A Four-Course Lunch
by Rozanne Charbonneau
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Table of Contents parts 1, 2, 3 |
part 2
The next day my little Gloria Steinem hangs her head over the dining table. The shadows under her eyes give her the air of a hospital patient. Did she toss and turn all night, worrying that I might report her to Madame Castagné? In the end, I was at fault for letting her run wild in the woods.
I place two scoops of céleri remoulade onto her plate. “You can put yesterday behind you, Lucy. Today is a new day.”
In the park, Lucy drags her shoes through the dust on the side of the path. She ignores the children’s calls to play. If she does not rest, she will fall asleep during her French class this afternoon. I close Une Espionne dans la maison de l’amour and motion her to join me on the bench.
She sits down so close that her thigh touches my own. “Is that man who comes to see you here your boyfriend?”
Of course, she would notice him. I move my thigh away from hers. “Yes, but he won’t be coming to the park anymore.”
“Is he nice to you?”
What a strange question. “Of course he’s nice to me. I wouldn’t let him be my boyfriend if he were not.”
She looks at me, sceptical. “Does he like your hair?”
I burst out laughing. Gilles tells me it falls like a curtain of yellow silk down my back. “He has never complained.”
“I wish I had hair like yours. My father won’t let me grow mine.”
This explains her brutal haircut. I keep quiet, aware that she might repeat anything I say at home. So far, all the children are within close range. Good. However, Mr. Maggot has set up camp in the dog roses. It seems Lucy’s beating yesterday has increased his ardour. I stand up and circle around the children. What is the matter with him? Does he want me to notice that he is circumcised? I will not give him the satisfaction.
Back at the bench, Lucy is reading my Anaïs Nin. “What is cunni... cunnilingus?”
I snatch the book out of her hands. “Never mind.”
A bumble bee flies close to her ear. I swat it away. Lucy watches it dive into a crocus and begin to suck. What does she know about sex? Perhaps very little, but the desire, I can tell, has started to stir.
* * *
I sit in the Café St Augustin with Gilles. Five o’clock. The place to ourselves. The workers will only stagger in after six. We order two cafés crèmes from the waiter. Our student coupons will cover the cost. Back at the altar to caffeine, he bangs the portafilter against the counter with two dull thuds. Metal locks, machine hammers, milk steams, all music to my ears.
Gilles’s knees hold mine in a vice as I take stock of the day. “I didn’t understand Jacot’s lecture this afternoon. His thoughts on Les Fleurs du mal are too obtuse.”
“Just take notes,” he says. “Don’t try to understand him.”
“He loves to pontificate from the podium. He gets off on one hundred and fifty students scribbling away.”
“Take notes, reread the poems for yourself, then tear his thoughts apart.”
I burst out laughing. “Always the Bolshevik.”
“And you need to be more bold,” he says, opening my knees with his own. “A girl from Normandy has just as much to say as a Parisian.”
The smart boys in my class back home were so competitive. I have never met anyone like Gilles before. So secure, so encouraging.
“Le Dernier Tango à Paris is playing at the cinema on Saturday. I could make you some pasta at my place afterwards.”
I hesitate. Is this the film you go to see before making love for the first time? Sure, everyone is talking about the rape scene with the butter, but what bothers me most is Marlon Brando’s age compared to Maria Schneider’s. His detachment, his power...
“Can I think about it?”
“Allez, viens. C’est ‘artistique’.”
The sugar in the bottom of my cup sings on my tongue. Flecks of amber dance in his eyes. “Very well, then. I look forward to it.” Diesel-drenched fingers be damned. It is time to claim your man.
* * *
I lie in my bed reciting the words of Anaïs Nin into the darkness. “Dressed in red and silver, she evoked the sounds and imagery of fire engines as they tore through the streets of New York. The first time he looked at her, he felt: everything will burn.” My favourite passage. Carved into my envious little heart. If only my pen could ignite such heat on the page.
