Their eyes locked and they stayed like that for a moment that seemed to last a lifetime. Then Angeline broke the silence. “I don’t think I’ll ever meet a boy I really like, Emilie. I haven’t found one yet I enjoy spending time with as much as I enjoy spending time with you.”
“Not even Joseph?”
Angeline quickly raised her head in surprise at Emilie’s mention of Joseph’s name and Emilie immediately freed her hand from the nook of Angeline’s neck and rested it on her own thigh. It seemed her hand was impregnated with Angeline’s pulse.
“Joseph? We’re friends, Emilie. It’s different.”
Angeline’s puzzled look forced Emilie to take a deep breath and continue. “Joseph spoke to me today on our walk to Main Street. He likes you more than a friend, Angeline. He’s in love with you. He dreams of marrying you and taking you to Rimouski with him. He wants to be your husband and have children with you.”
Although Emilie spoke solemnly and without even a trace of a smile, Angeline exploded into laughter. Emilie remained serious and stared at Angeline. “I’m not kidding, Angeline. He’s too scared you’ll reject him to talk to you, so I told him I would do it for him.”
Slowly, Angeline stopped laughing and didn’t seem as enthusiastic at the news as Emilie had both thought and feared. In fact, she looked more saddened than anything else. “So are you asking me to accept your brother as a suitor, Emilie?”
No! Emilie wanted to scream. Instead she remained calm. “I’m not asking you to do anything you don’t want to do, Angeline. I’m doing my brother a favor, that’s all. And let’s face it, if you’re going to have any suitor at all, Joseph is the best you could ever find,” she added as her voice caught and she wiped tears at the corner of her eye.
“If, Emilie. That’s a big ‘if.’ I don’t need a suitor at all. Not even Joseph. All I need is our friendship.” Angeline moved to hug her but Emilie stood up. She had to keep her distance from Angeline if she wanted to finish what she’d come to do. She couldn’t keep thinking that life without a suitor, a husband, was conceivable.
“Of course you do, Angeline. You can’t spend your life discussing books and gossiping about the neighborhood with your best friend. That’s not what your life should be. You should get married with a good man who can take care of you, give you children and a comfortable life you deserve. Joseph can do that for you, Angeline. You know that’s true as well as I do. I know you like him. You like the way he talks about Rimouski, the way he makes you laugh. Maybe you can fall in love with him too. Just think about it, that’s all I ask.”
“But, Emilie…”
Before Angeline could continue, Emilie took her leather mailbag and left her friend’s bedroom and the Fourniers’ apartment.
The temperature had dropped with the setting of the sun and Emilie walked briskly toward her apartment. The tears that fell to her cheeks briefly warmed them up before she wiped them away with determination, whispering between her clenched teeth, “Angeline Fournier will never be another Emma Bovary. Never.”
Chapter Ten
February 1895
The next morning Emilie woke up with burning eyes. She’d been crying for a large portion of the night. She hurried to get dressed and waited outside for the others. If the day before had been unusually mild, this morning marked the return of February in all of its freezing glory, which Emilie welcomed. The cold air soothed her eyes, insuring that Joseph or anyone else wouldn’t notice she’d been crying. Mathilde and Henri were the first outside, followed by Edouard. Jean-Baptiste had married a year ago and had left the Levesque apartment. Emilie’s parents and her older brother greeted her with a sleepy nod and left toward the mill. Emilie wanted to start walking behind them but she waited for Joseph instead. If she didn’t walk to the mill with Joseph and Angeline as she did every morning, they’d know she was upset. Joseph came out of the triple-decker and Emilie started walking toward their meeting spot but Joseph held her arm, forcing her to stop and face him.
“Did you talk to Angeline?” he asked with an expression of excitement mixed with apprehension that touched Emilie and left her no other choice but to smile.
“Yes, I talked to her.”
“And?”
“And she was surprised. She sees you as a friend and she didn’t suspect you had any deeper feelings. She’s fond of you, though, Joseph. And she knows you’re a decent man. That I am certain of, and I think if you approach her slowly you have good reasons to hope. Ask her to the dance. I’d be willing to bet she’ll say yes.”
“Really?”
“Really.”
“I might do that, then. Thank you Emilie.” He squeezed her shoulder to show his gratitude. Emilie stopped smiling as soon as he turned around to start walking, as if the smile she’d plastered on her face actually hurt. She followed Joseph but kept a distance between them, a space large enough to accommodate her brother’s hopes and her own clashing desperation.
