French Kissing

by Catherine Sanderson

  Following the link within the email to Belleville_girl’s completed profile – which, I was informed, had now gone ‘live’ – I re-read the text I’d submitted as my annonce the previous evening. It made me cringe, but not to the extent I’d feared. Translated into English, it read something like this:

  Ten years in Paris, yet still English through and through. I like: living in Belleville, playing with my daughter (4), the company of good friends, reading ‘Transports amoureux’ on the métro, the smell of baking bread, people who make me laugh…

  Would anyone look at my profile, read those two short sentences and think, ‘Now there’s a woman I’d like to meet’? And if they did, what were the chances – given what Kate had told me – that they would make contact for the right reasons? I felt sure the odds of finding someone special were almost as slim as those of a stranger falling for me in a crowded métro carriage. But it didn’t matter: I’d decided I didn’t mind if some men had less than honourable intentions. Nico hadn’t wasted any time finding a bit of light entertainment, so why should I play by a different set of rules?

  Seven o’clock found me dithering in front of the wardrobe in my underwear, agonizing over what to wear to Kate’s party. My clothes were crammed in, owing to the lack of space, and it was hard to find anything, or even remember what, among the things I owned, might be remotely suitable. Going out had been far simpler in my twenties. When I was slimmer and fresh-faced, looking good had required only a pair of smart jeans, a dressy top, tousled hair and a touch of mascara. So much more work was involved now. My post-partum curves were better served by dresses, which, in turn, cried out for tights and feminine footwear. As for my face, I’d had to abandon the ‘less is more’ approach: cracks needed papering over; fine lines camouflaging. The challenge was to achieve this without going overboard with the liquid foundation and winding up looking about as natural as a geisha.

  After lengthy deliberations, I settled on a scoop-necked navy jumper dress, coupled with a pair of thin tights and my brown knee-high boots. I transferred a few essential items – my Navigo métro pass, my purse and my keys – from my work satchel into a small brown clutch bag. The weather was mild and I threw on a beige mac I’d bought at H&M a couple of years earlier, leaving it unbuttoned. As I walked downhill towards Belleville métro, the cleavage I’d left on show drew appreciative stares from male passers-by.

  It was a little before eight, and night hadn’t yet fallen, although the backlit signs – most of which were written in both French and Mandarin – above the shop fronts I passed were already switched on, making their primary colours more vivid. The Chinese restaurants were teeming with diners, and the supermarkets were still open, although men in white overalls were busy packing away the fruit and vegetable stands in readiness for closing time. Plunging down into the métro, I selected ligne 2, colour-coded dark blue, which would take me all the way to Monceau, the stop nearest to Kate’s. The journey began underground, but soon the train emerged into the outdoors again, climbing a steep slope to continue along a metal viaduct which elevated us far above road level, although I could still hear beeping horns and see cars milling around below. The métro aérien, as it was called, continued its overground course across Place de Stalingrad and along the centre of boulevard de la Chapelle, moving east now and skirting the bottom of the eighteenth arrondissement. It plunged underground again at Anvers, robbing me of a view of the Moulin Rouge and the tacky sex shops of Pigalle, and remained underground until I arrived at my destination, five minutes later.

  Kate’s neighbourhood couldn’t have been more different from my own, I thought, as I climbed the litter-free steps and emerged by the Monceau park railings. The boulevard de Courcelles was lined with expensive-looking cars, and the damp pavements bore witness to a recent hosing down by a municipal cleaning truck. The majestic sandstone apartment blocks overlooking the park – one of which housed Kate’s own apartment – were well maintained and, craning my neck upwards, I caught sight of an enormous crystal chandelier through a second-floor window.

  In a way, Kate’s choice of neighbourhood mirrored her personal style: elegant and refined, without a single hair out of place. Come to think of it, perhaps Belleville summed me up too: a little ramshackle and chaotic on the surface but, if you were willing to overlook a few faults and stray off the beaten track into the lesser-known cobbled side streets, it was still possible to find the belle in Belleville.

