This is Life

by Dan Rhodes

  She got hold of a handful of fresh wipes, and after much struggling from both of them she completed her task. At last, Herbert was clean and in a fresh nappy. She had done it. The duvet cover had been bundled into a plastic shopping bag, ready to go to the laundry along with his original trousers, which had somehow been caught up in the general slurry, and the dirty nappy and wipes had been put in one of the no-longer-mysterious small plastic sacks she had found in Herbert’s bag. She opened the window, and as she breathed in the fresh air she was filled with a sense of accomplishment. At last she and the baby could relax and get to know each other.

  She looked at him for a while as he lay on the bed. The time had come to work out how to hold him properly. She scooped him up, and jostled him around, trying various ways of lifting him until she found one that seemed natural, with her right hand under his bottom and her left cradling his back. She held him close as she walked up and down on the tiny patch of available floor. He was still wearing his hat. She took it off, and saw for the first time that on his head was a coating of fine, golden hair. She stroked it, and was amazed by its softness.

  ‘You’re blonde,’ she said, ‘just like me. Only you’re a little bit fairer. But it’s OK, I’m not jealous. Well, that’s not entirely true – I am a bit jealous, but I think I’ll get over it. Either way, with that hair and those blue eyes everyone will think I’m your real mother.’ She gave him a squeeze, kissed the top of his head, and he looked up at her.

  She noticed details she hadn’t registered before. A few teeth were sticking out of his gums, and she couldn’t believe how white they were. Maybe there was something to be said for leading a life free of coffee, cigarettes and red wine. She felt she was starting to get to know the real Herbert, and getting the hang of having him around. Then she heard a rumble and felt a squelch against her right hand. This was followed by a terrible, but by now familiar, smell. It had all begun again.

  The second time, it was easier. She knew what was required of her, and she laid him on the plastic mat and got everything ready before the nappy came off. She was hoping that the new pair of trousers hadn’t caught it, because there wasn’t a spare pair after this. She was in luck.

  It was looking as though she was going to have to abandon her plan of spending a week indoors. As well as the room being far too small for the two of them, particularly when one of them was making such violent smells, she was already running low on supplies. She had been wondering whether the baby’s mother had been planning on handing him to a stranger for the week all along, but from the evidence it looked as if she probably hadn’t. There really did seem to be only just enough things in the bag to see him through the day. They would have to go out and get some more.

  Something else she knew was that there was no way she could cope with this on her own. With Herbert dressed again, and propped into a sitting position on the bed, she opened the window. With one hand she held a cigarette, directing as much of the smoke as she could into the outside air, and with the other she sent a text to Sylvie: Want to go shopping?

  VI

  For reasons that she told herself (and others if they asked, which they often did because she made no secret of it) were nobody’s business but her own, Sylvie Dupont wanted to find a husband. It was what she had wanted more than anything for as long as she could remember. She had read somewhere that the most common way to meet your life partner is in the workplace, and this was one of the reasons she had taken on so many jobs: a different one each day, seven days a week. As well as providing her with a varied working life and just enough money for her to always be able to wear nice dresses and not have to worry too much about the rent and bills, this strategy broadened her field of prospective spouses quite considerably.

  She made a point of taking on jobs that she thought would be interesting and unusual, partly so her shifts wouldn’t seem too much like work, but also because this way she was much more likely to meet interesting and unusual people. She had no image in her mind of her ideal man, and she was ready to be surprised when he came along, but if he was to be interesting and unusual then she would have no problem with that. If anything, she thought it would be a bonus.

