I retraced my steps within minutes and found the triangular-shaped enclave located just beyond the river’s edge. It was lined with tall skinny buildings with shutters that looked in danger of falling off. The six-storey hotel at the center was the worst-looking one on the square. The plaque on the outside wall said that the rickety old building once housed the printing press belonging to Henri IV, former king of France, meaning it was more than three hundred years old. And it looked it. The outside plaster was falling off in chunks, and inside the floors were raised and crooked, a veritable house of cards. The lobby was so dark it took a while for my eyes to be able to take in the full scope of the hotel’s seediness. The chairs were worn-out, and the wallpaper was peeling. And yet I was seized by a feeling of nostalgia. The Hôtel Henri IV was precisely the kind of place I would have relished if I had discovered it just a few years earlier, during my naive student days. It reeked of Old World authenticity. Dingy. Dilapidated. With communal toilets. And a historic pedigree, to boot. I walked up four flights with the surly hotel owner, stubbornly fixated on the romance of the place. I saw that the upstairs rooms were bright and airy, despite being frayed around the edges. In that moment, feeling out of synch both with myself and Paris, I believed it was exactly what I had been looking for. I hastily booked a double room, putting down a deposit. I convinced myself that Stefano would like it, as well. It seemed custom-made to the pursuit of a lost dream.
My immediate task accomplished, I had nothing else to do. The Paris night stretched before me, taunting me with boredom. I needed to keep moving, to keep from feeling depressed, but the cold was getting to me again. I needed a distraction, and I spied it in La Samaritaine, Paris’s largest department store, situated on the opposite side of the Seine. A mixture of art deco and art nouveau architectural styles, it was a large boxy building of several floors, constructed from large expanses of glass held together by a corseting of steel rods. Its domed roof twinkled in the encroaching darkness, beckoning me back across the river and onto the Rue de la Monnaie, the street of money. I entered through a revolving door and found myself in the cosmetics department. Color. Light. Scent. It was as if I had immediately arrived at a carnival. Every bottle, every iridescent jar boasting some magical elixir, called to me. I felt myself calming down a bit, my inner self cajoled into thinking I was in safe territory, a familiar place, having in Toronto become something of a cosmetics junkie. But my composure cracked at the Orlane counter when I looked in the mirror and saw my own eyes looking back at me with sadness, as if part of me knew that in Paris I was courting a masquerade.
“Bonjour Madame.”
“Er, bonjour.”
“Cherchez-vous quelque chose en particulier? Puis-je vous aider?”
I felt flustered. I had been alone with my thoughts, not thinking in French. What was the word for just looking?
“Um, je…je…ne cherche rien. Je veux juste regarder.”
I sounded like an imbecile. In the mirror I could see that I had started to blush. Parisian saleswomen are an intimidating lot. I suddenly felt awfully hot inside my winter coat.
“You have a very dehydrated peau,” pronounced my red-haired interlocutor, sliding into a slippery grasp of English. She had reached over to stroke my face with one of her manicured nails. A frown creased her perfectly plucked eyebrows as she intently studied my face. She smelled like gardenias. I was overcome by her scent when she gently put her hand under my chin and pulled me expertly forward, catching me unawares in her snare. At the cosmetics counter in Paris I had met a Siren.
“The pores, they are big, and the épiderme is, how would you say? Scaly.”
I jumped a little in that skin she was now describing as if it were a snake’s.
“S’il vous plaît, to sit down.”
She motioned to a tall white chair that was beside an enormous palette of lipstick shades displayed as greasy dots of eye-popping color. There were also small pots of red and pink blush, as well as a deployment of sharply pointed eyeliner pencils in black, brown, gray, turquoise, emerald, and sapphire blue. I was transfixed as if by a rainbow. I wondered if she would use these pigments on me, turn me into one of the peacocks that decorated an overhead mural.
She caught me looking at her tray of goodies.
