“I don’t have any money for the taxi,” I realized with a panic.
Why hadn’t I thought of it sooner? I’d have to find a cashpoint now and hope I could remember the PIN for my card. I whirled around, looking for one.
“Take this,” said Léo, fishing around in his pockets, pulling out a note.
“No,” I said, shaking my head. “You’ve done enough already.”
“Just take it.” He thrust a twenty-euro note into my hand. “There is no time to argue with me.” He hauled his bag onto his shoulder. “Come. Let us go, quickly.”
We sprinted down an escalator and into the bowels of the station.
“Taxis that way,” I said, pointing to a sign.
We ran, my twisted ankle forgotten, past brightly lit sandwich shops and someone playing a piano and a place selling clog-shaped doormats and bunches of wooden tulips. Once outside we joined the end of the queue, and when I stood on tiptoes I saw at least four or five taxis snaking into the station. It shouldn’t be long.
I took a deep breath, glad of the fresh air.
“So,” said Léo. “This is it.”
My eyes flickered over his shoulder, keeping an eye on the taxis coming in, feeling sick at the idea of saying goodbye, of never seeing him again.
“You didn’t get to finish whatever it was you wanted to say.”
“No,” he said, pushing his fringe back off his face. “And now the moment has passed, non?”
We took a step forward, the queue moving faster than I’d expected. My mind was full of contrasts. It would have been easier if I’d never met Léo; it was unthinkable that I might not have done.
“What are you going to do about your boyfriend?” he asked.
I ran my fingers up and down the length of my camera strap. “I haven’t decided.”
A family of four got into a car, leaving only one studenty-looking guy in front of us.
“Do you want to share?” I asked. “God, I don’t even know where you’re going, where your gig is.”
He shook his head. “It is fine. I must go in a different direction.”
I put my hand on my forehead. “I don’t want to leave you,” I told him, not quite believing that I’d said it out loud. But then again, if not now, when?
“You know, you turned out to be quite good company after all, Hannah.”
“I’ll take that as a compliment,” I said.
He brushed a hair out of my eye. “I had a good time,” he whispered.
I nodded. “Me too.” In a few seconds he would be gone, out of my life forever.
We reached the front of the queue and a cab pulled up to the curb. It was cooler in Amsterdam than it had been in Paris. The wind rippled through Sylvie’s T-shirt, the fabric flapping around my waist, his hoodie still tied there.
“Oh,” I said, pulling at the knot, “you should take this.”
“Non,” he said, putting his hand on top of mine. “Keep it. Then you will not forget me.”
I lifted my camera and took a quick photo of him, his dark eyes burning into me through the lens.
“Now I never will,” I said.
He took my head between his hands, smoothing his thumbs across my temples. “I will miss you, Hannah,” he said.
I wanted to run my hands through his hair, to know what it felt like, but if I started something, if I touched him at all, I might not be able to stop.
The taxi driver beeped his horn.
“I have to go,” I said, pulling away, opening the car door. “The Lux Hotel, please,” I shouted over the noise of the engine.
Léo slammed the door behind me.
“I hope everything works out for you, Hannah,” he said, bending down to look through the window, his face right there, centimeters from mine.
I smiled at him as the taxi screeched away from the curb, following the U-shaped driveway out of the station.
“Good luck tonight!” I shouted out the window.
He waved and I waved back and within seconds we’d pulled out onto the main road. Just like that, I couldn’t see him anymore. I sat back in my seat, finding my belt, doing it up, swallowing hard to try to dislodge the lump in my throat.
19
We were driving so quickly through Amsterdam that it was impossible to take everything in. It felt like a riot of color and sound after the relative silence of the train, with trams squealing past on their tracks everywhere you looked, and huge squares teeming with tourists. If I looked down the side streets, I caught the odd glimpse of the bridges I’d seen so many pictures of, and the heaving bike racks housing hundreds of bikes that looked as though they could tumble over like dominoes with one wrong move. It wasn’t as pretty as Paris, I thought. I already missed its grandness, the sweeping boulevards. Léo.
