by Amy Thomas
I lingered at the table, eyeing the golden brown topping of the crumble, clattering tea cups and intimate conversations dancing in the background. It was similar to Make My Cake’s cobbler in that it was a giant dish of oozing fruit concealed by bits of topping—exactly what I had come for. Yet it was unmistakably French. While it was indeed messier than the gâteaux I had fallen for elsewhere around Paris, Les Deux Abeilles’s crumble, presented in a round white porcelain dish, was still more refined. It looked thick and sweet and crunchy. I could practically taste the buttery bits and jammy fruit converging in a chaotic mix of flavors and textures in my mouth.
But now that pear-praline clafoutis was waving to me from across the room like a dense and eggy terrine from heaven. And the tall, airy wisps on the lemon meringue were tempting me, as well as the towering cheesecake, fluffier than the versions back home, with more finesse. Molten chocolate cake is never the wrong choice, I was rationalizing to myself, when Valeria returned. “Alors, what will it be?”
I gazed up at her comforting presence. “I’ll take the crumble, please.”
After my laborious decision, I was relieved to discover I had been right to stick with my original intentions. Five minutes later, a generous slice of rhubarb-apple crumble arrived, warmed in the small kitchen and served with a side of fresh cream, whipped staunchly into a thick, puffy cloud. I sat for a minute, contemplating the crumble’s imperfect bumps and dull brown color. The pale pink and sometimes green slices of rhubarb poked out of the sides and lumps of rogue topping decorated my plate. Where the crumble had baked against the dish, a sticky crust of caramelized fruit juice and sugar had formed. It looked like a tarte that had done a somersault in its pastry box and arrived bruised and battered. There was nothing perfect about it. Except its bright flavors. Except its comforting warmth. Except that it was exactly what I wanted and needed. I savored each juicy-crunchy bite. It was wonderful.
I went back to the office on Monday, embracing my imperfect job, my imperfect situation, and my own imperfections. All those months, I had been idealizing all the perfect little cakes, just as I had been Paris, as a city and as my new home. And I saw that nobody was expecting me to be perfect—except me. So I couldn’t wow my colleagues with French fluency. So maybe I wasn’t going to kick ass on everything the Louis Vuitton team asked me to do. And so what if my weekend’s dessert discovery looked more like a third grader’s bake sale contribution than the picture-perfect cakes in the windows of Hugo et Victor? Really, so what? It was time to be more open: to the unexpected, the unfamiliar, and, especially, the imperfect.
More Sweet Spots on the Map
Crumbles are curiously popular in Paris. They’re not only common dessert options at restaurants and tearooms, but they’re also often made at home for Sunday dinners and sold at boulangeries. Sometimes they’re baked in big sheets and sliced and served in rectangular portions. Me? I like the tidy, little circular pistachio and cherry crumbles served at Eric Kayser.
Crisps and crumbles make an occasional appearance on New York dessert menus (the always-divine Gramercy Tavern comes to mind), but they’re harder to come by than in Paris. When they are served at bakeries, it’s usually a seasonal thing offered around the autumn holidays. But Little Pie Company makes a delightful sour cream apple walnut pie whose streusel topping is awfully close to a good crumble. And it’s served year-round.
I may have been embracing my imperfections, but the Parisian men weren’t. I mean, forget Robert Doisneau café cuddles, moonlight strolls along the Seine, and dancers twirling beneath streetlamps glowing rose. My dating life so far exhibited none of the romantic trappings that the black-and-white posters on my college dorm walls had promised me sixteen years ago. The sad fact was, it reminded me more of my college boyfriend’s dorm room poster of Larry, Moe, and Curly: funny, ridiculous, and in a set of three.
My first date came about, unsurprisingly, after a night out with Michael. As my quintessential bachelor friend, we had an implicit agreement to be each other’s wingmen when we met for happy hours and nightcaps.