  The digicode outside Kate’s building was made of brass, which was an augur of the luxurious shape of things to come. Before the letterboxes, two mirrors in arched gilt frames were set into the facing walls on my left and right. The effect, when you stood and gazed into either one, was of an infinite number of reflected selves framed in mirrors stretching into the distance, each one a little smaller than the last. Lila, who was a huge fan of her own reflection, loved dawdling in the hallway whenever we paid Kate and her boys a visit. Beyond the mirrors and letterboxes was an intercom and, once I’d been buzzed through, I had the choice between a wide red-carpeted stairway and an old fashioned lift with a metal gate. At this time of night the building’s concierge would be off-duty, but I still could have sworn I saw the curtain behind the glass front door leading to her quarters twitch as I passed.

  I took the lift to the fifth floor, then pressed the buzzer to the right of the double doors in the centre of the landing and waited, fiddling nervously with my hair. It was my first lone outing to a gathering of this size, and standing here brought home to me how accustomed I’d grown over the years to drawing the lion’s share of my self-confidence from Nico’s presence by my side. I’d been blissfully unaware of this at the time, taking it for granted. But now, without him, I felt naked and exposed; bashful and shy.

  Yves answered the door, his eyes flickering over my décolleté, his ‘Bonjour, Sally’ devoid of any real warmth. He’d always had an unpleasant habit of pronouncing my name as though it were the French word ‘sâli’ – the past participle of the verb to dirty, to sully – and this never failed to rub me up the wrong way, which was doubtless his intention. Yves wore chinos and a polo shirt with a pair of expensive-looking beige shoes with clownlike, elongated toes. I bet he wears that kind of thing to work on ‘casual Friday’, I thought to myself, suppressing a smirk. Smart casual was not a look I was very fond of, on men. A well-tailored suit, fine. A pair of worn jeans, all well and good. But this no-man’s land in the middle, where the aim seemed to be to dress as though you were on your way to the golf club, was so easy to get wrong – especially for Frenchmen, who all too often tucked their shirts inside their trousers.

  Yves disappeared inside the spare room with my mac and handbag and I dithered by the front door, debating for a moment whether or not to wait for his return. In the end, I opted for making my entrance alone. It might be daunting, but I was less likely to be introduced to Yves’ tedious banker friends that way.

  Kate’s living room was large enough to contain my entire apartment. It was high-ceilinged, with a marble fireplace at either end. Four tall windows overlooked Parc Monceau, the park Kate’s boys crossed every morning with their nanny on their way to their expensive bilingual school. The Roche Bobois furniture had been evacuated or pushed back against the magnolia-painted woodwork in honour of the party and, judging by the lingering odour of beeswax, the cleaning lady had buffed up the oak floorboards that afternoon. Most of the twenty or so guests already present – Tailor-Made teachers, Yves’ banker set and a smattering of VIPs Kate wanted to impress – lingered by the tables set up in front of each fireplace, champagne flûtes at one end of the room, canapés at the other, to encourage mingling.

  I spotted Kate straight away, in her perfect LBD and glittering diamond earrings, and flashed her a wide smile. I refrained from approaching her as she was deep in conversation with a portly man I didn’t recognize, no doubt a high-ranking businessman from one of the firms we worked with. I made a beeline for one end of the drinks table instead, where I’d spied R
yan, a fellow teacher I used to see a lot of before Lila came along. He was chatting to a tall, dark-haired girl I’d never seen before.

  ‘Ooh, I was hoping I’d run into you here, Sally darling,’ Ryan exclaimed, interrupting his conversation to plant two enthusiastic kisses on my cheeks, then pouring me a glass of champagne. ‘I haven’t seen you in faaar too long!’ Taking a step back, he looked me up and down. ‘Officially foxy,’ he pronounced, his hands drawing quotation marks around the word ‘officially’ to underscore his verdict. ‘In fact, were I of the straight persuasion,’ he continued, ‘I’d definitely have designs on you this evening…’

  Ryan was not, as he so charmingly put it, ‘of the straight persuasion’. His appearance didn’t give much away – he wasn’t one for clingy T-shirts or edgy haircuts – but his mannerisms were deliciously camp. I had no idea whether he’d guessed how nervous I was tonight, but intentionally or not, he’d done an amazing job of putting me at my ease.

