Love Me in Paris

by D Pichardo-Johansson

  Oh shit. Something tells me a part of Sophia still clings to the fantasy that this woman will tell us they never boarded the plane and are still alive. Now I’m nervous as hell.

  Sophia continues, “This lady may know where they went after here. Who knows, it might lead to another leg of my trip. A city I never knew they went to.”

  Something changes in her expression, and suddenly I understand. She knows this will be the end of those fantasies forever and that’s precisely why she came on this trip. She’s about to say goodbye to her parents. In a way, she’s letting go of her childhood illusion and deciding to grow up.

  I’m moved and scared at once by her new determination to find out the truth. But I sense she’s stronger than when she started this trip, and I’m proud of her.

  Dominique receives us with polite courtesy. She is a typical French lady, who’s still slim in her late sixties, looks much younger than her years and dresses impeccably. Her ivy-overgrown house is almost a small castle on its own, and we sit on solid, dark wood furniture in a large living room overlooking the lake.

  She speaks no English, which puts me back in the role of translator. Unfortunately, the news isn’t good.

  “Je suis désolé. Je ne m’en souviens pas beaucoup,” Dominique concludes her explanation.

  It kills me having to translate this to Sophia. “She says she vaguely remembers Patrick and Nadia Paige, but she has little recollection of their visit.”

  Crushing disappointment darkens Sophia’s face. “Does she at least remember where they went after here?”

  I ask the question and offer the translated answer, “They stayed in her house for a few nights and left after that, she assumes back to Paris. She never heard back from them until now, and wasn’t aware that their plane had crashed.”

  Sophia fidgets and shifts in her chair. “But… she and my mother were friends. She has to remember something.”

  I make one last try, but Dominique just shrugs. “C’etait il y a trop longtemps.” That was too long ago.

  Sophia’s lips and hands tremble subtly, and her eyes have turned shiny. But she keeps it together like a champ—I’m so, so proud of her—and just bows her head once.

  Damn it, I knew something like this could happen. Since I have no cell phone, I give Dominique my address and landline number in case she remembers anything else, but she makes no promises. Are we stuck here, or is there any other way I can help Sophia get the closure she came here to get?

  While Dominique and Nicole show us the house, I borrow Sophia’s phone and email my firm’s private detective asking him to investigate the airline records. Interesting since I haven’t contacted anyone in the US besides Maxwell in ten months, and I didn’t do it even when I found myself with no money or passport. That’s how much I’ve come to care about this cause.

  That’s how much I’ve come to care about this woman.

  I push the thought away and try to focus on the tour of the library. It’s covered with dark, floor-to-ceiling bookshelves stuffed with books so old I wouldn’t dare to touch one, afraid it might crumble. While I study the moving ladder, Dominique glances in Sophia’s direction, then her eyes dart back to me and she says in French, “I need to talk to you. It’s very important.”

  Dominique asks Nicole to take Sophia on a tour of the garden, and as soon as the two of them walk out of earshot, she turns to me, startling me by speaking in fluent English. “We don’t have much time before they return. Come to my office.”

  Wait a minute. Dominique does speak English? Why was she making me translate?

  She guides me to a home office decorated with an antique desk and ancient chairs. “You are her boyfriend, aren’t you?”

  Unwilling to launch into a long explanation, I limit myself to a nod.

  Dominique shifts her weight from one foot to another repeatedly and wriggles her hands. “I don’t know your girlfriend’s emotional state enough to judge if this is something she should know or not. Is she fragile?”

  Shit. I have no idea what she’s going to say, but my heart is already racing. “No, I’d say she’s pretty strong.”

  She takes a seat behind the desk and signals me to imitate her. “I lied. I do remember that couple very well. And I did know about the plane crash, but that’s not the reason why I remember them. I do because they had a big fight in this house.” Remorse and regret mix in her expression. “Mrs. Paige found out that her husband had cheated on her… with me.”

  Chapter 24

  Trevor

  My mouth hangs open. I’m in shock. I’m flabbergasted. I can’t believe this woman is unloading this grenade on me.

  “Patrick and Nadia hosted my ex-husband and me at their house for a week when my ex attended a conference in the United States.” Dominique switches back and forth between French and English. “They wanted to practice their French, so we stayed in touch by letter. Then the next year, when Patrick came to France, I met him in Paris to give him a tour of the city.”

  Yes, Sophia had told me about that trip her father had when she was a baby. That was when her father had brought home the Louvre books.

  As Dominique continues, her clenched fists slowly relax and her pinched face softens. She seems to be deriving huge relief from confessing to someone. “I had just left my husband, and Patrick was going through some issues with Nadia at the time. The stress of parenthood was getting to them, and they had just had a big fight before his trip because she didn’t want him to leave her alone.”

  I know where the story’s heading.

  “We had an affair,” she finally gets to the point. “We knew it was wrong, and I knew from the beginning he would never leave his wife and would never move here, so there was no hope for a future. Later on he wrote to me confirming what I already knew; he had decided to give his marriage one more try.”

  My lawyer brain is full with questions. “It doesn’t make sense. Why would he bring his wife here, to you?” On nothing less than their second honeymoon anniversary trip, for crying out loud.

