12
Sweet adolescence
Thessaloniki, February 1986
‘Eleni, this is really not like you!’ Mrs Antoniou cried. ‘I am rather more in favour of your jitteriness and circus acrobatics in class. Can you get out of hibernation at once, please. We need your jittery mind in class today.’
Eleni blushed so much that she felt the redness go down her chest and her back. She had almost fallen asleep during Greek class, her favourite. Mrs Antoniou always liked to tease her and to accompany her compliments about Eleni being top of class with comments about her circus-monkey behaviour. She had enjoyed this in the past. It felt like someone was accepting her for her best and her worst all at once. But today, being dragged out of her dark space, being exposed in front of everybody like this, was a step too
