David took the car off the freeway and guided it through the always massively congested traffic at LAX to the curb outside the Air France gates of the Tom Bradley International Terminal. The dogs slept through Lala’s anguished exit from the vehicle.
“Mama! Loves! You!” she gasped in loud staccato outbursts that might have been better suited to grand opera than to an adult going on a fairly brief journey. “Mama and Papa love you and we will all be together again we promise so please . . . Are you seriously going to not wake up to say good-bye to Mama?”
Yootza would have woken up to say good-bye to Mama, Lala thought sadly. That’s actually not true at all. The grumpy little bastard would have been on my lap and he would have growled in his sleep when I moved to get out of the car. I miss him so much.
David had taken Lala’s suitcases out of the trunk and was showing Lala’s boarding pass and driver’s license to a curbside employee of Air France. When her bags were on the way and she was set to enter the terminal, she started to find it hard to breathe.
“I’m going to miss you so much,” Lala said. She put her arms around much-taller David’s chest and crushed her face against it, like a toddler not wanting to go in for her first day of school.
“We’ll Skype tomorrow,” David said. He had to stoop forward to kiss the top of Lala’s head. “We’ll write long and passionate e-mails all the time. We’ll be back together before you know it.”
Lala looked back at David and waved with each step toward the doors of the terminal. A series of people walking behind her smacked right into her because she was disrupting the smooth flow of traffic on a second-by-second basis.
“I love . . . oops, sorry . . . you . . . sorry, my mistake . . . so much . . . Did I crush your toe, I’m so sorry . . . David.”
Once inside, Lala searched for the nearest empty bench and collapsed onto it. She cradled her carry-on bag that contained her laptop, her Kindle, and a large bottle of Ambien. There was a thought weighing on her, and it was an echo of a thought that had haunted her ever since Terrence died. The frequency and the intensity of the thought diminished with time, but it never fully disappeared.
There’s nowhere I can walk to or drive to or fly to, there’s no number I can call. I can’t ever find Terrence again. He’s gone forever. I can’t ever see or speak to him again. If I hear or see or read something that would make him laugh, I can’t share it with him. Not ever again.
“Ma’am, are you okay?”
Lala looked up to see the worried, kindly face of an Air France representative looking at her.
“I’m great!” Lala said.
The woman handed Lala a tissue. Lala studied it, then looked back at the woman with a confused expression. The woman hesitated for a moment, then dabbed at her cheeks with her fingertips. Lala couldn’t think of anything else to do in response to the woman’s gesture except imitate it. So she did, and found that her cheeks were completely wet.
“Omigoodness,” Lala said. “Allergies. Sudden allergy attack. Thank you so much.”
“Of course,” the woman said. “Can I do anything to help?”
“Yes, please, can you point me in the direction of the nearest lounge I can get into with my Amex Platinum Business Card, registered trademark—I don’t know why I always have to add that—and my first class ticket?”
“That would be the Korean Air Lounge, ma’am. Please, let me escort you. I’d feel better knowing you got there okay.”
The woman, whose name, Lala discovered on their walk to the lounge—after Lala assured her that she didn’t need to find a cart to transport them because Lala could probably walk and wasn’t, god willing and the creek don’t rise, going to have a full-on mental and physical collapse anytime soon—was Peggy, brought Lala to the lounge and insisted on finding one of her colleagues, a lovely young man named Sean, so she could ask him to please take extra special care of Ms. Lala.
Lala hugged Peggy and realized she might start crying again, so she distracted herself with positive action. She grabbed her phone and started to pound on the screen.
“Peggy, would you please give me your e-mail address, and would you please pick a charity I can donate to in your honor, and would you please give me your boss’s contact information so I can tell her or him how sanity-savingly kind you are?”
“Dachshund Rescue of Southern California,” Peggy said without hesitation. Lala gasped.
“You have got to be kidding. Were you concerned that I didn’t adore you enough already? Done. I’m staying in touch with you, my new friend. And, yes, that is way more of a threat than a promise.”