  If a job ever got her down, if her colleagues were tiresome or customers rude, she would walk out and find one she liked better, and as a result she was usually happy at work, and often to be seen smiling. This rare trait, combined with her looks, which had never been a cause of concern for her (she knew she took after her mother, and she counted her mother as the most beautiful woman she had ever seen) drew her to the attention of an apparently endless stream of young men who thought they had finally, after years of longing, found their own personal Godard-era Chantal Goya, a sweet, smart and smiling dark-haired angel. As they found out fragments from the story of her life, any defences they might have had crumbled to nothing, and they were lost. When she told them, as casually as anything and usually on a first date, that her dream was to marry and have children, the thought of anyone but them being her husband or the father of those children made their blood run cold. If anybody could truly be said to have their pick, it was Sylvie Dupont. However, she had yet to take her pick.

  Today she was in Montmartre, at the top of the hill, sitting in the driver’s seat of a white 1963 Citroën 2CV and waiting to be assigned her next batch of tourists to take around the city. The morning had been pleasant but unexceptional, just a few short runs around the neighbourhood, and the afternoon had begun in the same way. She had a feeling that this wouldn’t be the day she was going to meet her future husband, and the sight of her next passengers did nothing to change this. They were a retired Japanese couple and their interpreter, a young French man. There wasn’t anything wrong with the interpreter, if anything he wasn’t bad-looking in a gawky kind of way, but a gut feeling told her she wasn’t going to be marrying him. She made a mental note to make him aware of this at the earliest opportunity, should he reveal the slightest hint of amorous intentions.

  She took no pleasure in reducing men to husks, but when she knew there was no alternative she was able to do so with lightning efficiency. She had come to learn that this was the kindest way: several of the boys she had let down gently over the years still lived in hope, and she wasn’t going to let herself be bothered with that kind of thing any more; it was just too time consuming.

  The Japanese couple lowered themselves into the back seat and fastened their seatbelts, and the interpreter settled in beside Sylvie. She smiled, and greeted them, and asked them where they wanted to go.

  The interpreter turned to them, and asked the same question in Japanese. The woman answered. ‘They just want to go around the city,’ he said. ‘They want to see the sights.’

  ‘That can be arranged.’

  Sylvie pulled away, and off they went. She had been born in Paris twenty-two and a half years earlier, and had never lived anywhere else. She knew it inside out, but she had never taken it for granted. She had not always lived in the best of neighbourhoods, but the city had always been there for her to escape into and lose herself in, filling her life with incredible places to go and things to do. She had also found that it had provided her with endless opportunities for getting into trouble, but she had grown tired of sticky situations and had begun to learn how to avoid them, so they were coming along with less and less frequency. One of her motivations for working so much was that she had that much less free time in which to go off the rails. She had learned to accept that there was really no one there to watch over her. She had friends, but she had let very few of them get really close, and those few knew her well enough to understand that she didn’t appreciate anybody interfering with her life. And besides, even the best of friends would never be the same as family, and she knew she had to be her own stabilising influence, that she had to watch over herself. She was quite pleased with how she had been doing lately. She was keeping her life together better than ever before.

  As they crept through the narrow streets, then raced down the hi
ll, she was looking forward to the next few hours. She always liked to know who she was driving. ‘Aren’t you going to introduce us?’ she asked the interpreter. She looked in the rear-view mirror. ‘What are you called?’

  The slightly gawky interpreter passed this on, and she learned that the stern-looking man was Monsieur Akiyama, and his smiling wife was Madame Akiyama. Further questions revealed that they had come all the way from somewhere called Funabashi, that they were on their second full day of a week-long trip to Paris, and had spent the entire day beforehand in the Louvre, sheltering from the rain, and they had been faintly disappointed by the Mona Lisa but spellbound by plenty of the other exhibits. Now that the sun was shining they were looking to broaden their horizons. It had been Madame Akiyama’s idea to head to Montmartre without any firm plans, just as it had been her very sudden idea to hire a classic car and go for a spin around the city. Monsieur Akiyama had yet to be convinced that such impulsive behaviour would not result in disaster.

  Sylvie told them her own name, and wished them an enjoyable stay. ‘And how about you?’ she asked the interpreter. ‘Who are you?’

  ‘Lucien,’ he said.

  ‘And how come you’re so good at speaking Japanese?’

