by Lj McEvoy
‘Well that went better than expected,’ Jacques, David’s solicitor tried to sound enthusiastic.
‘Did it? I don’t know,’ David was doubtful knowing Jacques was trying to make the events of the morning sound better than it actually was, ‘honestly do you think I’ll even get limited access?’ he was trying to prepare himself for the worst.
‘Of course you’ll get something out of this!’ Jacques sounded overly optimistic, David thought he should remind his friend he was a solicitor and not to give up the day job just yet.
‘Listen, I told you in the beginning it was going to be a battle for the children and the Judge has accepted the fact that you’ve agreed to the terms of your marital contract, even adding the extras makes it look good. But why did you continue the affair with Jacqueline Orliac and so bloody publicly?’ Jacques stated that last part with vehemence and in a whisper.
David cringed feeling that elevator effect on his stomach as soon as her name was mentioned. It was a publicity stunt set up by his agent but the advice from Jacques over one of their usual dinner meetings, (Jacques loved meeting his famous clients in restaurants), was not to go to the Premiere with her but what could David do? He needed the publicity and so did she; the film offers were slowing down and anyhow he and Francoise were legally separated at the time. That same week after the Premiere, David handed a contract for an Italian film into Jacques office, ensuring it was done personally to prove to his solicitor friend that all was not lost when it came to publicity stunts.
His agent and manager (also Jacqueline’s agent and manager David found out later) put him under pressure to have Jacqueline Orliac - a famous French soft-porn actress - by his side. As usual, her advances were too much for him, he was a man after all, and now they had a tempestuous on-off relationship he truly regretted, even though he and Francoise were separated at this stage. This time it’s got to end for good, ‘there, decision made,’ he said aloud.
‘What?’ Jacques looked up as he stuffed his papers into his briefcase he was debating with himself what restaurant would be suitable under these circumstances and thought he missed something important.
‘Nothing, just thinking aloud,’ David became embarrassed as he noticed a concerned look growing on his friend’s face.
The traditional French two-hour break for lunch edged by for David then waiting in the courtroom for the Judge to return was even slower. Looking around he regretted the fact that Francoise’s solicitor succeeded in getting this into a public court – was the bastard going to win this argument too? Beads of sweat were forming on his brow, a dampness sticking his shirt to his back; his hands were shaking so he held them tightly trying to control them. Feeling his broad shoulders beginning to slouch he checked himself giving his body a jerk to sit upright, chest out emulating his pride – ‘the stance’ one of his friends called it.
Eventually the Judge arrived commencing with his verdict, speaking to David and Francoise as if he was a headmaster correcting two children after a fight in the schoolyard and directing most of his criticism towards David, a fact evident to everybody in the courtroom. Finally he gave his decision; David could have one, supervised weekend with his children every two months.
‘No Way, Merde! Two months, Francoise you can’t do this to me!’ David anxiously cried over to her, ‘you can’t do this to me!’ The feeling of embarrassment and anger overtook all common sense as it rushed through his body quicker that the blood flowing through his veins.
‘Calm down!’ Jacques was getting worried attempting to restrain his friend; he knew full well how David could lose his temper and all sense of consideration for others around him, ‘Please David calm down!’
Without thinking David 6’ frame easily brushed the 5 inches shorter and leaner Jacques aside, he needed to talk to Francoise but the guards in the courtroom were on him in seconds, they were prepared; he was renowned for this type of outburst. David’s brothers tried to get involved but other guards and photographers got between them, suddenly hidden cameras and cell phones appeared from nowhere.
‘Silence! I will not have this sort of behaviour in my court and confiscate those cameras,’ the Judge was shocked at the disrespect being displayed before him, ‘Take M. Corvasieur below, maybe two hours in a cell will bring him to his senses!’
There was uproar in the courtroom with a sudden rush for the doors as journalist after journalist tried to be the first with their exclusive. The photographers were having a party as extra guards were brought in to control the chaos and stop them from taking more photos.
