The least I can do is look attractive in class, try to recapture some of that electricity I sported over the weekend. How could I fall under the Reaganite’s spell?
• • •
On Monday, everyone smiles at the two of us in class. Our one-night stand has become the big news this last week of the program. Hal ignores me completely because I am a whore. As the days tick by, I lose hope of an eleventh-hour declaration of love. Why would he make one? I can’t start baking him cookies after what we did.
When the program ends, I have to tape down my fingers to avoid writing a sappy letter to him. After all, no good comes from pining over men like Hal. Luckily, the beauty of Paris always outweighs the fleeting ecstasy of romance. No person can ruin the happiness I’ve found in this magical place.
• • •
I instantly forget my sad fling when Pan Am flight 103 explodes over Lockerbie, Scotland. This is the first time I’m alert to the fact that there are real crazy people who blow up planes. Some of the passengers are students going home after studying abroad. This sobering knowledge puts a damper on the holidays . . . until my mother and Don arrive to whisk me off to Sicily.
• • •
Traveling with family can be a special kind of heaven and hell. My mom and stepfather, Bonnie and Don, are both the best and the worst travel companions. They adore fine dining, seeing the sights, soaking up every fun aspect of a landmark. You just have to listen to them fight like cats and dogs while en route.
“Don, watch the road,” Bonnie says, grasping the handle above the window. Her jaw is clenched. Like me, she must be carsick. Don drives competitively, which means jerkily. No one is safe on the road. If you pass him, he will speed up, race you, and then pass, sometimes flipping the bird. As he does this, he might also sideswipe you.
“Would you calm down?” he barks.
“Don, you’re not staying in your lane. We’re going to drive off the mountain.”
And die, is what I’m thinking.
This is when I use my Walkman to escape. How did these two ever get married? I’m not sure. All I remember is that in 1978, my mother introduced me to this portly man with wild eyes and scary eyebrows. “This is Don.” He flashed me a rare impish smile, and his eyes twinkled, like I was this cute little butterball. I sort of liked him and resented him at the same time.
Within hours of knowing him, seeing how they interacted, I wondered how they survived each other, except for the fact that they are both passionate historians—and workaholics. All day long, books, discussing books, writing about dead people.
Over the course of a week in Sicily, we arrive at our various destinations in one piece: Palermo, Syracuse, Agrigento, Taormina. A bird shits on my shoulder on my first day in Palermo, but I see it as good fortune. And plus, these could be exotic Mafia birds. With all my Godfather reading, I expect to be greeted by the mob in every restaurant. My machine-gun sound effect makes my mother laugh, which makes me laugh.
We suck down plates and plates of pasta and sip sweet vermouth martinis while sitting on a veranda and looking out at the sea. After driving for a few hours, we take afternoon naps. There’s nothing like sleeping next to your mom. Our siestas are some of the best Zs I’ve ever caught. The only downside to this is that I accidentally see my stepfather naked as he’s walking out of the bathroom.
Eventually, I return to Paris and prepare for a second semester with the Wallaces and a whole new batch of students. Eric excitedly tells us we’re going to spend the semester seeing classic French films. Poor us!
Ever since Jean de Florette (1986), I keep wanting to run into Gérard Depardieu, a.k.a. Mr. French Actor. This turns out to be unnecessary since he is everywhere, like McDonald’s. A film comes out at the end of my first semester in France and we all run to see it at least once. Gerard plays Auguste Rodin (of course he does) in Camille Claudel. Isabelle Adjani plays the tragic Camille.
The story goes like this: Camille is this genius sculptress—and so beautiful you can barely look at her. The saving grace is that she’s covered in clay . . . but this only makes her sexier to Rodin, her new mentor. Because he’s so famous and she’s so pretty and they’re sculpting geniuses, they fornicate amid these naked clay figurines. The problem is Rodin won’t leave his longtime mistress—whom he eventually marries after decades. Once he stops calling on Camille, she goes crazy, stays in her room, takes in stray cats, and talks to herself (but always looks red-carpet ready). What comes of this mania? Moving, achingly emotional sculptures of women reaching out, the blind innocence of children, love found at last in a waltz. Camille’s brother commits her to an asylum, where she stays for thirty years.
