by Allison Parr
Anna threw herself on the loveseat, caught sight of me, and barely managed to restrain her eyes from rolling. “You have to drive me over to pub. The adults have been interrogating me for two hours about my college plans.”
Mike crossed his arms. “The pub where you’ve been underage drinking.”
She turned her eyes on me. “Natalie!”
I jumped up and headed for the shower. “Oh, hey. I am not part of this conversation.”
“Tell him it’s legal here!”
“Shirker,” Mike muttered as I closed the bathroom door.
When I came out, an agreement had been reached. It turned out no one wanted to stay indoors, so we all headed out to the pub. It was already packed, but Mike and I managed to squeeze in at the end of a table next to the O’Brien family and their four children. Five-year-old Kelly kept sticking her elbow in my side and stealing peeks at me, but other than that it was a pretty good fit.
As Mike spoke, Kelly stopped watching me and started watching him. Her little brother got jam all over Mike’s arm, which he absentmindedly cleaned off.
And then, in the middle of our happy, light-hearted conversation, he looked up with this half smile, like he’d forgotten it on his face. “I’m going back home in three weeks.”
“For another weekend?”
“No. For good. I have training camp on the twenty-sixth.”
I shook my head, oddly numb. Of course he had training camp. He was a New York Leopard. “Are you excited?”
He shrugged. “I’m always excited for a new season.”
Right. Right.
“If you find something, you have flexibility about where you’re based in your off-season, right? But what if you don’t find anything?”
“Then I’ll probably stay here and keep looking.”
He took a long drink. “Then I really hope you find Ivernis.”
A lump formed in my throat. I tried to clear it away with the same grace as a cat with a hairball. “I’ll definitely be back in New York late September, to present at the conference.”
“What will you guys give your talk on if you don’t find anything?”
Our talk was registered as a Field Report, and I was fairly certain the American Academy of Archaeology had accepted it because they figured Ceile and Jeremy’s feud would provide some much needed entertainment at the conference. “I was thinking about just crying for a straight hour if we have nothing to say. Or maybe Ceile will come and throw tomatoes at us.”
“Sort of like performance art.”
“Yeah. Maybe we’ll hold different tools as we do it. Trowel—tiny tears. Shovel—big wail.” I took a bite of my sandwich. “It’s funny—the conference is actually at the Javits Center, so right next to your stadium.”
He grinned. “The season will’ve started. You can come to a game while you’re home.”
Under the table, I hooked my ankle around his. “Without a doubt.”
That evening, Lauren and I were playing checkers before the fireplace when Mike came in with a slight smile. I rolled over and looked at him. “You know those charts where there’s a different smiley face for each emotion? We should have one of you, except instead of frowns and tears they’d all be different versions of you smiling.”
Kate made a mom noise. “That’s such a sweet idea.”
Well, I wasn’t sure about sweet. I was going for clever.
“We should have one of Anna,” Lauren said. “Except instead of smiles, it would be scowl variations.”
Anna demonstrated one. “You’re so funny.”
Mike sat down next to me. “And which smile is this?”
“You have a secret.”
He raised his brows. “Not a very long lasting one. Want to go somewhere this weekend?”
“Dublin?”
“Paris.”
Anna cried out, “I want to go to Paris!”
Her mother and sister swatted her.
“Ryan called and said he and Rachael are stopping by after her work trip in Italy, and that Malcolm and Bri might fly over as sort of a last fling before training starts. You in?”
Paris. For a fleeting moment I juggled ticket prices, but then a line of can-can dancers kicked through my budget. “I’m in.”
* * *
Lauren stopped by the library the next evening while I went over data. “Hey. Just wanted to check—do you have a dress?”
I blinked at her. “What?”
“Thought not. My brother’s a space shot. You’re going somewhere fancy, right? He’ll almost definitely get a tux delivered to the hotel.”
“He didn’t say we were going anywhere.”
She just gave me an oh-poor-you look. “You’re meeting up with Rach and Bri? You’re going somewhere fancy. It’ll be for charity. But it will also be for dresses.”
I frowned uncertainly. “I have that black dress I wore for the month’s mind...”
She dropped down next to me, shaking her head. “Nope. Won’t cut it. Don’t worry, you can rent cocktail dresses online and have them delivered to your hotel. Easy.”
I stared at her. “Crazy.”
“Come on, it’ll be fun.” She pulled the computer toward her and started a search. “Look, this site has two hundred different options. And it’s in English.”
“I speak French,” I muttered. But I was already being drawn into the sparkly gowns, which Lauren clicked through without stopping, until we reached one golden ball gown that made us both oooh.
“Maybe over the top, but see? You can find something nice.”
I suffered a thirty-second moral quandary about spending money renting a dress, and then the dress won.
Anna wandered in ten minutes later. “What are you guys doing?”
“Renting a dress in Paris for Nat.”
She plopped down beside us and tore open a bag of chips. Crisps. Whatever. “Sweet. Don’t get that one, it’s ugly. That one’s super skanky. No, that’s gross.”
Kate joined us after another twenty minutes. “What are you all studying so diligently?”