Angeline took a deep breath of fresh air as she walked out of the mill after the siren announced the end of her thirteen-hour shift. She heard some of her coworkers cough. The humidity and thick cotton dust of the mill were slow killers. Angeline had already lost two friends to brown lung disease since she’d started as a spinner. The lung infection started with a cough and breathing difficulties that got better for some, but much worse for others. Fortunately, Angeline had never been that affected by the thick wet air of the mill. It was not pleasant, of course, and she always enjoyed her first breath of fresh air after work, but she’d never had so much as a tickle in her throat.
She knew the air of the mill had nothing to do with her current difficulty to breathe. No, the awkwardness of her morning walk to the mill with Emilie and Joseph was entirely to blame. The dynamics of their trio had undeniably changed, and there was no turning back. Angeline did like Joseph very much, but she’d never thought of him as a suitor. At fifteen, she still felt too young to think of suitors. Joseph was a good friend. One who’d been there for her since the first day they’d met, just like his sister.
After Emilie had left her family’s apartment the night before, however, Angeline has started to imagine Joseph as more than a friend. It was true that Joseph was by far the best prospect any young woman could dream of in Flint Village. Choosing him as a suitor would mean she would be respected and would also protect her from the multiple annoying propositions and requests she received from other boys. Yet she hesitated.
She hesitated because what she felt for Joseph was not the all-consuming love Emilie had told her about when they discussed the novels she read. She hesitated because her best friend, the one person on whom she thought she could always rely, seemed to push her toward a marriage of reason rather than love, and that made no sense to Angeline. The more she thought about it, the more she felt hurt by the way Emilie had presented Joseph as a perfect provider for Angeline. Didn’t Emilie think Angeline was deserving of the same kind of love she wanted for herself? She wished she had the courage to ask Emilie.
Then again, sometimes it seemed like Emilie had given up on love entirely. Love was an afterthought in her discussions of the books she read recently and she never talked about her ideal romance anymore. She talked about more serious topics like women’s right to vote and the corruption of American politics. Angeline was often lost, at sea in Emilie’s speeches. Perhaps that was the real reason why Emilie was pushing her away toward her brother. Perhaps Angeline was no longer interesting enough as a friend. Angeline gasped at the thought and tears fell to her cheeks. That’s what really hurt. She felt like Emilie was pushing her away when she wanted nothing more than to spend all of her time with Emilie. Learn from her, make her laugh.
When Emilie laughed, her face went through a complete metamorphosis. First the crease between her thick eyebrows that gave her that permanent serious look disappeared as her eyebrows lifted up. Almost at the same time, her black eyes took a sparkling shine that lit up her entire face. Then her thin-lipped mouth opened in l
oud laughter, showing two rows of perfectly straight and white teeth, a sight that was rare in their community. It was beautiful to see such solemn features, similar to those of a nun, transform to a childlike expression of complete abandon. Angeline could never get tired of making Emilie laugh.
Angeline’s thoughts were interrupted when Joseph and Emilie approached. They smiled timidly at one another and Joseph took a deep breath before he spoke. “Angeline, I was hoping I could have a moment alone with you, if you don’t mind.”
Before Angeline could agree or disagree, Emilie took the lead. “Of course, the two of you go ahead and talk. I’ll catch up with you later on.”
Angeline considered the arm Joseph was offering and since Emilie had already disappeared when she looked up again, she accepted the offer. She held Joseph’s arm as they walked, something she’d done so naturally with Emilie many times before, but it felt so much more formal and artificial now. Angeline felt the tension in Joseph’s muscles through his overcoat. Under different circumstances she would have found a way to make him laugh to release some of that tension, but she just waited for him to talk instead. When he finally did, he was so proper Angeline barely recognized the boy she’d been friends with. “Angeline, I was hoping you would do me the honor of going to the dance with me this Saturday.”
This was ridiculous, Angeline thought. This was Joseph, one of her best friends. She couldn’t stand seeing him so nervous. “Relax. Joseph, it’s just me you’re talking to. And I’ll be happy to go to the dance with you.”
“You will?” he asked in a voice that was already much closer to the voice of the boy she knew and cared so much about.
“I will, Joseph.” Angeline watched him sigh with relief and smile with pride before she added, “But it’s just a dance, Joseph. I’m not ready to discuss anything more serious than that. I would really like us to continue being friends and see where this leads us in a year or two. That means I’ll go to dances with you, and other such events if you want me to, but we need to take things very slowly. Can you deal with that?”