“First we need to disencrust ze surface.” I knew what she meant, but this direct translation from the French made me feel that my face was a crater moon, full of volcanic ash. If I had been feeling bad that day, I suddenly felt worse. But she already had me bibbed, with a clip in my hair to hold back my unruly bangs. I couldn’t flee. She stood behind me and lowered my head backwards. I closed my eyes as she began massaging me with oil that she hurriedly wiped off with a tissue. That she followed with a cream that felt as if it had particles of sand in it. The exfoliant. “Please to relax,” she intoned. Her voice was low and seductive. “With this crème,” she continued, “I will protège your juvenility.” How had she known? I would buy anything now, as long as she made me feel eternally youthful. I thought to myself how good it was that she had found me.
Her hands moved rapidly, expertly, back and forth, like windshield wipers. She towelled me dry and straightened me in her chair. Again her brow furrowed. She reached for her instruments of the trade, the trowels used for foundation, the slanted blonde-hair brushes used for the brow bone, the small dainty ones used to line the lips.
“Can you make my eyes look like yours?” I asked. Hers were drawn wide with liner that lifted to cat’s tails at the corners. Very Anouk Aimée.
As she powdered and sponged me, I felt swept away, into a fantasy of transformation. A parisienne at long last. It crossed my mind that she would expect me to pay for this boudoir of beauty. She kept on telling me that I looked radiant now, radieuse. But I didn’t need it. Or did I? Well, if it was just a small jar. Maybe there was a gift with purchase. That would make it feel like a bargain. Two for one. Oh, but I should just relax. It was just money. After I had spent it, I would never even remember that I had had it.
But it was quite a lot of money, in the end. My seductive saleslady had written down a number that looked like 2,500 French francs. It glared menacingly at me from a piece of paper that I was to take to the nearby cash register. In Paris department stores you never get the goods in hand before you pay. I thought it was an error, or that the soft and flattering beauty-counter lighting was playing tricks on my eyes. But no. That was the price. I did some rudimentary arithmetic, furtively moving my fingers as I counted. Math had never been my strong suit. Holy smokes! Even if I was off a bit, 2,500 francs ended up being almost $400! A sum far greater than any of the fancy hotel rooms I had been eyeing earlier that day.
My saleslady eyed me expectantly. She said that everything was absolument necessaire —the firming neck gel, the eye sculptor—“to reduce madame’s puffiness”—the hydrating day cream, and, la pièce de résistance, the absolute skin-recovery serum. It looked disconcertingly like semen. “I think it is not what I need,” I stammered.
“Madame?”
My lady of the gardenias was no longer smiling. In Paris, one doesn’t need, one takes what one wants. That is what her impatience said to me. She turned to a second guardian of French beauty, also in an immaculate white coat, standing next to her behind the counter. I believed they were talking about me now, I was sure of it, in agitated French. They both rolled their eyes. The colleague walked away. My lady looked at me, forcing a frown. “Ne l’aimez-vous pas?” she frowned, thrusting a handheld mirror into my face.
She had fallen back into French, as if showing me who was who. “Do you not like it all?” I looked. I wasn’t as ashen as when I had first walked in. I took the paper she was holding and walked toward the cash register. I thought that maybe I should duck into the hosiery department, get lost among the fishnets. I wouldn’t need to return to La Samaritaine any time soon. I could make a run for it. But when I turned back to see if she was watching me, she was, and she waved, holding in her other hand a beribboned pa
ckage loaded with my new French necessities. When I returned with the stamped receipt, she wished me, tra-la-la-la-la, a very nice bonne soirée. She had turned her attentions to another woman eyeing herself critically in the mirror. She had freed me to wander off again, on my own. I headed back out on to the street, clutching my purchases, and walked the distance to Tova’s apartment, my face as shiny as the cold and distant moon.
