Time: Present Day

Location: HereAfter

Carter and Amelia watched the tearful farewells as the young Amelia escorted by her Aunty Michy hugged and kissed her parents and siblings. Amanda was a total wreck, still not coming to the realisation that this was really happening. Her sister and her were to be parted for the first time in their lives. She hugged Amelia so tight that Amelia thought she might break, then she let go and passed Amelia over to her brother to say the final goodbye. They all watched as they boarded the Airbus and then went to the observation deck to see the plane taxi and then take to the sky like some impossible metal bird that surely could not fly but did. Carter could sense something very wrong with Amanda. He felt confused himself about who his mother was, maybe that was all it was. Then he understood, Amanda thought of the plane as some sinister eagle that had snatched up her sister and carried her away. She had an emptiness, deep inside that she couldn't explain, a foreboding, maybe the plane would crash. She didn't fully recover her composure until she spoke to her Aunt Margot the next day who put Amelia on the phone to prove she had arrived safe and sound.

They chatted for hours, as though they hadn't seen each other in months. They chatted like they used to when they were little and shared a bedroom in the old house in Paddington. Monique interrupted them with, "That's quite enough you two." Just like she did in Paddington, Amanda half expected her to follow it with, "Off to sleep now you two." But instead she said, "It's time to give someone else a go, give the phone to your father, Amanda."

"I would but I don't see him here." They could all hear Amelia laugh over the phone as Jean said, "Give it here you cheeky possum. Hi, princess how's it going over there?

"It's pretty cool, and very cold," Amelia replied.

"Don't worry it'll soon be spring, you'll love it there. There's no place like Paris in the spring," Jean said reflecting back to his teen years.

Carter started to zone out with the small talk. He turned to his left and saw Teacher had returned. He looked back to his right with a degree of dread that Amelia may no longer be there. She smiled back at him and gave his hand a reassuring pat.

"Can we speed things up a little?" Carter ventured.

Teacher smiled, “You are in control Carter Cheval. You have always been in control. You will learn how to manage your story, remember there is no time here only now, the important thing is that you understand. You can take as long or as little as you need. Whatever you do will be right for you now."

Carter and Amelia watched as the young Amelia studied at the Music Academy. They saw her make friends with a number of girls at the college. She became particularly close with a girl called Collette. Collette was studying the cello like Amelia, but not piano as well, like Amelia. She had a bit more free time on her hands so she became the social organiser for the group.

They became best friends over the spring months as Amelia started to show the obvious signs of her pregnancy. Collette didn't judge her, she was always supportive and was quick to berate any of the girls or boys for that matter who started to look down on her because of her condition. It reminded her a little of her relationship with Peter when they were young and added a touch of nostalgia and sadness to the relationship. She had written several letters to Peter and was yet to receive a reply.

Collette thought she should forget about him, that he had obviously moved on. She had had similar experiences with boys in the past, without the added complication of course. Her mother had told her that Don had informed them that Peter had gotten married in Melbourne. No one from the Cheval family had been invited. She said that they probably would have declined anyway, even if it had been in Sydney, given the circumstances. The family had decided to let old wounds heal by avoiding the Margates, at least until they returned to Sydney. Still she felt that it wasn't like Peter to ignore her like this. Maybe his new girlfriend had insisted he not answer her letters.

She had given up telling how she really felt on her recent attempts, rather concentrating on what she was doing about his and her first love, music. It was what had drawn them close together in the first place. It was sitting next to each other in music class at primary school that had planted what she had thought might have been the seed of a great love. They had spent hours arguing the relative merits of Bach and Beethoven, Dylan and the Beatle, Billy Joel and the Moody Blues and even Elvis and Peter, Paul and Mary. Both of them had eclectic tastes in music, both were opinionated without being fanatical, and so a great relationship based on a great common love of everything musical had developed and carried them through to Secondary school and their teens.

It had even survived their separation as they went to separate schools with the Catholic tradition of gender separation in Catholic high schools. They still walked to school and home again together and the boys and girls schools had formed a joint orchestra to which they both became an integral part and which in turn became an integral part of their lives and relationship as well. However even her attempts at engaging him in some repartee on latest music trends and even bringing up issues that had previously led to inspired debates on the relative merits of this genre or that, or this artist versus that, had apparently fell on deaf ears . . . and a mute pen. So maybe she should take Collette's advice and forget him.

Perhaps she would try one more time, when the baby comes, after all he is the father, she thought, he has a right to know whether it was a boy or girl at the very least. She was also hoping that he might be able to support her in any decision to keep or adopt out the baby when the time came.

Chapter 26 - Music Music Music.

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