A Hundred Million Years and a Day by Jean-Baptiste Andrea

Author:Jean-Baptiste Andrea
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Gallic Books
Published: 2020-08-04T16:00:00+00:00

Mathilde came every year, like many of those children who swelled the population of our village in summer, because their parents had a house there or because they wanted to breathe our beautiful air. We all wandered around the dusty streets in a loose band, a nebula whose centre was formed around the most popular kids. I was on the periphery, an insignificant comet, following them around sometimes without being noticed, pretending to join in their games.

At that age, all girls are pretty. But she was the prettiest. And finally, after four summers, at the age of thirteen, I worked up the nerve to speak to her. I deviated from my usual orbit and approached the sun, inviting her to come and see my fossil collection, on the hilltop near the little church of Notre-Dame des Lavandes. I couldn’t invite her to the farm, because of the Commander.

I didn’t expect her to say yes. Girls who were much less pretty than she had already rejected me. When she agreed, my head exploded with incredulity at her stunning beauty and I shrugged and muttered: ‘Ciao, see you tomorrow then.’ I ran home. I was burning to tell someone. But who? My mother was no longer there.

The next day, I arrived an hour early. I sat amid the scent of lavender, laid out my fossils on a beach towel, folded the edges, and waited. She arrived late. Without apologising, she sat down next to me. We didn’t say anything for a long time, so long that the shadow of a cypress tree moved, creaking, until it covered us.

So I unfolded my towel and showed her my ammonites, my belemnites, and my crowning glory – an insect preserved in a drop of amber. Ignoring them, she turned to me and unbuttoned the top half of her dress. Gaping, I stared at her breasts. They were small and very white, with blue veins and pink nipples. I thought my heart was going to burst.

‘What are you waiting for?’ she asked with a smile.

I lowered my eyes and stared into the earth. I no longer understood what we were doing there, or the strange emotions that were bubbling up inside me. I started to name each fossil in a trembling voice. She shrugged, said, ‘Suit yourself,’ buttoned up her dress, and turned away from me.

I’m sorry, Mathilde, it wasn’t easy for me to know what to do. Nobody had ever taught me to touch the living. The only flesh I knew was stone. I wished I could explain this to her but I couldn’t find the words. It took me years to find them. Besides, I wouldn’t have had time. Just then, the boys from the group came pouring out of the woods. I don’t know if they’d followed her or if they had come that way by chance. They looked at me as if seeing me for the first time. I heard one of them say: ‘Who’s that?’ Yelling, they swooped on my fossils. They left Mathilde alone because they respected her, admired her.

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