by Julia Holden
When we first met, Celestine told me she was from Paris. She said her mother was a poet. I never met anybody whose mother was a poet before. I asked what her father did. She said he was a cad, and that was all she ever told me about him. Then she said she was a student at the Sorbonne. I didn’t know then what the Sorbonne was, but it sounded so sophisticated it made me wish I was a student there myself. Just as I was starting to wonder what this amazing sophisticated French girl was doing at Purdue, she explained that there was an exchange program between the Sorbonne and Purdue, and she was here for the year.
I am going to let you in on a little secret. First, the not-secret part: Americans have a thing for Europeans. American men melt if a woman has a French accent, and American women melt if a man has a French accent. Italian, too. And British. And Spanish. German, not so much. Anyway, here is the secret: Europeans—including Celestine—have that same thing with Americans. That was why she decided to come to the United States for a year and immerse herself in, well, Americans. If she ever does settle down, I guarantee you it’ll be with some white-bread Boilermaker boy from Indiana or Ohio or Wisconsin.
Anyway, Celestine and I went straight to the housing office and told them we had done their work for them. We instantly became best friends, and we still are. Thank goodness for e-mail and the occasional very expensive phone call, because even though she lives in a time zone far far away, I would be lost without her. And did I mention that we are almost exactly the same size? Which girl roommates should absolutely always be. Celestine got to wear my sturdy nondescript middle-America wardrobe from Marshall Field’s in Chicago, which she loved, for reasons I cannot fathom. And I got to wear her fabulous European designer clothes with labels like agnes b and Versace, which I loved wearing, for reasons I trust are obvious. At the end of the year, after we cried and hugged and cried and she finally flew back to Paris, I opened the closet and found she had left me a fabulous little black Dolce & Gabbana top and skirt, and a gorgeous but fiercely painful pair of Stephane Kélian pumps. Which is how those things ended up in my mom’s pink carpet-bag suitcase.
I left for Paris in such a hurry, I didn’t even have time to e-mail Celestine to tell her I was coming. So it would be a big surprise. Although maybe not. When I wrote my “Dangerous Dress” paper, she had already moved back to Paris. I sent her a copy because I was very proud of it, and because, in a way, it was about Paris. After she read it she called me. I told her I thought it was a funny coincidence that she was from Paris, and now, out of the blue, I ended up writing this whole long paper about Paris.
“But it’s not a coincidence at all,” she said.
“What do you mean?”
“The dress called to your Grandma. It made her come all the way to Paris to get it. Now she has given the dress to you, and it is telling you to go to Paris, just like your Grandma did. Someday it will bring you here.”
I laughed. Celestine didn’t. “You’re serious,” I said.
“I’m a mystic,” she said. Then she laughed, too.
I had forgotten all about that conversation. I only remembered it sitting on the plane. The plane to Paris.
Maybe Celestine actually was a mystic—because Grandma’s dress really was bringing me to Paris.
9
Thinking about that conversation, and Grandma’s dress, gave me goose bumps.
Although perhaps they just had the air-conditioning in Coach turned up too high.
Once my goose bumps went down, I unzipped my little duffel baggy carry-on and took out the screenplay. The Importance of Beating Ernest. Since Elliot Schiffter and Reliable Pictures were flying me all the way to Paris to help them find a dress for this movie, I figured I’d better at least read the script.
The Ernest in the title is Ernest Hemingway.
I don’t know about you. But when I was a junior in high school, I had to read some book by Ernest Hemingway. I don’t remember which one. All I remember is that I hated it, hated having to read it, hated everything about it. So when I saw that the screenplay had to do with Ernest Hemingway, I thought, Uh-oh.
Silly me. I loved the screenplay.
Maybe because it’s actually not mostly about Hemingway. The main character is this old college professor named Harold Klein. He teaches literature, and he’s an expert on Hemingway. Which is really ironic, because when Harold was a very young man he went to Paris and fell in love with a beautiful French girl named Catherine. She fell in love with him, too. Only rat bastard Hemingway stole her away, even though he was married at the time.
