Tout Sweet

by Karen Wheeler

  ‘Are you sure, Mathilde?’ I say. ‘I could always take my car and follow you.’

  ‘No, I am fine,’ she says, as Sebastian slams the door closed behind her. ‘You are too feminine to sit in the back. I am at least wearing trousers.’ She lowers her voice to a whisper. ‘And anyway, it is good for me. It makes me look young and sportive in front of Sebastian.’

  There are no seats in the rear of the van, so Mathilde is forced to sit on the floor for the entire journey. She props her head between the driver and passenger seats like a small child. As we drive towards La Rochelle, we pass a sign to the bridge to the Île de Ré and she asks me if I have ever visited the salt marshes there, as salt from the island is very famous.

  ‘Yes,’ I say.

  ‘What kind of salt do you use?’ asks Mathilde.

  ‘Um, I think it comes in a blue and white box. Why? What do you use?’

  ‘Well, it depends,’ she says. ‘I have four kinds of salt: big crystals for cooking, sel de Bayonne for meat dishes, fleurs de Ré for food once it has been cooked and then another salt for the table.’

  ‘You have four different kinds of salt?’

  ‘Yes, it’s normal,’ says Sebastian.

  The conversation shifts to oysters, the Île de Ré’s other speciality. I say again that I like oysters but oysters don’t like me (a joke I have made many times since living in France, always with great success). Sebastian roars with laughter. Not all oysters, it seems, are equal. The ones to go for, he says, are size 3 ‘special’. The word ‘special’ means that they have been turned many times. He explains that size 1 oysters are the biggest and oldest (eight years old) and the most likely to make you ill as they have had longer to absorb toxins, size 2 are seven years old and size 3 are six years old and so on. Mathilde and I listen with wide eyes as Sebastian also tells us about a type of potato unique to the island. Cultivated using a special algae, they apparently cost up to €100 a kilo. ‘I suppose if you are rich enough to live on the Île de Ré, that’s nothing,’ says Mathilde drily.

  ‘Maybe we could visit the Île de Ré tomorrow?’ says Sebastian.

  ‘Bonne idée,’ says Mathilde. I say nothing as we drive past the turn-off for the magnificent bridge and the place in the world that has the capacity to cause me the most pain.

  It is pouring with rain and the sky is the colour of graphite when we arrive in La Rochelle. Sebastian wants to walk around, so he parks the car in the harbourfront car park and we do a circuit of the harbour in the rain, Sebastian stopping to admire the different boats. After walking long enough to ensure that my boots are squelching with water and my hair is as wet as if I’d just stepped out of the shower, we all climb back into the van and Sebastian announces that we will go to visit his brother now. It takes a good half-hour of driving around to find Jean-Jacques’ house. Although Sebastian has been here before, it was a long time ago and he is trying to find it from memory. We follow a narrow road up to higher ground and finally stop in front of a modern white building, with huge glass windows. Perched as it is on a cliff top, it has a direct view of the Île de Ré and the silver-grey Atlantic shimmering menacingly in the distance.

  Mathilde and I wait in the van while Sebastian goes to knock on the door. ‘It used to be a holiday colony,’ explains Mathilde. By ‘colony’ I assume she means holiday village. ‘Sebastian’s brother is an architect and he has converted the main reception building into a house.’ Mathilde seems nervous but excited. It transpires that she has never met any members of Sebastian’s family before – despite being with him for nearly six years.

  ‘All I know is that Jean-Jacques is very quiet and does not say very much,’ she says. After a while Sebastian returns to the van. ‘OK,’ he says. ‘On y va.’

  Jean-Jacques, like Sebastian, is tall with long grey hair, worn in a ponytail. Although his skin is slightly more weather-beaten, due to living on the coast, it’s immediately obvious that they are brothers. The welcome is friendly but not effusive and Jean-Jacques does not seem at all surprised to receive a visit from his brother after all this time. We enter the house through a workshop filled with industrial-looking machinery. Sebastian explains that it belongs to Jean-Jacques’ girlfriend Camille, an artist who specialises in metal sculptures. We follow Jean-Jacques up a staircase and into a large, modern kitchen, one wall of which is entirely glass with a stunning view of an expanse of sea below.