ON FRIDAY MORNING I had packed my bags again, moving from Tova’s apartment and into the Henri IV. The cold hadn’t abated. If anything, it had gotten worse. I had spent most of the day before sitting in cafés, eating cake, waiting for nightfall, when it would be time to sleep again. The waiting was soon to be over. Stefano’s train was due to arrive just after one o’clock in the afternoon. It was noon. There wasn’t time to walk to Gare de Lyon. I hopped on the metro and arrived almost half an hour early, my heart heavy with fear and expectation. The station was on that day littered with heroin addicts, alcoholics, and other sorry specimens of human weakness, some twisted by deformities, others slumped, heavy with hopelessness, against the walls. Cardboard signs told mini tales of human tragedy. “Je suis un père qui ne peut pas nourrir ses enfants. Si vous aimez Dieu, svp, aidez-moi.” I am a father who cannot feed my children, please, if you love God, help me. The arrivals board whirred rapidly above my head, white letters against a black background announcing the trains about to slide into the station from various destinations. The words filled me with wanderlust: Geneva, Marseilles, Milan, Rome. My gut twisted and turned when I saw the announcement for Zurich. Platform number four. I started to run. What if I couldn’t find Stefano in the mess of voyagers disgorging from the train? I pushed past the backpackers and the businessmen with their briefcases. I took several stairs at a time. I wondered, when I saw him, would I feel that stab of recognition that people in love always say happens when faced with the one? But when the crowd on the platform parted and I saw him standing there, looking bewildered, not knowing which way to turn for the exit, I knew in an instant that I had made a mistake.
He was no longer tan, no longer glowing like an Adonis. He had long ago left sunny Italy to move back to boring old Switzerland and was now a working stiff like me. A selfless job—caring for elderly, mentally challenged patients, spoon-feeding them, giving them sponge baths. Maybe it was penance for having led the sensual life? He had never felt comfortable about selling his body, and now he was making up for it by tending to the bodies of others. He was not highly remunerated, I could see. How good he was. I understood, but also didn’t want to. I was all go-girl attitude. I wanted to be busy, happening, on the move. I coldly analyzed the situation. I noticed the frayed collar of his salt-and-pepper tweed coat. The high-pitched, nervous laugh. Girly. I had forgotten. We kissed. Nothing.
His hand was clammy, clutching mine. He lit a cigarette, and then said something in German before correcting himself. He said he didn’t have an opportunity to speak much English anymore. “I am forgetting my words. But you will teach me, no?”
I walked quietly beside him, out of the station. I did not know what to say and was painfully aware that I spoke a foreign language. I was conscious of every clunky syllable, every flat vowel. On the metro we looked at each other and smiled. Shyly. He had come to me out of a belief that I was worth waiting for. I had come to him wanting to revive a more innocent past. We were both deluded. Both, I thought, noticing the faraway look in his eyes, disappointed. Inspired by my recent visit to La Samaritaine, I was wearing too much makeup. I felt him quietly scrutinizing the eyeliner, the thick layer of foundation. He had noticed that I was different. I babbled on, trying to fill the silence between us with words, fluttering gestures, anything. He listened, but I didn’t think he could follow me.
We disembarked at the Pont Neuf metro station, and I led him onwards toward the Place Dauphine and the beaten-up hotel that I thought still might unite us, somehow, in a shared feeling of nostalgia. He liked relics. He drew them in his letters. And that’s what our love affair was, a thing from the past honored on this trip to Paris. But the hotel’s threadbare accommodations shocked him. He went to sit on a rickety chair, but it broke. “You can’t be serious?” he said, confronting my folly with his clearly enunciated but heartbreaking words. He said he wanted to wash his hands, but the room didn’t have hot water. “I am Swiss,” he said. “We are not used to such things.” I remembered that I had always known we were different. We didn’t even like the same music. I wondered if he would say it. That I was crazy. But he was too polite.
“I am sorry,” I said. “Shall we change hotels?” I really wanted to say, “Shall I leave?” He had come all this way to see me. I could go back to Tova’s. I had an out. But then I thought it was better to stay until he left again for Zurich in two days’ time. It would have been cruel to do otherwise.
We stood awkwardly facing each other. Our winter coats were still on. I thought that maybe we should have sex. To see if that might reignite something. So I initiated. He was repelled. I had pulled down his fly and was on my knees. He cupped his crotch. Yes. I felt very foolish now. I was playing so many roles that I had lost sight of myself.
We lay quietly beside each other on one of the beds, fully clothed. It creaked. I felt the coils pressing into my flesh. He lit another cigarette. The hours passed. He fell asleep. I think I did, too. I opened my eyes and saw that the room had grown darker and that Stefano was in a corner of the room, watching me. I asked him if he was hungry. Yes, he said dolefully. I followed him down the stairs and out into the night.
I had seen his worn wallet, torn at the seams. I wouldn’t let him convince me to have couscous in the Latin Quarter. The occasion called for something more exciting. More expensive. My treat.