I turn on the light and reach for my backpack. A few paragraphs should transport me out of myself, to the woman I wish I could be. But something is wrong. Une Espionne dans la maison de l’amour is gone. And who is the thief? Lucy, the girl who wants to be me.
* * *
The next day, Lucy takes dainty bites of her coq au vin. She does not dare pick up the bones under my gaze. I pull her aside as the children file out of the dining room. “I would like you to return my book, Lucy.”
She looks towards the children racing into the courtyard. “What book?”
“If you just give it back, we can forget about the whole thing.”
“It’s time to go to the park.”
“We all make mistakes. But we mustn’t lie.”
“I am not a liar.”
“No one said you are a liar. You are a girl who made a mistake.”
“I hate you. You pretend to be my friend, but you want me to feel bad.”
“Nonsense. I want you to return my book so that you can feel good.”
“What is this?” asks Madame Castagné from the doorway.
How long has she been there? She must never see me lose my nerve with a child. “It’s nothing. I’ve given Lucy the chance to return my book—”
Madame Castagné snaps her fingers. “Come on. We don’t have all day.”
Out in the corridor, she orders Lucy to open her locker. The book lies on the top shelf. Lucy shrugs and sticks out her chin. “I don’t know how it got there.” For all her sighs and lovesick eyes, the little brat sees me as her servant. So be it.
A large manila envelope falls onto the floor. Lucy kneels to grab it, but Madame Castagné is swifter. She opens it and pulls out a manuscript. The title page reads, Under the Eaves of Paris, a novel by Frank Jones. “Doesn’t this belong to your father, Lucy?”
Crimson splotches break out over her face. “Please don’t tell on me,” she begs.
Madame Castagné nods for me to leave them alone. She puts her hand on Lucy’s shoulder and ushers her into the main office.
* * *
From my bench, I watch a group of elderly gentlemen play a round of boules. One click of the ball and I am back with my father in our garden. He taught me how to aim like a man. “Raise your wrist. The ball must sail high in the air. You want to crush your opponents on the way down.” He loved it when my ball knocked his off the gravel and onto the grass. He loved it when I won. Why has Lucy taken her father’s manuscript? And why is she so afraid of him? Fortunately, Madame Castagné is wise. She will know how to make things right between them.
* * *
The line outside the cinema snakes around the block. Most of the people are middle-aged. By their attire, I estimate that they come from both the Left and Right Banks. Bearded, pipe-smoking “professors” rub shoulders with men clad in Lacoste shirts. Women with hennaed locks as wild as Medusa’s check out the ash blonde queens à la Deneuve. We are all as depraved as the perverts in the park. We can’t wait to see an old man drag a young woman through the mud.
“Le Dernier Tango à Paris is sold out!” announces the usher as he walks past.
I glance at Gilles, relieved. If we are going to make love for the first time tonight, we don’t need to bring Marlon Brando along for the ride.
Gilles checks his watch. He suggests we catch The Poseidon Adventure nearby on the Champs-Elysées. The movie will begin in half an hour.
I burst out laughing. “But that’s a Hollywood blockbuster.”
“Come on! If we run into anyone we know, we’ll tell them we’re doing research on that strange specimen of humanity, the American.”
I am glad that he enjoys popular movies; pretending to be an intellectual all the time is exhausting.
* * *
The line for The Poseidon Adventure is never-ending. This time around it is a family affair. The cinema has over two hundred seats. If we are patient, we should be swallowed by its velvet darkness.
Gilles puts his hand on the small of my back. “A wave turns over a ship in the middle of the ocean. Twelve people decide to climb to safety. The concept is so simple, but brilliant. It taps into our basic drive...”
The man in front of us nudges his wife. He points his finger to the very top of the line. “Of course, the Americans here feel compelled to make a scene,” he says.
It is Lucy. She is with her brothers. In the distance, I can see them squatting on the pavement. Their father, Mr Jones, towers above them. He raises his arms and yells, “On your marks, get set, go!” The race is on. The two boys begin to waddle on their haunches along the entire line of cinemagoers. They look like ducks hurrying towards a mirage of water. Their mother, Mrs Jones, stands at the end of the block, waiting for her children to reach her. This is Saturday night on the Champs-Elysées. Childish cartwheels or even running would be out of place. But the duck walk? Has this family lost their minds?
