Friday, 31 March 1978 . Hedgehope Hall House. Disco. Parents. Parquet. Paranoia.
Robbie stood at the side of the parquet floor, jaw aching from the dentist, still trying to figure out how to smile again. Then he saw her. India Jones was no longer just a name on a Form Photo. She moved like music, hips sharp, rhythm loose from any sense of social propriety.
He stepped forward. They collided somewhere in the middle of “Rebel Rebel.” Bowie sang the hymn; India made it gospel.
India Armstrong-Jones, as she was when he first saw her and who would soon be forever known as Indi, was already moving when he saw her. She wore tight red cords that looked painted on and a too-small velour top that sparkled under the fairy lights as if it had something to prove.
Robbie (2028, V.O.):
“It wasn’t a dance; it was a challenge. In theory, this ‘Christian Disco’ concept meant we weren’t supposed to touch, but we soon discovered we could suggestively sync our dancing. “
Kizzy (2028, cross-referencing her box files):
“She was one of the first darts. Of course, she was. Are you telling me red cords didn’t sway your aim? Those trousers should’ve had a government warning.”
Scene: The Party’s Backroom. 1978.
They weren’t supposed to be outside. Especially not together. Not behind the chapel in the rhododendrons. But that’s where India led him. She lit a cigarette. He said he didn’t smoke. She passed it anyway. He took it. He coughed. She kissed him.
Robbie (2028):
“She didn’t want a boyfriend. Turns out I was the warm-up act. She was marking time before going to London to stay with her Mum. Holland Park had more going for it than Wylam.
Kizzy (2028):
“She’d been expelled from Bedales. That still floors me. Bedales! You have to try to get thrown out of Bedales actively. It takes effort.”
Kizzy flips through her folder. “Blondie in Plymouth, May ‘77. Nicked the housemaster’s car, expelled in June. Mother gave up. She shipped out to Newcastle to live with her dad. Daddy thinks enrolling her at Eastfield and giving her a clothing allowance equals ‘parenting.’”
Scene: After the Dance. Robbie’s Bedroom. 1 a.m.
Robbie lies awake, the taste of her still in his mouth, the feel of her cigarette still in his lungs. His fingers itch to sketch her face, but the light’s off, and his brain is in chaos. He stares at the ceiling.
He doesn’t know she’s already described him as “sweet” in a letter to a friend back in Fulham. He won’t find that out until much later. But tonight? Tonight, he thinks the start of something.
Robbie (2028):
“She was already halfway gone. Newcastle was a pit stop. I was a friendly local that fitted the mold.”
Dr Kizzy Foster (2028), the psychologist:
Indi and Robbie had what I would now call a ‘shared attachment gap’—a classic example of post-divorce logistics. There are two sets of houses, and they feel as though they don’t quite belong in either. That can lead to two outcomes: either you overcompensate by becoming exceptionally good at fitting in, or you stop trying altogether and become intensely, unapologetically yourself. Indi did the latter. Robbie… well, he hovered. I was always hoping someone would tell him who he was. Of course, they found each other. Of course, they collided. They were the children of absence. And absence, when shared, feels like connection.”
A few days later, Robbie remembered that India had said she would return to London on Friday. He called and went and spent the afternoon with her on the following week.
Discoveries followed that Kizzy didn’t need to know. Robbie had a copy of Shere Hite’s ‘Hite Report.’ Enough said. Indi had wondered if something else would have been of more practical use. Not for a diary. To be remembered.
As for London, that never happened
Indi stayed there. She was enrolled at St. Paul’s Girls School and quickly moved on to boys who offered more than Robbie could provide.
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