I took Stefano’s hand, and we walked a short distance until I saw a short solid man methodically sweeping the sidewalk outside a fruit-and-vegetable store. I assumed the marché was his. Under a red awning were oranges and coconuts and lemons, tropical delicacies that stood out in vivid contrast to the wintry pallor of the surrounding street. The produce was piled high in a pyramid, making me think how patient and proud the store owner must be. How conscientious. I had a hunch that he would know a restaurant where we could go, an insider place, not a tourist trap, perhaps a place that he sold his delicious-looking fruit to, an establishment of quality? I asked him in French to give us a suggestion. He kept his head bowed for a moment, fixated on a piece of ice that refused to be uprooted from the sidewalk in front of him. I was growing desperate. I needed levity. My life depended on a fun night out.
The man looked up at me then. He looked at Stefano, glum and chain-smoking. He quietly sized us up. Thinking. And then, after about a minute, he said, “Bon!” He had it. A really good place. We wouldn’t be sorry. He wrote the address down on the back of Stefano’s book of matches.
We climbed into a taxi and were off. “Paris by night!” I said. I was trying to make the best of it. I told myself I was on a Paris adventure. Going where fate would guide me. No wrong turns, as long as you have an open mind. I told myself to enjoy the mystery ride. I whispered into Stefano’s ear, as if we were lovers.
I was confused when the taxi stopped. The Rue Mazarine looked deserted. No people. No crowds. There was no indication that we had arrived in the vicinity of an “in” spot. Before us was a restaurant set back a bit from the street, partially hidden behind a series of small evergreens in painted plant boxes. The address was written large on a brass plate. It was definitely where we were supposed to be. Perhaps it was closed. I noticed a braided silk rope. I thought that if I pulled on it, someone might come. I pulled. A small metal grill on the door lifted from the inside. A pair of dark eyes. First on me, then on Stefano. I was asked what I wanted. “Pour manger,” I replied. The grill slammed shut—odd. Then I heard the unlocking of latches, and the door opened, slowly.
A black man in a tuxedo appeared. Very tall, very beautiful. The white of his collar highlighted the ebony lustre of his skin. He made a small bo
w, inviting us to enter. The room had rounded ceilings, like a cave. There were a few patrons. People nodded in our direction. Okay. Cool.
A short middle-aged woman wore a patch over an eye and walked with a rhinestone-encrusted cane. “Monsieur. Madame,” she said, bending her head of pink hair in our direction. She ushered us across the floor of the restaurant to a small round table covered in white linen. It was raised on a small platform—we were on display. I could go with that. I fluffed my hair and licked my lips. That was more like it, I thought, back at center stage. I told Stefano I was ravenous, simply ravenous. I perused the heavy leather menu. Excellent wine list, I said, wanting Stefano to know how cosmopolitan I was. Stefano ordered the spaghetti bolognese, the least-expensive item on the menu. He didn’t know yet that I was paying. “Champagne?” I said. I wanted to be extravagant, to put the Henri IV behind me.
He giggled. Okay. Two glasses. Then two more. Finally we were talking; the fiasco had been averted.
It was close to midnight now, and the restaurant had filled with people. The black man working behind the bar was busily trying to keep up with the crush of orders. The evening had turned velvet. A trio of jazz musicians played “It Never Entered My Mind.” Glasses clinked. Voices rose and fell on the cadences of animated conversation. I needed to use the ladies’. I wobbled a bit on my feet when I stood up, but then sashayed in time to the music to the back of the restaurant—and that’s when I noticed. There were men in dresses, women in ties. Women with women. Lots of women. The bartender? Looked again. Not a he. A she. I went into the washroom and splashed cold water on my face.
“Stefano!” I leaned in to him across the table after I had returned, gingerly, to my seat. “Look around you.” I was whispering, but probably too loudly. I gestured with my hands, making a whirling motion. I was trying to tell him that it was all mixed up. Things weren’t as they seemed. He looked at me, confused. “Dyke bar,” I said. “We’re in a bloody dyke bar.” I hoped I didn’t have to translate that. But he seemed finally to understand me. He looked around the room, turning flamboyantly in his chair to make sure everyone knew he was checking them out. The patrons smiled. He smiled back.
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