Francoise wanted to shrink away and die she didn’t want this to happen, her hands covered her mouth in shock as she watched the guards dragging a struggling David below, still calling her. ‘Why didn’t he agree to the terms we offered?’ She understood how he felt but her job offer in Barcelona was beyond her dreams. Any more than one weekend trip per month to France or wherever he was working would be too much for the children, they were confused enough as it was, both with the move and Papa no longer being around. ‘Not that he was around that much anyhow,’ Francoise attempted to convince herself, ‘since the break-up he’s become too emotional towards the children, too close constantly telephoning them nearly every day - the hypocrite never did that when we were married. Maybe this divorce will do him good make him bloody grow up.’
Observing her solicitor, a small bespectacled man now carefully filing away his paperwork choosing to ignore the bedlam surrounding him, she began thinking how he made up for his small stature in the thorough way he conducted his work. No wonder other married men fear him - his work and reputation is indisputable. Although he had warned her in advance she was still not prepared for what he produced in the courtroom. She couldn’t even build up the courage to look at David although she could feel his brooding dark brown eyes penetrating her from time to time throughout the proceedings. How stupid could she have been - always believing his excuses throughout their miserable lie of a marriage.
‘Can you get me out of here?’ Francoise pleaded to her solicitor.
‘I’m sorry Madame,’ he said unemotionally, always formal never getting involved with his clients, ‘but the only public exit is through those doors.’ Knowing full well that behind those doors were a pack of journalists from every French gossip magazine and newspaper, waiting to pound on Francoise and David’s brothers.
She put on a brave face, ‘Mon Dieu, thankfully this will be the last time I will have to face the wolves.’
‘Don’t worry we’ll get you through them, you don’t have to answer their questions.’ Francoise turned to face the voice she happily welcomed, both of David’s tall brothers stood side by side ready to protect her even after all that’s just happened.
Two and half-hours later, David and Jacques emerged from the jail at the back of the courthouse. Suddenly a car pulled up, ‘Quick! Get in!’ It was David’s younger brother Claude, he was enjoying the attention from the media, it was a first for him but then he was also concerned for David and what effect this would have on him, again another first for Claude – his brother looked terrible.
Both men jumped in the car, the tyres screeched as it sped away, ‘Where do you want to go, to the apartment?’ Claude just expected confirmation of what he thought David wanted to do.
‘No, home,’ David could barely speak, with his head bent forward, his eyes closed tightly as he pinched the bridge of his nose.
‘What do you mean?’ Claude didn’t understand. ‘Marseille?’
‘Yes,’ turning to his young brother, ‘how lucky you are,’ David thought as he attempted a half smile.
Claude quickly glanced at David fully comprehending, ‘I’ll drop Jacques off first, collect Joel and our cases at the apartment then head straight for the airport. Jacques could you phone Joel and tell him to get ready please.’
‘Francoise?’
‘She’s fine, safely back at the hotel and Jacques ensured the security will stop any reporters from pestering her.
>
No more words were needed between the two brothers.
While Joel waited for his brothers’ arrival, he arranged flight details to Marseille. He was informed of flights the next day but thinking of David’s state of mind and his predictable change of moods, he knew it would be best if they got an immediate flight.
The three brothers were lucky to get seats on a private internal flight to Marseille at 2am. After a long day, Claude and Joel took advantage of the hour long flight but David couldn’t sleep his emotions were a mixture of sadness, adrenaline, fatigue and worry, as the plane rose from the Charles De Gaulle airport he stared out the window looking at the millions of streetlights below his thoughts were elsewhere.
‘Pierre and Chantal when will I ever get to see them again,’ soon he was leaving for Italy to start making a TV film he would be gone for nearly ten weeks. He couldn’t expect the children to visit him there sometimes filming lasted 10 to 12 hours per day, all going well and with the contract signed, around five days later he would be leaving for Columbia for an American backed movie.
