by Harper Bliss
Dominique inhaled and exhaled slowly. She was losing her grip on this conversation and didn’t like where it was headed. “I’m doing my best to understand where this is coming from. A week ago we were doing fine. Or so it seemed to me, at least. What changed? What happened?”
“I think that about sums it all up. The fact that you don’t have a clue and didn’t see this coming. Having you at my throat because of that video was the final straw—a video that did not need to be unearthed by anyone, I might stress. That never even needed to be discussed. Why don’t you just admit here and now that I’m more of a nuisance to you than anything else. If you get rid of me—which is what Solange wants, for your information—the path to reelection lies wide open. You can move your politics to the right again and go to war with the left. I won’t stand in your way. I won’t make any demands of you. You can capture the hearts of the true conservatives in this country, show some remorse about having a dalliance with a woman, and just continue doing what really sets your heart on fire: being President of the Republic.”
Dominique pushed herself up and straightened her clothes. “Do you have any idea of what you’re saying?” She squared her shoulders. “First of all, I won’t be spoken to like that, not even by you. Second, I think you might be right. I think you—we—do need a break.”
Steph pushed herself up. “Fine.” Tears streamed down her face. “I’ll pack my bags.”
Dominique watched Steph storm off. How had things spiralled out of control so quickly? And was there any truth to what Steph had just said? If Dominique was going to save this relationship, she would have to examine Steph’s words carefully instead of dismissing them as utter nonsense.
Steph
Steph punched in the code to Juliette and Nadia’s building, squeezed herself and her hastily packed suitcase into the tiny elevator, then knocked on the front door of their apartment. It was only when her knuckles touched the wood that she came to her senses. She had left the Elysée—she had left Dominique. If only Dominique had given her something other than one of her speeches. If only she’d looked Steph in the eye and made her see that she understood what she was going through. But maybe it was too much to ask of a woman whose head was perpetually elsewhere. Maybe Steph had demanded too much of herself as well.
The door swung open and Nadia stood in front of her. Steph hadn’t seen her friend in weeks, perhaps even months.
“Come here.” Nadia tugged Steph inside, brushed off the hood she’d pulled over her head, and embraced her in one of those typical Nadia hugs—one that melted Steph to the core with the friendship she’d missed and all the other things it reminded her of.
Their dog Phénix came to greet Steph in the hallway. Juliette brought him into the office often enough for him to recognise Steph and give her an enthusiastic lick of the hand.
“Juliette’s out, which is good, so you and I can talk. If you want to, of course.”
In that moment, Steph wanted to remain in Nadia’s soft embrace forever, until Juliette returned and removed her wife’s arms from around her. But Nadia let go of her, put a hand in the small of her back, and led her into the living room. How long had it been since she’d been in her best friends’ apartment? Steph saw Juliette at work almost every day, but gone were the days when after hours they would head down to Le Comptoir together for a few drinks to let off steam.
“I’m sorry for being such a stranger, Nadz. God, I’ve missed you. You have no idea how much.”
“I’ve missed you too.” Nadia gave her a warm smile. “Drink?”
“God yes. I’ll take anything.”
“I have an open bottle of Sancerre in the fridge.”
“I’ll take the bottle,” Steph joked.
“Coming right up.”
While Nadia busied herself with getting drinks, Phénix put his head on Steph’s knee. She petted him and thought of her cat Pierrot, whom she’d had to leave behind. She was sure he was well taken care of, but she missed him nonetheless. Would he be looking for her? Would he be sleeping at Dominique’s feet? The image of Dominique sleeping with Pierrot next to her made her swallow a sob in her throat.
Nadia handed her a glass of cool wine and Steph took a sip.
“Thank you for letting me stay here.”
“Don’t mention it. You can stay here as long as you like.”
“Juliette is my boss so I don’t know how long I’ll be able to hack it.”
“Sometimes, it feels like she’s my boss too so we can gang up on her together. It’ll be fun.”
“How are you doing? Tell me everything, Nadz.”
Nadia tilted her head. “I’m doing just fine. I can give you the low-down on my quiet, rather boring life if you want to, of course, but perhaps you want to tell me about what’s going on with you first?”
Steph drank again. “I snapped. I lost it. And I left.”
Nadia grinned. “Very descriptive. I can just picture it all happening before my eyes.”
Steph chuckled. “You’ve been there, Nadz. You know what it’s like when you’re not on the same wavelength anymore. When it feels like your partner doesn’t have your back any longer.”
“That’s true.” Nadia nodded. “Juliette and I have indeed been there. Talking to friends about it helped to put things in perspective. Talking to one friend in particular, one very wise for her age.” She winked at Steph.
“I feel like I’ve lost touch with that person as well. I know this will sound dramatic, but when I look in the mirror, I still see me, but it doesn’t feel like me anymore. I’ve become this yay-saying monkey. A marionette to be paraded when needed. A pair of loving arms for Dominique to fall into when she comes to bed late at night. All the things I am now are so far removed from who I used to be. I’m not saying I can’t handle a bit of growth as a person and that I haven’t evolved for the better. Being in a relationship has matured me and made me see things from the other’s perspective. But by god, Nadz, I’m so sick of all the pomp and circumstance. But most of all, I miss her. Dominique was always busy and that suited me because I’m not the type to succumb to the urge to merge, but… I need some more than I’ve been given. And we haven’t even talked about politics yet. And possible re-election.”