Poor Camille may have hit a dead end, but she still produced great art. Coincidentally, much of her work is featured in the Musée Rodin. I run to see it, wondering what it must have been like to witness these two—so doomed in love but creating these provocative pieces. For hours, I pine over the statues, think about what Rodin and his protégés must have endured to bring this brilliance to us.
How will I ever be the same?
So the moral of the story is that tortured love isn’t all bad, as long as you have a hobby. My time with Craig wasn’t a total waste since it brought me here. Hal was a learning experience, too. And this American-in-Paris lifestyle suits me. I don’t even try to be the little French girl I once was. I am inquisitive, I am social, and, more important, I am all over the Paris bar scene. It’s part of my new living-out-loud routine. If every great artist in France did it, so can I. This is romance, for sure, with its mixture of tragedy and exultation.
I begin my nights in the Palais Royal area, right off the rue de Rivoli, in a tiny Irish pub called the Flann O’Brien. I go there most nights to be with other Americans not specifically in my program. It’s just refreshing to hear English after a day of French immersion. The bartender is true Irish and serves me Guinness, which I love. By the time I have a good buzz, my program-mates and I stagger across the Pont Neuf and into the Latin Quarter, where we hit up the overpriced, touristy Pub Saint-Germain. The many floors are filled with international clientele. On one floor, you may meet Swedes, another a pack from Italy. The waiters are all French.
My first time there, I’m with David, a boy who took me to my first formal dance at Taft, the one I hid from in the stairwell. David was in love with me, wrote me these beautiful poems in French, and I treated him like merde. Since I’m mature and in college and in Paris, I feel compelled to make amends with David. Now living in England, he comes to visit. When I meet him at his metro stop, we run into each other’s arms. I’d forgotten how tall he was. He has a cute face, not conventionally attractive, but more like I’ve-been-beaten-up-a-few-times handsome.
We go to Pub Saint-Germain, to the top floor, which is empty. There we share our stories. I unload about the drunk I dated in college. He tells me about his father, who just died. It’s all about the angst, isn’t it? It brings people together in such a miserable way, like Camille and Rodin. Throughout our storytelling, I notice the speed with which David downs his pints of beer. It begins to worry me, as in I’ve been here before. For the first three hours, I give him a pass, figure he’s mourning his father. But it’s soon obvious that he could black out at any moment.
I’m traumatized and keep looking for an exit. Can I just ditch him the way I did at the dance? Glancing up, I notice the waiter making eyes at me. He can see I’m in a problematic situation, winks at me. I’ve seen him before, with those French blue eyes, the kind that have magic powers. Now, how do I get rid of David?
By two in the morning, with no chance of doing anything except walking home—especially since I’ve spent all my money—I leave David at the table. I can’t even worry about how he’s going to get home.
“Sorry, I have to go.”
“Where you going?” he asks, smiling widely, as if nothing’s wrong.
“I need to leave.�
�
Carrying my coat and purse, I make a quick Cinderella escape and literally bump into my waiter.
“Leaving so soon?” he asks in this adorable French accent.
“My friend is too drunk,” I answer in French.
“Too bad.” He smiles, then does the unthinkable: pulls me around the corner and kisses me. It’s such a French moment—spontaneous, absurd, romantic. “When are you coming back?”
“I don’t know.”
“I call you.”
“Sure.” I scramble for a piece of paper, write my name and number on it.
“Ah, Patience.” He grins. I often get this reaction to my name. “I’m Denis.”
He kisses me again and takes my phone number. “Tomorrow, I call you.”
“Okay!”
What fiendish luck! Though saddled with drunken David, Denis the Waiter saves my night. Waiters in France are not like waiters in America. Many of them are career waiters, in that they are well schooled in service and manners. They’re not doing this so that they can go to auditions during the day. I’m sure some are planning a different vocation—but every time I go to Paris, I’m amazed by how waiting tables is an art. And here I’ve encountered one waiter who kissed me.
