by Ann Jacobus
Madame says, “Your mother mentioned Arkansas State in Jonesboro, but that would be a ‘reach’ school for you. North Central Mountain College of the Ozarks in Whipperwillville is a potential safe school.”
I’m on to you, Summer thinks. You made that place up. “The Ozarks are awesome,” she says cheerfully. “Let’s aim for that.”
“I’ll be checking with your teachers. Please fill out the personal statement form for me online and I’ll see you in two weeks.”
Probably a whole ’nother year lost now. The thought occurs to Summer, as she shuffles out of the office. She might make a good tabloid headline, though. FORMER HONOR ROLL GRANDDAUGHTER AND ONLY HEIR PROVES WORTHLESS, FLAMES OUT, AND FORFEITS FORTUNE.
At least she didn’t get the “choices” lecture today. It is so time to be finished with high school and she has screwed up long enough. The good thing about this bad news is it makes her want to prove everyone wrong. She’ll bust ass for the next month, and graduate if it kills her. Then worry about where to apply.
And she still wants to find someone to hold hands with. Or else she might as well chug a can of motor oil now.
FOUR
In the kitchen the next morning, Mom’s little dog, Camus, barks at Summer when she sits down. She ignores him despite the pain it blasts through her headache. Mom’s elderly Moroccan housekeeper mutters and puts him on the other side of the pantry door, then places a plate of scrambled eggs before Summer.
“Merci,” Summer says. Mom’s still out of town. The International Herald Tribune and Le Monde lie before her. By the gray light from the courtyard window she searches the city section of the French paper looking for any mention of the lady who died at Étoile station. Fire, robberies—nothing looks close.
“Ouaiba, I’m looking, uh—je cherche … un accident.”
Ouaiba dries her hands on a violet linen dishtowel and approaches.
Summer holds up the paper. “Une femme … etait mort … dans le Métro.”
“Sacrebleu!”
“Can you help me? Find the story? L’histoire?”
Ouaiba takes the paper and scans the two pages of short local police reports. “Hier? Yes-ter-day?” she asks.
“Thursday. Jeudi soir.”
Ouaiba shakes her head. She doesn’t see anything either.
No mention, as if it never even happened. It was a suicide then, Summer thinks. If it had been an accident, or a murder, it would be a story.
Summer dresses and heads out. Public transportation is one of the best things about Paris. She’s had free run of the city since her first visit at age thirteen. A ton of homework awaits her but she has tomorrow, too. She gets that she has to graduate. She needs to find someone to be with.
As she descends the Métro stairs, her pulse quickens. She stops. Something huge and dark and cold and deadly waits patiently below for her.
Great. Trainophobia. Just what she didn’t order.
She grips the grimy handrail, as people push around her. It’s as if the lady on the tracks is still there, emitting a repelling force field. She inches forward. Shallow breathing makes her light-headed. She grabs a seat on the train, then concentrates on slow, deep breaths and listens to Kentucky’s Safety Glass.
A couple of sips from her silver flask help. It was given to her dad by his fraternity brothers at the University of Arkansas. He kept it filled with scotch. She’s a vodka girl, herself.
She emerges in the eleventh arrondissement, gulping in fresh air and proud of her fortitude in overcoming this new little anxiety.
A twenty-foot wall rings the outside of Père Lachaise Cemetery, but she enters by a side stairway. Her mini guide has a fold-out map showing the locations of all the noteworthy residents: Oscar Wilde, Frédéric Chopin, Edith Piaf, and … Jim Morrison.
“‘Hot American lead singer of The Doors and big partier who overdosed in Paris in the seventies,’” she reads. That’s the guy to visit.
Hands deep in her ski jacket pockets, she walks along a gray cobblestone main drag. Soot-darkened, elaborate tombstones, ten-foot angels and obelisk monuments, and shed-sized mausoleums crowd together like bad teeth. Dried leaves cartwheel alongside her, and a solitary man in a dark coat crosses her path in the distance.
So beautiful this place, she thinks. Like something out of a poem. Or a dream.