“Sooo? Did you get his number?” he trilled toward the end of a night at Experimental, one of the city’s chicest—nay, one of the city’s only—cocktail bars, which had been started a year and a half earlier by three natty friends. It was more East Village speakeasy than common comptoir or ubiquitous café, giving a mostly international crowd a sophisticated place to drink and dance. Not even two blocks away from my tree house, I was lucky to claim this little taste of home as “my” neighborhood bar.
“Oui, oui, and I gave him mine,” I yawned, always staying out later than I should with Michael. Even though I wasn’t particularly charmed by the tall, skinny, Swedish trust fund baby I had chatted with for forty minutes, I was determined to live by my new Paris motto: Be open. Say yes. So I agreed to meet the beanpole for a drink the following week. Michael and I high-fived.
The night hardly started auspiciously. Alec, the Swedish beanpole, suggested we meet outside a pub on rue Saint-Denis. Now, unless you’re walking around with a penis, rue Saint-Denis is not the most desirable place—an infamous stretch of dingy sex shops, seedy massage parlors, and fifty-year-old hookers with vinyl boots and basketball-sized implants loitering in doorways. I tried to keep my chin up after fifteen minutes of waiting for Alec, lecherous men muttering and blowing kisses in my face the whole time. It was one of the few times I was relieved, not amiss, that I couldn’t understand what was being said to me. I was about to text and cancel when the beanpole jogged up, shoulder-length brown hair flapping in the wind. What was I thinking, agreeing to this? But as suddenly as the thought entered my mind, I squashed it, trying to embrace the night with my new optimism. (Be open! Say yes!)
Once we were settled inside a nearby bar with gin and tonics—his eighth by the smell of it—Alec rapidly progressed from small talking to flirting to seducing. Within minutes, he leaned over and just started making out with me. No attempt at warming things up. No soft “hello, you” kiss. Just a full on make-out attack. And he wasn’t a good kisser. That said, I must admit I was a little flattered. This kid was probably twelve years younger than me, and I hadn’t even been sure if our drink, when arranged the week before, was intended to be platonic or romantic. After my months of lonely moments, I was finally on a date. So I went with it, still being open! Saying yes!
“So,” he sat back, all smug and smiley, his concave brown chest peeking out from the crisp shirt that was unbuttoned one more button than it should have been. “Should we go home now or meet my friends at a club?”
It had been a long time since someone rendered me speechless, and I laughed in his face. “Um, right,” I said, wiping my lips dry. “Why don’t we join your friends.”
My bullshit sensor on high alert, we left to ostensibly go to this club, but along the way, he dragged us into a brightly lit, sadly empty bar with thumping music. It was then I realized how horrendous French music is. Sure, they had Serge in the sixties, Air in the nineties, and add me to the list of Phoenix fans. But otherwise, the outdated house music and cheesy crooners that permeate are embarrassingly unhip.
Alec marched up to the bartender like he owned the joint and ordered himself, only himself, a drink, and though he was generous enough to let me take sips of his vodka and mint liquor, I declined after the first sip, having gagged at what tasted like tainted mouthwash. I found myself in that mute role again, not so much because I couldn’t understand the language—I just didn’t get this guy’s behavior. I was simultaneously fascinated and horrified as he kept leaning over and mauling me. What can I say? It was one of those things where I was so aware of the absurdity of the situation, but I didn’t care. (Be open! Say yes!)
But then things just started getting dumb. “Don’t you want to go home with an arrogant bastard?” he asked, grinding against the bar and flipping his hair behind his ear. “Don’t you want to be able to tell your friends you slept with a hot Parisian?” Incapable of a kind or clever response, I just sm
iled and shook my head. He switched tactics. “Okay, time for a shot!”
“Yeah, that’s not going to happen, Alec.” Finally, my senses were coming back to me. The comedy routine had gone on long enough. “It’s time for me to call it a night.”
“What?” He was incredulous. And I was incredulous that he was incredulous. “C’mon. Let’s do a shot. What do you want? Whiskey? Tequila?”
“No, seriously, I’m going to go now.”