  “By then, Nadia had been my pen pal for a decade; guilt didn’t allow me to cut off our friendship. She practically invited herself and her husband to stay at my house, and neither he nor I could explain why that wasn’t a good idea without revealing our secret. So we went along with it. It had been so long, we thought we could handle it, but Nadia quickly figured out something strange was going on between us and confronted her husband.

  “When he confessed he had cheated on her, she went out of her mind. They had a loud fight that ended with her asking him for a divorce. Then, she repacked her bag in a hurry and left.”

  Oh shoot. No wonder Sophia never got a letter from that last week of the trip. “Do you know if he ever caught up with her? If they boarded the plane together?”

  She gives me a disheartened headshake. “He took off behind her almost immediately, and I never heard back from either one of them.”

  Shit. Why did she have to tell me?

  As if reading my thoughts, she explains, “Your girlfriend obviously has an idealized image of her parents’ marriage and I didn’t dare tell her and break her heart. I’m leaving it in your hands to decide if she should learn this or not.”

  So basically, Dominique doesn’t want to stomp on Sophia’s heart, pulverize her illusions about love and scar her for life—she wants me to do it.

  I so wish I could un-hear everything I’ve heard from her, that I could rewind time so I’d never come here.

  “Oh, wait. There’s one more thing.”

  Damn it. Please, no more.

  She searches in one of the desk drawers. “Nadia left in such a rush she forgot something. And I debate whether that could be a good souvenir for Sophia, maybe as a way to soothe her pain and give her some more answers.”

  Even if I never saw it before, I immediately recognize the red leather-bound book Dominique extends to me. Sophia has described it to me more than once.

  It’s her mother’s journal.

&nb
sp; * * *

  I have to hand it to Sophia for keeping it together that well. Our visit to Dominique has been a heart-wrenching disappointment for her. However, she manages to put on her best face and make small talk as we leave the house. I’m hiding the red journal in my backpack, nestled in with the lunch I’d packed for today.

  The knowledge of her father’s affair weighs on me, heavy as a boulder. God, why? Why did that woman have to unload this huge responsibility on me? I’ve just promised Sophia that there will no longer be any lies or secrets between us. At the same time, the truth will forever destroy the loving image she had of her father and it’s likely to sweep away her faith in love.

  Then, the journal I hold, which of course I haven’t dared to open, might carry all sorts of other secrets in it. Does it talk about her parents’ last fight? Does it talk about the decline of their marriage before the affair? It might contain invaluable information about their next destination and firsthand notes on the anniversary journey. But will Sophia even want to learn about it after figuring out how that journey ended?

  I talk her out of our idea for a late picnic lunch and lobby for an early dinner with plans of going to bed early. She agrees, and we pick a small Italian restaurant; we both need a break from French cuisine. We eat in silence and then head to take one last look at the mountains before retiring.

  The sound of the birds is deafening; there must be a bird sanctuary on one of the small islands we can see in the lake.

  “You’ve been very quiet,” she comments.

  “I didn’t know what to say. That trip was not what we were hoping for.”

  Her desolate expression confirms my words. “It was disappointing, I agree.” Her eyes drift to the mountains across the lake. “I guess it was unreasonable of me to think the whole world cared about my parents’ story as much as I do.”

  The sadness in her face pierces my heart. I wish I could cradle her in my arms, sit her across my lap and kiss her forehead.

  Perking up, she forces a grin. “But I’ll be okay. I guess I put too many high expectations on this trip, and I shouldn’t be surprised that it was a letdown. Maybe that is my lesson in growing up.”

  She’s breaking my heart. Here’s the woman who has jumped up and down every step of our journey. To me, she’s the embodiment of enthusiasm and joy. And it kills me to see her down like this.

  “Sophia, do you remember that question I asked you once? About choosing between keeping an illusion that keeps you going and knowing the truth that might disappoint you?”

  She turns to me without smiling. “Yes?”

  “I’m going to ask you one more time. What would you chose, illusion or truth?”

  She sustains my gaze. “I know I said before I’d rather keep my illusion. But it’s different now. This trip has changed me.” Her growing inner strength resembles the immense mountains behind her. There’s no hint of doubt in her answer. “I’d choose the truth.”

  I swallow and search in the depths of my backpack. “In that case… there’s something Dominique gave me for you. She made me promise I’d take the responsibility to decide if you were ready to handle it or not.”

  Holding my breath, I hand her the journal.

  Chapter 25

  Sophia

  It’s two in the morning and I still can’t stop reading and sobbing. I sit in bed, my back and pillow against the headboard, with the journal in my lap. While joyful tears fall on the faded pages, my right fingers caress the script and my left ones clutch my latest tissue—mountains of used ones spread all around me.

  Poor Trevor must be freaked out. From all the inconveniences that losing his money belt brought, the worst of all must be getting trapped in a hotel room with a crazy woman crying her eyes out. I can tell he’s both moved by my tears and terrified of them.

  He doesn’t understand that I’m crying out of happiness. He’ll never be able to grasp how amazing it is to hold this journal. I’m seeing my mother’s handwriting again; the letters I’ve already memorized have lost their effect on me. I can almost hear her speak to me right now, and the musical ring of her voice returns, vivid and alive.

