La Vie en Bleu

by Jody Klaire

  “No.”

  “Then why is she better without you?” Babs wouldn’t let go and I was stuck between yanking my arm away and bolting or standing and taking what I deserved.

  “She has Vivienne. She found someone else, someone who cares.” Someone who’d been with her for years, not the solitary one we’d spent together. That must have meant more.

  “Vivienne does not care for her.”

  Stopping my struggle to escape, I scowled. “What?”

  “Vivienne, she takes advantage of her. Berne is nothing to her but a secret . . . a mistress.”

  Well, if I disliked Vivi-vixen-viper before, now I wanted to . . . to . . . do something very unladylike.

  “What?”

  “Oui. You left her to be mistreated.”

  Ouch.

  “Why . . . why would this woman do that?” I put my hands on my hips. I wanted to poke the wench. Yes, that’s right. Poke her right in the eye. “Why would she mistreat her?”

  “Why would you abandon her and never say a word?”

  I opened my mouth to argue but then sighed. Good point. “Then I’m no better than this woman and she is better off without me.”

  “Non, without you, she is so lost.” Babs took my hand. “She needs you to come alive again.”

  Odd images of me next to an operating table with lightning forking across the sky made me blink. Rebecca and I watched far too many films. “Berne doesn’t need me or anyone else to be wonderful, she just is.”

  “And to be loved helps that to radiate from her. You are much the same.” Babs wagged her finger as I opened my mouth to argue. “I hear enough to know that you pine for her too.”

  “Of course I do. That’s not the point.”

  Conscious that Berne and Rebecca were waiting for us, I headed out of the door and locked it behind Babs.

  “She cries much of the time because of that woman.”

  Ouch again.

  “Why, what does Vivienne say?”

  “It is subtle but I have watched it over the years. Piece by piece, she picks away at the confidence, she has Berne to think that it is okay to be shut away.” Babs shrugged. “It is not that she means to consciously but her own fears drive so much.”

  “Vivienne is afraid?”

  “Oui.” Babs cocked her head. “You do not know why?”

  “Of course I don’t.” Was I a mind reader? When would I have learned this information?

  “Vivienne is an actress. On television, oui?” Babs shook her head as if astounded I didn’t know. “You remember that Raquel work behind the scenes? Alors, they meet when Berne went to the set, oui?”

  Raquel had been close to Berne and Babs back then. She was tall, leggy, blonde, with men following her everywhere. Another charming French woman who had intimidated me beyond measure. She’d been Berne’s age. She and Berne could talk about things I didn’t understand. Lucky for me she’d been straight or I would have seriously worr—

  “They got together when Berne and Raquel split up.”

  I missed my footing and stumbled, Babs caught me before I face planted into the wall. “Berne went out with Raquel?”

  “Oui.”

  I couldn’t swallow. When did swallowing get so hard? I’d performed the action automatically enough times, surely you couldn’t forget how to swallow.

  “Pippa?” Rebecca’s voice sounded somewhere nearby but I leaned over onto my knees, trying to breathe. Swallowing was simple, why couldn’t I swallow?

  “Pippa, you okay?”

  I shook my head. My stomach swirled like it was ready to make a bid for freedom.

  “What did you say?” Rebecca sounded irritated.

  “I tell her of Vivienne.” Babs sounded defiant. “And Raquel.”

  “Why?” Rebecca asked. “What good does that do anyone?”

  Uh oh, Rebecca sounded mad. Swallow, you daft clot, why couldn’t I swallow!

  “Good?” Babs snapped. “Maybe she will see sense and stop this nonsense.”

  “Pip has the right to be insane if she wants.”

  Insane? Wow, thanks. I would have said something but every time I regained my breath, the name Raquel Rocher pulsed into my head. The way she’d smiled at me with such patience, like I amused her. Had she just been biding her time? Waiting for Berne to stop fooling around with me? Had Berne felt the same way?

  “You admit that this is crazy?”

  “Yeah, I do. They should be married and all domesticated. It’s not my place to demand she stop messing around and get to it already.”