“No, wait. Just walk me to this club where my friends are,” he said, apparently no longer interested in who I was but only in what I could do for him. He was furiously texting on his mobile. “They’ll charge me if I’m alone, but not if you’re with me. So come with me, it’s really close, and then you can go home.”
It was 1:15 on a Wednesday night. I had to meet Josephine for my French lesson at 8:30 the following morning. I was done. “Hmm, that’s tempting. But still, I’m going home.” I was making my way to the door, over his protestations. “Thanks, um, for an, um…see ya!” Having reached the door, I bolted midsentence and started running through the cobblestoned streets without so much as a glance over my shoulder. When I was safely back in my tree house, I noticed my phone ringing. Alec wanted to come over. In disbelief—at his audacity and because I couldn’t figure out how to turn my phone off (French wasn’t my only challenge; I was an iPhone girl back in New York, and I couldn’t quite figure out the BlackBerry the Paris office gave me)—I hung up without any pretenses of politesse, dislodged the phone’s battery, and crawled into bed.
The next morning, I had twelve missed calls. And when I hopped off my Vélib’ outside Ladurée, ready for my French lesson, the phone rang again. It was the Swedish beanpole, oblivious, still wanting to know if he should come over.
My first date in Paris: strike one.
About a month later, I connected with a Frenchman—a sane Frenchman. I went to a Pretenders concert, giddy about seeing one of my favorite all-time bands in my favorite all-time city. I had been to two great shows since arriving in Paris, both at incredibly intimate venues that would have sold out in, well, a New York minute, back home. My music karma was good, and I had big expectations for the night. It was an unusually steamy night, and beads of sweat were already tickling my back before I entered Élysée Montmartre, a two-hundred-year-old music venue that had hosted everyone from David Bowie to Robbie Williams. The French are infamous for not investing in air-conditioning—but I thought a major music venue where twelve hundred people cram into one room might be different. It wasn’t; it was going to be a hot night. Weaving through the crowd, I found an open pocket and noticed a very cute guy in a simple white button-down, perfectly worn Levi’s, and closely cropped salt-and-pepperish hair nearby. He was also alone.
More and more people started filing in around us, the air getting stickier with every one of them. I was as acutely aware that I was standing next to a single, attractive guy as I was that my naturally curly hair was undoubtedly getting bigger and frizzier by the minute. Chrissie Hynde and the rest of the band had taken the stage, starting with “Break Up the Concrete.” I needed to seize the opportunity before I had an afro.
Striking up conversation with strangers has never been my forte. In New York, AJ was always there to loosen things up and give me a jolt of confidence, telling me how funny I was or that I was having a good hair night. She encouraged me to make eye contact, not put pressure on myself, and to just enjoy meeting people, with no expectation for the outcome. So I kept thinking: What would AJ do? As I was channeling my best friend in New York, Chrissie was snarling on stage: “Il fait chaud! Merde!” I cracked up with the rest of the roaring crowd at her ability to say it was bloody hot in there like a badass Frenchie. Then I made my move.
“Elle est la mieux,” I shouted to Salt-and-Pepper, letting him know I thought she was the coolest chick going.
“Oui, oui,” he smiled back at me. Okay, so maybe he had been looking at me out of the corner of his eye, too. “Oui…”
“As-tu déjà vu?” My French was laughable, but I wasn’t backing down now that I had successfully made contact.
“Oui, trois fois,” he smiled at me again. What a great smile. “Toi?” We exchanged adoration for our mutual idol the rest of the show, in between jumping around to “Message of Love” and singing “Brass in Pocket” at the top of our lungs. As we were getting herded out of the sweaty venue ninety minutes later, he asked me if I wanted to get a drink. I did. So we did!
We climbed the hill to rue des Abbesses, a street in Montmartre jammed with classic cafés—the kind Robert Doisneau would have photographed—my stomach aflutter for the first time since coming to Paris. We sat down and the hours ticked by as we talked about music, traveling, France, and politics. While he did most of the talking, I was still proud I was keeping up and following, oh, about 40 percent of what he was saying. Although, toward the end, he did get very French on me—talking superfast with beaucoup gesticulations to emphasize his points. That’s when I began to check out, again faced with the reality that French people really like to hear themselves pontificate. After shutting down the café, we exchanged numbers—and names, which we hadn’t until that point. Frank. What a nice name. What a nice night.
