Two Loves

Chapter 29

A series of letters

To: Miss Wilhelmina Thornton, London                                                       5th of May, 1892

My dear Minnie,

I promised to write to you as soon as I arrive at this charming place - forgive me for delaying it! My days have been so filled with all kinds of merriment that I simply didn't find the time for it.

We arrived here on Monday and have been in the best of moods since then.

Of course, the true purpose of our stay is not forgotten. Atticus tends over Isaac like a nurse and will not let him go three steps on his own - a behaviour the patient seems quite to enjoy. The last day, they spent almost fully on the terrace, where Isaac lay in a sun-chair, inhaled the sea breeze and let himself be fed, entertained and serenaded by his companion.

Even my dearest Cymbeline starts to let the rays of optimism in her so naturally sceptic temper.

Oh, Minnie, if I could tell you how wonderful it is to be here with her!

Each morning, we wake up next to each other and see the others face instead of the sunrise.
She said that it feels quite like being back at boarding school and sharing rooms with her companions - a time she seems to remember with great melancholy, joy and sadness. Sooner or later, I will get to the bottom of it.

But just to see her without the thin lines of constant worrying or to be tenderly touched by her, what joy is that.

The room we share is on the East-side of the house, so that we see the sun rise in the morning and the men in the room on the other side of the hallway see the sun set in the evening. Our whole day spans between these two cycles of life.

Each day, after the morning toilette and dressing, we usually have breakfast at around ten in the morning. The boys would even like to get up later, since they both belong to the type of young men that think that one shouldn't see nine o'clock two times a day (a bon mot I picked up from Cymbeline, and that I cannot await to use on my brother Aidan once he comes back).
But Cymbeline and I are, thankfully, both early birds and want to make most of the time. We have so much time on our hands that we simply do not know what we should do first!

Mostly, we spend the morning idly with playing games or doing sports. Atticus persuaded me to play tennis against him after I mentioned that I learned it briefly last summer, and soon, he and Cymbeline had set up a net on the back lawn and found two bats in a shed hidden under two birch trees.

We set our positions, cheered on by both siblings, Isaac of course fixing his attention on my opponent, while Cymbeline was already encouragingly chanting my name.

I suppose Atticus expected an easy victory, given that he is tall and fit and all that.

Oh, I can almost hear how you will laugh about this sentence!

I hope I have not ruined our friendship when he saw his meagre head start waning away and leave him completely in the second half of the match. Cymbeline was counting the points and shouted each number with increasing pride.

I am unfair - Atticus is a good player. He has just never experienced the epic highs and lows of years of trying to match with your older brother and cousins in all kinds of sports.

Maybe it also helped that he already feels like a brother to me. Our small company is so strongly knit together by the bonds of secrecy and company that I start to think of them as a family I belong to. Here and with you is where I can truly be myself.

No one watches or wrinkles his nose or shouts horrid words here when Cymbeline takes me in her arms or when Isaac consoles his friend over a lost tennis match with peppering kisses over his forehead. We can be as gay and free as we want to be. It is only solitude that gives us this freedom, but I try to ignore that. I want to be free, not isolated.