Box of Chocolates

Origami stories

Aislyn straightened the square of white paper, smoothing its creases by pressing it hard against the wooden table top with the palm of her hand. No, it was no good, not even this one... And now the paper was ruined, the wrinkles and fold lines would remain on its surface forever.

She sighed and pushed the used square to the side, towards a messy pile of similar squares, and took a new, smooth piece from another stack. Yet again, she looked inside the book lying on the table in front of her-- it contained instructions to make a whole lot of origami things. Boats, flowers, and animals... And a whole lot of birds-- cranes, swallows, parrots, and doves... She had tried them all. But the kind she was attempting to make, those small white birds she could not name which she kept seeing in her dreams, were not there...

"Aislyn, hey, are you listening? Where shall I take you aujourd'hui? To the park again? Or for a walk by the... the... le fleuve?" Suzette, suddenly standing behind her, asked impatiently.

Aislyn closed her origami book and looked at the other girl. It was time to go out; the paper birds would have to wait.

This is not how you imagined your stay in London, I know, Aislyn mused. She pitied the nineteen-years-old student from Paris, coming to spend her summer in London as an au pair, to improve her English. Suzette definitely needed that, Aislyn admitted. What she did not need was to look after a fourteen-years-old girl with a dislocated ankle, bound to spend the holidays in a wheelchair. A girl so quiet and introverted that she not only hardly ever spoke, but neither listened to Suzette's endless rattling most of the time. Not much help with her English there...

"River, Suzette, le fleuve is the river Thames. And bring me my notebook, please," Aislyn said, smiling to herself.

She was sorry for Suzette, but, secretly, she didn't mind her injured ankle. Now, finally, she could spend her days reading, drawing, and scribbling into her notebook, a thing she was not encouraged to do normally. Her parents expected her to study, go to her ballet and violin lessons daily, and if she had some time left, hang out with her 'friends'-- a group of posh, spoiled girls from good families whom they picked for her.

Not that they ever noticed if she did any of those things, that was Suzette's job, and before her Dolores', and before that... She could not even remember that girl's name anymore. Aislyn's parents were too busy with their own lives to follow her too closely personally.

Anyway, suddenly avoiding all this, and even the boring swimming pool, the only place where Suzette actually liked to take her-- because there, unlike in the park or by the river, she always found a group of boys her age to chat with, while Aislyn was forced to swim for hours on end under the strict glare of her swimming teacher-- was a real holiday.

Aislyn opened her notebook the moment Suzette passed it to her, even before the girl pushed her out of the flat, locked the door, and called the lift.

At least there was a lift in their house-- most of the houses similar to their, built high above the Richmond Park a century or so ago, did not have one. If that would be the case, Aislyn was sure that Suzette would be back in Paris already, sunbathing somewhere on the green under la Tour Eiffel, winking at the English speaking tourists. Maybe she would learn her English faster that way...

Aislyn masked the fit of giggles caused by the image which the idea painted promptly in her mind-- a picture of a very cheerful Suzette wearing a short, flowery, summer dress, lying on a picnic blanket with a couple of friends, listening to loud pop music while blowing huge, pink bubbles with her enormous chewing gum and waving at the young tourists queuing up to buy tickets to the Eiffel Tower-- behind her hand, while the lift wheezed and rattled to a stop.

"Mon dieu c'est lourde..." Suzette muttered, pushing the wheelchair out of the lift a few minutes later, even as they were greeted by the doorman.

"Miss Aislyn, Suzette," Mr. Cumberbatch greeted them, scrambling to his feet and hurrying from behind his desk to open the door for the girls.