So you see, Ernest Hemingway is the villain. Maybe that’s why I liked it so much.
Anyway, old Harold Klein is dying. And a young student convinces him to go back to Paris. To try to find Catherine, who was the love of his life. He goes, and he sees an old woman who is maybe Catherine. Only before he can find out, Harold gets run over by a guy on a Vespa.
This is not a sad story.
Because Harold wakes up, it’s 1928, and he’s nineteen again. Only this time he knows everything he learned in his whole life. He and Catherine fall in love all over again. And here comes rat bastard Ernest Hemingway all over again. But this time Harold has the chance to get it right. Of course it’s not easy. If love came easy, it would be a very short movie. Harold has run-ins with Gertrude Stein and Alice Toklas, and Scott and Zelda Fitzgerald, who apparently were pretty funny in real life, although probably not intentionally. Even though Harold should know better, having lived through it all before, he does something stupid and Catherine gets really mad at him. So in swoops Hemingway. He invites Catherine to a glamorous soiree and buys her a dangerous dress, which she wears to the party. Only Hemingway’s wife sneaks Harold in, and Harold steals Catherine right back.
But Hemingway chases them down. There is a big fight, where scrappy little Harold actually beats up big drunk thug Ernest Hemingway. Only Harold takes a terrible beating too, and he passes out, and we don’t know if he’s alive or dead.
Wait, it’s happy.
He’s alive. But when he wakes up, he’s old again, and he’s in a hospital in Paris. The old lady at his bedside is Catherine, who has never fallen out of love with him. And the best part is, Harold is not dying after all. Which the doctor can’t explain, but hey, it’s a movie. Harold and Catherine get married in the same Paris café where they first met. They dance, they kiss, and—
“I love this!”
Then I realized I had said it out loud.
Fortunately the people sitting on both sides of me were asleep. I don’t usually rave out loud about things I read. But I did love it. It was so romantic. Funny, too. But mostly romantic.
I put the screenplay back in my duffel baggy. Then I looked at my watch. I still had another four and a half hours till Paris. So I decided to take a nap.
I guess what with all the rushing around and the excitement I was pretty tired, because in just a few seconds I felt myself drifting off. Before I fell asleep, though, I thought, Look where I was only twenty-four hours ago. Look where I am right this minute. And just imagine where I could be twenty-four hours from now.
Only I didn’t have to imagine. I was going to Paris. Paris, France.
Where absolutely anything could happen.
10
Finally we landed at Charles de Gaulle airport. I was one of the last people off the plane. I looked around, but there was no one waiting to greet me. I followed everybody to passport control. Where there was no line. I do not mean there was nobody waiting. On the contrary: There were about six thousand people waiting. There was just no line. So it took quite a while until the passport control guy scanned my passport and let me into the country. Actually he was very handsome, but there was only one of him. Then it was off to baggage claim.
Baggage claim at CDG is a lot like passport control. Which is to say it is not the most organized place. They give out luggage carts for free, so everybody takes one. Many people take two. It’s like a big game of bumper cars, only played in about sixte
en different languages.
Given the crummy seat I got on the planes, it will come as no great surprise to you that my bag was one of the very last ones out. At least I had no trouble spotting it. Let us say that not everyone flying to Paris has a big pink carpet-bag suitcase.
I hauled my bag into the main terminal, which is even less organized than passport control and baggage claim. Then I really started to worry. Fret. Panic. Not just in little flashes, either. Full-blown panic. Because somebody was supposed to be meeting me—only there was nobody. Instead of saving a movie, I was in the middle of mayhem, without a clue how I might actually get to Paris on my own if I had to, or where I was even going. I was beginning to feel like Kiefer Sutherland on 24, with a big digital clock ticking away my time. Okay Kiefer Sutherland faces somewhat weightier matters on 24, but you get what I mean. To make matters worse, everything was in French.
And I do not speak French.
