Hidden In Paris Part 11

"Just wait and hope that he serves you. And don't think your shenanigans with the apple went unnoticed. His moustache works like an antenna. You've lost points already. If you behave, he'll serve you. If he likes you, he'll be generous, give you his best stuff, and often some extras."

"With that att.i.tude, you're sure you want to give him your business?"

"Ha! He's a p.u.s.s.ycat compared to the others. Around here, if you step out of line, you'll go hungry."

"What else am I not supposed to do?"

Annie shrugged. "Just don't p.i.s.s anyone off."

When their turn came Annie took her time at the stand, asking the proprietaire for his recommendations. For someone so difficult, the man was in no hurry. He and Annie exchanged thoughts about the weather, and about the President as he picked vegetables and fruit from piles purposefully. Lola found it amusing, this air of importance people were taking. Everyone here was a connaisseur. At the fish stand, Annie selected the fish they were having for dinner as though it was a child she was looking to adopt. Surrounded by the opaque eyes of hundreds of fish spread on beds of crushed ice, Lola tried to look at the mounds of shrimp before her with different eyes. She was trying to see the place with French eyes. Obviously there must have been differences. French women pointed without hesitation towards this mound of antennaed creatures or that one. There were sh.e.l.ls of various colors, size and texture but what did they taste like? Wasn't a clam a clam? Some shrimp were pink, some were gray, they varied in size and price, but why?

She followed Annie obediently from one stand to another. At the Boucherie they stood between guinea fouls hanging upside down on hooks-head, legs, and feathers still attached-and a display of hoofs and tongues artfully arranged around a vividly pink pig's head. She wished Lia was there to see this strange and gruesome sight, and she felt a pang of sadness at the thought of Lia, and then a bit of fear. One should not be afraid of one's own nine-year-old. Annie was not afraid of her children.

When their turn came, the butcher gave Annie a lot of attention as he ground beef for the children's lunch of simple biftek hache et coquillettes, then wrapped it in pink paper. They spoke about agneau but Lola wasn't sure if they meant the live animal or a cut of meat. Annie and the butcher laughed a lot and ignored the growing line. Soon everyone in line, who should have gotten mad, instead began to take part in the lively discussion about, again, le President, who had apparently gotten into some sort of mischief, an indiscretion involving sa maitresse. His lover.

Once they left, Lola pointed out, "The butcher has the hots for you."

Annie blushed. "You're imagining it."

"I can't believe you do this shopping thing every day. It doesn't seem time efficient."

"That's the fabulous thing about France. Cooking and eating are perfectly worthwhile goals for a day."

Annie's totes were full. On the way back home, Lola was surprised to see her pa.s.s a half dozen bakeries on her way to purchase the daily baguette. Lola pointed to a beautiful bakery. "What's wrong with this one?"

"It's all in the details, you see. It gets pretty nutty, choosing the right lettuce, the right bread, and the right cheese. Vivre pour manger takes precision, you see. It takes skill."

The baguette they bought was still warm and Lola ate half of it walking to the house not thinking about Lia once. Lia would have to be fine. She wasn't made out of sugar. She was not the first kid going to a new school. Kids adapted. See how she had adapted to the house in a short week? See how she had stopped mentioning her father?

Before they arrived home, they stopped at a small drugstore that looked like an apothecary shop. As soon as he saw Annie, the owner, a tiny man without a hair on his scalp, ran to the back of the store. He returned with a small package wrapped in brown paper.

"You found it!" Annie exclaimed.

"C'est de la bonne!" he said.

At home, Annie showed her how to prepare a marinade for the fish they would have for dinner, how to arrange fresh herbs into individual bouquets that she hung to dry on little hooks on the wall and would later serve as bouquets garnis, and she learned what bouquets garnis were. Once the food was put away, Annie unwrapped the brown package to reveal a jar of old-fashioned wax. She offered it to Lola to smell like it was precious perfume. She then, using a cloth, began rubbing the kitchen table explaining the motion, how much pressure to apply. And it suddenly all made perfect sense. The universe where Lola had spent the last ten years of her life and this one were alternate realities, no less. In this universe, what used to be a ch.o.r.e became an art form, what used to be the work of maids became daily pleasures, what used to be a waste of time became essential. This universe resembled her and the old one didn't!