According to the clock on the driver’s dashboard, it was 5:17 p.m. when we pulled into the driveway of the hotel, coming to a stop in a cobbled courtyard. Even from the outside it looked just as chic and upmarket as Catherine had described. It’s where all the Dutch celebrities stay, she’d told us. All the models. I’d pretended to be impressed, but since I didn’t actually know any famous Dutch people, I would be none the wiser, anyway.
A porter in a sleek black suit rushed over, flinging open the taxi door.
“Madam?” he said, looking for my bags.
“No luggage,” I explained, handing the driver the money Léo had given me. It seemed wrong that I had no way of paying him back.
I followed the porter into the lobby, which was completely encased in glass and exposed brickwork, with huge wooden candelabras hanging from the ceiling. And there were actual trees. Inside. It was like entering a different world, which explained why it had cost a small fortune to stay here. I was suddenly hyperaware of feeling like an impostor, which happened whenever I mixed with people with money. I didn’t imagine their usual clientele arrived with a tatty straw bag and mud-stained ballet pumps.
Si must have spoken to them because the front desk seemed to be expecting me. Room 305, the receptionist told me. He already had my passport, he said, and all my details. I asked him to point me in the direction of the stairs, keeping my head down in the hope that I wouldn’t bump into anyone I knew. There were wedding guests milling about everywhere. I could spot them out of the corner of my eye, lounging on the leather sofas, all dressed up in heels and fascinators, champagne clasped in their hands. I loosened my hair from its bun, pulling it across my face in a pathetic attempt at disguise.
“Hannah!”
I pretended to be oblivious to the fact that somebody had called my name, but then there was a tap on my shoulder that I couldn’t ignore. I turned round, plastering the requisite smile on my face.
“You made it, then.”
It was Si’s dad. I didn’t know him as well as the other members of the family. He was rarely at home when I was over there for dinner, or was late to the table, citing an extended round at the golf club or work drinks with some visiting vice president from the Boston office. Mind you, if I’d lived with Catherine and Pauline at the height of wedding fever, I’d have made excuses to be out most of the time, too.
“Hi, Roger,” I said, dredging up as much enthusiasm as I could manage. “Good to see you.”
He’d been drinking. I could tell by the way he was rocking back and forth on his heels. His lips were stained red with wine and he kept licking them with a fat pink tongue.
“Hear you’ve had a bit of bother with the trains,” said Roger, leaning against the metal staircase for support. It zigzagged upward, with glass sides as you went farther up. Apparently there was a floating meeting room somewhere, Catherine had told us.
“You could say that,” I said. “How’s the bride doing?”
“Oh, she’s all right. Ordering everyone about as usual.”
He pulled a hankie from the pocket of his (
admittedly beautiful) charcoal-gray suit, which Catherine had harangued him into buying from Paul Smith so that it would match the suit she’d also harangued Jasper into buying from Paul Smith. The poor guy hadn’t even been allowed to choose an outfit for his own wedding, which if I were him, would have set alarm bells ringing.
“Roger, I really have to go and get changed. See you back down here in a minute, okay?”
“Yes, fine, fine,” he said, dabbing sweat off his face. “You go, make yourself beautiful, I know what you ladies are like.”
When I reached the third floor, huffing and puffing and wishing I’d got the lift, I strode down the corridor to our room and let myself in. Inside, it smelled like Si, which made me feel lots of different things: sad, scared, angry, nostalgic for how uncomplicated things had been before. For now, he was still my boyfriend. As far as he knew, nothing had changed, that was the strange thing. He was still the man I lived with, whose face I woke up to every morning, who stroked my head while I fell asleep next to him at night. He was the boyfriend who had treated me to a trip to Venice, because he knew I’d always wanted to go and because he could be romantic when he wanted to be. I wondered now about his job, whether that was why he’d put his foot down about the water taxi to the station, because he’d run out of money. Was that why he’d seemed so stressed lately, why he’d been so tired all the time? And I wouldn’t have had a clue about our finances, because he managed our joint account. He’d set up the direct debits, he paid the bills. Because he was on the ball with all that stuff and I wasn’t particularly, which was crap of me, because now look. It was pathetic that it had taken me until now to realize that I had to start taking control of my own life, my own money, my career and lots of other things. I’d simply paid half my salary into the joint account each month and had trusted him to take care of it.