“I can imagine. I often think of you, Steph. I picture you wandering through the corridors of the Elysée. It’s something that’s hard to imagine, but…” She fixed her gaze on Steph. “You love her.”
“I do.” Steph had just literally said the words to Dominique. Love was not the issue. “But I think I’ve learned that love isn’t everything.”
“It most certainly is not.” Nadia briefly sucked her bottom lip into her mouth. “Has she disrespected you? Crossed certain boundaries?”
Steph thought for a moment. “She has.” Being scolded like a child remained a sore point for Steph. “I sometimes think I bring it on myself, you know, because when you’re”—she curled her fingers into air quotes—“‘first lady,’ there isn’t much margin for error. I have to be on my best behaviour all the time.”
“None of us are at our best all the time. Surely Dominique isn’t either.”
“No. And she gets judged even more harshly. But she stood for office, I didn’t.”
“But you helped her get elected.”
“That I did.” Steph put her glass of wine down and rubbed the heels of her hands over her eyes. “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’m going to need some time to figure this out.”
“It’s not a… definite break then?”
Steph shrugged. “Who’s to say?”
“You are, I presume.”
“Not just me. It depends on Dominique as well.” She knitted her fingers together behind her head. “She kept asking me to marry her. In a way, that set me off most of all. I thought it was a joke at first. I took it in jest and even mocked her a little. Now I’m left wondering what it really meant and I keep thinking that is not a question I should be asking myself. I wonder whether if I had felt like she
really meant it, if her words and behaviour had aligned more with the question, whether I would have said yes. I don’t know. I don’t know much anymore and that’s what gets me. It’s not supposed to be a question of this magnitude. Whether I want to stay with her, I mean.”
“You’ve had to adapt and change at a faster pace than you could manage. It’s only normal some big questions pop up. The presidency has changed Dominique as well. How could it not? It’s very plausible that two people who change that quickly lose each other along the way. The real question is if you can find each other again.”
“Yeah.” Steph reached for her wine glass. “We’ll have to see about that.”
Camille
“I’m starting to feel guilty,” Aurore said. She and Camille walked, arm in arm, in the Bois de Boulogne near Aurore’s apartment. “Steph has moved out of the Elysée.”
“Surely there’s nothing for you to feel guilty about.”
“Maybe, but… I don’t know. When I went to dinner, there surely was some tension brewing. I wrongly assumed it was tension between Solange and Steph, but clearly more was bubbling underneath the surface.”
“There usually is.” Camille inhaled the forest air. “I don’t know the details. Zoya talked to her on the phone yesterday.”
“Should I call her?” Aurore asked. “Or would that be inappropriate?”
“Why would it be inappropriate?”
Aurore sighed. “That whole thing with the video. I promised to keep my distance from Steph as well as the Elysée. I promised Solange. I’m not sure it’s a promise I can break.”
“Only you can decide that. Maybe Steph will call you. What will you do then? Not pick up because of a promise you made to Solange, who sounds more and more like Steph’s arch nemesis than someone who has her best interests at heart.”
“Of course I would take her call. I would love to talk to her. We have a certain… rapport.”
“Funny, that’s what Zoya has said about her as well.”
“She’s easy to talk to. Unlike others in the president’s entourage.”
“By that you mean Solange Garceau.”
“I had her over at my place. To call a truce.”
“Are you kidding me?” Camille shouldn’t be so shocked. She’d known Aurore for decades and nothing about her should shock her after all this time—after all, this was a woman who in her early twenties had found herself on the set of a pornographic movie.
“It wasn’t too bad. Until I made the fatal mistake of saying the word sex, which clammed her up tighter than an uncooked mussel. But we had a bit of a chat. Some warming up happened.”
Camille stopped in her tracks.
“What is it?” Aurore asked.
“Please don’t tell me you’re getting the hots for her.” Camille scanned her friend’s face.
Aurore knitted her brows together. “What? No. No way, Camille. You are barking up the wrong tree so much I’m not even sure it’s a tree anymore.”
“Good. I hope you’ve learned your lesson after Vivianne.”
“Solange is nothing like Vivianne,” Aurore said. “Granted, they might both be straight, and we know I have a bit of a penchant for that, but Vivianne was warm, exuberant and effortlessly sexy. Solange Garceau is the polar opposite of all those things.”
“Just checking,” Camille said.
“I thought you held me in higher esteem than that,” Aurore said in a mock-admonishing tone. “How would I even go about it? The woman is as unapproachable as the guards outside the Elysée. In fact, I think she has her own guards watching over her emotions and every time she’s tempted to show too much, they rein her in.”
“She represents a challenge for you,” Camille said. “Which is what worries me.”
“A bit too much of a challenge, even for me. I like to get a little something in return for my affections and I doubt Solange has anything at all to give.”