Lucy is clearly still sane. She jumps up off the ground and tries to slink away from her father. He grabs her by the arm and twists. She looks at the line of cinemagoers, but they pay no attention to her. They are too busy staring and pointing at her brothers. The boys must be too young to realize they are objects of ridicule. Lucy knows better. She tries to pull away from her father, but he takes hold of her shoulder and pushes her to the ground. She has no choice but to begin the walk of shame.
What is the matter with this man? Can’t he see that her skirt is crawling up around her hips? Is his will more important than his daughter’s modesty? Her bottom, only covered by pink underpants, is now in full view of over one hundred Parisians. She keeps her head to the ground to block out the mob.
I can’t stand it. I run down the line and confront the father’s partner in crime. “Madame, you have got to stop this, now!”
She looks away from me. “I can’t,” she says. Her tone is conflicted.
For all the extinct cats on her back, I realize she has no authority at all. Some people in the line have begun to laugh. Others look annoyed, but not enough to intervene. I run to Lucy and pull her to her feet. Her face lights up in surprise, but then fades at the sound of her master’s voice. “Get your butt back on the ground!” her father yells.
I will not allow it. I smooth her skirt down over her legs. She will be safe with me in the line.
“What are you doing, Sophie? We shouldn’t get involved,” says Gilles when we slip in beside him. Before I can argue, Mr Jones saunters over. “So, if it isn’t Mademoiselle Sophie, the children’s lunch girl.” His command of French is too good. It gives him an edge.
I can smell gin on his breath. I have seen him out of the corner of my eye in the school’s courtyard, but never up close. His eyes are beady and black. He is not a fat man, but his second chin falls to his collar bone. The flesh under his ears is as pink as roast beef.
“This is the Champs-Elysées, Monsieur.”
He shrugs. “The children are cooped up in the apartment all weekend. If they don’t exercise, they will be up all night. How and where I make them do it, is none of your business.”
His words are reasonable, but I don’t believe them. My father would never treat my sister and me like this. For sure, the alcohol has rid him of all inhibitions. He doesn’t seem to care what people around him feel or think. But I sense his motives are more sinister. This man uses his children as marionettes to act out the Grand Guignol scenarios in his mind.
“Lucy is too old for your game. You must never embarrass a young girl in public.”
He turns to his daughter, who lowers her eyes to the ground. “You made a mistake, honey child. You’ll just have to get your exercise after the show.”
Mrs. Jones approaches and waves the tickets at her husband. “Let’s go in now, Frank. The boys will want ice cream.” She pretends that I do not exist as she grabs Lucy’s hand.
Mr. Jones extends a finger in the air. “You haven’t heard the end of this, Mademoiselle Sophie.”
The man is odious, but Mrs Jones is worse. She is weak, and oh so complicit. She should squat down on the pavement in her stockings and fur herself.
When Lucy looks back over her shoulder, I wave.
Mr Jones clocks our exchange. He grabs Lucy’s ear and drags her towards the cinema entrance.
Gilles shakes his head. “This isn’t going to end well. That man is drunk out of his mind, but he will have you fired Monday morning.”
The idea of staring at a sinking ship on the screen with Gilles’s hand up my thigh now seems absurd. I plant a kiss on his cheek. “I’m really sorry, but it’s best if I go home.”
He follows as I head towards the Métro. “Hey! I’m only trying to protect you,” he says, taking hold of my arm.
“And Lucy?”
He raises his hands in the air at a loss.
I take a step back and suggest we meet Tuesday. Gilles may end our story, and I will regret it. No man wants to bed Joan of Arc.
The steps of the Métro are black with filth. Eight million shoes racing God knows where. Would anyone notice a lost girl in the city? Would anyone care?
* * *
Copyright © 2023 by Rozanne Charbonneau