  ‘I hope we are not interrupting anything,’ says Sebastian, although it is blatantly obvious that we are. Five very attractive, elegantly dressed individuals, all French and in their thirties, are perched on stools at a high table in the centre of the kitchen. Since it is nearly 6.00 p.m., it’s not clear if they are finishing a long, leisurely lunch or are about to start dinner.

  ‘Not at all,’ says a slender woman in wide black trousers and a black-and-white stripy top – everyone, it seems, has adopted the maritime dress code – getting up (or rather down) from the table. This is Camille. After introductions and some small talk, she asks if we would like to see the house. Mathilde says that this would be ‘super bon’! We follow Camille through the kitchen and into a large central space, with high ceilings and rooms leading directly off it. The interior walls are made of metal frames with glass panel windows, so it is obvious that it was once office space. Camille shows us the bathroom, the utility room, Sebastian’s office and the bedroom. Through the large glass panels, I can see five immaculately dressed children, aged between about three and eleven, sitting in a neat line on the bed. Heads propped up against the grandiose curved wooden headboard, legs stretched out in front of them, they are watching cartoons on a small TV screen placed on a shelf above the bed.

  ‘They are having their own little party,’ says Camille.

  ‘Bonjour, les enfants,’ says Mathilde, sticking her head around the door, and she is rewarded with a polite chorus of ‘Bonjour, Madame.’

  We move on to the sitting room, which leads off the kitchen. It’s filled with uncomfortable looking modern furniture, liberally interspersed with Camille’s artworks. Mathilde admires the fluid, organic sculptures and politely asks lots of questions about her work, before we rejoin the other, frankly terrifying, guests in the kitchen. In London I was used to mingling with Sunday supplement types, but since living in Villiers, I’ve become a country bumpkin and I’m certain that my conversational skills are not up to this gathering.

  Isabelle, dressed in pristine white jeans and a floral chiffon top, and her husband Gilles are friendly enough. They are neighbours of Camille and Jean-Jacques and own a marketing consultancy business in La Rochelle. They are the parents of two of the little girls, in the room next door. But it is the other couple, parents of the remaining three children, that I find intriguing. Arnaud – I do not catch his profession – is bespectacled, intense and very French-looking. He does not smile at all. Nor does he speak very much, but when he does it is in short, rapid-fire sentences, which make everyone laugh. I wish I could understand what he’s saying as it is obviously very dry and funny.

  His wife Lila is mesmerising: she is French-Cambodian with long dark hair and beautiful, smooth skin in a shade that the French call café au lait. Dressed in jeans and a white, see-through tunic which is almost incandescent against the brownness of her skin, she exudes inner peace and serenity. Her husband, on the other hand, is constantly on the move, jumping up regularly to police the children at even the slightest hint of noise or movement from the bedroom.

  In an ungainly fashion, I manage to hoik myself onto the stool next to Mathilde. It seems like an age before we are offered any refreshment but eventually Jean-Jacques produces a bottle of champagne from the large American-style fridge. As predicted, he is very taciturn. A gentle, benign presence, he seems happy to fade into the background while his brother holds court, talking about his yacht. Everyone is very polite and interested, asking what kind of boat it is, when it will be seaworthy and so on. Bu
t Camille also likes to talk a lot, and for a while the conversation ping-pongs rapidly between the two of them, leaving little scope for anyone else to speak. ‘Oof. I think I chose the wrong brother,’ Camille says at one point and everyone laughs.

  The fast-flowing conversation does not let up even for a second. I understand hardly any of it, which is very humbling as up until this point I’d considered my French to be pretty good. Here, I feel like I am watching from the sidelines of a very fast relay race – all short, conversational sprints and someone expertly picking up the baton when another member of the team has come to the end of their run. I desperately want to understand what they are saying – especially when the conversation moves on to a discussion of the Île de Ré. There is, it seems, no escaping that place. It follows me around like a sad memory.

  ‘Are you able to follow?’ asks Mathilde at one point, which is the cue for everyone to suddenly notice the silent presence at the table.

  ‘Not everything,’ I say, with supreme understatement.

  ‘Me neither,’ says Arnaud, in his intense, quick-fire style, and everyone laughs. Except me.