My suitcase was on the floor next to the huge king-sized bed, which was made up with pristine white cotton sheets with a cozy-looking gray blanket draped across the bottom of it. If I could have, I would have got in it and pulled the covers over my head and stayed there. I knelt down on the wooden floor and unzipped the suitcase, rooting through my stuff, relieved to have it all back, picking out bits I needed: my wedding shoes, my clutch bag. And then, glancing over my shoulder, I opened up Si’s bag, which he’d placed on the floor at the end of the bed. I dug gingerly around inside, not really knowing what I was looking for. A note? A second phone, because wasn’t that what people carried around with them when they were having an affair? All I had to go on was my imagination and what I’d seen on Doctor Foster, which hardly prepared me for the reality of working out whether my boyfriend was cheating on me or not.
I put everything back and stood up, looking around for more clues as to what might be going on. His things were strewn across the bed—his iPad, a pair of socks, a can of deodorant. My wedding outfit, a light blue sleeveless prom dress with delicate sprigs of white flowers embroidered onto it, had been ironed and was hanging on the back of the door. Si was thoughtful like that. Good at the detail, which was probably why I felt like I needed him so much. He remembered to do stuff that hadn’t even occurred to me. But today I’d started to think that that wasn’t what relationships were all about. It shouldn’t be about them filling a hole, replacing something that was missing from your life. It was about connection. Trust. Attraction. God, even having fun, which Si and I hadn’t been having much of lately.
I thought briefly of Léo, wondered where he was, whether I was already firmly relegated to the back of his mind. Part of me assumed he’d consider our day together a sweet, funny little interlude that meant nothing in the scheme of things and that had no effect on his already very interesting life. I also held on to the tiniest bit of hope that what we’d had had been genuine. That he’d meant it when he said he’d miss me. Not that I’d ever know now.
I washed and dressed in a matter of minutes, dabbing on some of my makeup, brushing my hair, dousing myself in perfume. I slipped on my heels and left the room. Out in the corridor I passed a porter and asked him the time: it was 5:28. I’d made it, then, against the odds. I half ran down the staircase, clattering on the metal steps, very aware of everything I did, the sharp pain that occasionally spiked in my ankle, the way my breath was coming in quick, light bursts, how my shoes were already pinching at the toe. A concierge directed me to the terrace.
When I ran down the steps into the atrium, Catherine and her bridesmaids were standing at the bottom. Roger was there, too, wild-eyed, busy propping up the wall with his hand. There was a sort of loaded silence, the way there always seemed to be before a wedding ceremony. The bridesmaids were fussing about. One of them was straightening Catherine’s veil and another was on the floor rearranging the hem of her dress. Alison was holding the bride’s bouquet as well as her own. Catherine looked stunning, just as I’d known she would. Her body was encased in swaths of cream lace, cinched in at the waist to show off her amazing figure, her makeup dewy and discreet. As I moved closer, my eyes flickered across to Alison and the diamond-drop earrings she was wearing that sparkled in the light. Was she the kind of woman Si would fall for? Would he like her enough to give up on everything we’d built together?
“Hello, Catherine,” I said, in the soft voice I always used when conversing with brides. For some reason, I found it impossible to talk normally to someone on their wedding day, no matter how well I knew them. What were you supposed to chat about, when really nothing else mattered except the huge, life-changing journey they were about to embark on?
“You look stunning. What a gorgeous dress,” I said, settling for clichés, although I meant them, too. She had the same features as Si, with nothing too big or too small, and perfectly aligned white teeth and the same light green eyes. Her hair was a darker blond than his and usually swished between her shoulder blades with just the right amount of volume courtesy of regular and very expensive blow-dries. Today, though, it was pulled back off her face in a complicated, twisty bun.
“I’m glad you’re here, Hannah,” she said, smiling at me.