"I want to learn how to do that," Lola told Annie.

"Wax the table?"

Lola made a wide gesture. "I want to learn to do all of this."

They had a routine now. Evenings after homework, the children were allowed to turn on the TV. Annie and Lola tiptoed into the family room to watch the children in the act of gazing adoringly at a forty-two-inch flat screen TV that Lucas had selected and installed for them. Maxence and Laurent were curled up on one sofa with a beatific expression on their faces, and Paul, bearing the same expression, was lying on the rug. On the other couch were Lia and Simon, she peaceful, he snuggled beside her, sucking avidly on his thumb. No sign of the latest tantrum she had entertained them with just an hour before. As Annie predicted, Lia adapted to school rapidly. The bulk of Lia's obnoxious behavior was reserved for the times when her mother was around to suffer from it, as though she must be punished for some unknown crime. Lia would seem fine until Lola appeared, at which point she would melt into angry tears issued of a perfectly fabricated drama that everyone but Lola could see right through. This baffled Annie. Lola was so patient-so much more patient than she was-so sweet, so utterly beyond reproach. She reasoned that maybe this was what daughters did. Her boys were the opposite. They did ask for things, of course, but never made demands. They knew to get into line the minute she raised her voice. They made her laugh when she looked sad, and tiptoed around her bad moods. Were the boys easy because she was a great mother? Was it because there was a solidarity born of their common loss? Or was it, as she had told Lola before, that she was scary. And if she was indeed scary, was that necessarily a good thing? "I love this machine," Annie told Lola pointing to the TV. "It's the great unifier. Why wasn't I told about this invention earlier?" She turned on her heels and walked to the kitchen to make dinner hoping that Lola would stay behind. The last thing she wanted to deal with was what Lola called a cooking lesson and what she called misery. Lola had no instinct, no natural inclination when it came to cooking. But already, Lola was following her. "Why don't you sit on the couch and relax with the kids. I'll make dinner." She told Lola.

The answer was no, unfortunately. In the kitchen, Annie began to work on her endives au jambon, washing the endives, arranging slices of ham, grating gruyere and preparing the bechamel sauce. Lola was in charge of the vinaigrette, a simple enough task she had instructed her on several times. Lola scratched her head before the salt and pepper grinders and the jars of vinegar, olive oil, and mustard asking: "Which one goes in first, again?"

"When do you plan on calling Mark?" she asked, that question often resulting in Lola running away and giving her some freedom.

"I, well, not, I didn't, I mean, not yet. So it's vinegar first?"

There was also the more bothersome question: Why was Lola pretending to be in the United States. Why this charade? Annie was wondering how to phrase her question when Lia barged into the kitchen.

"I'm not watching stupid French cartoons. Maxence is choosing all the channels. Mom! Tell him!" Lola turned to her daughter with a blank expression. "Mom! Wake up!" Lola fumbled with a response and looked at Annie apologetically. Lia was already raising her voice. "Mom! Do something. Maxence is being an a.s.shole!"

Annie gave Lia a piercing look. "Well, pardon your French, young lady."

Lia stood, defiant. "Well, he is!"

Annie turned to Lola, who averted her eyes, which Annie took as an invitation to set down the rule. "Deal with it, Lia."

Lia's faced turned pale with fury. Annie watched Lia's anger gather energy, her gaze darting around the kitchen like she was looking for something to break, and a second later she was charging toward Lola, pushing her hard with both hands. "I hate you!" she screamed.

"Lia, get out of this kitchen this instant," Annie said. Lia looked defiantly from her mother to Annie, waiting for Lola to come to her rescue. Annie smiled inwardly. If Lola could not take a stand with her daughter, she was not about to take one with her. Lia murdered her with her eyes, stormed out of the kitchen and slammed the door.

