At the Library
Flicka von Hannover
There were lots of little kids.
It was weird.
Dieter asked Flicka if she wanted to accompany him and Alina to a library program before they dropped Alina off at daycare for the evening.
“A library program?” Flicka asked as she tucked herself into her costume, tying her shirt tightly under her boobs. “Like, isn’t she too young tocheck out books by herself? She can’t even read yet.”
“It’s a children’s program,” Dieter said, buttoning his shirt over his broad chest. “Like they have in a creche back home.”
“All right,” Flicka said, “if it’s more convenient.”
At the library, they followed a herd of small tots leading their caretakers to a back room in the children’s section.
The kids sat on the floor around a chair atthe front, though Alina lingered near Dieter’s legs. The adults sat on chairs near the back. A lot of the adults knew each other and struck up conversations right away. Alina stood between Dieter’s legs, swaying and resting her tiny hands on his knees like she might catapult out of a starting gate.
Flicka took the chair beside Dieter and watched the other women eye him.
Dieter leaned down andspoke softly to Alina, encouraging her to sit with the other kids. The toddler shook her head, her blond hair swishing around her ears.
Flicka listened and realized he was speaking the Swiss language Alemannic to her, not English.
Weird.
Well, no. It made sense. Gretchen had a Swiss passport. They probably spoke Alemannic at home to her.
Dieter had had a wife and a family and a whole lifewithout Flicka.
They had missed a lot of each other’s lives in those two years, after their London fling.
It was a disturbing thought.
Flicka clutched her hands together and stared at her fingernails.
She needed a manicure. They didn’t have money for such indulgences. Maybe she should buy some polish. The girls used to paint each other’s nails in the Le Rosey dorms when they couldn’t get toa city for a proper manicure. She knew how to paint her own nails. She wasn’t entirely helpless.
Beside her, Dieter whispered to Alina. The baby looked up at him, searching his face with her pale green eyes, and took a few tentative steps toward the other children. She turned and looked back at him, her eyes wide on her tiny face.
“Go on,” he told her, still in Alemannic.
The woman next toFlicka asked, “Do you speak English?”
“Oh, yes,” Flicka told her, careful to repress any accent she might have left over. “We all do.”
“What language is he speaking to her?”
“Alemannic,” Flicka told her. “It’s a Swiss dialect of German, but kind of different.”
“That’s wonderful,” the woman said. “It’s great that she’ll be bilingual. It’s so useful. You have a beautiful family.”
A slice cutacross Flicka’s chest.
To the woman, she smiled and said, “Thank you.”
Flicka resumed watching the children and blinked hard, making sure nothing untoward happened around her tear ducts.