I wait an entire twenty-four hours for Denis to call. Seriously, watch the phone, don’t take a shower, don’t leave the apartment. The question is whether I should pull a Fatal Attraction and go back to Pub Saint-Germain. Of course I will. Camille Claudel was a crazy stalker—and an artistic genius. I will do as she did!
I enlist my friend Fiona in my mission to date a French waiter. She understands my crush since she has a French boyfriend of her own. She’s eager to go along with me—the first time. But Denis isn’t even there. I look everywhere for him. Did he quit? Oh God, how could this happen to me, just when my love life was starting to blossom (sort of)?
My insanity flourishes, along with my love for cheap red wine. I go night after night to Pub Saint-Germain, am a relentless French waiter pursuer. If I have a friend visiting, a buddy from my program who has nothing to do, we go to Pub Saint-Germain. Meanwhile, I’m hemorrhaging money that my parents don’t have, withdrawing more dough for this overpriced tourist-ridden pub that is not in the least bit French. Love is expensive.
Just as I give up, Denis shows up. It’s divine intervention, showing me that hope is alive. My heart palpitates. Did he think of me, the love we shared in those thirty seconds when he kissed me?
His face brightens when he sees me, and he winks. Those French and their winking! It says to me that I’m going to have a French boyfriend, like my friend Fiona. She gets to experience the ecstasy of French desire and lust—just like in the movies! Denis is an obsession in my blood, my Rodin.
When I see a lull, I go up to him. “Bonsoir.”
We kiss on both cheeks, as if we’re old friends. “Where’ve you been?” I ask.
“I went skiing,” he says in French, then rattles off his itinerary. As I swim in those ocean-blue eyes of his, I know this is just an intense and passing fancy. I have no more chance of dating this Denis than this pub has of being French. Why would he kiss me and then ask for my number?
Because it was polite. Because he saw me in the hellish David situation. It was a nice thing to do. And now I’m back feeding more money into the pub, into his livelihood.
I’ve been played.
I go home at three in the morning, dejected. How could I come to France and not find a nice French guy? Well, it isn’t my original goal, which involved getting away, feeling better, getting a life beyond pining over a boy.
So I spend the rest of the semester doing just that. A few places that capture my heart: Versailles, home of Louis XIV, who had the most rock-star hair ever. As a kid, I bonded with this Louis’s audacious stance in paintings, showing off his legs and crazy hair. His palace is beyond luxurious with the pools, the statues, never mind the room full of mirrors—a narcissist’s dream come true. After this, Giverny, the home of Monet, bewitches me. It’s like living in a crisper version of one of his paintings, a riot of flowers everywhere you walk. I am speechless, never having seen this kind of utopia. Wandering around, I snap pictures that don’t quite do the place justice. At one point, I see the Wallaces walking arm in arm, obviously in love, obviously enjoying every minute with each other, and I take a picture. This is how I want my love story to be.
The last few months, I continue touring France, guzzle more panachés, smoke Gauloises, eat as many pastries as possible. I stare at the fashion shows right in front of me—more dotted panty hose, short skirts, red lipstick—the graceful gaits, the French charm that renders most dullards breathless.
I fall in love with Paris but never find my French Louis—just the charming waiters. I figure that my true love is the city itself, which makes my heart feel full again. Well, there is this other waiter, Jean-Baptiste, also from Pub Saint-Germain, but he also wants me to hemorrhage money on tips for him, which I do for a couple weeks. Then he sleeps with my friend.
I leave France happy, poor in finances but rich in spirit.
CHAPTER FOUR
Harrison Ford Isn’t Coming to Cleveland
1991
There is a movie that plays in my mind as I graduate from college: Working Girl, a popular rags-to-riches movie from 1988 and an excellent guide for finding a job and a boyfriend. My senior year was a breeze because I focused on work and friends, and avoided drama. Days before graduation, I received a bittersweet letter from Craig, who’s moved to Japan with his girlfriend. He congratulated me on my surviving college and wished me happiness. It was a sweet message, one I’ll always cherish. I never answer him but appreciate the nice send-off.