"What was that?" Lola said with a little laugh. If someone had disciplined her children, Annie would have seen red, but Lola sounded apologetic. "All this change will be good ultimately."

Did Lola mean leaving Mark, moving to France, or having boundaries set by a stranger? It was as good as any entry into her preferred subject. "Does Lia ask about her father? What do you tell her? What did the judge say about visitations?"

"I'm definitely going to call him."

"The Judge or Mark?"

"Hm...both." Lola presented her bowl. "How much mustard?"

She felt an urge to torment her. "Eyeball it."

Lola examined the contents of the bowl, added a minuscule amount of mustard, and pushed the bowl in front of Annie. "Like this much?" Annie made a gesture to add more, and Lola added a tiny amount. "More?" Lola asked. "More? Still more?"

If Lola could be annoyingly persistent, so could she. "I'm just wondering, I'm just worried that your husband--"

"The one I'm worried about is Althea," Lola interrupted according to her own tactic of diversion. "She's so quiet."

"I know. Isn't it fantastic?" she answered, but Lola gave her a reproachful look. "At least she's eating with us. For a few days, she was eating in her room. Lucas might be a bit much for Althea at mealtimes. You know how he is, the s.e.xual innuendoes, the jokes, the flirting."

Lola beamed at the mere thought of Lucas. "He's a riot. And cute. And so devoted to you!"

"Lucas is a great friend," Annie said, suspiciously.

"A friend who practically lives with you and can't keep his eyes off you," Lola chuckled.

"Seems to me that his eyes are going more in the general direction of your b.r.e.a.s.t.s."

"I know...my b.r.e.a.s.t.s..." Lola sighed.

They were interrupted by Maxence who barged into the kitchen just as Lia had and said: "Lia keeps switching channels and putting my favorite show on mute!"

Apparently Lia had taken the situation into her own hands. "You guys figure it out or I'll pull the plug."

"It's not fair!"

Annie grabbed a box of dry pasta from the table, and aimed it at Maxence like a remote control. "You're on mute too now. Go!" Maxence left the room grumbling. She turned to Lola: "I don't think it's Lucas that Althea's trying to avoid. I think it's my food."

"What do you mean?"

"Yesterday she said she'd eat with us as long as she could eat her own food. She said mine doesn't agree with her. Weird, but fine with me. Better than having her bring a heaping plate of Linguini a la Carbonara to her room and shoving it down the toilet behind my back like she did the other day."

"She did?" Lola seemed shocked.

"The pancetta bits refused to be flushed. I guess their high fat content brought them back to the surface of the john's water, an interesting piece of trivia. I told Althea that I noticed her tossing food down the toilet, that I wasn't a complete numskull."

Lola thought for a moment. "Tossed it before or after eating it?"

Annie froze. She had the vision of Althea putting fingers down her throat. "Wow. I am a numbskull! That's terrible! We have to talk to her."

"Well, I wouldn't say a word about it," Lola said as she slowly stirred the contents of her bowl, pausing every so often to observe the result. "Food issues are control issues."

"So we should let her have full control over starving herself?"

"Those things get better on their own. I had one of those phases. Models all do."

Annie now had the vision of Lola bent over the toilet bowl. "Let's talk to her."

Lola's voiced slowed, and she turned her face away. "Bringing unpleasant things up will only make the atmosphere uncomfortable."

Was Lola giving her a subliminal message about her own unpleasant things she'd rather not bring up? "Goodness, the last thing we want is an uncomfortable atmosphere, so I'll shut up."

"It's a difficult subject for her I'm sure."

"And if I start really opening my mouth about what's on my mind, it won't be pretty," Annie said.

Chapter 13.

The force of the first blow vibrated his entire body. She was full of s.h.i.t is what she was.

Larry's voice said, "Take it easy. Take it slow."

Mark ignored Larry and hit the heavy bag with a right, then a left. Larry held the bag with his hairy paws. The guy had hair all over his back. A f.u.c.king disgrace. Mark alternated, quick right, quick left. A maid and a nanny while he busted his a.s.s making a living. His face, his arms, and his body were slick with sweat as he punched. He felt the impact in his stomach, felt it in his jaw. Beads of sweat gathered down his neck. The gloves were shiny and red. The place stank like a f.u.c.king barn. Hit. Hit. Sweat squirted out of his body like a dog shaking after his bath. And that expression on her face? A professional victim. Hit. Hit.