“I’ve never met her and I’m not keen to.”
“You mean she wasn’t hovering in the vicinity when you and Zoya visited the Elysée?”
“She must have had something better to do that day.”
“Poor Steph. My theory is that Solange dislikes her so much because she represents everything she is not,” Aurore said.
“Maybe… I just hope she and Dominique can work things out. Imagine if they separated officially.”
“It wouldn’t be the first time a sitting president split from his companion.”
“True, but this would be different. The far right would have too much of a field day pointing out that lesbian relationships don’t work out. The MLR would be delighted to not have a practicing lesbian as a party leader anymore. It would just be negative publicity for lesbians in general.” Camille chuckled. “This is what happens when the president’s a lesbian. She is doomed to represent all of us and she must uphold our image at all times.”
“Your image maybe… she doesn’t want anything to do with mine,” Aurore said. “But enough about lesbians in the public eye. How are things at work? Still being persecuted for being one? A lesbian, I mean.”
“Yes, I’m beginning to think that having a lesbian president might have enraged quite a few straight men. As if it’s nothing but an insult to their masculinity.”
“I’ve told you before and I’m telling you again, men with small penises will instigate the apocalypse.”
“Small penises that need to be compensated for with large inflated egos. I agree.”
“It won’t take much to upset their masculinity enough to trigger a nuclear war.”
“Or just ignore climate change and wait until we’re all burnt to a crisp.”
Aurore shook her head. “If only what we’re saying were nothing but a joke.”
“That’s what I think every morning when I arrive at work, when I check my desk for any pieces of paper containing some lovely name-calling words. Not that I take the word dyke as an insult. I am one, after all. But I wonder what’s in someone’s mind when they put pen to paper and write it down.”
“You can be sure that whoever wrote this is extremely sexually frustrated. A happy, fulfilled person isn’t going to waste their time insulting others.” Aurore gave Camille’s arm a squeeze. “You know the worst homophobes are usually closet cases.”
“Or religious zealots.”
“They’re not mutually exclusive.”
Camille shook her head. “When I hold little Emma in my arms, I worry for her future.”
“That’s natural, but, really, you shouldn’t worry for her. Despite all that goes on in the world, this is a good time to be alive. Maybe Emma will invent something important in her life, something that will change the destiny of humankind. Every child that is born represents new hope for the future. That’s the way I choose to look at it.” Aurore turned to Camille. “And before you say that’s because I don’t have children or grandchildren, I have plenty of noisy little humans in my family. Little humans I care very much about.”
“I would never accuse you of not caring enough about anything, Aurore. You’ve always been my compass for caring.”
“Your left-wing compass, even when you were surrounded by right-wing politicians.”
“My example of successful lesbianism when I was still deep in the clutches of heterosexual marriage.”
“Well, I’ve never really set you a good example of what a long-term relationship looks like. If anything, you are my guiding light when it comes to that these days. How is the lovely Zoya?”
“She’s good.” Thinking of Zoya always brought a smile to Camille’s face. “She’s a little homesick. Maybe even more than a little.”
“How does that make you feel?”
Camille shrugged. “She moved here for me, hence I am the direct cause of her homesickness. But I can’t let that get to me too much, because we’re so in love, and what’s the alternative?” She paused for a minute and was grateful Aurore let her have some time to think before speaking again. “I’ll make a pat
riotic Frenchwoman out of her yet.”
“You make her happy, even someone as jaded by love as me can see that.”
“Speaking of being jaded. What are we going to do about that?”
“How do you mean?”
“I don’t really know if you want a relationship or not, Aurore. You always sabotage everything from the start by picking the wrong woman.”
“But that’s just the thing. I don’t feel like I’m the one who picks the woman. It’s the other woman who chooses me.”
Camille chuckled. “But you let her, even though you know very well you shouldn’t.”
“You have a point. For all my smarts, I let them walk all over me. I’ve asked myself why many a time. You’re a scientist. Maybe you have the answer.”
“It could simply be that you just haven’t come across the right woman for you yet.” Camille was beginning to feel sorry for her friend. “Look at me and Zoya. We’re not exactly spring chickens.”
“So there’s hope for me yet.”
“As long as you stay away from straight women…” Camille bumped her hips into Aurore’s. They walked in companionable silence for a while, a silence during which Camille concluded that, even though she had trouble at work, and she was worried about Zoya’s homesickness, and the news about Steph escaping the Elysée had upset her, a walk in the woods with her good friend made life seem perfectly all right for now.
Zoya
“Come to the office anyway,” Steph had said. “It’s about time I introduced you to my bosses. Although I guess I should say partners these days, but old habits die hard.”
That was how Zoya found herself in Steph’s office at Barbier & Cyr, the PR agency that had gotten Dominique Laroche elected. She was supposed to interview the owners, Juliette Barbier and Claire Cyr, and, if lucky, get a few soundbites from Steph, but with Steph and Dominique’s relationship currently being in tatters, the timing wasn’t right for any of that.
“Swanky digs,” Zoya said as she looked around Steph’s office.