When she finally finds it, Morrison’s grave is deserted, simple and anticlimactic. Wilted flowers in cellophane, a bourbon bottle, two beer cans, and folded notes litter it. On his tombstone, a mysterious line underneath his dates reads, KATA TON DAIMONA EAUTOY.
A patch of dry grass and a park bench catch her eye, and even though she must climb uphill to sit, she’s ready for a refreshment break. She sips vodka from her flask to clear her head, then pulls out her phone from her backpack. She opens her to-do app and taps:
Scope out classes. Again. Then she deletes it.
Join a school club? Doubtful on that one, too.
Bars. Clubs. Not ideal.
Ballroom dancing lessons?
French dating sites. Expat dating sites.
Prisons?
Volunteer somewhere. That would be good for her French, too. But finding something could be a major undertaking and she’s not up for it.
Through the bare trees, crowded, slate rooftops stretch out to the horizon beneath ashy skies. This would be an excellent location for eternal rest, she thinks. Assuming the inhabitants are actually resting.
The anniversary of Dad’s death is December 17, less than a month away. She closes her eyes and her twelve-year-old self is sitting in the hard front pew of his quiet memorial service.
“‘I shut my eyes and all the world drops dead.’” A guy is standing at the other end of her bench.
“Ex-cuse me?” She clenches her fists. Some English-speaking crackhead has zeroed in on her. She has a green belt in tae kwon do, only it’s been over six years since she’s thrown a good kick.
“The poet you’re reading,” he says. “Plath.” His cologne wafts up her nose. Heavy, spicy, undertones of cider vinegar? He looks about nineteen, maybe twenty—although hard to tell with his unnecessary sunglasses—and he’s wearing jeans and hiking boots, wrapped in a black wool coat. Maybe the guy she glimpsed over on the main drag earlier.
“Oh.” She stares at the front cover of her book, as if she forgot.
He says, “Let me guess. I bet you like Dickinson, too, maybe even Virginia Woolf?”
Without making any sudden moves, she slips the book into her backpack and her phone in her pocket. “I’m going to speak to you as if you’re not insane, because I’ve heard that’s the best way to handle a lunatic.”
He looks taken aback, then laughs. “Sorry. Didn’t mean to startle you. I don’t often run into women reading Plath in Père Lachaise.”
She has to give him credit. She would appreciate it if everyone took her sharper remarks this well.
His gaze makes her feel like a smear under a microscope. She pulls off her ski hat and runs her hand through her uncombed hair. He’s tall and broad shouldered, with full lips and silky skin. His hair is eighteenth-century-English-poet-like in its thickness, length, slight curl, and suggestion of unkemptness.
“You hang out here regularly?” she asks, zipping her backpack.
He smiles with perfect, straight white teeth. “I’m new in town. Just had some time in between appointments.”
As a rule, guys who hit on her have tossed back a half dozen shots, some X, who knows what else, and are no great shakes themselves. Heathcliff here seems sober, so why is he talking to her?
Oh, yeah, she thinks, I’ve slipped below the magic weight. Deflated my chipmunk cheeks. Even though her clothes are all oversized on her lately, she feels no different. People are nicer to her though.
“You’re American.” She crosses her arms. Maybe this is some kind of prank. Or the guy’s a predator.
“Among other things. I’m here for a while on business.” There’s something familiar abou
t him. Like when you see a stranger on the street and the shape of their eyes or mouth reminds you of a relative. “And you?” he asks. “May I?” He sits on the end of the bench.
He looks like the guy who loitered in the corridor outside of her father’s hospital room. Waiting on someone in one of the other rooms. He kept smiling sadly at her.
But there’s no way. This guy would have been too young.
She says, “I’m originally from Arkansas. Little Rock.”
“No kidding. I’ve spent time there. Nice city. You don’t sound like you’re from Arkansas.”
“Been gone too long, I guess.” She’s only visited a few times in the last five years, most recently for Grandpa’s funeral. “You’re here on business? What kind of business are you in?” she asks.