  Babs burst out with laughter. “I knew that I liked you.”

  Rebecca’s incoherent mumbling reached my ears above the ringing racket of my own pulse.

  Calm . . . calm . . .

  “Ça va?” Berne’s voice only made the inability to swallow rage into desperate sobbing breaths.

  I covered my eyes to try and fend off the pulsing lights. Rebecca mumbled something about a paper bag and a second or two later one was stuck to my face.

  “What did you say?” Berne’s voice filled with angst.

  It didn’t matter. Even the sound of her voice now made everything worse. I wanted to explode into tears but couldn’t. Instead I shuddered my breaths in and out, trying to hold the paper bag over my mouth and nose. It smelled of peppermint. I hated peppermint.

  “She told her about Vivienne and Raquel.” Rebecca sounded livid. “Now she’s hyperventilating.”

  “You could not keep it secret from her.” Babs was again defiant. “My little English melon here is passionate in her defence.”

  “That’s because my little French pinball had all the tact of a bulldozer when she did it.”

  That was cue for them to start bickering. Were they seriously flirting? Now?

  “Wait in the vehicle.” Berne cut everyone to silence with her tone.

  I heard them bicker some more as they trundled off to the truck. Berne sat down beside me. She waited until my breathing calmed enough for me to pull the bag away.

  “It is something I do not wish to talk about with you.”

  “I’m not surprised.” Ooh, I was mad. That was better, I could swallow when mad.

  “You have no right to be angry with me.”

  “Well, suck it up because I am.” I got to my feet, too quickly, and stars popped before my eyes. “I’m mad at you. In fact . . . stuff your flipping Ardèche.”

  I went to stomp off only for Berne to wrap her arms around me from behind. She buried her head in my shoulder. “You are marrying some rich man. You left me.”

  “I know I did . . . I don’t care . . . Raquel Rocher . . . that’s . . . that’s worse than revenge . . . that’s . . .” I flapped my arms about, unable to stomp off and unwilling to give in to the gentle custody of her arms. “You suck . . . you . . . I can’t believe you—”

  “I did. I do.” Berne held on tighter. “You left.”

  “You said that you were just friends. You said you didn’t feel a thing for her when I met her.” Sudden thoughts of betrayal burst through my mind. “You used to stay at her place.”

  “I was never unfaithful to you.” Berne turned me around so I could see the truth in her eyes. “You left me. She was there for me. There was no reason not to explore our feelings.”

  The visual of Berne being drooled over by Raquel made my entire body ache. Raquel was there to console her? Oh I bet she was.

  “You swore you didn’t feel anything for her. You swore it.”

  Oh crap. I felt like someone had ripped out the foundations from under me. There was Berne acting like she’d pined away. Hah. Raquel. If she’d left Raquel for Vivienne, what did Vivienne look like? What chance did a babbling idiot like me have against them? I was a fool. A fool to think she’d seen only me.

  “Things changed. You left.” Berne’s irritated tone cut even deeper.

  A clarity washed over me. Somehow the fact seemed to make a calmness settle inside.

  “We’re done.”

&
nbsp; I broke free of Berne’s grasp and walked to the truck. “I’ll find someone else to guide me.”

  “I will do as promised. I will.”

  “Pip, we’ll never get another guide now.” Rebecca looked like she wanted to plead for my forgiveness. She must have known what I was up against with Vivienne since they went to Marseille. Well, we were even on hiding secrets now.

  Raquel Rocher.

  I wanted to throw up.

  “Fine. I’ll take you in the kayak.”

  Berne said nothing. In fact no one dared utter a word to me as I snatched the keys off Berne and drove us to our starting point.

  Of all the people in the world to sleep with, Berne found the one who could make the most impact on me. Logically, what reason did I have to be angry when I’d left her? What gave me the right to be livid about some friend from the past? Why wouldn’t Berne fall for her?

  I wasn’t sure if I was angrier at Raquel for daring to touch Berne or Berne for being so calculated.

