On A Day Like This Read Free Page B

and he hurled accusations at them that he later regretted. He looked at Fabienne and tried to read some lingering trace of his kiss in her eyes. But all he saw in her look was distaste.
    On the way home, she sat in the front, next to Manuel. It was a warm night, they had the roof of the 2CV down, as they drove back over the hill to the village. Manuel drew up in front of Andreas’s parents’ house. They said their good-byes. Fabienne leaned back between the seats and kissed Andreas on both cheeks. He stopped by the garden gate and watched the car disappear around the corner. Then he remained sitting on the front steps for a long time, smoking and thinking about Fabienne and his love for her.
    When he next saw her, a couple of days later, she was different, still friendly but distant. They went swimming again, but Fabienne seemed to take care not to be alone with Andreas. Eventually the weather changed, and it got too cold to swim. Then they only saw each other with the rest of the group, going to the cinema or meeting in a restaurant. In the autumn, Fabienne returned to Paris, to study German. Andreas hadn’t gone to the station to see her off—why, he could no longer remember.
    After Fabienne was gone, Andreas felt how little he and Manuel had in common. They saw each other once or twice still, but without Fabienne there, their meetings were boring.
    He read the scene a second time. The footnotes explained those words that were not part of the basic vocabulary.
    canal: man-made waterway
alongside: next to, by the side of
kiss: two people pressing their lips together
    At the end of the chapter there were some comprehension questions.
    Why is Jens disappointed?
What do you know about Angélique?
Where is Schleswig-Holstein?
    That time at the lake, Andreas felt glad that Fabienne had run away. He was in love with her, but for the time being that first kiss was enough for him, that first touch. In the ensuing weeks he sometimes imagined what would have happened if she had kissed him back. They would run into the forest together. They would hide in the undergrowth, take off their bathing suits. They would lie on the forest floor, which was warm and soft in Andreas’s imagination. Then Manuel would come calling for them, and they would hurriedly pull theirbathing suits back on and stroll down to the lake, as though nothing had happened. Fabienne would look at Andreas, and smile. Manuel surely must have noticed what had happened, but Andreas didn’t care. In his imagination he felt strangely proud and solemn. They were all quiet on the drive back. Andreas sat in the back, studying Fabienne, her tanned neck, with little tiny, almost invisible hairs on it, her pink translucent ears, her pinned back hair. Through her T-shirt he could see the outline of her shoulderblades and the straps of her bra.
    Fabienne’s beauty had always taken his breath away. It was the flawless beauty of a statue. He imagined his hands gliding over her body, which would be cool as bronze or smooth marble. In his projection, Fabienne had remained the young girl he had first met, and when he thought of her he felt as young and inexperienced as he had been at the time. He couldn’t imagine Fabienne sweaty or tired, or aroused, or in a temper. He couldn’t imagine her naked.
    In the winter after Fabienne’s departure, Andreas’s mother died of breast cancer. She had known she was sick for some time, but she had first concealed it fromthe family, and then played it down. Even when she had only a little time to live, she still pretended everything was OK. The atmosphere in the house was unbearable, and finally Andreas rented a room in the city, and came home only at weekends. He would usually arrive after lunch on Saturday, and go straight up to his room. He said he had to work. Then he would lie on his bed and read his old children’s books, and only come down for supper. After supper, he disappeared as quickly as possible into the village, to meet