Just when I was trying to decide whether to cry or scream, I found the driver. He was standing off to the side smoking a cigarette. Lots of people in the terminal were smoking. Which right away told me I was not in Kansas anymore. Anyway, the driver was wearing a Niketown sweatshirt and big hip hop sneakers. I thought they looked silly on this somewhat middle-aged little Frenchman. Still, he was my savior.
I am not suggesting any religious connotation when I say he was my savior. Although it did seem pretty miraculous to me. In the midst of all that bedlam, I found him. And he had a sign with my name on it.
Even if it was the tiniest little sign.
“Excuse me,” I said. He looked up from his cigarette. I pointed to the sign. “That’s me.”
“Zat’s you?” he asked. I’m not making fun. He really said it that way.
“That’s me.”
I guess he believed me. Because he immediately grabbed the handle of my mother’s big suitcase, and off he went, running madly through the airport, weaving in and out of the huge crowds. Only he obviously knew his way around this airport, and I didn’t. Plus he already knew where he parked his car, and I didn’t. So in about ten seconds he was gone, my suitcase was gone, and may I remind you that my Grandma’s dress was in that suitcase.
Now I was absolutely sure I wanted to cry. But I didn’t. I heard somewhere that if you are lost, you should stay put so they know where to look for you. I probably heard that on a news story about hikers lost in the Himalayas or some such. I’m not sure the same rules apply when you’re in the middle of a million people in Charles de Gaulle airport. But I stayed where I was anyway. Finally the driver came back and found me. He looked annoyed, but I didn’t care. Because he still had my suitcase. Grandma’s dress was back. I was rescued. Saved.
We got to his car. Which was not a big Lincoln Continental. It was just a car. A Renault, which is a French car. Not a very large one, either. It’s a good thing my Mom’s suitcase was not one inch bigger. Because the suitcase would’ve had to ride in the back seat and I would’ve been in the trunk.
The instant we were out of the airport, the driver started to drive very fast. I do not generally mind driving fast. But this car was very small. And it sure felt like we were going extremely fast. Some people always look at the speedometer to see how fast the car is going. I am not usually one of those people. But I looked.
The speedometer said we were going 145. Which made me very anxious.
Then I remembered: That was not 145 miles per hour. We were going fast, but not that fast. That was kilometers per hour. Okay, how many miles is 145 kilometers? I couldn’t remember.
I now know the answer, because I looked it up. We were going 89.5 miles an hour. Which in that tiny little car seemed awfully fast. Especially zooming in and out around the other slowpoke cars that were only going, say, 85 miles an hour.
I was about to ask the driver to slow down. But all of a sudden the traffic got quite awful, and we went from flying to crawling just like that.
After an hour, the traffic was making me even more nervous than the speeding had done. First because I kept imagining that big 24 digital clock pounding away at me. Second because I really needed to pee.
Fortunately, right about then traffic started to move. And all of a sudden I could see.
I was in Paris.
For all I know, we had probably been in Paris for quite some time. But now it looked the way somebody who has never been to Paris expects it to look.
The driver turned left, onto a pretty old bridge across a river that even I knew must be the Seine. On an island in the middle of the river, up soared a huge ancient cathedral with wings that seemed to fly everywhere, and two enormous towers, and even I knew that was Notre Dame. I recognized it from the Walt Disney movie, which I watch with my cousin Paris sometimes when I babysit. Every time we see that movie, I tell her that someday I will take her there, and then she will be Paris in Paris. Which she finds extremely amusing. Of course, every time I ever said that, it was just silly talk. Only now it wasn’t so silly. Because there was the real Notre Dame—and here I was.
And do you know? Even though I was tired and stiff, and desperately needed to pee . . . even with all that, being in Paris felt pretty good.
Who am I kidding? I was in Paris, France. It was amazing.