  ‘You’re looking very well, yourself,’ I replied, taking a sip of champagne, which was crisp and spiky, just how I liked it. ‘Rather trim, in fact. Have you been working out?’ It was true. He did look good. His hair was cropped shorter than I’d ever seen it before and the weight loss I’d referred to was most noticeable in his face. He’d made an effort with his clothes too. Jeans were pretty much his uniform, but he’d worn a smart purple shirt and discarded his usual trainers in favour of smart shoes.

  ‘Good gracious no, I’d never make it out of the men’s changing rooms,’ Ryan said with a fiendish grin, ‘but I have been sticking to my new diet plan. It’s an invention of mine I like to call “No Solids till December”, which is why I’ll be spending the evening at this end of the room only…’ The dark-haired girl by his side giggled. ‘Oh dear, here I am, forgetting my manners,’ Ryan apologized. ‘Sally, let me introduce you to Kate’s newest recruit, Anna. Anna, meet Sally, Kate’s oldest recruit. We were busy deconstructing The Wizard of Oz before you arrived. You’re no stranger to my Judy Garland obsession, of course, Sally. And imagine! Anna grew up in Kansas…’

  ‘Nice to meet you, Anna,’ I said, registering her properly for the first time and liking what I saw. Anna had accentuated her feline green eyes with a bold stroke of black eyeliner, and her dark hair was cropped short and wispy – the kind of Hepburn-style haircut I’d always dreamed of, but never dared try. She looked about my age, stood about a head taller, and wore a black tunic dress with calf-length boots not unlike my own. The notable difference was that she had worn them with a pair of electric-blue tights. Anna, I deduced, was no shrinking violet.

  ‘So I guess you must have been working for Kate for, like, five years?’ said Anna, raising a neatly plucked eyebrow. ‘You and Ryan are both Paris veterans, compared to me. I moved here a year ago. My husband got a job with UNESCO and I’ve been going batshit crazy with boredom ever since, while I tried to figure out how to get a work permit…’

  ‘Is your husband here?’ I was already scanning the room, wondering how Anna’s mate would look.

  ‘Uh, well, he and I are kind of separated,’ Anna said with a grimace. ‘Or rather, I left him. A few more glasses of champagne and I’m sure I’ll wind up giving you the low-down on how and why…’ I was about to comment on how subtle Anna’s accent was, when Kate caught my eye and the penny suddenly dropped. Anna was the mystery person Kate had so wanted me to meet. She’d been matchmaking all right, but not quite in the way I’d expected.

  ‘I suspect,’ I said, taking the empty champagne glass from Anna’s hand and pouring her a refill, ‘that you and I are about to find out we have way more in common than a contract with Tailor-Made…’ I held up my glass, waiting until Ryan and Anna did the same, Ryan’s eyes glinting in anticipation, because there was nothing he loved more than a good bitching session. ‘I’d like to propose a toast,’ I continued, looking Anna straight in the eye. ‘Here’s to new beginnings.’

  4

  Anna and I hit it off, just as Kate must have suspected we would. I began by dusting off some of my favourite expat anecdotes, comparing them with Anna’s more recent experiences, and we talked at length about what we loved and hated most about our adoptive city.

  ‘I can’t believe that you gave birth to your daughter in a French hospital,’ Anna exclaimed. ‘If that isn’t going native, I don’t know what is!’ And as the champagne progressively loosened our tongues, we moved on to far more interesting territory, namely how we were coming to terms with being thrust, kicking and screaming, back into the single life.

  ‘I never thought I’d have to go through the whole tedious process of auditioning men again,’ Anna said, her voice laced with bitterness. ‘That part of my life was supposed to be so over. I’ve spent years listening to my single friends moaning about how all the good men are already taken, and feeling smug because I figured I’d never have to live by The Rules or read He’s Just Not That Into You. I have no time for all that “Thou shalt not return his call until the fourth day” bullshit…’

  ‘You mean there are rules?’ I feigned astonishment. I’d never opened a self-help book in my life, but could imagine all too easily the kind of advice dispensed within. ‘Last time I was in the market for a boyfriend – ten long years ago – I just invited him to a party I was going to after work,’ I explained. ‘Things seemed to happen kind of organically in those days… There were no strategies or magic formulas.’