Commencement at Oberlin went without a hitch. My parents mostly stayed away from each other and we all traveled in our different directions after unloading the moving truck to my future. Mom and Don returned to their new house in New Jersey, close to Rutgers University, where they were both just hired to teach history. My father went back to Brockport, Patrick to Manhattan.
Now it’s my turn. Let the adult fun begin! I can already tell great things will happen to me. And since I’m the star of my own romance novel, I figure I’ll land on my feet without a career track, especially if I follow Tess McGill’s lead.
The idea of living in New York City is too overwhelming, so I decided to move to Cleveland as a transitional home—only thirty minutes from my college. Baby steps to my big dreams, which, at the moment, are as mystifying as my dwindling savings. Where does the money go? Most of my friends find employment in other cities or go to graduate school. Except for a couple college friends who live in my new neighborhood, I’m left to my own devices.
Thanks to a generous girlfriend, who spends hours helping me look at places, I find an apartment in the safe-ish suburb of Lakewood, Ohio, a thirty-minute bus ride from downtown Cleveland. This neighborhood is made up of families and Yuppies, mostly Caucasian. The city has invisible racial lines, which cause tension from one end to the other. To add to this, bigotry is everywhere. No sooner do I step into this city than I hear the N-word out of Caucasian mouths. It shocks me. Not exactly the harmonious environment of Oberlin, where all races are celebrated.
Despite the underlying violence of this city, my one-bedroom is enormous, with a giant living room, ample closet space, a full kitchen and bedroom. And cheap! My parents each donate old furniture and rugs, and setting up my new independent-girl digs is a blast.
The only outrageous part is that my parents expect me to make my own money. I am allegedly an adult. There is an exciting quality to this adulthood phase—that I can make my own money, decisions, and meals. This is also the worst part. To make money, you need to work—every day. If you’re lucky, this work builds into a career. To get work, you need to make a decision about what kind of work you want to do. I just want to be famous or rich or married or . . . something, as l
ong as I don’t have to break a sweat.
The food part is fine, though it’s painful to leave the luxury of the campus dining hall. How hard could it be to cook a meal? I know how to make rice and pasta and open a can. In a matter of weeks, I’m certain that my Prince Charming will whisk me off to fancy restaurants where we’ll have five-course meals (I love going out). For now, I really want to try powdered potatoes—the forbidden fruit. My parents wouldn’t let me eat them, so now’s the time to try this awesome contraband. With potato flakes, just add water and milk—along with a stick of butter. Maybe Parmesan cheese. It’s a delicious, easy adult meal! Ramen noodles are so cute and cheap, too, and I buy baskets and baskets of them.
Next comes adult employment. What helps me through the hurdle of being jobless with a BA is the idea that I could be the next Tess from Working Girl. In a nutshell, Tess, the eternal temp with big dreams, fights to crawl out of the job sewer and, in her quest, finds a great profession and a man with whom she can order Chinese while number-crunching into the wee hours. She is the quintessential romance heroine because she’s special and smart. We all know that she’ll get the job she deserves. In her spare time, when she’s not being adorable at work—e.g., giving cartons of cigarettes to friends, just because—she secretly takes all these business classes. Though stuck working a temp job, she gradually outdoes her boss (who has a bony ass) and attracts the love of Jack Trainer, played by Harrison Ford. Jack is so hardworking that he stays at the office late to the point where he needs to change into a new shirt and start a new day. On the outside, he’s a ruthless businessman. On the inside, he’s a lovelorn puppy, offering to make herbal tea for Tess when she accidentally gets trashed at an industry event. Best of all, he packs her a high-fructose lunch for her first day at work at the end. Tess is multifaceted, brainy with the voice of a porn star. She may start at a less-than-great job, but she gets a better job and the guy in the end. I need to be Tess: a wage earner with the ability to seduce executives without even trying.
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