Foreign Tongue

by Vanina Marsot

  “Finalement,” he said pointedly, opening the door.

  “Monsieur Laveau! Quel plaisir de vous voir!” I exclaimed, pasting a sunny smile on my face. My attempt to kill him with kindness elicited nothing more than a lukewarm harrumphing sound. I handed over the envelope and watched as he leafed through the pages. He looked jowly, and the bushy eyebrows seemed to radiate out from his forehead like angry antennae. “Vous n’avez pas bonne mine, monsieur,” I observed in a solicitous voice. “Est-ce que vous dormez assez?” He didn’t look up. Criticizing his appearance and asking if he was getting enough sleep might have been overdoing it.

  I cleared my throat. At this, he remembered my existence, muttered something incomprehensible, and retreated to his office. I heard foraging sounds, the rustling of papers, and then he emerged, brandishing a check and another envelope.

  “Tenez. Et voilà le troisième chapitre,” he said, handing them to me. I opened the envelope and skimmed the first page. He jangled his keys in his pocket when I didn’t leave immediately. “Bon, à la semaine prochaine,” he said, trying to send me on my way. I switched to English, a language where I had a far better command than he did.

  “Monsieur, I’d like to know something. Do you have a sense of whether the author is pleased with my work, or if he has any specific instructions for me? Notes? Comments?” I was pretty sure he didn’t because I’d have heard by now, but Monsieur Laveau wanted to leave, and I wanted to inconvenience him.

  “He hasn’t discussed it with me, mademoiselle. Now, if you’ll excuse—”

  “I see. Does that mean you have no idea how he feels about it?” I interrupted, a honeyed note in my voice.

  “Of course I know how he feels about it, but he hasn’t given me any comments for you,” he said, irritated.

  “He must be very, very busy, that he doesn’t have time to discuss this with you. Or maybe he doesn’t care what you think?” It was hard not to grin as I said it.

  “Mademoiselle, je suis en retard,” he said, tapping his watch.

  “Oui, monsieur. But you don’t know?”

  He folded his arms and gave me a long, hard look, exhaling at length. Others had fallen before such intimidation, but I didn’t budge. We locked eyes.

  “Mademoiselle, vous êtes une emmerdeuse,” he said, breaking the standoff.

  “Oui, monsieur. In English, the term you’re looking for is ‘pain in the ass.’” I turned on my heel. “Oh, and it’s unisex, you can use it for both genders. Bonne soirée,” I added, over my shoulder.

  I could almost swear I heard a muffled laugh as I walked out the door, but maybe I misheard the cowbell. In any case, it was the first time I’d managed to best Monsieur Laveau.

  I waltzed down rue de Condé, crossed Saint-Germain, and wound my way toward the river. I stopped off at La Palette, one of Pascal’s hangs. There was no sign of him, but there was an empty table on the sidewalk next to a potted tree. I squeezed myself into it, banging my hip as I sat. A tall, portly, irascible waiter I recognized from previous visits stood guard at the entrance. Fat fingers, bushy mustache and long sideburns, black waistcoat, long, stained apron: he looked right out of a Toulouse-Lautrec painting.

  He planted himself in front of me. “J’écoute,” he said, succinctly.

  “Un verre de rouge, s’il vous plaît,” I said, smiling up at him. “Merci, Bruno,” I added, remembering his name. He grunted but came back with a glass of red wine and a small dish of black olives.

  “Comme c’est gentil!” I exclaimed, piercing one with a toothpick, trying to remember if they always gave dishes of olives or if this was just my lucky day. Bruno snorted, but it seemed like a friendly snort. Maybe this was the trick. Maybe being sort of deviously nice and semiflirtatious was what it took to avoid being ignored.

  A familiar face approached another outdoor table. With an elated internal leap, I recognized Olivier as he sat down, his back to me, and lit a cigarette. He glanced around but didn’t see me. He ran an impatient hand through his already disheveled hair and answered his phone. I sat there, trying to think up something clever to say, but then he stood up to greet a brunette valkyrie.