“Sorry I’m late,” I said, wincing.
“You made it, that’s the main thing,” she said, taking my hands and squeezing them. And then she whispered in my ear, “I’m so nervous.”
Her fingers felt quivery and cold.
“We’re all here, rooting for you,” I told her. “And you look amazing. Really beautiful. Just try and enjoy it, okay?”
And then, with a quick glance at Alison, who smiled at me in a friendly way, as though she hadn’t been secretly messaging my boyfriend, I ran out onto the terrace. Eva Cassidy’s version of “Over the Rainbow” started up the second I stepped through the door and I scooted into the first empty chair I saw, at the end of the back row. Seconds later everyone stood up and I followed suit, tucking my hair behind my ears, wishing I’d had time to put it up in the more sophisticated style I’d intended. I strained my neck, looking for Si, who would be up at the front. I wondered if he’d seen me come in. I wanted him to know that I was here, that I’d made it after all, like I’d promised. That, at least, felt important.
He eventually turned round and caught my eye. I half waved and he smiled and then he looked away again, focusing on watching his sister glide down the aisle. I noticed that she had a tight hold on Roger’s arm, possibly so that he didn’t fall over, and perhaps so that she didn’t, either. Jasper was waiting for her underneath a wooden pergola covered in yellow roses, resplendent and watery-eyed. What with the music and the dress and the beautiful setting, I almost forgot that anything was wrong. The woman in front of me was dabbing her eyes with a tissue, which made me feel tearful again, myself. I couldn’t pinpoint what it was, whether it was the emotion of the day, the rousing violin on the track or the fact that it could have been me, next. If he’d proposed to me in Venice, if I hadn’t moved seats, if I’d never met Léo, then it could have been me and Si walking down the aisle in a year’s time an
d I’d never have known any different.
The music faded out and everyone except Catherine, Jasper and the registrar sat down. My stomach flipped as we waited for the ceremony to begin.
20
Catherine was officially married. The ceremony had been short and very sweet with lots of tears and much laughter. Jasper’s sister had read a Shakespearean sonnet and Si had recited an extract from Captain Corelli’s Mandolin, which he’d been practicing obsessively, of course, and had duly delivered to perfection, like one of his work presentations. Catherine had arranged for candles housed in lanterns to cover every available surface, and Pauline’s suggestion that ivy and gypsophila be twisted around the tree trunks lining the perimeter of the terrace had made the area all dreamy and romantic. Léo’s face popped into my head and I pushed it out again as quickly as it had arrived. I couldn’t think about him now.
Once Catherine and Jasper had walked back down the aisle to rapturous applause (and a more upbeat piece of music), the guests began to stream out after them, peeling off from the front, row by row. First came Si, Roger and Pauline, who was in the Max Mara royal-blue dress and jacket she’d been banging on about for weeks, her short, flicky hair coiffed to within an inch of its life, a fascinator placed precariously on top. Si winked at me as he went past before turning to shake the hand of a man I didn’t know on the other side of the aisle. Behind him were Jasper’s parents, who were very blond and very elegant, and then the bridesmaids.
The reception was taking place in the hotel’s swanky restaurant, which, handily enough, was about two feet away. By the time I stepped inside, the photographs were already in full swing, with Catherine and Jasper standing underneath one of the indoor trees, kissing for the camera.
I spotted Si immediately and made my way over, grabbing a glass of champagne on the way. How things had changed in the space of a day. Yesterday I was happily wandering around Italy imagining my future with the man I loved, and now I wasn’t so sure that I really knew him at all. The more I thought about it, the more I realized he’d taken on the “caring father” role with me and that I’d let him. He did the same thing with Catherine. He liked being relied upon, the go-to person for problem-solving and disaster-averting. It was what made him tick, what made him feel powerful, I supposed, and honestly, I thought it might have been what had drawn me to him in the first place. I’d loved having someone to care about me, who wanted to look after me in a way my dad never had. But what would be better, I was starting to realize, would be to find out who I was, and what I wanted, first.
The Paris Connection Page 22