  Then Babs’s words popped into my head. She’d split up with Raquel. She was with Vivienne who took advantage of her. Vivienne who hurt her and made her cry. That sucked even more.

  I wanted to run back to Doug and away from all the hurt. I wanted to run to him and make it clear just to hurt Berne back.

  I was such a child.

  “You taking the front or the back?”

  Somehow we’d gotten to the river and I’d gotten my flotation vest on. I’d carried the kayak down to the river with Rebecca too. “Back.”

  Rebecca didn’t argue. Berne and Babs got into the kayak in front and stowed the water and camping gear on board.

  “You ready?” Babs was looking straight at me, all I could do was nod at her. She’d told me the moment she knew I hadn’t been told.

  The two women who supposedly loved me hadn’t even bothered.

  Well, I knew where I stood now and it felt pretty lonely.

  MOST OF THE day passed by in silence. Babs and Berne were chatting quietly in their kayak but I centred myself on looking up at the green broccoli chunks of trees that hung over the craggy rocks. I adored the Ardèche and the sloshing of my paddle in the river. It was one of the most beautiful places I had ever been to. The cliffs on either side soared up into endless blue. Bird calls, insects, nature sang every second. In a little wooden or fibreglass boat it felt as though the stress of life was a million miles away. Out here it was as it always had been.

  Life meandered on, bouncing and bubbling over the rocks, sweeping around bends and snaking around ancient pillars of stone. Up on the hills, little villages were somewhere beyond the trees, ancient structures and monasteries. There were prehistoric caves, Roman arches, forts, farms, people who lived in the same way generations before them had. Down here, on the winding river, I felt connected to it, rooted by it. I was one person passing through.

  By evening we were at the first campsite. Our kayaks pulled up alongside. The beaches were pebbled and no one was allowed to camp on them unless they did something like sleep under the stars. Of course, sometimes the locals chose to ignore such things but Berne didn’t. So we trudged up the slope in silence. Silence so thick it felt like a rain cloud or maybe I was the donkey from Winnie the Pooh. Tigger? No he was the bouncy tiger, Piglet was the pig in a jumper . . . Anyway, I felt like the gloomy one with a stick-on tail.

  Berne, Babs, and Rebecca sat around the gas stove while I chose to erect my tent. It would take me much longer because I didn’t have any idea how to do it but, boy, was I going to.

  “You need to eat.” It was Berne.

  I nodded in her direction and carried on. I pulled out all the stuff from the pouch. Who knew you needed so many ropes. What were they even for? I put the ropes back and pulled out a few poles. Here went nothing.

  “I have it here for you.”

  Stuff your food, is what I wanted to say. Instead, I nodded.

  “It’s going to get cold if you do not eat it.”

  Like I would care. I clicked another pole into place. My tent looked more like a wigwam. Hmmm . . .

  “I forgave you.” She placed the food down on a nearby rock. “All I ask is the same.”

  “Why? You’re still going to sleep with Vivienne.” Fury rumbled up from inside me. “You’re still going to carry on . . .”

  I snapped another pole into place. It was too numbing to put into words. My hands shook with the rage.

  “You are still going to marry a man. A man who you sleep with?” Berne’s voice pulsed with her own anger. “You have no right to judge me when you caused this. You did this to us both.”

  “Because you would have said no to Vivienne?” I shoved another pole in. Now it looked like I’d taken up cubism.

  “I would have told her no everytime, always.” Berne’s voice was quiet but her words were clear. “Vivienne is not and will never be you.” She looked up to the stars and huffed out a breath.

  “Yet you let her treat you like you are nothing.” The sheer force of my own rage shocked me. I was far angrier that Berne was being hurt by someone. I was angrier that Berne was hurting. How did that make sense? “You’re better than someone’s mistress.”

  “Am I?”

  I looked at Berne, wondering if she’d gone loopy. “You think I treated you with such contempt?”

  “Oui. When you leave and not tell me why. Why did you leave and return with a man’s ring on your finger?”

  I turned and glared at her. “I don’t love him.”