Sean escorted Lala inside the lounge. He pointed toward the bar area.
“Yes?”
“Oh, yes, dear Sean,” Lala said. “And you go right ahead and start thinking about your charity-of-choice.”
Sean settled Lala into a very comfortable chair in a corner of the area surrounding the bar. He helped her adjust her seat so that her feet were elevated, and he very quickly got her in possession of a very large glass of premium white wine from Sonoma and a lovely cheese plate.
“Sean, your place in heaven is assured, and I’m adopting you as one of my slew of nephews. That means you’ll be taking care of me when I’m old and, I hope, agreeably dotty.”
“Great!” Sean said. He gave Lala a sweet little nod and left her to relax.
Poor dear boy, Lala thought as she watched Sean walk away. He has no idea how demanding I intend to be in my dotage.
Lala surveyed the spacious lounge. The colors were soothing. There weren’t many people there. It was a calming, cozy atmosphere, and Lala was very grateful for that. She propped a pillow under her head and leaned back with her Kindle screen on the most recent page of The Count of Monte Cristo. After maybe a few more readings, Lala felt happily sure, she would probably have all 1,500 pages memorized.
Maybe this wasn’t such a scary plan after all, Lala thought. She looked around the lounge again. When I went to Paris the last time, with Terrence, we left from JFK. And we certainly didn’t fly first class. And we stayed in a cheap, wonderfully small hotel, and now I’ll be in a charming apartment. So the memories might not be able to flatten me.
Lala took a big sip of wine and visited with the Count as he formulated his escape from the Chateau D’If. After a half hour of wonderful transport to a completely different place and time, Lala shut her Kindle cover for a moment.
I’m okay, she thought. I think I may even have bested the Dread Memory Demons for now. Yup. Going to Paris is actually a very good plan, and I don’t feel a bit frightened. God, this bleu cheese is fabulous. What a harbinger of bonnes choses to come!
This was a very terrible plan, and I should not have done this!
That upsetting thought had actually been kept at bay for far longer than Lala had any right to expect. She had done very well during the long overnight flight, other than a momentary blip while she was getting comfortable in her big first-class slumber pod. The Air France jet had not yet left the gate to head to the runway when Lala suddenly blurted.
“Sweet Mother of God, what am I thinking going to Paris alone?”
Lala just as suddenly clapped her hand over her mouth and tentatively half-stood to see if her outburst had been loud enough to be heard by anyone. First class was fairly empty, and the air hosts were gathered at the galley in front of the plane, so it seemed possible that she had not branded herself a whack job from the beginning of the flight.
Lala had settled back in her seat. Champagne service began almost immediately, and Lala didn’t have an empty glass through the delicious vegetarian dinner and the viewing of movies that was interrupted only by trips to the bathroom and reading breaks to visit with her forever-loved Edmond Dantès, until she fell asleep without even needing to pop an Ambien.
She woke just before landing. A smiling young man holding up a sign with her nam
e on it was waiting for her when she exited customs.
“Bonjour, Madame Pettibone,” he said.
He pronounced her last name “Puh-teee-boh,” and Lala had to try not to swoon.
My god, he is adorable, Lala thought. Frenchmen. My god.
The car the production had hired to take her to her apartment was very comfortable, and, after chatting with the driver, Fabrice, in French and English, Lala fell into a bit of a nap in the backseat. When she lifted her head, the Eiffel Tower loomed in the distance against a clear blue sky. And that’s when the Memory Demons recaptured their hegemony.
This was a very terrible plan, and I should not have done this! Lala thought.
“I’m sorry,” she gasped. “Could you please pull over?”
“Of course, Madame,” Fabrice said. He found a spot around the corner from the main road they were on and parked. He turned toward the backseat. “What can I do for you?”
Lala couldn’t answer right away. She tried not to hyperventilate.