  She looked about six feet tall, with full lips, high cheekbones, and the kind of thick, black, nerdy glasses that seem to make beautiful women look even more beautiful for not trying. She was probably an actress. Or a model. Olivier gave a strand of her hair an affectionate tug. I looked away. I didn’t need to see the inevitable kiss.

  The French do that. They have no compunction about it whatsoever. They kiss in public, and I mean big, wet, sexy kisses. People of all ages do it, and no one yells “Get a room!” If you don’t like it, you can lump it, or look the other way, but most Parisians shake their heads indulgently, as if to say, “Ah, love,” or something equally sappy. I didn’t know why it was so aggravating, except that I was in Paris and no one was kissing me in a smart Left Bank café.

  They probably had impossibly beautiful children. I sipped my wine, picturing their kids in Petit Bateau T-shirts and baby Dior overalls, pushing toy sailboats around the fountain at the Jardin du Luxembourg on a Sunday afternoon. No, they were cooler than that; I revised the image: they probably dressed their kids in mud-cloth ensembles hand-sewn by a Senegalese feminist collective in Barbès. They went to family tabla drumming classes.

  The brunette caught me staring. Olivier turned to look at me at the precise moment when I did that extremely attractive thing whereby the lips miss the edge of the wineglass. Red wine dribbled down the front of my beige sweater. He waved. I grimaced and dabbed at my chest with a napkin, knocking my bag to the ground. Ducking my head, I scraped my knuckles as I retrieved my keys, wallet, and cell phone. I straightened up, bumping my head on the side of the table. Olivier stood in front of me.

  “It’s you!” he said with a smile.

  “Ow. Hello,” I said, rubbing my head. “Yup, it’s me.”

  “What are you doing?” he asked. I hunched over, folding one arm across my chest to hide the stain.

  “Wearing my drink. Well, isn’t it a nice night? Don’t let me keep you,” I babbled. He cocked his head, looking bemused.

  “May we join you?” he asked. I was speechless in the face of this near-perfect definition of hell. “Sandrine!” he called, waving his hand. The beautiful brunette walked over. “This is Sandrine,” Olivier said.

  “Anna,” I said. She bent to kiss me on both cheeks.

  “C’est elle qui fait la traduction pour Bernard,” he explained as she sat. “And how is the translation going?” he asked, in English.

  “As well as can be expected,” I answered.

  “That doesn’t sound very promising,” he said.

  “No, it’s fine. I just can’t talk about it. Monsieur Laveau wants me to keep it confidential.”

  “But I already know about it. The cat has left the baggie,” he said.

  “Bag,” I said and bit down on the inside of my mouth, charmed despite my discomfort. I calculated I could leave Perfect Couple in ten minutes. Her cell phone rang.

  “Oui, maman, oui.” Sandrine made an apologetic face. “Bien sûr. Non, en fait, il est là,” she said. “D’accord,” she answered and passed him the phone. He took it and got up to speak. “Our mother wants us to go to a cousin’s wedding in the south,” she explained, switching back into French. “We don’t like this cousin, she’s awful, but it’s a delicate situation,” she confided.

  “Is it very soon?” I asked, merely to make conversation. Maybe I’d walk home.

  “Next month.”

  “And is it a big family wedding?” I asked. I could catch the 96, or cross the river to Châtelet. I wondered if Monoprix had avocados; I was in the mood for guacamole.

  “Enorme!” she said, laughing. Olivier hung up, passed her the phone and looked at me. Suddenly, the full, potential meaning of the phrase “our mother” clicked into place like a roulette ball in a numbered slot.

  “I’m sorry, did you say that was your mother?” I asked,
using the handy-dandy French second-person plural. It came out overly dramatic, as if the question was of vital importance to national security, but I went with it.

  “Yes,” she said. She waved at Bruno and signaled for another glass of wine.

  “Aha,” I stalled, trying to find an elegant way of confirming this information. “Is it just the two of you, or do you have other brothers or sisters?”

  “We have an older sister, Gisèle, but she lives in Milan,” Sandrine said. I nodded sagely, as if this was the crucial piece of information I was looking for. Olivier half-smiled, as if he knew what I was up to and liked it. Feeling a wild urge to stroke his cheek, I sat on my hands. It was hard to control the insane internal bubble of euphoria I felt. She’s your sister! Yay! Are you single? I asked Sandrine if she spoke English.