  In rural France just being English is usually enough to impart curiosity value and catapult you to the centre of the conversation. But not here. At this wealthy, erudite gathering, being an Anglaise is no big deal. The onus is on me to keep up and no attempt is made to include me in the conversation; no allowances are made for the language gap. The exception is Jean-Jacques, who does not speak at all for the first half-hour. And when he does, to my surprise, it is to me: ‘So how long have you been living in France?’ he asks in a slow, thoughtful tone. Finally, a sentence I understand.

  ‘Since last August,’ I reply. ‘About nine months.’

  ‘And do you work here?’

  ‘She writes for English newspapers,’ says Sebastian, depriving me of a rare opportunity to speak.

  ‘As a fashion journalist,’ adds Mathilde.

  This news is greeted with polite silence. And I am even more aware of my muddy boots and wild-looking hair. Thankfully, the conversation quickly moves on.

  Arnaud suddenly jumps to his feet again and rushes into the bedroom to chastise the children about something. When he returns, he stands behind his beautiful wife and starts to massage her back and shoulders, in a slow, sensuous rhythm. This continues for an unseemly amount of time. It makes me – and probably everyone else at the table – feel like a voyeur, even though we have no choice but to watch this astonishing display of affection. It’s particularly awkward for me as they are directly in my sight line. Each time Arnaud gets up to correct the children (which is often) he has a grope of his wife on his return. At one point, his hand hovers near the neckline of her loose-fitting white top and for a second it looks like he is going to slip his hand down it. The continuous display of sexual tension – the subtext is that he cannot wait to get her home – is very disconcerting, the more so since Arnaud looks so stern and serious and lawyerly. At one point, as the caressing reaches a crescendo and she throws her head back in apparent ecstasy, I am tempted to shout, ‘Prenez une chambre!’

  In a brief interlude when her husband isn’t lustfully running his hands over her body, I ask Lila how she knows Jean-Jacques and Camille.

  ‘I used to work for Jean-Jacques,’ she says. ‘And now we are almost neighbours.’

  ‘You live in La Rochelle?’

  ‘No we live in Poitiers but we have a holiday home on the Île de Ré, which is not very far from here.’

  ‘How fabulous,’ I say, feeling a familiar stab of pain, and thinking how totally annoying. This must be the reason why they were talking about the Île de Ré earlier. ‘I‘ve heard that it’s very difficult to buy a house there.’

  ‘No,’ she says, shrugging her beautiful shoulders with extreme nonchalance, as though talking about buying a new pair of shoes. ‘It was very easy.’

  I am not so much green with jealousy as the colour of chlorophyll. The Île de Ré seems to have become the most fashionable spot in France (and in terms of real estate, the most expensive). It’s galling to accept that it is infinitely more fashionable and picturesque than Villiers – the difference between Stoke and St Ives, Primark and Prada. I feel like an outsider and a failure, surrounded by these attractive, successful couples with their beautiful children and holiday homes on the Île de Ré. Perched on an uncomfortable stool in their midst, it pains to me to think how close I came to having all this too. Instead, I am planning to spend the night in the back of a van in the middle of a boatyard, which for a thirty-something woman is just plain wrong. I sit in silence – not a natural state of affairs for me – and since I can’t join in with the adults, I try to converse with the children. The two little boys, who are like miniature versions of their bespectacled father, are now standing next to me, politely waiting for a pause in the conversation.

  ‘How old are you?’ I ask one of them.

  ‘I am nine years old, Madame,’ he replies with disarming politeness. ‘And he is seven.’ The two boys wait in silence until they are spoken to, and then ask their mother if they might please have a glass of water. As they’re doing so, their little sister – dark skin, almond eyes and without doubt the cutest child I have ever seen – comes rushing into the kitchen and says something that makes everyone laugh. Except her father.

  ‘What did she say?’ I ask Mathilde.

  ‘She is asking Sebastian to keep his voice down as it’s very loud and they cannot hear the TV,’ she explains. Most people would be putty in the hands of this little girl in her pink daisy-print dress and navy cardigan. But Arnaud responds with a very loud ‘Shhh’ and a fearsome expression on his face. This, I think to myself, is why French children are so well behaved. He jumps up from the table, grabs the toddler by the hand and leads her back to the bedroom.