It has been a long time since I felt so alone, Lala thought. Maybe not since the months right after Terrence died. Oh, and that summer during college when I worked on that midnight-to-seven shift at that phone sex line in Tarzana because the pay was so good.
“Madame,” Fabrice said. “Are you ill?”
“I’m great!” Lala forced herself to say. “Sudden and thankfully momentary attack of jet lag, I guess. Merci mille fois pour votre gentillesse.”
They got back on the road and arrived at the gate leading to the courtyard of Lala’s new home without any additional mishaps. Fabrice had phoned ahead to alert the concierge that they would be arriving. A stooped old man was standing at the entrance when the car pulled up. He slowly opened each side of the wide iron gate, and the car pulled in to the cobblestone courtyard. Lala looked up at the charming old three-story building that wrapped around the center.
Oy vey, she thought. SO gorgeous. I’m kvelling. Alone. Oy.
The concierge leaned into the open window on the driver’s side and spoke to Fabrice in rapid-fire French. Lala couldn’t catch many of the words. She did manage to make out “la femme” and “bien sûr que non” before she saw the concierge hand Fabrice a huge, elaborate key. The old man then shuffled away from the car and disappeared into a nearby door. Fabrice leapt out of the car and ran over to Lala’s door to open it.
“Madame, let me show you up to the apartment so you can relax while I bring the bags upstairs.”
“God, no,” Lala said. “Pop the trunk and let’s schlepp them to my place together so you can be on your way, you sweet young man. And your big tip is assured, mon ami.”
Fabrice protested that he didn’t want her to have to carry anything, and Lala wouldn’t hear of it, so they hauled Lala’s suitcases up one flight of stairs together. Fabrice used the fancy key to open the door to a small, utterly charming one-bedroom, all the windows of which faced the courtyard. The sun made every corner of the apartment bright. The furnishings were clean and crisp and cozy. Lala wanted to cry.
“Wow,” she said. “Listen, Fabrice, you are wonderful. Thank you so much. I think I’m going to have a shower and a nap. Don’t be a stranger. Come visit the set sometime, yes?”
Fabrice promised Lala he would, and he gave her a cheerful wave on the way out the door. Lala had a long, hot shower. She wrapped one of many big, fluffy towels around herself like a sarong and unpacked. There was a gorgeous armoire in the bedroom, and it was just the right size for all her clothes and then some. The bed was big and had an ornate headboard carved in a wood Lala couldn’t identify because she had no idea about anything having to do with interior design other than what was comfortable and comforting for her. And this apartment was profoundly that. It felt like a sanctuary. It felt like just what Lala needed at that point.
My fear of losing David to his untimely death that would occur anytime before I kick it, and my resulting urge to run and hide from our relationship aside, I may need to fly him over here so we can bonk on that bed, Lala thought.
She set up her laptop on the small desk in the bedroom. One of the first e-mails she saw was from Clive, inviting her to dinner that night. She wrote a quick response to ask for a rain check. Having to maintain a sustained conversation with anyone at any point during at least the next twelve hours didn’t really seem that appealing to her. Clive responded immediately that they would definitely reschedule and that, if it was okay with Lala, he would pick her up to take her to the set the next afternoon.
Lala sent a quick e-mail to David to tell him that she had landed safely, and that she loved him and couldn’t wait to Skype with him, and could they please do that tomorrow as she was exhausted from jet lag and desperate to get to bed.
Part of the e-mail was a lie; Lala felt wired and not a bit tired, and she knew she wouldn’t be able to sleep anytime soon.
David wrote back immediately to say that he loved her and missed her, and they would definitely Skype tomorrow. Lala sent another e-mail that consisted of rows and rows of ‘X’s and ‘O’s.
Her next e-mail was to Geraldine, to tell her that the trip was wonderful and she was safely in her adorable apartment, and she would write more tomorrow because right now she was exhausted from jet lag and desperate to get to bed.