Larry held the bag tighter. "Take it easy man, you gonna bust a knuckle."

He didn't drink. He didn't screw around, and it's not like there were no opportunities. Mark pummeled the bag. One two, one two. He was a happy guy. That's what he f.u.c.king was. Mark let out a roar, and Larry moved away from the bag. Mark hit, hit, and hit again, out of control.

"What the f.u.c.k's wrong with you?" Larry said.

He was happy. Mark was f.u.c.king happy with what he had and she was wrecking everything.

Lia, Maxence, Laurent, and Paul walked through the school gate and Lola followed the four backpacks on legs until they made the turn into the schoolyard. Lia turned and waved to her, and a minute later she was gone. Just like that. Lia had entered school today again without the slightest drama. Could it be possible that Annie's strict rules and unwavering consequences suited Lia better than the respect and freedom she was accustomed to? Lola kneeled next to the stroller. "And you," she said, readjusting Simon's hat. "You're turning out to be a model citizen." She kissed Simon on his cold cheek. "You gave Mommy a whole night's sleep."

She pushed the stroller, light enough to float above the sidewalk. She had thrown all principles-all Mark's principles-to the wind and had let Simon sleep in bed with her. Annie said that women had been doing that from time immemorial, and what was the big deal. Last night she had put him in his pajamas and lied down next to him in her bed and woken up in disbelief after eight hours of uninterrupted slumber. No screams, no bad dream, no night terror, just sweet sleep. She should have listened to her own instinct sooner and claimed her right to soothe her own child. So what if she was "creating sleeping issues." Weren't they knee deep in sleeping issues already? She pushed the stroller toward the post office rue Singer, took an envelope from her pocket and opened it. She read the postcard it contained one last time.

Dear Mark, The weather is warming up here in New York. I hope this postcard finds you well. The children are doing fine. Simon slept through the night yesterday! We miss you, but I really need this time for right now.

I will continue to send you news weekly. Love. L.

She slid the postcard into the envelope and added the note for Alyssa.

Dear A., Please mail as usual. How will I repay you for your help?! Love, L.

She jotted down Alyssa's address in Manhattan, dropped the envelope in the slot, and walked away from the mailbox harboring a complex mix of guilt and satisfaction. By the time she reached rue Duban, Lola's postcard to Mark was a vague, unpleasant thought that added to all the other unpleasant thoughts she worked so hard to ignore.

She entered the indoor produce market rue Duban and strolled along the crowded market aisles, marveling at the sights, the colors, the life of it. She wanted to get flowers for the house and took her time looking. She settled for an armful of pink peonies, some still in bud form, some already open and fluffy like cotton candy. She paid the price of gold for them. Mark would be surprised one day to find out she had money stashed away from her modeling days. That was probably a residue from what Mark called her "poor person mentality." She had never told him about the account. It wasn't a lie per se. It was an omission, her secret garden.

The fishmonger beamed his toothless smile at her when she bought half a kilo of shrimp for lunch. She knew her shrimp now, and favored the tiny grey ones so full of ocean flavor. People at the market and the bakery knew her now. They made conversation; they recommended their best products. She waited in line at the cremerie and removed empty, washed gla.s.s jars from her straw bag. Simon saw his mother hand over the containers and receive her daily supply of fresh yogurt. He waved his arm at them. "Yayout! Yayout!"

"Simon! Your first French word," Lola exclaimed.

She sat on a public bench outside the market, peeled off the jar's thin metal seal, ran her hand around the bottom of her backpack, retrieved a plastic spoon, and licked it clean. She put a spoonful of raspberry yogurt on her tongue. "You've earned your yayout, sweetheart." Here she was, feeding her toddler raspberry yogurt on a cold but clear morning in the sixteenth arrondiss.e.m.e.nt of Paris. Here she was, without make-up or acrylic nails, sitting on a stone bench, watching Parisians walk by with their arms filled with produce and bread. Here she was, light. Light as air. She felt tightness in her throat, that urge to cry. Was it sadness or was it relief? Could it possibly be both?

