Amantine's Song

Chapter 9

CHAPTER 5

University, research and life at the Parkers. Little space for anything else. The truth was that I didn’t want to compromise myself too much with Geoff. I had reached an age whereby I was at an easy to compromise age, I was the first to realize that. Geoff’s intentions were too serious for me. I understood that. But in the end, what could I do? Maybe leave him would be the most sensible and right thing for him. I couldn’t go and live with him. I wasn’t ready. And I didn’t even know if and when I would be.

‘Then, Jinny... it’s me and you this afternoon!’ The little girl had her dark eyes fixed on me and gave me a toothless smile, full of dimples, as I knelt down to secure her in the stroller and placed the little pink woollen hat on her head. ‘And we’re going for a nice walk, so maybe Amantine will take a nice cup of coffee and for you she will buy a nice biscuit and…’

And nothing! I was shameless and definitely a naughty girl. Because I knew what I was looking for, heading at full speed from Holland Park Avenue to Notting Hill Gate. Above all, stopping at that precise point where I thought I could find him, he who wasn’t there now. I used to take the underground at Holland Park, closer to home. Only when I went to Geoff on Sunday mornings, I preferred to reach Notting Hill station so I didn’t have to change the line going to Edgware Road.

‘We don’t care at all if he’s not here... they’re not here...’ I snorted sullenly. ‘We’re going to get a wonderful coffee and a great bickie!’

‘Bic… kie!’ Jinny repeated enthusiastically, beating her little hands. Every now and then she pointed at something, murmuring a few words and I, lost in my thoughts, pretended to indulge her.

I did what I could but didn’t shine with maternal instinct and active conversation with such a small child. Maybe I had never really been a child myself. I had never claimed anyone’s attention. I was born already old, introvert, surly and slightly hysterical.

I took the coffee and the biscuits, one for me as well, not caring about my shape, and we headed to Holland Park. The park had swings for children and we could take advantage of the sunny day that was not so cold. I placed Jinny on the swing and pushed her gently for a while. Shortly thereafter she managed to push herself by swinging her little legs. She was a child of few aspirations, luckily for me. She would swing for a while, easily pleased, she loved the swing.

I went to sit on the bench not far away and took from my bag the book on Byron’s life I was reading. I held it on my knees without opening it and looked around. Not many people around, just some other kids in the playground.

I felt like I was being watched. Or maybe I felt lost. Intimidated, scared of a life that wasn’t going anywhere. Or maybe, yes, somewhere, it was going somewhere, but... was it really what I wanted? Or just what I thought I wanted?

I had always known exactly what to do with myself. All my life, a well-defined line, without smudges. But what if... I was wrong? If that wasn’t the right life for me? If I was stubbornly trying to reach and become part of a world that wasn’t and would never be really mine?

No way. I had fought too hard for that world. I was not going to lose it. I wouldn’t let it go. It belonged to me. Because in addition to being born already old, introvert, surly and slightly hysterical, I was also born disgustingly and irretrievably coherent.