“Dresses,” we chorused, in what was possibly the twee-est moment of my life.
We narrowed it down to three choices—a long lavender gown Lauren thought would go well with my hair and eyes; a short black thing Anna favored, though I wasn’t so sure about the weird puff of fabric on the sleeve, and a short, simply cut silver dress with a boat neckline. It was kind of weird but appealing nonetheless.
“Hey, what size are your feet?”
I hadn’t even thought about shoes. “Nine-and-a-half.” They all made faces. “What? What sizes are you?”
“I’m a six,” Anna said.
I stared at her. “Are you serious?”
She shrugged nonchalantly. “They’re beautiful too. I have beautiful feet.”
“She does.” Kate smiled fondly. “She gets them from me.”
I turned to Lauren in astonishment. She shook her head. “I’m no Cinderella, but my feet are still smaller. Just think of it as an excuse to buy fancy French shoes.”
“But I don’t wear fancy shoes.”
Anna popped a chip in her mouth. “Now you do.”
Mike came in, and stopped when he saw the four of us gathered around my computer. “Breaking news?”
I looked up. “Are you getting a tux delivered in France? For any reason?”
“Oh, yeah. There’s some charity thing Friday night.”
Kate’s head popped up. “And when were you going to tell Natalie this?”
His eyes flickered back and forth between all of us and he started to back up. “I can tell when I’m not wanted. I’ll just...go disappear.”
“Go have a boys’ night with Paul!” Lauren yelled after him.
I met his eyes. He grinned and wrinkled his nose at me and vanished.
The O’Connor women went with us to the airport, as they planned to do a little more exploring of the country while we were out of it. Kate gave me one last box before we left. “These are from Maggie. I know you said you could just pick up something in France, but Maggie had your size, and I thought—well, you don’t have to wear them if you don’t want to.”
“Thank you.” I took the box but didn’t look inside. “I’m sorry about digging up the past.”
She smiled painstakingly. “It’s time we got over it. We could have used you ten years ago.”
Chapter Twenty
So. The thing about the Eiffel Tower? It was big.
That shouldn’t have surprised me. When it was first built in 1890, it was the tallest building in the world, and at fifteen hundred feet it still rose above the rest of Paris, the most iconic part of an incredibly iconic skyline.
Yet at first, catching glimpses of the monument between Haussmann’s elegant apartments as our taxi zoomed through the streets, it looked like no more than a toy. Even when we reached the narrow, tree lined streets of the seventh arrondissement—the neighborhood that housed the Tower, upscale homes and our touristy hotel—and a leg of the structure peaked through at the cross streets, I thought, oh, that’s not that big.
Then we dropped off our bags, walked over and looked up.
And up.
It was like a monster. A gorgeous metallic beast that cut into the sky, so large that when you stood by one of the legs it blocked out everything else.
We climbed to the first level, and then took the elevator to the top. Paris spread out before us, as different from Kilkarten as New York from the Andes. To the south, the Champs du Mars spread out before us, a patch of green amidst the elegant tan and gray buildings with their turrets and balconies. A dark, shadowy rectangle sprung up in the distance like a blot against the skyline, while just slightly to the left the much more pleasing golden dome of Napoleon’s tomb marked another park. Farther on came the Seine and its bridges. The shadow of the tower stretched across the green water, pointing toward the Arc de Triumph and its many avenues. Closer, the palace and gardens of the Trocadéro curved toward us.
Gazing at it made my heart expand in my chest, until I felt like I might float off, fueled by admiration and happiness and joy and beauty. And then I turned my back on it all and kissed Mike until I thought sheer euphoria would carry me off.
When I drew back, he was grinning so hard his dimple showed. “What was that for?”
I kissed the dimple. “It is a rule that you kiss on top of the Eiffel Tower.”
He slid his arms around my back and pulled me closer. “That so?”
“In fact, if you weren’t here, I’d just have to walk up to some stranger and kiss him.”
For lunch, we spread out a blanket halfway between the monument and the military academy on the other side of the park. Like-minded tourists and locals surrounded us. Children raced tricycles while their parents chatted on green benches.
Men jangling Eiffel Tower keychains walked about, targeting camera-wearing tourists and extracting exorbitant amounts of money. A man with dozens of roses moved from couple to couple.
“Don’t do it,” I muttered to Mike as the salesman walked determinedly toward us. “Don’t make eye-contact. Say non, merci.”
Bouquets were shoved in our faces. “Hello, monsieur! A flower for your beautiful lady?”
Mike looked up. “Yeah, sure.”
I stared at him. “What?” He was not going to buy an overpriced, touristy flower. No. No way. Ridiculous! Unbelievable!
Mike handed me a red rose.
I buried my nose in it, and then frowned at him as the man walked away. “You know they marked this up like five-hundred percent.”
“Do you like it?”
I inhaled the strong, heady perfume, deep and rich and velvet. “Maybe.”
“Isn’t Ecuador famous for roses? Or is that bananas?”