She ached for Mark far more than he would ever miss her and ache for her. Mark would be fine, really. Oh there was familiarity in that pain. It was the sweet pain of loving him, a sweet pain in feeling victimized by him even. In her life with Mark, Lola had grown to picture herself as someone who failed at everything and enjoyed nothing.

She could not remember a self that did not involve Mark's vision of that self and the consequence, which was for her to feel hurt, neglected, unappreciated. Mark did not do this to her; most of the time, she did this to herself. It was a strange habit, a compulsion. Every decision, every emotion of every instant began with imagining what Mark would say or what Mark would think. But was Mark to blame? Now that she lived with Annie she had to wonder, because now there was a variation on the compulsion. It had become: How would Annie react? What would Annie say? What she needed to get to was: What do I alone think? What should I alone do? With the ultimate question being: Who am I?

She pushed away those thoughts. Right at this precise moment in time, she didn't have a problem. The day was beautiful, Simon had slept through the night, and Parisians carried baskets br.i.m.m.i.n.g with produce from the market. Her Present was Paris. Her Present was her budding friendship with Annie and a new way to spend each day, which made so much more sense to her. This of course was temporary, this lightness, this break from the fear of disappointing Mark, this freedom of movement away from that tentacular Bel Air house. It was temporary but she needed to focus on the moment and just enjoy the fact that she breathed differently here. She even looked different. Her hair was bicolor now, black at the tip with the blonde roots apparent, which gave her a punkish look, an image of rebellion she liked. And she had stopped plucking her eyebrows, those perfect arches that betrayed tension and self-involvement. Here, no power was taken away from her. Here, she could let her baby crawl into her bed in exchange for a full night's sleep. Here, she cooked and did the dishes and didn't feel like a b.u.mp on a log. Here, she took care of her own children, and they were doing better than with the nanny!

Those thoughts of Mark were like the Sword of Damocles at times, but only at times. She realized there was something obtuse about the way she had just wished Mark away, or how strangely successful she was at avoiding thinking about disagreeable things such as the consequences of her disappearance, as well as what the future held.

Althea lay in bed, dressed in her coat, boots, and scarf. She was torn between the obligation to call her mother, something she had not done in days and felt guilty about, and the obligation to get out of the house so as to not appear strange. Those, she knew, were no obligations at all. She could stay like this and not make another decision all day. She could stay on her bed and daydream about Jared until night if she wanted to. She didn't move when she heard a tap at her bedroom door.

"Althea? It's Lola. May I come in?"

She felt too apathetic to get up. "Come in," she said.

Lola open the door and looked at her lying in bed with a coat on. "Were you busy?"

"Do I look busy?" she said. She had not meant to sound antagonistic, yet she did not feel sorry she did.

"Do you want to do the makeover?" Lola asked, dangling a large Vuitton make-up case before her.

Althea wanted to say no, but instead took off her coat and followed Lola to the bathroom they shared but that Althea had come to consider as her own. When she had first entered it, the clutter had been a shock. A cornucopia of seash.e.l.ls and polished rocks marred every surface. The shelves were heavy with gla.s.s jars filled with sand and marked Biarritz, Cannes, La Baule, and bottle after sticky bottle of various bubble baths. The bathroom looked clean on first inspection, but Althea had soon noticed mildew on tiles and dull grime hidden beneath the sink, the claw foot bathtub and the toilet. She had spent hours on her knees scrubbing the bathroom tile by tile with an old toothbrush. She had rearranged the blue and white room, polished the jars, even cleaned the seash.e.l.ls and rocks. It was Annie's house, maybe, but the bathroom had become Althea's territory. She liked to spend hours bathing in the ma.s.sive tub or combing her hair as she sat at the antique vanity imagining she was lost in an entirely different place in time.