  “Very little, though I must learn. It would be useful for work. I’m in advertising,” she confessed. She really was very, very beautiful. Absolutely stunning. And his sister! I ordered another glass of wine as well. We chatted about movies and art exhibits, her summer trip to Croatia, his trip to New York, and places to see in Los Angeles. They were smart and playful, with a gentle way of ribbing each other that seemed to include me. I liked her tremendously, not just because she was his sister. I more than liked him.

  The air did seem to sparkle between us. After a while, even my pessimistic side wasn’t buying that this was merely wishful thinking on my part. He was warm and engaging, and when I looked at him, he held my gaze. Sandrine got up to take another call. Olivier switched back into English.

  “Do you mind? I need to practice,” he said.

  “No, but I won’t correct any grammatical mistakes. I hate it when anyone does it to me. I’m just warning you,” I said. Somehow, it came out flirty.

  “That’s fair,” he said and leaned closer to me. My brain froze. I tried to think of something intelligent to say, but speech seemed either superfluous or loaded with innuendo when all I could think about was the shape of his mouth and the slingshot tension in my stomach. He stroked the inside of my wrist. “I must confess. I have ulterior motives for wanting to talk to you.”

  “Oh?” I answered dreamily. His finger was making figure eights on the clustered network of veins. It felt like a cross between a caress and a hundred mosquito bites, lovely and unbearable. I wanted to scratch my wrist, but I didn’t want it to end.

  “I’m trying to get to one of Bernard’s authors, and I think he may be the one whose work you’re translating,” he said. “I want to adapt one of his books for the screen,” he clarified.

  The thing in my stomach snapped, and something went thud, a boulder landing in soft dirt.

  “I can’t help you.” I pulled my hand away. “I don’t know who he is.” I couldn’t keep a note of froideur out of my voice.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “I just remembered I said I’d meet a friend this evening,” I lied, looking at my watch. I wasn’t a very good liar. Embroidery, yes, outright lies, no. By the skeptical look on his face, I knew he could tell, but I stood up.

  Sandrine came back. “Mais, tu t’en vas?” she asked, surprised.

  “Oui,” I said and described a fictional friend. The fictional friend was having a hard time getting over a breakup, and I’d promised to visit. And what a coincidence, fictional friend lived in the Eleventh, near me.

  “I can drive you, I have my car,” Olivier suggested.

  “No, no, I’m already late, I’ll pop in the métro,” I said, waving him off, my voice high-pitched and cheery with insincerity.

  I sped away, darting in and out of the throng on Saint-André des Arts, past the crepe places and postcard stands. So that was why Olivier was being so friendly. He wanted to get to the author, my author. I was a fool for thinking he was interested in me.

  I crossed the Seine. The reflections of streetlamps bobbed on the surface of the water below. In the métro, someone played a mournful Air on the G String, the notes bouncing against the tiled walls. I sat on an orange plastic seat that looked like unsafe playground furniture and shook my head. He was a nice man, a nice, attractive man who was flirting with me, and I’d flown out of there like a crazy person. A complete overreaction.

  The station was nearly empty. I walked to the edge of the platform, feeling the cold, damp air above the track. On the opposite quai was a billboard advertising a three-day sale at one of the big department stores. “Les Trois J,” said the caption, underneath a giant image of a woman sprawled on a red sofa, kicking her feet up in a pink lace negligee. The train came in. As we pulled out of the station, I glanced at the ad again, and a burst of heat flooded my face.

  I’d left my shopping bag of new lingerie at the café.

  13

  Le désir possède une persistance indestructible.*

  —JACQUES LACAN, Ecrits

  I pondered my plight as I walked home from the station, hoping the bag of lingerie was still under the table at the café. A mass of pale-faced teenagers with piercings and spiked hair swarmed the sidewalk, Goth night at the Gibus. I’d forked over a lot of money for that lingerie. All for naught.

