“Jean-Luc is a little strange,” Lara says. “But he’s actually really nice, once you get to know him.” That last part she says under her breath. I don’t know how much time she expects me to spend with him. I have an itinerary planned, after all, so I probably won’t say more than a few words to this “Jean-Luc” character.
“Also,” Lara goes on, “he’s half-American, so he speaks English really well. You’ll get along just fine. Here” — she writes something on a map of the Paris transit system, which she then hands to me — “this should help you get around.”
I take it and hope my face doesn’t show my disbelief that my own sister doesn’t know me well enough to know that I came here with three maps of the Metro.
“I’ve written Jean-Luc’s number at the top.”
I enter the number into my phone, realizing that I’ve “agreed” to crash with some half-American boy who is really nice but also strange. It’s not ideal, but I don’t see any other choice right now. “Fine,” I say, with a shrug. “I probably won’t see him much, anyway.”
Lara’s looking at me again — confused, like before, but also a little wary and concerned. “You’re really going to walk around Paris all by yourself?”
For a second, I have to look away, because Lara’s eyes narrow in the exact way that our dad’s used to whenever he was concerned about me. Whenever I would pretend to him I wasn’t upset about something. I look back at her, hoping my voice doesn’t rat me out by cracking.
“I am. I have to.”
Lara steps forward and pulls me into a big hug — only the second one she’s given me since I got here, nearly five minutes ago, which is way below her batting average. She pulls away from me, holding my hands and staring at me. There are tears in her eyes.
“Mayonnaise?” she asks me. When we were little, we both hated mayonnaise and would vow to eat a jar of it if we ever broke a promise. Even though we are both older, and both kind of like mayo now, it’s still our sisterly code for Trust me.
I nod, because I know if I try to speak, my voice will rat me out.
Henri clears his throat and says something in French. Lara responds in English: “I know, I know.” Then, to me: “We have to go soon if we’re going to make our train.”
I nod again and dare to speak: “I understand.” Another hug, and then I pick up my exactly-fifty-pound suitcase and haul it out of the apartment.
When I’m at the top of the stairs, Lara’s voice drifts toward me.
“Hey, sis, maybe you should let Henri carry that down for you.”
I’m halfway through insisting that I’ve got it, when my muscles give out, my hand cramps and I watch fifty pounds of luggage tumble down the flight of stairs.
~ CHAPTER TWO ~
JEAN-LUC
9H45
Why did I answer my phone?
I’ve been ignoring it for the last three weeks, ever since Martine decided that, rather than merely break up, she’d prefer to live in our breakup conversation forever, but today, I actually looked to see who was calling me, in case it wasn’t her, and now …
Now, Henri has roped me into babysitting Lara’s little sister, because I was the idiot who told him that Olivier would be driving to Lille on some emotional suicide mission to win back his lycée girlfriend. Which means there is a spare room at our dorm. Which means I am now taking down all my photographs and clearing out all my notes and equipment from my temporary studio, so this stranded American girl has somewhere to sleep tonight.
Well, I will give her the spare room and the spare key, but I cannot do more than that. I have a project to finish for when classes start up again in January — and three weeks ago, I had to start all over again, because I realized that my very giving ex-girlfriend had so distracted me, I was producing poorly framed, amateurish work. I hope that this American girl doesn’t expect me to play tour guide, because I really can’t handle that right now. I mean, of course, I’ll make sure I’m contactable in case she gets into some sort of trouble. But I can’t literally watch her all day.
I’m trying to arrange my photos in a neat pile without looking too closely at them. They only make me wince, especially the shots of rue Lamarck, in Montmartre, at dawn. For some reason, I got it into my head that what those shots needed was to be at a ninety-degree angle. I may have been going for something with that, but I’ll be damned if I can remember what it was. Usually, when I look at my photos, I know exactly what I was trying to achieve — even when I don’t really meet my own goals. But this time, I cannot remember anything except crouching down and turning the camera over in my hands, as if that was going to magically make things more interesting. It did not.
The corner of my sleeve brushes the pile and several photos cascade to the floor. I’m tempted to yell all the swear words I know in two languages as I pick them up again.
But I don’t do this. I take a deep breath and ask myself, is it really the prospect of a houseguest that has me in this mood? Am I sure it wasn’t the red badge? The red badge in the bottom-right corner of my cell phone screen that tells me I received a voice mail from PAUL THAYER at 6h05.
Paul Thayer is my father. He lives in New Jersey, so he was technically calling me a little after midnight, his time, but I would not be surprised if he was confused and somehow thought that Paris was six hours behind the East Coast. Either that, or he actually expected me to be up that early. If he knew anything about me, he’d know that I’ve never been a morning person.
I haven’t listened to the voice mail. I don’t even need to. I know it will be a variation on the voice mail I got from him last Christmas:
Son, I’m so sorry I can’t get to Paris this December like I usually do. (He says that like him visiting is an annual tradition, even though he’s skipped the last seven years.) But I can make it up to you. Julie and I would really love it if you could make it out to Jersey this summer. You know we’ll take great care of you, although I understand you might, uh … you know, have to stay in Paris for the summer.