“Sales. International.” The wind tousles his hair.
“International sales?”
Yeah, right. Unless he means drugs, which might explain the expensive clothes and that flashy Swiss watch. Maybe he recognized her as a potential client. Good radar if he does. She’s never bought any drugs in France, though. The laws are harsher here.
And jail would really suck.
“My name is Kurt, by the way.” He doesn’t extend his hand. Neither does she.
Summer blinks.
He looks familiar because he’s the guy from the Métro.
FIVE
“You were at the accident!” Summer cries, springing up from the cemetery park bench. “At Étoile the other night.”
Kurt’s smile fades. “That was you, then. I wasn’t sure. Also wasn’t sure whether to bring it up or not.”
“Her scream has been bouncing around my head ever since.”
“That was a witness,” he says quietly.
“Oh.” Ding dong. Of course. Someone who saw it and was alive to scream. “I looked but never found anything about it. In the paper.” She sits on the bench then stands up again. “So, I guess it was a suicide?”
“Yeah. An accident or a homicide would be a story. Suicide isn’t news since it happens every day. Plus no one wants to hear about them. Unless it’s a celebrity, of course.”
She nods. “I know, right? Why wouldn’t people be totally fascinated?” She smiles to show she’s kidding. Kurt looks into her eyes, as if searching for something. He is so hot, her cheeks warm. “Um, do you always stare at people like that?”
“Was I staring? Sorry,” he says, looking down, almost shyly.
A slight dizziness knocks her. She needs to get out of here. Which way?
Downhill.
“I was just heading out,” she says, slinging her pack over her shoulder.
“Mind if I walk with you? I’ll grab a taxi outside the main gate.” He actually seems sort of lonely.
“Fine.” She steers toward a wide lane through the grand, iron-colored mausoleums.
He scrambles to catch up. “I don’t want you to think I’m sketchy. I’m just happy to find a fellow American. A literary one.” She glances at him now. There’s that grin again.
Moving relaxes her a little. He keeps stride with her, his tall form strong, his movements graceful and confident. Brown leaves whirlpool before them.
“Have you been here long?” she asks, pulling her shoulders back and sucking in her stomach. Yay for being thinner.
“Just got here. How about you?”
“A couple of weeks now.”
“What are you doing here?”
“I’m a student.” She is not going to say she’s in her second senior year of high school.
“How’s your French?” he asks.
“It sucks,” she says. “Yours?”
“I have to speak it for business.”
“Oh, right, sales,” she says. She glances at him sideways.
He pulls out a package of fancy British cigarettes and offers her one.
“No thanks, I quit.”
“Are you sure?”
“What the hell. Might as well.” Just one. She sniffs the fresh, rich tobacco. He lights hers, then his.
“Ah, nicotine,” she says, exhaling. “What my life has been missing. Whoo—head rush.”
He laughs. She’s not sure she’s really that funny but she’s liking him better by the minute. They smoke and walk the last half block without talking.
“Here we are,” Kurt says. They’re under the huge stone arch at the main entrance, and a taxi idles at the stand on the street. He turns to her. His dark, soulful eyes say, You’re gorgeous, I want you.
Like a hen eyeing a june bug, she thinks. But sincere. And intoxicating.
Here he is. A made-to-order ten. New in town. Très sophisticated. A guy Mom would probably not only approve of, depending on his business, but lust after herself. Actually a strike against him.
Someone to hold hands or drink champagne with. Someone who could make life a little more meaningful.
“Thanks for keeping me company,” he says. “It’s been a pleasure…” He waits, a not-so-subtle hint that he doesn’t know her name.
“Summer. Summer Barnes.”
“Barnes.” He frowns in thought. “Of Little Rock. Any relation to the chicken Barnes?”
“Ha. No,” she lies, crossing her arms. She doesn’t want him to like her, or not like her because of—or even to have to discuss—her stupid family, the chicken Barnes. If she ever sees this guy again she can explain. She also doesn’t want him to kidnap her for ransom, if he isn’t already planning to. When she was six, her parents hired a firm that specialized in personal security. They trained her how to avoid kidnappers.