Geraldine wrote back immediately to say that she suspected that was a load of crap and that Lala would be too agitated to sleep, but she loved her anyway, even though she was a bald-faced liar.
Lala chose to completely ignore Geraldine’s P.S., which stated that Geraldine “better not find out you are trying to peddle the same bullshit to dear David, tonight or any other night, or there will be hell to pay.”
Lala decided a long constitutional was an absolute must. She put on a comfortable pair of jeans, a cozy cotton sweater, and her walking sneakers. They were certainly not her workout sneakers, which had been left behind in Los Angeles, as they were fairly pungent and she hadn’t planned to visit a gym while she was in France. Lala wanted to get her exercise like a real Parisian, by traveling on foot everywhere. She stuck her credit cards and her international driver’s license in her back pocket so she could travel light. She grabbed her sunglasses and her key and was out the door, skipping down the stairs.
Act like you’re feeling safe and confident, she thought. And you’ll end up feeling safe and confident. God, I hope that’s true.
Lala’s apartment was in the Fifth Arrondissement, on a charming little side street not a hundred steps from the Seine and in a direct line to one of the many bridges across the river, this one leading to the Île Saint-Louis. The end of the street also boasted a stunning view of the back of Notre Dame. Lala marched toward the water and smiled.
Ice cream, she thought.
Her first stop was at Berthillon, a wonderful ice cream shop she had visited with Terrence on their honeymoon. The line leading to the store stretched around the block. Lala cheerfully took her place behind the last person in line, a cute and tiny woman who looked like a sweet grandma-for-hire. The older woman smiled at Lala and nodded.
“Bonjour,” she said.
“Bonjour, Madame,” Lala said, nodding and smiling a bit to excess. “Comme il fait beau aujourd’hui!”
The woman’s smile instantly became broader.
“Oh, you are American,” she said.
Yikes, Lala thought. It’s that obvious? Well, I never was a good actress.
“Yup,” Lala said.
“Where are you from?”
“Los Angeles by way of New York,” Lala said.
“J’adore New York,” the woman trilled. “I live there for many years right after the war, with my parents. In the Greenwich Village!”
“J’adore Greenwich Village!” Lala crowed.
By the time they got to the front of the line, Lala had to tell the woman, whose name was Mimi, that she would love to meet her gran
dson if she were single, but she was in fact engaged-to-be-engaged to a lovely man, and Mimi responded that that sounded “adorable, but is my English perhaps not of high enough quality for me to understand why that is not entirely fucking ridiculous en même temps,” and Lala couldn’t stop laughing. She bought them both a double scoop of lavender and vanilla, and they made a date to have dinner together over the weekend. Lala told Mimi she had to promise to come visit the set of the film.
After hugging Mimi good-bye, Lala walked along the bank of the Seine and made her way over to Notre Dame. She walked around the cathedral and remembered dancing with Terrence to a violinist who had been playing in the long square in front of the cathedral years ago.
Lala sat on a bench and listened to a guitarist play and sing to Et Maintenant. It was one of the songs she memorized to help her learn French, and so she sang along in French, while also astonishing herself by simultaneously translating in her mind.
Now that you’re gone . . .
A young man had been standing next to the bench on the other side to listen to the song, and when he heard Lala singing in French, he turned and spoke to her.
“You’re American?” he asked.
Sheesh. My accent sucks when I sing, too? she thought. Well, I never was much of a singer. Like, not much of one at all.
“Yup,” she told the young man, smiling. “How are ya?”
They chatted for a few minutes and Lala complimented him on his excellent English. Then Lala walked back to the Left Bank and continued walking for several miles, past bookstalls and all kinds of other vendors. She made it all the way to the Musée d’Orsay, also a much-loved memory from her honeymoon. It was closed at that point during the early evening, and she resolved that she would visit the museum as soon as possible.
By the time she got back to her street, Lala was ravenous. She noticed a small Italian restaurant right across from the entrance to the courtyard of her building, and she felt a welcome and familiar craving for carbs.
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