The man has not visited me for seven Christmases and seven birthdays but expects me to travel to another continent by myself, to hang out with him and his second family? That we will have things to talk about, bond over? That I’ll suddenly connect with his twin sons, whom I haven’t seen since he brought them to Paris as screaming toddlers?
I walk out of Olivier’s room and into mine. I place my portfolio (the zombie of my project) on top of my laptop and try not to pay attention to how messy and cluttered my desk is. Try not to think — again — about how a photo of Montmartre is always going to be a photo of Montmartre, whether the camera has been turned ninety degrees or not. Try not to think any more about how I am producing uninspired work for this project. Try not to dread how Monsieur Deschamps, my advisor, is going to give me another one of his lectures. A portfolio of simple shots of Paris, he will say, does not meet the assignment’s objective of “telling a story from the city.”
“Where are the people?” he asked me on Wednesday, when I popped into his office for an end-of-term consultation. I told him, the people were there — surely, every piece of art contains pieces of the artist?
He told me to “stop being such a pretentious young fool. Connect with your subject. Remember, you’re trying to capture a city. A city’s heart is not just its streets, its sights — it is in its people.”
I chose not to inform him that, having recently broken up with my girlfriend and said goodbye to my dormmates — who all went home for Christmas — I am somewhat short on people right now. And photographing people has never been one of my strengths. Some of my classmates seem to just know the right moment to capture a smile. A pensive look or a flash of wonder. But that involves spending time with the subject, keeping them loose, engaged. And then getting them to stand still long enough for you to get a good shot.
Convincing people to stand still has never come naturally to
me. And now, four days before Christmas, I have the whole dorm to myself, so there’s no one in here for me to even ask to stand still. Well, there’s this American girl who’s due any minute now, but I can hardly ask her, can I? Henri said she had a list of things she really wanted to do while she was here. I might be able to venture outside and get some shots of strangers instead. Though I’ve barely been able to see more than a dozen meters out my window, because of a thick fog that does not seem to want to lift.
Reception buzzes me, and I go downstairs to the lobby. As stressed and irritated as I am, I still can’t stop my brain from noting all the details, in case there’s something new to capture. The lobby is kind of drab, with an ancient, artificial Christmas tree in one corner looking like a smudge of moss against the dull brick walls — a weak effort to give the place some “seasonal cheer.” A Latina girl is standing by the front desk, where Thierry the concierge is not even pretending to look up from his copy of L’Équipe. In front of her is a bulging suitcase, with a tote bag on top — a traveler with a lot to do while she’s here. She’s about the same height as me. Her long, slightly frizzy black hair is tied back, and she’s not wearing makeup. She has a knee-length, black down parka over dark blue jeans and a purple sweater. Black boots. It’s only as I look at her that I realize I was not expecting this inconvenient guest to look both very American and naturally stylish. I raise a hand to signal that I’m the guy she’s looking for, and she starts to say something that might be French.
Then again, it could also be Swahili.
“It’s okay,” I tell her. “I speak English. You are Serena?”
“That’s right.”
“I am Jean-Luc.” I reach out to shake her hand, but when she takes mine, she leans forward, turning her face away, offering her cheek. I don’t expect this from an American girl, so I do nothing — I stand still, holding her hand, until she turns her face to look at me, extracting her hand from mine as if we didn’t just have an awkward non-kiss.
Through a weary smile, she thanks me for taking her in.
“It’s okay,” I say again. “You must be kind of tired. Henri said you were on an overnight flight and arrived less than an hour ago.”
“Yep, that’s me. Direct from New York.”
“Let me carry your luggage.” I gesture that she should go upstairs.
“Thank you.” She hooks her tote bag over one shoulder, then walks past me.
Once Serena is halfway up the stairs, Thierry looks up from his newspaper. Gives me a suspicious look. In French, I tell him: “She’s my friend from America.”
I bend down to pick up Serena’s suitcase and almost dislocate my shoulder.
The thing feels like it weighs twenty kilos!
*
Serena is in the living room sitting on the chaise longue, her head leaning back. She’s certainly made herself at home.
“I really hope I’m not putting you out,” she tells me. Like most Americans I’ve encountered in Paris, her voice is so loud — like she is yelling at someone, except she is not. It seems to rattle the walls of my dorm.
“It is no problem,” I tell her, dragging the suitcase to the spare room. I keep my body and head turned from her as I wipe the sweat from my brow. “This is where you can sleep. I imagine you will want to rest after your flight, non?”
She sits straight up, like a vampire in an old-time Hollywood movie. Swings her legs off the chaise longue. “Can’t. I have a plan! Besides, I made sure to research the best travel pillows, so I slept a little during the flight. And even if I didn’t, I’d still have to get going, because I’m already running behind. I’ve got so much to see. The Louvre, the Seine, the Eiffel Tower. I need to get started!”
I wonder if she has decided to fight jet lag with coffee. Lots of coffee. So that she can stomp around the most popular sights of Paris. The ones everybody ticks off, like the city is a to-do list.