  ‘Alors, you will stay and dine with us?’ asks Camille, eventually. This, I realise, is a coded message, for it has an immediate effect. Everyone stands up to leave. I for one am pleased, since we have now been drinking champagne for over two hours and in that time no one has asked to use the bathroom. (This is one of the unspoken rules of French etiquette – I am not sure why it is – but you never, ever ask to use the loo when visiting friends.) Camille persists with a ‘Yes, yes, but of course you must stay and eat with us,’ but everyone is already getting down from the table. The adorable toddler suddenly appears in a bright-yellow fisherman style coat and matching hat but even though we are all now standing, the rapid-fire conversation continues.

  ‘Would it be OK to ask to use the loo?’ I whisper to Mathilde.

  ‘Can you wait?’ she asks. ‘I am in the same situation.’

  I stand silent in the kitchen for another ten minutes, caught in a conversational crossfire, before slowly we all start to edge towards the door. No one wants to be the first across the threshold. It’s a scene I have witnessed many times at French gatherings, where it’s important to give the impression that you are tearing yourself away under duress. A typical exit procedure might go like this: first you announce your intention to leave and ten minutes later you might stand up. You remain here for a minimum of five minutes, preferably ten, before slowly edging out of the room and advancing towards the door as reluctantly as possible. Throughout this process, you must maintain a lively discourse with your hosts. Then comes the cheek-kissing, followed by some more conversation on the doorstep. Only then can you make your getaway. Having watched my French friends do it many times, I have realised that there is a real art to this – the subtle dance of the long, graceful goodbye.

  And so it is chez Jean-Jacques. It takes an age, but we are finally out of the door, kisses and thanks conveyed. I feel for Mathilde as she suffers the indignity of climbing into the back of Sebastian’s ancient van, watched by the chic little crowd on the doorstep. As I open the passenger door, I commit one final solecism by bidding everyone a cheerful ‘Bonne soirée’.
/>   ‘We say Au revoir,’ says Camille. ‘Bonne soirée is for shopkeepers.’

  ‘What a lucky woman to have a husband as affectionate as that,’ says Mathilde, as we pull away, and Sebastian and I know immediately whom she is referring to. ‘Even after three children!’

  ‘What does he do in Poitiers?’ I ask.

  ‘He’s a lawyer,’ says Mathilde.

  ‘And I suppose his wife doesn’t work?’

  ‘Oh yes, she does. She is an architect. A very successful one,’ says Sebastian.

  ‘And did you hear what she was saying about their two boys?’ asks Mathilde.

  ‘Tell me!’ I say.

  ‘They are both extremely gifted – of a much higher intelligence than is usual for their age.’

  I should have known that even their problems would be of the ‘too-perfect’ kind.

  ‘You should try and meet up with them in Poitiers,’ says Mathilde. ‘I think it would be good for you to have some friends like that, no? Especially if they have a holiday home on the Île de Ré!’

  She asks Sebastian if we can stop by some trees ‘pour faire pi pi’. Instead of asking why on earth we didn’t visit the bathroom before we left his brother’s house, Sebastian says, ‘Ah yes, very good idea’, and pulls over at the side of the road, so that Mathilde and I can creep into the bushes. It seems like a suitably humiliating end to the day. Only the day is not over yet.

  As we are leaving La Rochelle, we pass a quay where a fishing boat has just come in. And in the few seconds it takes to pass by, I witness a scene so painful that it would have been less hurtful if someone had thrust a knife into my solar plexus. A member of the crew, a man with long hair and a golden tan, lithe-looking in jeans and navy Wellington boots, has just hopped onto the quay. He kisses a girl with very dark hair, who is leaning on the bonnet of a black Golf, waiting for him. The girl is in her early thirties, petite and she looks very French. The man with the long hair is Eric, I am sure of it, and I am gutted. I never was brave enough to dial his number again after finding it in Les Pages Blanches but I want to shout out to Sebastian to stop the van, to run over and speak to Eric, like nothing has happened, like several years have not passed. But Sebastian drives on unaware and I sit in the passenger seat, silently devastated.