  Said very loudly, the words echoed back off the rocks around us. A confirmation of something it had taken me to say, to realise. Oh merde. I didn’t love him. At least I wasn’t in love with him.

  Berne glared back at me. “And I do not love her.”

  “So then why aren’t you together yet?”

  We both looked at Rebecca who threw her hands in the air.

  “You’re both going round and round. Get to the good stuff already.”

  “She has a point,” Babs said, handing Rebecca a drink.

  “This isn’t a democracy. I made a promise, Berne made a promise.”

  I slotted in another pole. “I broke her heart and she’ll never get over that.”

  Click, the pole fitted together. I swished it through the fabric opening.

  “I’m marrying Doug, she’s with Vivienne. We made promises to other people. Neither of us will go back on those promises no matter how much it hurts.” I shook my head. “I trusted her with Raquel. I can’t get over that.”

  Click, click, swish.

  “We messed it up. Move on.”

  The pain in Berne’s eyes was agonising to look at but she nodded. “Perhaps our chance faded long ago.”

  “Yes.”

  Rebecca looked like she wanted to cry and Babs was no better.

  “We can finish the trip if you want to, then I’m going home.” I shoved the pole through another piece of fabric.

  Rebecca and Babs nodded, sloping off.

  Berne stared long and hard into my eyes until finally adding her own nod. “Let us make it a good one, oui.”

  “You’re the guide.” I tried to smile but I felt too tired to lift the necessary muscles.

  It was why the past needed to be left where it belonged. Why I needed to grow up and start acting like a sane adult instead of a love-struck teenager.

  “Is there any way you can fix this stupid tent?”

  Berne shook her head. “I cannot.”

  I frowned. “What do you mean?”

  She walked past and tapped the tent with her hand, managing a small smile. “I cannot fix it because it is perfect.”

  I looked at my tent and could see that she was right. “Wow, that’s . . . that’s . . . lucky.”

  “Not luck. Just what is inside showing through.” Berne turned and walked away, but I still caught her whispered words. “I will miss that.”

  Chapter Twelve

  IT WAS A clear, calm night. The stars twinkled above and the wind was, for
once, conspicuous in its absence. It was no surprise that many felt Van Gogh had cut off his ear not because of the argument but due to le vent.

  The wind wasn’t the only thing that seemed to drive people to madness. Berne stared up at the stars overhead, trying to fight back the tears.

  This was cruel, so very cruel to suffer. Of course, it was Babs’s plan to tell Pippa that she and Raquel had been more. It would give Pippa a chance to find herself while staying separated from Berne. It hurt that Pippa would think she would ever even consider it, that she bought the lies.

  Raquel Rocher could have begged on her hands and knees, Berne could have loved her dearly but her loyalty to Pippa would still have made her say no. She swore to Pippa she had never felt that way and it had been the truth.

  It was almost amusing to think that Pippa believed it at all. Raquel had been a close friend back then. She had been there for Berne. Now, she was married with three sons and their friendship had become more distant. Her husband was a sweet man. A handsome man. Berne liked him. It was a shame they were not as close as they’d once been. Raquel had been the first to warn her away from Vivienne but Berne had been too empty to listen.

  “How are you holding up there?”

  Berne offered Rebecca a smile but it was half hearted. Deceiving Pippa, even if it was in a bid to help her, went against every instinct that she had.

  “She really socked it to you, huh?”

  “Would you expect her to do any less?”

  Rebecca shook her head and took a seat on a chair opposite. The campsite, just back from the river, was nothing but a clearing with a bench. “Did get her to put up her tent in some shape though.” She thumbed in the direction. “I didn’t think pitching a tent so close to the stream was okay.”

  “It isn’t.” Berne poked the pot of boiling water. The stream was actually a small waterfall that slid down the rocks behind, over the rocks and pebbles and dropped off the edge into the Ardèche. “I will move it later.”

  “Maybe you shouldn’t.”

  Berne met Rebecca’s eyes. “Pardon?”

  “Don’t move it just tell her it’s going to flood.” Rebecca smiled. “You and Doug . . . even me, we all do it . . . we don’t want to hurt her.”