Remember, I grew up in Kirland, Indiana. And growing up in Kirland does not give you the very broadest horizons. So I never really believed I would find myself in Paris. Although the thought had occurred to me—probably starting six years ago, when my cousin Mary named her daughter Paris. Which she picked on account of her and Nick planning to go to Paris, France, someday. Which never happened. The whole tragic aspect of it—that Nick and Mary would never get there—made it seem like Paris must be this perfect place where everything worked out. Romantically, anyway. And if things worked out for you romantically, everything else just fell into place, right?
I was only nineteen years old when I got that notion about Paris. Everything about life and love seemed very straightforward to me then. Whereas now I am a jaded twenty-five-year-old cynic. Only perhaps I am not totally jaded. Because suddenly I was in Paris, France. And just being there made me feel like I was glowing. Even better, I had Grandma’s dress with me. Grandma’s dress, which came from Paris all those years ago, had come back—and it was bringing me along on a wild and wonderful ride. At that moment, I felt like absolutely anything and everything was possible.
The car turned right, onto a big street that paralleled the river. It was a bright sunny afternoon, just the way you would want your first day in Paris to be. There were hundreds of people out walking. Maybe thousands. All just strolling along the Seine, holding hands, laughing, smiling. Not one of them looked like they had a care in the world.
I thought, I could be one of those people. I could be anyone I felt like being. I could eat, and drink, and shop. I could find romance. Real romance, too, nothing like Jimmy Krasna fumbling at me with his clammy cold hands in the back seat of his mom’s Chrysler in the parking lot at Kirland Park.
I was in Paris. Happiness would be so easy.
11
Except. I am willing to bet that not one of those happy free romantic people strolling along the Seine had just two days to find the perfect antique dress to save a movie. Suddenly I wasn’t glowing anymore: I was panicking.
The driver turned left, onto a tiny narrow little street. Then he made kind of a right turn, and a couple of kind of lefts, which took us to an even tinier street. I say kind of because these streets did not run at right angles. Like maybe the guy who drew the plan for this part of town had too much to drink first.
Then the driver stopped. “I am too far,” he said, looking over his shoulder. He put the car in reverse and backed up—fast. Down this narrow little street. For a whole block.
So when he stopped the car, yanked my suitcase out of the trunk, and dropped it unceremoniously onto the sidewalk, that was fine with me. All that mattered was that I had survived the ride and gotten to my hotel. It is called the Hotel Jacob, I
guess because it’s on Rue Jacob. It’s an old building, four stories high. The lobby is dark old wood, and it makes you feel like you just walked into the 1920s.
When I checked in, the desk clerk asked me for a credit card. I thought that was a little strange, since I was here working on the movie. The clerk told me my room number, 302, handed me the key, and pointed to the elevator.
Nobody carried my suitcase upstairs. Which is actually a good thing. Because the elevator was small. You may have been in small elevators before. But you only think you have been in small elevators. This elevator was big enough for my mom’s suitcase. And my little duffel baggy carry-on. And me. And that is all. In fact, the elevator had one of those old-fashioned gates you pull closed before it will go, and if for instance I had been wearing my Miracle Bra, I’m not sure it would have closed.
The room was clean. Not fancy, but nice, although it was definitely on the small side. The bed was a double, not even a queen. The closet was little, the bathroom was little, and the only dresser in the room had two teeny drawers that I knew wouldn’t be enough for my clothes. So I unpacked things in odd places. My panties, including the little wedgie thong, went into the nightstand drawer. My socks went into the desk drawer, right on top of the stationery. You get the idea.
Before I unpacked, though, the first thing I did was pee. Forgive me if this is an unladylike observation, but taking a pee when you really desperately need to is highly underrated.
I did not hang Grandma’s dress in the closet. I wanted to, but I couldn’t. There was no place to put it. The closet was just too small.
I was thinking what a huge coincidence it would be if Grandma had stayed in this exact same hotel. Although I am not really much of a believer in coincidence. Anyway I hoped she had. I wondered for about the millionth time how Grandma had come to own her dress. I hoped she had gotten it under the most adventurous, reckless, dangerously passionate circumstances possible.