Whitney 118

"Now let me guess. It sounds like that was the decisive moment. Am I right?"

"She said she had to think. She took off her glasses and stared to the window and then to a giant mirror on the wall. Then she put her glasses on again and I could see that she had made a decision. These are her own words now. Maybe this is wrong. You are so young. but I want to give you something. Not now. Next week, when my foot is a bit better, I know what you want. No man has ever given me what you just gave to me. The moment of our song will never come back. I will never forget it. You gave it to me in your way. What I want to give you will never come back either. And I will give it to you in my way. Just once. But only if you are sure you can handle it. Follow me, don't interrupt me, don't take anything over. And then we'll see how far it goes. Can we agree about that? And I said, agreed, I'll follow you. Again her own words. We need a full afternoon. Just once. And you must not try to follow me afterwards. Don't come back. Can you promise me that? And I said yes, I promise. Then we chose a day. Her place, her room. And we introduced ourselves. Her name was an abbreviation. It's written the same way as C sharp in Dutch. Cis. The song is called Francesca, the Italian version of her name. Before leaving the room I asked about her foot and she showed it to me briefly. It was all black and blue. The last thing she said was, you have very beautiful hands. Your song is still in my head. It will help me fall asleep. See you next week. And then I left".

"You were almost seventeen. Was she much older?"

"At the time I estimated she was nineteen. But she may well have been early twenties".

"And did she keep her word?"

"Yes, and so did I. She taught me everything. I gave her all my trust. There was no rush. I felt safe and protected. It was all about her seduction. She knew exactly what she was doing, step by step. She was like the leader of the rope in mountain climbing. It was all about route finding, not fixating on reaching the top. The book chapter about her is called Symphony in Cis".

"And what happened with the song? Did you ever record it or sing it in public?"

"Yes, it got a place of honor on a solo album and I sometimes sang it at concerts, depending on the audience and the stage. She has always remained sacrosanct to me. But now it's time for you to check your smartphone. It's a quarter past five".

"Thank you for sharing this with me. I completely forgot about the smartphone. Here are the glasses. My glasses are better for the smartphone. Were her eyes worse than mine?"

"My face was about one foot away when she drew me near. So yes, minus three or minus four"

"No news. We have at least half an hour left. Is this the end of the journey you had in mind?"

"The final location is the entrance of the preparatory high school. It's just around the corner over there".

"OK, let's hit the road"