  ‘Would you like an honest answer, or would you rather I hid the truth from you?’

  She thought for a moment. ‘Hide the truth.’

  ‘OK. It’s because I find it a fascinating language.’

  They drove on in silence for a while, until Sylvie could bear it no longer. ‘I’m starting to wonder whether an honest answer might have been a bit more interesting.’

  ‘Well, it is a fascinating language. But if you must know, the main reason is because I just really like Japan ese girls. I always have done, and I realised early in life that if I was ever to meet one there would be a language barrier, so I started teaching myself at thirteen, that was twelve years ago, and now I’ve pretty much got it nailed, the conversational side at least. I’ve been taking on gigs like this to keep me on my toes.’ He gestured towards the holidaymakers in the back seat. ‘I’ve got these two for the whole week.’

  Sylvie was delighted to find out that Lucien was obsessed with Japanese girls, and that he wouldn’t be falling in love with her. It was always such a relief when she knew she was in the clear and could talk to a boy without the possibility of his impending misery hanging over her. She sympathised with his situation, too. She supposed that if she had been a man there would have been a strong possibility that she would be preoccupied with Japanese women. Why wouldn’t she be? What was not to like about jet-black hair, porcelain skin, slim bodies and delicate features? ‘Any luck yet?’ she asked.

  He pulled a face. ‘I’m going to move there next year. I’ve got a job lined up at a university, as a French language and literature teaching assistant.’ He sounded melancholy.

  ‘What’s the problem? I think you’ll do fine. You’ll be ploughing through them.’

  Lucien went quiet.

  ‘What? I thought that’s what you wanted.’

  ‘Well, no. I don’t want to plough through them. That’s the thing. There’s something very wrong with me, you see. I tend not to talk about it, but since I already seem to have decided to use you as confessor I might as well tell you. My problem is that I only want to meet one girl, the right one for me. It’s all I’ve ever wanted.’

  ‘Hey, I’m a bit like that, only not for Japanese girls – I’ve got no interest at all in being with someone I can’t see myself marrying. I’ve had a bunch of boyfriends, but the moment I realise I’m not going to marry them I drop them like a hot brick. It’s got me into all sorts of trouble, some really deep shit, as a matter of fact – we’re talking guns and knives, even ropes – but at least I’m honest with them. I’m getting pretty good at telling now. It used to take me ages, but these days I can usually see straight away if a man’s not going to be the one. Take you, for example – the moment I saw you I knew we wouldn’t be getting married. But enough about me . . .’ She was distracted, and noticed a red light just in time. She slammed on the brakes, and stopped millimetres from the car in front. She heard gasps coming from the back seat. She could see in her rear-view mirror that Monsieur and Madame Akiyama were looking alarmed. She turned to Lucien. ‘Tell them it’s the French way of driving.’

  He did this, and Monsieur Akiyama spoke sternly for a while, after which Madame Akiyama spoke softly.

  Lucien translated. ‘Monsieur Akiyama wishes you to know that he worked for a large corporation for many years, rising through the ranks to a senior position. He says that if any of his company’s chauffeurs had ever driven in the French way while transporting one of their employers, they would have been subject to the most stringent disciplinary procedures.’

  ‘Oh, OK. It’s always interesting to learn about different cultures. That’s partly why I do this job.’

  ‘And Madame Akiyama wishes you to know that her husband needs to relax and remember he’s on holiday.’

  Sylvie laughed. She was becoming a big fan of Madame Akiyama. The light turned green, and she drove on. She and Lucien continued their conversation.

  ‘My theory is that most people only want one person,’ she said, ‘but people of our generation aren’t prepared to admit it because they don’t want everyone to think they’re desperate. I’m not desperate, though. There’s no way I would marry anyone unless I knew he was absolutely right for me. I would rather die than get stuck with the wrong man.’

  ‘So you would rather die than marry me?’

  ‘Yes.’

  He shrugged. ‘Fair enough.’