The following evening, when I hadn’t heard from him, I told myself I could text him. Pourquoi pas? AJ would. But things had started on a French foot. It seemed too ugly-American to do that. So I waited. For nothing, as it turned out. Josephine was certain the reason I hadn’t heard from him was because he was married. She pointed out that he lived in les banlieues and had a daughter and had probably just come in for the night to see the concert. So confident was my plump, schoolmarmish tutor whose every word of French I clung to that a week later, I had to concede. Strike two.
Meanwhile, after a lifetime of wondering who “the one” would be, AJ finally knew. My best friend was getting married.
“Hi, Aim. Call me when you can,” her voice mail said. “I want to tell you something.” It was a short and simple message, but I knew. I could hear the restrained giddiness in her voice. Since meeting Mitchell the previous month, I knew he was different from the other New York clowns. I called her immediately.
“So, tell me,” I baited. “What’s up?” I felt compelled to let her know that I knew exactly what she was about to share. She started giggling the way she did when we lip-synced Duran Duran’s “Wild Boys” back in 1984. Oh my, she had it bad. “You’re engaged, aren’t you?”
“Yessss!” she melted into the phone. For the next ten minutes, she recounted every detail of her night in the Meatpacking District, which started with Mitchell buying her a new dress at Diane von Furstenburg, then proceeded to a lovely dinner at Bagatelle, a moonlight walk on the High Line, bended knee proposal, a suite at the new Standard Hotel, champagne…
I stared out my window, looking across the zinc rooftops to Sacré-Coeur, glowing big and white up on Montmartre. I felt strangely detached. Mostly it was because I was hearing AJ’s happiness through a crummy little BlackBerry, in a rented apartment, in the middle of a foreign city. How did I wind up here? AJ and I had been attached at the hip for twenty-five years. And now for one of the biggest milestones in life, she was back home, and I was thirty-six hundred miles away from the excitement.
But it was also something else. As happy as I was for her, her engagement made my single status more conspicuous. It hadn’t been that long since I arrived in Paris, all starry-eyed and buoyed by the confidence of being “a catch.” Colleagues and acquaintances had told me being a foreigner was an asset in Paris. That my accent was “cute” and my expat status “exotic.” But after months of hearing this and nothing but two dubious dates to back it up, I was beginning to wonder: was I going to strike out in the world’s most lover-ly city? I wouldn’t have admitted it to just anyone, but I had secretly dreamed of meeting a cute pastry chef and eating tarte tatin for the rest of my life. But the closest I was getting to romance was an old amputee in a wheelchair telling me I h
ad jolies jambes. I may have pretty legs, but they weren’t getting me anywhere. Out of the five of us best friends from high school, I was the last one standing—the only unattached one.
Getting engaged hadn’t exactly been at the top of my to-do list. Ever since graduating from college, I had let my career dictate my path in life. With a New York agent and budding editorial career, the prospect of a fat book advance had prompted me to leave San Francisco—and Max—for Manhattan at the prime marrying age of twenty-nine. And now my advertising career had brought me to Paris at an age where the news programs and my outspoken aunts were telling me I’d better heed my biological clock, or else. Certainly, I had thought about love and marriage and babies over the years. It’s just that how to get a byline in Elle magazine had always been a bigger deal than how to get a guy.
So a year ago, my single status wouldn’t have bothered me one bit. It had become central to my identity and was normally such a source of pride. I protected my independence, enjoyed my freedom, and had done enough dating over the years that I didn’t feel like a hopeless leper.
But something was triggered by AJ’s engagement. She had been my steady companion through two and a half decades, across country borders, and despite our respective relationships. Now, she was going to be committing to someone else. I felt more alone than ever.