic and the absurd are routine occurrences. All man's follies are laid out before us."

He smiled at her passionate answer. 'Yes, passionate would be a good way to describe her' "So what folly was being sung about yesterday?

"O, that one was the flying Dutchman." Her voice drops like she is sharing a piece scandalous rumor. "A sailor is cursed by the devil to live forever until he finds the love of a honest woman who be faithful till death, only he can only come ashore once every seven years. Senta falls in love with him before she meets him and promises to be faithful. They become betrothed and before they meet her gossips and contender for her affection question her character. He thinks he has been hoodwinked and her and will remain cursed. But she was faithful. She vows her unwavering love and in the end throws herself in the ocean to release him from his curse. They then ascend to heaven together."

"That sounds…terrible."

"It's an Opera." She grinned at the look of horror on his face. "They may not always happy in the way we wish them to be, but they are always beautiful. That is what my father always said."

"He sounds like a romantic." He grinned.

"He was." Her grin slips for a brief moment. Her joy is clouded by sorrow that only another orphan can recognize. Steve pulls at his collar, not even five minutes in and he said something wrong. "My father was romantic about life in general. He definitely set the standard for all men." She looks Steve squarely in the eye and smiles when she sees the blush climb up his neck. "My moder was a ballerina at Det Kongelige Teaters in Copenhagen. He saw her perform one night and said she danced off stage with his heart in her hand." Her smile is not tinted with sadness anymore. "So Mr. Rogers, how about you? Is there some great romance in your life that all women will fail to live up to?" She arched her brow at him

He blushes a lovely shade of red and he tugged on his collar again. 'Well she seems to be only interested in me. This is going swell.'

"No can't say that I do. My father was a soldier in the Great War and my mother was a tuberculosis nurse. …They've passed too." He chokes out past his discomfort. 'Great let's talk about something even more depressing, maybe dead puppies or the collapse of her country would be a great topic for dessert.' he quips to himself.

It is Else who reaches across the table and grabs his hand in a comforting gesture. "I'm sorry. I teased you for asking a dull question and I am the one who led us to such a somber conversation." She gives his hand a squeeze. He thinks how soft and lovely her hands are, and he prays she doesn't feel how sweaty his palms are.

Their food arrives along with a two glasses of cheap wine. Else raises her glass and toasts with Steve. "To our parents love stories, may we never forget them and to one day finding our own." He is awed by her ability to smooth over their potential conversation quagmire. He still acutely feels the pain of losing his parents and he can only imagine she feels the same about hers. Here she comes in like a whirlwind of energy and pulls him out of his awkwardness and calms his nerves. Steve is enchanted by her poise and ease with handling the uncomfortable situations. He can only think to describe her as ineffable.

He didn't know how to talk to women. Women generally didn't ever want to talk to him so it was a nonissue. But he desperately wanted to keep talking to her, to peel back all of her layers and know her. He was terrified he was on the brink of losing all ability to string words together in coherent sentences. 'Okay Rogers, need to find safe territory.'

"So Else… how does a swell Danish girl find life here in Brooklyn?"

"OH. It's a gode adventure Ja. I have never truly lived in a city such as this before. It's not home but maybe someday it will be. You? You seem to be a true New Yorker?

"Yeah. A New York Irish Catholic through and through."

She slurps at her spaghetti and some of the red sauce surreptitiously lands on her nose. 'Damn, even with food on her face she is lovely.' He tries to not stare at her nose. "I'm in art school so New York is an … ideal place to be. Umm. So many galleries…" he can't look her in the eye. 'Should I tell her? Should I wipe it off?' "The city itself is just a beautiful place to be. It's the city that never sleeps. I can't tell if art reflects life or if it's the other way round."

She laughs, "Have you been anywhere else Steve?"

"Umm. No." He turns red in the face again. Else realizes that she interpreted her laughter as mocking him and takes quick steps to rectify.

"O Steve, you are correct. I havebeen many places and New York is so unique but I find the locals are lacking in something."

Quickly he moves from embarrassed to miffed. "What do you mean lacking?"

"Why they are too busy looking at their setting and the grandeur of the place but they seem, to me at least, to overlook the subtle things. The real gems."

"Why do you say that?"

"Why else would I be on a date with you this evening. Clearly the women here don't know a good man when they see one. You should be snatched up by now. I met you all of five seconds and I knew you were a good one. I don't waste my time on bad company Mr. Rogers." He tugged at his collar and took a long drink of his wine.

"Steve, call me Steve. Only fitting since I call you by your given name."

"Yes, you can call me El if you want. Maybe easier to pronounce, Ja?. It is what my friends called me in Copenhagen. Else was my moder, made it easier."

"Well than, El, I should warn you, since we are now friends, you have a bit of sauce…on your nose, just there." He points to it, and when she seems to obviously miss it with her napkin, he reaches over to remove the offending piece of food himself.

"My Hero!" She teases. He grows flustered and quickly withdraws his hand knocking over a water glass. 'Perfect, just perfect' he chastises himself. 'I try to flirt and end up soaking her.'

Else quickly helps mop up the mess. He was more skittish than a newborn colt. She was afraid that he wanted to run for the hills but his sense of chivalry prevented him from abandoning her at diner.

In his haste to divert attention from his shortcomings at being suave he blurts out the first question that pops in his mind. "So how where you able to make it over the Atlantic? I thought civilian travel from Europe was next to impossible?" 'Oh perfect Steve, right on time with that 'dessert conversation' lets talk about Ware in Europe.'