  ‘But what’s your problem anyway? Why are you so miserable? I can’t see why you’re all . . .’ She let out a long moan, and mimicked his voice. ‘Boo hoo, poor me, I’m going to Japan to be surrounded by Japanese student girls who will all have big crushes on me.’

  ‘I’ve hit a difficulty with my plan.’

  ‘What’s that?’

  He lowered his voice, and looked sheepish. ‘I think I’ve just fallen in love – even though I’m clearly not husband material.’

  Sylvie was exasperated. She had really thought she was in the clear with this one, and she had certainly let him know where she stood. Her hair wasn’t black, but it was dark brown and very straight. Her eyes were dark brown too, she was slim, and her complexion was clear. She had never thought of herself as looking Japanese, but maybe she looked just Japanese enough for Lucien. ‘Listen, I’ve already told you – I’m not going to marry you, OK? How many more times will I have to tell you before it sinks in? Don’t take offence, but I just know you’re not the one. Stick with your Japanese girls. You’ll be fine.’

  ‘No, no. I’m not in love with you.’

  Sylvie was relieved, but also a little put out. ‘Oh, really?’

  ‘Yes, really.’

  ‘Good. I’m glad.’

  ‘I’m glad you’re glad. It would never have worked out with you, even if you had liked me. I’ve tried being with girls who aren’t Japanese – I suppose I was hoping it would somehow cure me of my affliction – and I even really liked some of them, but it’s never ended well. It’s not right for me, and it’s not fair on them. I’ve embraced the way I am, and there’s no turning back. There were times when I saw it as a curse, but not any more – now I see it as a blessing.’

  ‘That’s good. So who is she then? Who is this Mademoiselle Wonderful who you just can’t live without?’

  ‘I think I’m in love with the Akiyamas’ daughter.’

  Sylvie was quiet for a while, as she pondered Lucien’s predicament. ‘You only think you’re in love with her?’

  ‘No, it’s no use. I can’t fight it – I am in love with her.’

  ‘That’s better. So where is she now?’

  ‘In Japan. They showed me a picture of her yesterday. I could hardly sleep last night, and when I finally did I dreamt only of her.’

  ‘I see.’ Sylvie didn’t subscribe to fashionable notio
ns that in order to love somebody you need to know them. Love, she knew for sure, was stranger than that. One summer, when she was ten years old, she had been sent to stay with a distant aunt, who had shut her in her room for the entire school holidays with nothing but a copy of Les Misérables for company. She had read it over and over again, empathising with Cosette as she huddled under the Thénardiers’ table, and glorying in her story as her happiness unfolded. When Marius had first set eyes on her he had felt no pressing need to take her out for coffee to find out her likes and dislikes, or to live with her on a trial basis just to be sure they were right for one another. And had Cosette reserved judgement until she had worked out whether or not Marius was going to fit in well with her existing social circle? Had she held back until she’d had a chance to interrogate him at extreme length about whether or not he still harboured residual feelings for any girls he had known before? No, they just saw each other and fell in love, and everything else melted away.

  Sylvie saw no reason why Lucien’s feelings shouldn’t be as deep and poetic as theirs. She was by no means a starry-eyed romantic, though; while she believed absolutely in true love, she knew how hard it was to find, and how easy it was for tender-hearted boys to be fooled by their feelings. She had even allowed herself to be fooled enough times, but she had always been OK; only disappointed, not devastated. She could see that Lucien had a tender heart, and she didn’t want to see him make a terrible mistake. He reminded her of several of her exes, and she didn’t want to see him ending up like them. ‘Just one picture?’ she asked.

  ‘Yes, just one.’

  ‘You should probably see a few more, just to be double sure that it’s true love and not just a crush.’ After all, Marius and Cosette would at least have had the opportunity to observe one another from a number of angles at their first encounter. She was worried that this might have been the Akiyama girl’s best photo by a long way, the only one her mother ever showed to people.