Continuing to stare out the window as the plane flew over Paris, the city was still alive with its lights glowing, moving. But suddenly it was gone, hidden by the clouds, ‘like my family is now gone,’ sighing to himself with tears starting to flow down his cheeks.
Chapter 6
Marseille - Gabrielle Corvasieur carried out her daily chores with her usual brusqueness but her thoughts were in Paris, it was 2.30pm. Finishing washing the worktop for the third time she shouted down to her husband, ‘What’s happening, why can’t somebody telephone us?’ her normally laid back character was losing its patience.
‘Quiet woman! We’ll get a call when something happens and there is news to tell,’ Jean-Pierre shouted back as he was sketching in his workshop below. At least he was trying to sketch – but more errors were showing up on what should be a simple outline on the paper. ‘I’ve never had this trouble before,’ he thought to himself, ‘but then I’ve never had a son get divorced before.’ He sighed, ‘why won’t someone call?’ he wiped his brow as the feeling of exhaustion crept into his bones and now regretting how he snapped at Gabrielle. ‘But it was the fourth time she has shouted down the same question to me. I’ll go up and join her as soon as I’ve finished this,’ his weather-beaten dark face trying desperately to concentrate insisting that his normally natural artistic ability flow to his hands and onto the page pegged to his easel.
Gabrielle sat her rounded frame down in one of the matching rocking chairs placed by the side of the fireplace her chubby hands tightly clasped together, her small eyes darted around the kitchen muttering, ‘What else can I do? Normally I have plenty to do why not today of all days!’
With her mind trailing back to the events of the morning, she could feel hot spots of red rushing to her plump cheeks. Placing her hands on them in exasperation she questioned herself, ‘why did I start talking to Lauren like that? She must think I’m a crazy Old French woman.’ But then Gabrielle quickly changed her mind admitting how the young woman was very kind though, ‘just listening and waiting for me to finish my ramblings, never showing any impatience even staying for two cups of coffee instead of her usual one! I could never talk to the others in the village so freely, I trust her,’ confidently Gabrielle hugged herself.
Lauren instinctively knew something was wrong because Gabrielle waited until the bread man left before commencing their usual chat. ‘Did she understand what I was saying? There were many times before when she asked me to slow down, maybe now she can understand our language and is just lacking the courage to speak it.’
Gabrielle chuckled as she remembered the first time she spoke about more than the weather to her new friend, the look of shock on the young woman’s face said it all – ‘Oh my God, the French woman has said something more than it’s going to rain today!’
Thinking of the previous three months when the widow first arrived, (the locals started calling her that because she always wore black), everybody knew she was foreign - the estate agent’s wife Mme. Fauche made sure of that, ‘Divorced perhaps,’ she would snootily state to her captive audience in the local patisserie. That was one meeting place Gabrielle had the advantage of not regularly visiting, the bread man called out to all local houses on the outskirts of the village on a daily basis.
Visiting the small village only for fresh food supplies and for church, Lauren’s two children attended a private school in the outskirts of Marseille. Gabrielle liked that, not that she had a superior stance over her neighbours, her own children had attended the local primary school and nobody would ever give that opinion of Gabrielle. But Lauren kept herself to herself never getting personally involved with the usual banter of local gossip, ‘would she understand it if she tried?’ Gabrielle laughed aloud.
They both met up nearly every morning when the local bread man called to the farm and when Lauren was here in France. At first it was awkward; a brief hello a small mention of the weather then Gabrielle decided to speak to her a bit more. Difficult was more the word than awkward, she was taught Spanish not English in school and being the only child, she left her education behind to help on the farm at the young age of twelve. But the two women both determinedly struggled along soon getting to talk about more than just weather conditions.
And how right the people in the village were, she was a widow and so young!
‘Je suis veuve,’ the young woman nervously stated when Gabrielle pointed to her wedding ring. ‘Well at least she got the pronunciation right,’ Gabrielle thought as she patted the young woman’s hand, it was funny how after that short simple sentence Gabrielle felt the need to get closer, to protect and help this stranger.