"Well the signs were all there that Hitler was going to invade. It was difficult decision to leave. I didn't want to but a friend convinced me." Her voice drops and she start to play with her food. No longer eating, or looking him in the eye. "We had heard what they did in Poland. My moder was a Mischling so I used my contacts through the University to leave. It was easier, being just I. A Herr Huber took me on as his assistant and helped me across the border. We got papers to attend a mathematic and cryptography symposium at Université Pierre et Marie Curie in Paris. From there it was just a matter of bribing the right official to book passage to Morocco and then America. It was quite dull travel really. No seducing a Luftwaffe or kidnapping a high ranking official's family, just money and waiting around in hotel rooms."

He could only nod his head at her spectacular story. Sneaking through customs, crossing several borders and the Atlantic Ocean. It was not something you shrug off as an everyday occurrence. He could tell she was holding back. Strange that he was picking up on these mannerisms after only a short acquaintance. He could only imagine what this proper lady was refraining from sharing. He was after all a stranger.

'She must have been brave to run away. Will she keep running? Her country has surrendered. Warzone is no place for a sweet girl on her own. What is she doing with me?'

She steered the conversation to safer topics and over the remainder of their dinner they talked about art and all of the places in the city Else needed to visit. Art, they talked extensively about art. He was pleasantly surprised how well versed she was in the art masters and had mentioned some of the works she had seen in person. He learned she favors the impressionists and it evolved to a lively debate of Monet vs. Manet.

The sun was starting to set when they made their way back to their apartment building. She loops her hand in the crook of his elbow and his gait falters for a step. She keeps initiating physical contact because she knows he is too much of gentleman and too shy to be so bold. In that moment he appreciates how she wore flats and she doesn't appear to tower over him. He stands a little taller.

"Why did you ask me out?" Steve blurts when they are a few blocks from home. He turns red, more shocked that he asked the question that has been on his mind all night than she is. 'How could I have just blurted that out?' She stops and turns to face him letting go of his arm.

"O, I wish you could see you as I see you. It's hard to explain. You ever hear stories of people avoiding disaster because they had a sixth sense not to go somewhere, do something. Well it was kind of like that only the feeling was, this man is going to be important to me. I must get to know him. Am I silly?" Steve shifts his weight on his feet. He didn't know what he was expecting but it wasn't that. He needs to stop blushing and exclaiming unfiltered thoughts around her.

"No, it's not silly. Just…I mean…look at me."

"And?" Else looks Steve over thoroughly from head to toe. His small frame, whose clothes just seem a hang off him, blonde hair and a mouth that looks better in a smile than the current grimace it is now. She is barely taller than him and her soft curves are in contrast to his boney angles. However, she sees the man that he is. Like his heart, his character makes him twice the size of any gentleman on the street. She barely knows him and of this fact she is certain. "Don't second guess this too much Steve. The world is at war. We might not have as much time as we think."

For a few heartbeats he just stares at her, debating whether or not to accept her assessment of the situation. In all of his 22 years he has never been offered a sweeter proposition. To accept her liking him and preferring his company with all of his social setbacks is too much to pass up. So he nods before offering his arm to her to continue on their journey. It was in that moment he would set the course of their future. Because when a man who the world perceives as weak first tastes the power of being accepted there is not a force in the universe that can stop their resolve.

Music from an open windows wafts down from the open windows filling calming the heated moment between them. And like turning on a light her serious demeanor switches back to the lighthearted one from dinner. "O, I do love this song. My moder taught me how to 'truckin' a few years ago." Else exclaims when Ina Ray Hutton starts to play.

"Can't say that I know how to do that one." He laughs when she lets go of his arm and in the middle of the sidewalk begins to dance to the jazz music. Her feet are turned out and she moves her weight back and forth from foot to foot with a slight hop and wagging her finger in the air to the beat.

"They had to have something new / dance to do up there in Harlem so. / Someone started truckin'. / As soon as news got round / Folks downtown came up to Harlem saw / everybody truckin'"

A few bystanders began to clap and she threw her head back and laughed. He clapped too and vigorously shakes his head no when she tries to get him to dance too.

"O, such a spoil sport Steve. Don't you ever dance?" She gives up and pinches his arm playfully. She is a bid sad that she can now see their building. The evening is almost over.

"I don't really know how to do those swing dancing moves. Never learned."

"Slow dancing? Did you ever learn to do those?"

"Girls aren't actually lining up to dance with a guy like me. Asking them seems quite terrifying really. Figured I'd just wait."

"Wait for what?"

"The right partner." This time it is Else who blushes at the hopeful look in Steve's eye. He truly is the sweetest man she has ever met. The war had turned decent men into the baser versions of themselves. Even here in America, where they have not yet declared war, men have attained certain coldness. She sent up a silent prayer that her Steve never lost his goodness, his heart.

A/N

So this was a bit difficult to write. I have a decent map now of how this story lays out. I wanted to end on a very hopeful note.
Opera is real. You can see the whole thing on Youtube.

Also Truckin was a very popular dance step in 1937. It is very easy to do. Again see you tube. Ina Hutton does it in her video.

I am not a WWII expert. If I have a huge gaping whole, lets just call it authors license for now unless you can help me close it up.

Mischling is a characterization used by Germans to classify how jewish somebody was. A mischling had at least one Jewish Grandparent

Next Chapter:

This budding romance needs to have a small hiccup. Else gets a visit from a familiar person. And we are getting closer to Pearl Harbor