  On the ground, I spotted a witch doctor card. I’d started a collection of them years ago, when I was a student in Paris. I wasn’t the only one: there were websites devoted to collectors of des cartes de marabouts africains, and I’d even found a witch doctor card generator online. Catering to the African community, they were business cards advertising the various services of witch doctors, seers, or mediums. This one was dingy beige, with green lettering. Grand Mage Mamadou promised to cure all problems, including those related to “love, job, work, family, desire, and lack of desire.” Results were guaranteed within twenty-four hours or your money back, and an address in the Nineteenth was listed. I put the card in my pocket. Maybe Mamadou knew where my lingerie was.

  I looked up the café in the phone book and called them. No, no one had found a shopping bag, a woman assured me. I explained I’d been there with two people, described the location of the table, and asked if “someone” might possibly be kind enough to go outside and check. She put the phone down. I heard clattering cups and the screaming milk steamer.

  “Ecoutez, il n’y pas de sac. Peut-être vos amis sont partis avec votre paquet,” she suggested when she came back, done with her good deed for the day. It occurred to me that even if Olivier and Sandrine had taken my shopping bag, I didn’t know how to get in touch with them, nor did they know how to reach me. Except through Bernard. Now there was an embarrassing scenario. The whole situation was maddening: overreacting, forgetting the shopping bag. I groaned and turned on the TV, trying not to think about it.

  Later, when I climbed into bed, I couldn’t sleep. I readjusted the pillow, turning it over, then turning it over again. Just when I got comfortable, my nose started itching. Then my ear. Then a spot behind my ear. My shoulder blade, thighs, calves, the small of my back. Itching led to thinking about itching. I flung off the covers, stomped into the bathroom, and popped half a sleeping pill. I burrowed underneath the duvet, scratched my chin and my cheek, and closed my eyes.

  I dreamed the doorbell rang, and I stumbled out of bed, sleepy and discombobulated. It was Timothy. He was wearing a trench coat, and his hair was long and shaggy. He shoved a cardboard box into my arms. “Here,” he said. “You left these at my place.” He turned and walked into an old-fashioned cage elevator, slamming the iron door behind him with a clang. The box was full of things I didn’t recognize: a collection of Chinese poetry, a Lonely Planet guide to South America, and a crocheted afghan. These aren’t mine, I thought. Then: Oh, they belong to the other woman. I ran out of the building, chasing after him. His trench coat flapped open, whipping in the wind.

  “Wait!” I yelled. “Why did you come all this way?” He turned around, and it wasn’t Timothy, it was Olivier. He looked at me like I was a stranger.

  In the morning, I spread a slab of churned butter on toasted pain Poilâne. The butter came from the open market,
where they cut it with a garrote-like length of wire. It tasted of cream and salt, and I spread it in a thick, voluptuous layer.

  I poured another cup of coffee and got out the chapter. I skimmed the pages: narrator and Eve finally go to Venice. The chapter was longer than the last one and contained at least a couple of sex scenes. I thought about turning on the computer and powering through a first draft, but it wasn’t due for another six days, and it wasn’t like me to get something done in an efficient and timely manner. I called Clara.

  “Buyer’s remorse?” she asked.

  “Not quite.” I told her what had happened. As she burst into cackles of hysterical laughter, I mused on the fact that Clara, like many French people, had a cruel sense of humor. My observation fell on deaf ears. She was too busy laughing.

  “After all that trouble! L’ironie est extra!” she exclaimed between giggles.

  “Yeah, yeah. Do you think Olivier has my lingerie?”

  “I don’t know, ma chère. Why not ask Monsieur Laveau for Olivier’s number?”

  “I can’t. He wigged when he thought I was discussing the translation with him.”

  “C’est quoi, ‘wigged’?”

  “Flipped out—il a flippé,” I explained.

  “I still don’t understand ‘wigged.’”

  “‘Wigged,’ the past simple of the verb ‘to wig,’ derived from the noun ‘wig,’ like perruque. I’m assuming it’s slang and that the etymology comes from slapstick comedy, a genre which could easily feature the loss of or a droll mishap with a wig, either worn by a woman or, when worn by a man, usually referred to as a toupee or rug, like tapis.” I caught my breath. “Or it’s from the expression ‘to flip your wig.’ Or lid. Not sure.”