But then a thought strikes me.
All these places are the most crowded … where better to find people for my project?
“Well, if you’re sure you don’t need to rest …” I lean down to gather up my camera, which I’ve been leaving on the coffee table now that Olivier isn’t here to complain about “clutter.” I hook the camera over my neck, letting it hang over my chest. “I have a little bit of work to do on my photography project” — that’s an understatement! — “but I guess I could show you around Paris for a little while.”
Serena is digging into the tote bag at her feet. “Oh, you don’t have to do that. I have four maps, an almost fully charged phone and three guidebooks. I’ll be fine.”
She does have all these things. She shows them to me.
“You will not experience the soul of the city from just this book,” I tell her. “You must not go only to museums and tourist sights. You must take the Metro, walk the streets, look at the architecture, listen to the sounds of the city. You must let it speak to you. Then, you will feel like you have really been here. If you let me, I can take you to many great places that the writers of this book never even heard of. Real Paris.” I may not have captured it on film — yet. But I know it is there.
“Oh, I’m not here for ‘real’ Paris,” she tells me, picking up one of the guidebooks.
“I do not understand.”
She hesitates, but then her eyes soften and she speaks. “The thing is … I’m here for my parents. They came to Paris on their honeymoon, almost twenty-five years ago. Both of them always said it was the best, most magical trip they ever took together. And, for the last two years, my mom always gets very sad around Christmas and New Year, because she’s reminded of … who’s not here. I thought, if I could tour the city, see all the sights they did, put together a scrapbook for her to keep, it will remind her of happier times. Maybe she won’t be as sad this time of year …”
Her voice catches, and she looks back down to the guidebook. Flicks through it, front to back, then back to front. I can tell she’s not actually reading anything, just keeping herself occupied and letting the moment pass. I can see her struggling to keep emotions off her face.
The camera at my chest suddenly feels heavy. I reach for it and take her photo.
Her head snaps up, and she’s scowling. In fairness, I might have earned the scowl — that was a really private moment I just stole from her. But the photo does look great.
“Pardon.” I look at the floor and try to will away the blood that rises into my cheeks. “I am studying photography. It is an ’abit.”
Yes, I am making myself sound just a little bit more French to give myself more chance of being forgiven.
“That’s okay,” she says. I am about to ask her if she studies — and, if so, what — but she is pulling a smart faux leather cross-body bag out of the tote bag and stuffing her guidebooks and itinerary and maps into it. “I should get started. Is there a spare key I can borrow?”
This is a most curious turn of events — a few minutes ago, I was looking forward to shaking off this American girl, but now, as she’s getting ready to leave, I want to follow her. She’s my best hope of getting good shots for my project. It could even be ironic — pretentious crowd shots where the sea of humanity obscures one’s view of the world’s greatest city.
Actually, that’s not a bad idea.
“Surely,” I say, “you would prefer someone who knows the city to go with you? What if you get lost?”
“I’m an expert at Google Maps.” But then she pauses, sighs, looks at me. Not withering or offended this time — more curious. “I guess if you want to tag along for a while, that’d be okay.”
For some reason, when she says “tag along,” I feel a bit embarrassed.
“But I warn you,” she continues, “I have a lot of places to get to and not a lot of time to get to them, so I think I’m probably going to be moving too fast for you to take any good photos of stuff.”
“What is first?” I ask.
“The Louvre,” she says, crossing the room to where I left her suitcase. She sets it down and unzips it. Removes a pair of bright orange sneakers that change my opinion of her sense of style. “And we need to get going, because the whole mix-up with Lara has cost me too much time.”
She changes out of her boots into the hideous sneakers, then scoops up her cross-body bag and is out the door before I can even mentally list what lenses I should bring with me. I hear her voice over her footsteps as she heads back downstairs. I swear, I can hear her from the lobby!
“You coming or what?”
I can tell that this American girl, with the orange feet, is not going to slow down. And even though it feels wrong to venture out into the world with only a single lens on my camera — looking at the world with just one pair of eyes, mon dieu! — here I am running out the door after her, strangely eager to spend a day seeing a tourist’s Paris.
Just how badly do I not want to be alone today?
~ CHAPTER THREE ~
SERENA
10:25 a.m.
“Hey,” I call back to Jean-Luc, as I march along a bridge called Pont du Carrousel, on our way to the Louvre. “Why don’t I just meet you back at the dorm?”
It shouldn’t have taken us this long to get here, but ever since we got off the Metro at Palais Royal, we’ve been stalled by his constant need to fall back and take photos of whatever catches his eye. I know he’s got a project to finish, but it’s not like I’m ever going to see it, so I don’t need to stand next to him while he takes shots of streetlamps or people lined up for a bus. I’ve got places to be! I appreciate that he’s come this far, but it really does seem like it would be easier for both of us if we just went our separate ways right now. I guess he doesn’t agree, though, because here he comes, expensive camera around his neck, mumbling an apology as he jogs to catch up as we come off the bridge, walking along Place du Carrousel toward the courtyard.
Kiss Me in Paris Page 2