Never saying how her husband died Gabrielle didn’t like to ask, one could see in the widow’s soft blue eyes it was too painful to talk about, perhaps that would come later when the memory wasn’t so fresh. Gabrielle showed Lauren photos of her own family speaking proudly of her three sons, especially David. Not that he was her favourite son, in the Corvassier household the love was shared equally and sides were never taken in discussions or arguments. An attitude Jean-Pierre strictly enforced even when it pulled on Gabrielle’s heartstrings.
Lauren had never heard of David but later recognised two English films he played cameo roles in. Jean-Pierre liked her often meeting when she was jogging and he walking the dogs through the small forest. Sometimes he came out to the gate to join in their regular chat and eventually she came into the house for coffee and pastries, Gabrielle was proud the widow liked her pastries, ‘and my jam, don’t forget my jam,’ even though she herself thought it too early for pastries. Every morning the young woman would now ask, ‘and what fattening delight have you got for me today then?’ it was a sentence she stated in French with perfection and Gabrielle always delightfully giggled.
‘I must talk to Jean-Pierre and see if we should invite her to dinner, perhaps we could then meet her children,’ thinking it would be nice to hear children’s voices once more she pulled herself up from her chair glaring at the telephone in the hallway wondering if she should try Joel’s mobile number. ‘No wait, maybe David got full access and they are celebrating!’ But she knew that was a dream as she had read the papers too.
Dejectedly sitting back down again she reminisced on happier times when all her family surrounded her. Claude still living at home, Joel with his wife just a stone’s throwaway and David with his family a ten minutes walk up the hill in the house he had built. Now Claude lived and worked in Marseille and David was getting divorced.
She couldn’t believe it when he broke the news to her and then the bombshell, Francoise was moving to Barcelona with the children, immediately. She couldn’t take the news and burst out crying, so did David he got so emotional sometimes exposing himself too much. ‘I’m unsure it was the sight of me crying or the breakdown of his marriage which upset him most,’ she thought. Then came the questions and the blame, Jean-Pierre was sitting silently in his ch
air when David broke the news his lack of reaction told her that he already knew.
‘You knew this was happening?’ she accused her husband, ‘Why couldn’t you tell me? Am I not to be trusted? I could have helped!’
‘Maman nobody could help, it’s between me and Francoise,’ David said.
‘And the other women,’ she rebuked.
‘Gabrielle!’ Jean-Pierre was shocked.
Gabrielle remembered the hurt look on David’s face, how she wished she never said those words. But it was true; she didn't know where he got his ideas of marriage. Okay, for this day and age he was very young when he got married and so unexpectedly, but that didn’t explain his adultery.
Remembering the call from Paris as if it was yesterday, he was just finished his National Service and sounded so happy, ‘Maman, I’ve just got married.’
‘Ah congratulations. To who?’ she replied.
He fell in and out of love so often, she wasn’t sure who he had married and at nineteen years of age too. How she wished he got married here, a white wedding now that would have been wonderful, just like Joel’s. But Gabrielle soon got to know and love Francoise; she was beautiful and intelligent with a degree in languages. Six years David’s senior it was an unusual match, but you could see she was his rock someone he could totally trust but now, now it was over.
At nineteen he was just starting his career in acting, ‘A young rising star, a genius,’ the French critics later described him but that relationship soon turned sour. His temperament and constant outbursts didn’t help and his want for privacy when it came to his wife and children, or rather Francoise’s need for privacy.
Gabrielle wished he could control his temper, but he was a perfectionist considering criticism or advice by any director he happened to work with an insult to his work. There was many a film where he would walk out only to return if the director or producers bowed to his demands. Sometimes they didn’t and the papers would have yet another headline to write. The public loved him, his style of acting, his rebelliousness to all the masters before him; every film or theatre project he took part in was a success and how Gabrielle loved to walk down to the village knowing someone would stop her to talk of her famous son and his latest film.