  When I confessed I’d signed up with Rendez-vous, Anna admitted she’d toyed with the idea herself. The main sticking point – the reason she’d never had the guts to go through with it – was her rudimentary grasp of French. There were a few expats online – I’d spent an evening playing with language and nationality filters and found a couple of hundred men of all ages hailing from Australia, the US and England – but the majority of Rendez-vous members were, of course, French. ‘I’d love to meet a Frenchman, in theory,’ Anna said in a wistful voice, ‘but he’d have to be bilingual, otherwise I’d require the services of a full-time interpreter…’

  ‘Full-time could be problematic,’ Ryan smirked. He’d been uncharacteristically quiet since I’d begun talking to Anna and I’d noticed his eyes flickering repeatedly in the direction of one of Yves’ banker friends on the other side of the room, admiring the scenery.

  ‘Sure could,’ Anna agreed. ‘I mean, I pride myself on keeping an open mind, but I’m pretty sure threesomes are not my thing…’

  I’d been right about Anna’s age: she was thirty-one, a year younger than me. She and Tom had tied the knot only eighteen months earlier. The way she told it, marriage had been a pragmatic decision prompted more by Tom’s imminent transfer to Paris than by a genuine desire to be united in the eyes of church or state. Now, faced with figuring out how best to get a divorce in a foreign country whose legal system she couldn’t begin to comprehend, she had her misgivings. She and Tom might not have got around to starting a family, but things were complicated all the same. A tangled web of joint credit-card debts needed paying off back home in the States, and they hadn’t yet figured out how to divide up a number of expensive wedding gifts.

  I was about to cut to the chase and quiz Anna about what had prompted her to leave Tom when Kate appeared at my elbow and steered me purposefully across the room to meet another of her recent recruits. Tessa was a softly spoken woman with mousy brown hair and a grey wool twin-set. Her age remained a mystery – any figure between thirty and forty seemed plausible – but I was willing to bet she lived alone; there was an aura of spinster about her. ‘Tessa would love to pick your brains about prep work,’ Kate said, shooting me a look which managed to convey both a sincere apology and an entreaty to take Tessa off her hands. I found myself fielding Tessa’s volley of earnest questions, shooting jealous looks at Ryan and Anna over Tessa’s shoulder all the while. They’d taken up residence next to the food table now – despite Ryan’s dietary resolution – but I suspected this had less to do with cosying up to the petit fours salés than it di
d with a desire to move closer to the attractive banker he’d been eyeballing. From time to time Anna threw back her head and laughed. I would have given anything, right then, to be privy to their jokes rather than talking shop with tedious Tessa.

  When Tessa excused herself to visit the bathroom, I seized my chance to escape. Scanning the room with a frown, I spied Ryan, who had made his move and was now deep in conversation with his quarry, but Anna was nowhere to be seen. Shooting a quizzical glance at Ryan as I passed, I slipped into the hallway, where I was relieved to see Anna chatting to Kate. As I approached, Yves emerged from the spare room with a coat the same shade of blue as Anna’s tights.

  ‘Oh, are you leaving already, Anna?’ I interjected, dismayed. ‘That’s a shame! I was hoping we’d have more time to chat…’

  ‘My brother and his wife are in town,’ Anna explained, slipping her arms into the coat, which Yves held gallantly out for her, ‘and I kind of promised I’d meet them after dinner. Wanna meet for coffee tomorrow, instead? I often head down to the canal and sit in Chez Prune with a newspaper on Sundays. Their all-day brunch isn’t bad…’

  ‘Sounds good,’ I said. ‘Chez Prune isn’t far from where I live.’ I was surprised and pleased that Anna was familiar with one of my favourite haunts. In my experience, far too many expats never strayed from the beaux quartiers, unaware that such a thing as a canal existed within the city limits unless they happened to have seen Amélie Poulain. We decided to meet around two, and grabbing a pen and paper from Kate’s hall table, I scribbled down first Anna’s phone number, then mine, and tore the page in two, handing her a strip.