these for him? No, she’d left our apartment and come straight here. Had Monsieur Duplessi stopped for them? What kind of guest was he that he felt so at home here, he brought food with him?
Noticing me eyeing the croissants, he pushed the plate toward me. “Please, help yourself. I can always go and get more if I get hungry. There is an excellent bakery just a few doors down.” He paused and then added, “But of course you know that.”
“So you plan to stay the day?” I asked.
“Yes, of course. Every day for several weeks. It’s going to take quite a while.” He looked pleased at the thought.
“I imagine it will,” I said even though I had no idea what he was talking about and less of an idea how to ask.
But for the moment it didn’t matter. Nothing did. Not that I was alone here with a stranger, in the kitchen of all places. Or that we were so informally sitting across from each other. Not that my grandmother might in fact return—though I doubted it. None of that mattered because for the first time in two weeks the ache of my recent loss receded. I felt as if I was where I wanted to be. In this house, be it in the kitchen or the parlor. Just here in this house in Paris.
And even odder, I wanted to be here with this stranger. Breathing in the same air. Observing him. Listening to his low, sultry voice, which warmed me through. I watched him put his lips on the rim of the cup and then, as he was taking a sip, look up and find my eyes on him. He didn’t smile. Didn’t respond. And he didn’t look away. Oh yes, I wanted to be here feeling the sweet and sharp sting of— What was it that I was feeling?
I vaguely remembered it from that long-ago spring I’d spent in Paris when I was fifteen. Leon Ferre had stirred me like this. It had been as much about the clandestine aspects of being with a boy for the first time, hiding from my grandmother and doing what was forbidden, as it had been about him, but it was real. I used to acheto touch him and have him touch me. For that brief time, ten years ago, I had been fully awake, and then, after the tragedy of him dying, I had gone back to sleep.
Now, many dreams and terrible nightmares later, my mind was tricking me. Teasing me into thinking I might be able to feel. But I couldn’t. My body would never respond.
First love, my mother had called my infatuation with Leon when she and my father stopped in Paris on the way from Russia to Algiers. She’d smiled and smoothed down my hair and kissed me on the forehead. “Enjoy it, darling.”
Hearing her, my grandmother had frowned. “Love? Don’t put any stock in it. Marry well, Sandrine. Not often and never for love. That is the only way you’ll be happy. For the women in our family, love is a curse, not a blessing.”
Chapter 5
After drinking Monsieur Duplessi’s coffee and eating one of his croissants, I left Maison de la Lune without looking around as I’d wished to and without discovering what Monsieur Duplessi was doing there.
I needed to hurry back to the rented apartment before too much time passed. My grandmother would surely have returned, found me absent, and begun to worry as it was the first time I’d gone out without her.
As I shut the front door behind me, I whispered to Maison de la Lune that I’d return. Walking down the steps to the sidewalk, I wondered why I’d begun to think of the house as a living entity. Was it because I missed my father so much and he’d grown up there? Because I’d spent time there as a child and it was familiar to me as few things were anymore? Or was it because so much had happened to me in such a short time that I was slightly mad with grief?
On the walk from our ancient family home back to the apartment on rue de la Chaise, I worked out the small lie that I would tell my grandmother to excuse my absence. I’d say I hadn’t been able to shake a nightmare, and with her gone, I decided taking a walk might help.
As I’d expected, she had returned, but
Noticing me eyeing the croissants, he pushed the plate toward me. “Please, help yourself. I can always go and get more if I get hungry. There is an excellent bakery just a few doors down.” He paused and then added, “But of course you know that.”
“So you plan to stay the day?” I asked.
“Yes, of course. Every day for several weeks. It’s going to take quite a while.” He looked pleased at the thought.
“I imagine it will,” I said even though I had no idea what he was talking about and less of an idea how to ask.
But for the moment it didn’t matter. Nothing did. Not that I was alone here with a stranger, in the kitchen of all places. Or that we were so informally sitting across from each other. Not that my grandmother might in fact return—though I doubted it. None of that mattered because for the first time in two weeks the ache of my recent loss receded. I felt as if I was where I wanted to be. In this house, be it in the kitchen or the parlor. Just here in this house in Paris.
And even odder, I wanted to be here with this stranger. Breathing in the same air. Observing him. Listening to his low, sultry voice, which warmed me through. I watched him put his lips on the rim of the cup and then, as he was taking a sip, look up and find my eyes on him. He didn’t smile. Didn’t respond. And he didn’t look away. Oh yes, I wanted to be here feeling the sweet and sharp sting of— What was it that I was feeling?
I vaguely remembered it from that long-ago spring I’d spent in Paris when I was fifteen. Leon Ferre had stirred me like this. It had been as much about the clandestine aspects of being with a boy for the first time, hiding from my grandmother and doing what was forbidden, as it had been about him, but it was real. I used to acheto touch him and have him touch me. For that brief time, ten years ago, I had been fully awake, and then, after the tragedy of him dying, I had gone back to sleep.
Now, many dreams and terrible nightmares later, my mind was tricking me. Teasing me into thinking I might be able to feel. But I couldn’t. My body would never respond.
First love, my mother had called my infatuation with Leon when she and my father stopped in Paris on the way from Russia to Algiers. She’d smiled and smoothed down my hair and kissed me on the forehead. “Enjoy it, darling.”
Hearing her, my grandmother had frowned. “Love? Don’t put any stock in it. Marry well, Sandrine. Not often and never for love. That is the only way you’ll be happy. For the women in our family, love is a curse, not a blessing.”
Chapter 5
After drinking Monsieur Duplessi’s coffee and eating one of his croissants, I left Maison de la Lune without looking around as I’d wished to and without discovering what Monsieur Duplessi was doing there.
I needed to hurry back to the rented apartment before too much time passed. My grandmother would surely have returned, found me absent, and begun to worry as it was the first time I’d gone out without her.
As I shut the front door behind me, I whispered to Maison de la Lune that I’d return. Walking down the steps to the sidewalk, I wondered why I’d begun to think of the house as a living entity. Was it because I missed my father so much and he’d grown up there? Because I’d spent time there as a child and it was familiar to me as few things were anymore? Or was it because so much had happened to me in such a short time that I was slightly mad with grief?
On the walk from our ancient family home back to the apartment on rue de la Chaise, I worked out the small lie that I would tell my grandmother to excuse my absence. I’d say I hadn’t been able to shake a nightmare, and with her gone, I decided taking a walk might help.
As I’d expected, she had returned, but
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