  Even the most banal of entries, when she talks about finding a mess in the kitchen from me making pancakes, sends me into wailing and heaving. It’s like riding a time machine and inhabiting a single still of the movie of my childhood. Every new passage is such a delight to discover, I re-read it, and weep, and sob, and journal about it, so it takes me ages to read each entry.

  With infinite patience, Trevor hands me tissue after tissue; he then surrenders his whole pack of Kleenex, and then all the napkins he stole from the breakfast area for our lunch. Later on, we run out of those and he hands me the whole roll of toilet paper from the bathroom. Any other man I know would’ve run away a long time ago. Yet he stays put, sitting on his bed while I lie on mine crying and reading. He stays far enough that I can forget about his presence, yet close enough to intervene if I take a turn for the worse.

  Some time around two thirty he convinces me to go to sleep. Despite my protests, I succumb almost instantly, and exhausted from the crying, don’t wake up until ten in the morning. Trevor suspected I’d miss the hotel breakfast hours; he was thoughtful enough to bring me coffee and crepes.

  “I almost regret giving you that journal,” he says when I’ve finished my breakfast but don’t make an effort to leave the bed. His green-golden eyes are loaded with worry.

  “Don’t! You know these are tears of joy, don’t you?” I reach for his hand, and he sits on the bed, closing his fingers around mine. The proximity of his body and the electricity of his touch slowly bring me back from my mental haze, and I become painfully aware of how bad I must look right now. I desperately need a shower.

  “I understand this is very emotional for you.” He captures one of my hands in both of his. “I just don’t want you to get stuck in this story, in the past, to the point that you forget there are other things going on in your life. I mean, I wish you could be a little more detached from whatever you’re going to find in those pages.”

  I beam at him and move my other hand to join his. “I can tell I’ve scared you, but I swear I’m fine. I’m three-quarters through reading and trying not to skip ahead. Once I get to the end, I’m sure I’ll find something about the places my parents visited when they came here, before she forgot her journal at Dominique’s. Then it would mean a lot to me if you came with me to visit those places.”

  His frown and pressed lips tell me he’s concerned beyond what he wants to admit. “Can I ask you a favor, Sophia?”

  I nod.

  “How about today you and I go enjoy the town for ourselves, without following in your parents’ steps. If when you get to the end of the journal our tour doesn’t match theirs and you want to repeat it, I’ll be glad to do it all over again. But let’s just not postpone it. Let’s make our trip a symbol that no matter what happened to your parents, you are your own person, and you are building your own destiny.”

  The request surprises me, as does the seriousness of his expression.

  But he makes sense. And even if he didn’t, how can I deny anything to this wonderful man who’s been my right hand and support all along this journey?

  I close the journal, put it away, and let him guide me by the hand out of the bed.

  Chapter 26

  Trevor

  This city is mocking me.

  The same sights that one day seemed depressing and beaten up, and the next, colorful and pretty, now seem to laugh in my face. Because I have the feeling those images will be forever linked in our minds with pain; the pain that’s coming when Sophia arrives at the end of that journal.

  These might be the last hours of Sophia’s life when she still has that innocence and faith in humanity I envy. When she finds out the truth about her parents’ marriage, the woman I know will die and another one will be born—one more cynical, more hardened. As much as I repeat to myself that it’s all probably for her own good, I c
an’t help grieving in advance for what she might lose.

  Because if she lets this demolish her, if she turns hardened and cold by this discovery, I won’t be able to handle it. Sophia has become the epitome of my hope and faith, and I need her to stay like that.

  Sophia jokes relentlessly about her breakdown and how it terrified me. She makes me chuckle a little here and there, and eventually I manage to relax and enjoy myself. The plan today is aimlessness, and we indulge in sightseeing without any structure or hurry (63-64b). We spend some time touring the cathedral. Then we explore an ancient antique store that seems more like the garage of a hoarder. The grumpy old owner growls at us every time we ask a question about something, as if he hated the idea that we could buy any of his “treasures” and take them away from him. The treasures look more like junk to me.

  I know how he feels. I, the man who’s always bragged about being focused on the future and not the past, am torn too about letting go. A part of me believes it’s Sophia’s right to learn the truth, no matter how much uglier it is than the illusion. Yet another part wants to stop her, steal away the journal, hide the last pages from her.

  We lose ourselves among the citizens, without an agenda. Watch a volleyball game at the park for a while. Lie on the grass and people-watch for most of it. As we did in Paris, we make up stories about the people passing by, and laugh at our made-up tales. “That guy is a rich mafia boss, and she’s with him for the money,” I guess, pointing at a mismatched couple of a well-dressed, late middle-aged man and a younger, much better-looking woman.

  “No, they’re not!” Sophia protests. “He’s her father, and the reason they’re so affectionate is because they’re reuniting after being separated for a decade.”

  God bless Sophia’s innocence and kind heart for as long as they still last.

  It’s so good to be lazy with her, without a plan. I wish I could freeze this moment so we don’t have to say goodbye.