I laughed. “Both.” We unpacked the picnic we’d brought: a baguette, a wheel of Camembert, slices of ham and tiny, dark grapes. “They have these giant rose farms, and they’re just stunning—full and deep and perfect. They’re some of the most beautiful flowers I’ve ever seen. And I’m just a walking cliché—roses are my favorite.” I tore off a chunk of bread and unwrapped the cheese. “But they breed them for beauty, not fragrance, and so they have almost no scent. And I always sort of thought a rose without a scent was like a person without a soul.”
He stopped assembling his sandwich and grinned widely. “Look at you. Yeats two-point-oh.”
I laughed. “What can I say. If I don’t find Ivernis, I can always write greeting cards.”
Afterward, we dusted off the crumbs and took pictures of each other in front of the Tower. A girl, not much older than Anna, watched with a beleaguered expression as we took selfies and finally walked over, determination in her step and resignation in her voice. “Want me to take that for you?”
Despite her self-sacrificial tone, she took six pictures in quick succession. When she handed the camera back and strode away, she only made it twenty yards before visibly sighing and walking over to another hopeless couple.
So then we spent the next twenty minutes watching her as her instinct to help overpowered her desire to ignore everyone. “I always daydreamed about being a spy,” I admitted when she finally headed out of view. “Probably stemmed from my nosiness.”
He rolled over onto his stomach. “Not a bad cover, being an archaeologist. Good reason to travel and bug people.”
I grinned and waved my flower in his face. “It’s actually a classic. Archaeologists have been spying since the first world war.”
“What? No way.”
I relaxed back on my elbows, admiring the drifting clouds. “My favorite story is about this Egyptologist who passed messages in hieroglyphs, and just told the occupiers that it was an inscription he needed help translating.” I raised my brows. “See? We are the most badass profession.”
“Yeah, yeah. You’d make an awful spy.”
“You don’t think I’d make an awesome femme fatale?” I fluttered my lashes at him.
I’d completely been kidding, but his gaze went dark and he reached out to brush my hair behind my ear. My heart fluttered. Mike made me feel like I was as stunning and amazing as any woman that graced the silver screen.
Then a crew of loud American boys tripped over their own feet, and we pulled apart as they milled before us and pushed one of their members forward. He cleared his throat and performed the ubiquitous chin nod at Mike. “Hey. Are you Michael O’Connor?”
I’d been with my mother a handful of times when she’d been recognized. She’d always slipped out the scornful half smile, the drops of disdain. If they offered a hand she raised her brows, if they smiled she frowned.
Mike grinned. “Yeah, that’s me. What are you guys doing here?”
They were study abroad students at Sciences Po, and they clamored for Mike’s attention. A couple of them checked me out until Mike blatantly wrapped his arm around me. And then, so easily I barely noticed it was happening, he extricated us from the group, leaving them with shining eyes and puffed up chests.
“You’re good at that.”
“Ryan and I used to make bets about how fast we could get out.” He let out a laugh. “You should see Keith. If he gets bored he walks away from people mid-sentence. Abe pretends his mom’s calling.”
“Aw, that’s a cute one.”
“Yeah, that’s why he does it. Subtle publicity work when he’s hemmed in by old ladies. I don’t think he pulls that one on guys.” He quirked a brow. “Speaking of mothers. I have some
ideas for how we should spend the rest of the day.”
“Like eating bonbons and checking out the Louvre and the gadgetty, steampunky museum?”
For one hopeful moment, interest distracted him, and then he leveled a deliberate look at me. “Like I looked up your mother.”
I let my head thump down on him. “Nooo.”
He marched on. “Apparently, when she moved to Paris at thirteen, she lived in model housing in, coincidentally, this neighborhood.”
All of a sudden hot anger swamped me. I shoved my hair out of my face. “Who cares? What do you want to do, traipse around her old stomping grounds? What’s that going to do?”
He shrugged, still keeping those light, steady eyes fastened on me. “It’s where she grew up.”
I snorted. “She never grew up.”
“Can you blame her?”
I tilted my head, some of my anger fading at the odd note in his voice.
He stared at the Eiffel Tower. “She spent years working when she should have been having a childhood.”
I also looked at the metal structure. “It got her fame and money.”
“Was it worth it?”
He looked so calm, his chiseled face imperturbable. It struck me how few people he ever let in, how few realized there was anything behind the charm. “I don’t know. Was it?”
He turned back to me and reached out to trace my cheekbone with his finger. “I’m just saying. It was a large part of her life.”
I laced my hand through his. “All right, then. Let’s go.”
* * *
The walk through the narrow streets was beautiful. Even the tourist shops added flare. Bright scarves caught our attention from sidewalk stands. Every block seemed to have a boulangerie piping the scent of fresh, crusty baguettes into the air. Small, round pastries and fruit glazed with sugar filled their windows. We almost smacked into a man carrying a giant slab of half-alive meat into the boucherie, and almost keeled over from the yellow perfume of the fromageries.
I was in heaven.
Little nooks and crannies kept jumping out at us, demanding our attention: a hidden churchyard with a mossy fountain; a marble plaque on a building declaring this the site where two members of La Résistance died. A florist shop with such beautiful bouquets; a tour crawling by on Segways; a park with an old Metro sign done up in beautiful Art Deco style.