Rule number one: Never talk to strangers.
He opens the taxi door and before she can say good-bye, he slides in. Then he leans out to see her and says brightly, “I’m going to Place de la Concorde. Can I drop you anywhere on the way?”
“I’m in the sixteenth. Near Place Victor-Hugo,” she says. Considerably farther.
The taxi driver turns to look at her, too. Is she getting in or not?
“You can get the one at Place de la Concorde. Change at Étoile.”
“Yeah, I know.” No need to inform him that she and the Métro are having issues. She has to get back to Mom’s and do her work. This will be faster.
Like their old golden retriever, Polly, she follows him into the waiting car.
SIX
Inside the warm cab, they aren’t touching, but the heat of Kurt’s body and the slightly funky smell of him permeates Summer’s clothes and settles on her skin.
It’s already dusk, and car lights and neon signs burn bright in the gray dimness. Kurt chats about the differences between the French and Americans, as she studies his handsome profile and shiny, disheveled hair. She’s never been this physically close to someone so gorgeous. The warmth in her cheeks says she’s blushing.
Kurt gestures with his large but elegant, smooth, tanned hand, waving perfectly shaped fingers and nails. He displays those white teeth, and she imagines running her tongue over them.
Place de la Concorde is lit up like a rock concert and traffic zooms in giant pinwheels around the Luxor Obelisk. Kurt has no small euro bills, so she pays the taxi fare.
“Thanks. Sorry about that,” he says as they get out. “May I offer you a glass of champagne to show my appreciation? This hotel has an awesome bar. Quiet, soft lights…” He tilts his head in the direction of the très cher one at the end of the block.
“Champagne!” she exclaims. “What a great idea.” She’s giddy already. Long live the French who let you drink wine and beer at eighteen. And her flask is empty.
They walk past the Métro entrance. A bum wrapped in a dirty gray blanket sits on the sidewalk and she drops a euro coin into his paper cup. He nods at her, and then raises two fingers in a sort of salute at Kurt. “Beau chapeau,” the bum says.
Kurt nods in return. Nice hat? she wonders, looking at Kurt’s bare head.
“Do you know him?” she asks.
“We’re old pals. I’m staying nearby.”
He doesn’t strike her as kindhearted. He’s hot, not warm, she thinks. But who cares? Just as they are about to enter the brass revolving door, she feels his hand on the small of her back. Through her jacket, fleece, and T-shirt, an electric jolt of hard iciness spreads through her middle.
Fear jitters her nerve endings. It’s like when she and Katie were fourteen and convinced two townies they were college students. They realized they were in over their heads when the guys drove them to a scary apartment complex, and they bolted at the last minute.
No, it’s more than that. Something about his touch is both hot and freezing, terrifying and soothing. Violent and peaceful.
She plucks her France Telecom phone from her pocket and scans the screen as if there’s new information there. “Oh, shoot,” she says. “I—I’ve got to go home.”
He pouts. “Are you sure? Not even a quick coffee?”
“I can’t. Sorry.”
He thrusts a card into her hand. “Here. Since we’re both new in town, if you ever want to catch a movie or something, call me.”
She stuffs it into her coat. A nineteen-year-old with a business card. Kind of impressive. “Okay! See you.” Greatly relieved, guilty, and a little disappointed, she skids past the startled doorman and sprints for a taxi.
SEVEN
Monday, Summer sits alone at the end of a long table in the steamy school cafeteria, trying to appear coolly oblivious to the three sophomore guys at the other end whispering and shooting her furtive looks. Their clothes, their slang, their zits are the same as at any other American high school, except that there are more kids from more countries here, and apparently they come and go more frequently. It’s not even weird that she arrived in the middle of the semester.
All she has to do is get through this lunch, then this week of classes, then three more. And finals. She massages the bridge of her nose.
The important thing is to stay focused. Persevere.
Honestly, would a boyfriend help her do that? Or hurt? And where is she going to meet someone?