Angeline thought Joseph might be disappointed but instead his smile extended even further. “Yes, I can deal with that, Angeline. I promise I will respect your wishes. All I want is a chance to spend time with you and show you that we could be really good together. Thank you for giving me that chance.” As if his joy were contagious, Angeline couldn’t help but smile. She kept holding his arm as they walked in the cold and Angeline tried to ignore the fact that Emilie never caught up with them. Joseph walked Angeline all the way to her door like a perfect gentleman and said good night.
Angeline entered the Fourniers’ apartment and smiled as she imagined her mother’s reaction when she told her about the dance. She would be overjoyed and excited to help Angeline choose the perfect dress. Emilie wouldn’t be at the dance and that was unfortunate, but as Angeline chased that dark thought away, a new thought came to her mind and made her smile even more. If she ever ended up marrying Joseph, she would always be close to Emilie. She wondered if Emilie had considered that fact when she’d pushed her toward her brother. Of course she had. Emilie always considered every side to any situation. Maybe Emilie didn’t want to drive Angeline away after all. Maybe she wanted to keep her close to her the only way she could. The thought comforted Angeline to the point where she almost got excited about going to the dance with Joseph.
Chapter Eleven
July 1896
Emilie turned seventeen on July fifth, a Sunday. Joseph had gone to the Fourth of July dance with Angeline the night before and was so tired the next morning he’d almost fallen asleep in church, so Emilie didn’t have to work too hard to convince him to stay home and rest instead of walking her to the Banvilles’. It was not the first time she’d attempted to assure him she could make the trip by herself and be safe, but it was the first time she succeeded. Emilie knew Joseph would regret it as soon as he was rested enough but she’d already be at the Banville residence by then. She wanted to walk alone because she needed to think a little more about the book she planned on discussing with Maurice.
For several months now, Emilie’s favorite author had been Emile Zola. She felt she could trust his portrait of France during the Second Empire in his series of novels focusing on two families of that period from 1852 to 1870, when France was ruled by Emperor Napoleon III. Zola was part of the French Naturalism movement and to Emilie that meant that everything he wrote was realistic and could actually happen in the context of his story. Through Zola she was learning about France and even more about French people and she couldn’t get enough. The novels she’d read so far had inspired great conversations with Maurice, who’d been to Paris on two occasions in more recent years. He explained how things had changed or not changed that much since the Second Empire and she hung on every word he said.
The last book she’d read was Nana and Emilie didn’t know how she could articulate her questions about very specific passages of the book that weren’t really related to the main story. Nana Coupeau was a performer at the Théâtre des Variétés who ruined every man who was unfortunate enough to fall for her or develop any kind of carnal relationship with her. She took all of their money and even drove one to commit suicide. Nana ended up dying of smallpox, Zola’s way of punishing her for her sins, Emilie thought. Nana’s unscrupulous nature and the fact that she was a high-class prostitute were not what troubled Emilie so much though. At seventeen she’d already read about so many things other Flint girls her age knew nothing about. It took more and more to shake her.
Yet the brief relationship between Nana and another prostitute named Satin had raised all kinds of questions and emotions in Emilie. The two women started out as friends but then kissed on the lips and Zola hinted at more intimate caresses that created a relationship made of feelings Emilie attributed to couples: possessiveness, jealousy, love. Yes, Emilie was certain the two women had been in love.
But how could that be? Were there really women out there who were in love with other women? And if so, were there women who were in love exclusively with women? Those were the questions she didn’t know how to ask Maurice. Not to mention other questions, even more perverse, she couldn’t even ask herself yet. She blushed every time she tried to think of them or put them into words. Just imagining the kind of caress Zola had suggested sent an unfamiliar heat through her and left her cheeks flushed and lower parts of her body tingling in a way she couldn’t remember feeling before. It was an exciting sensation, perhaps, but it was even more disturbing because she couldn’t help thinking it was wrong. Especially when thoughts of Angeline popped into her mind at the same time.
“Whoa! You plan on going far like that?”
Maurice’s voice startled Emilie and she stopped walking to turn toward him. She was so absorbed in her musings she would have walked right past the Banvilles’ Victorian home if Maurice hadn’t stopped her. She worried that her unsettling thoughts were visible on her face as she walked up the stairs that led to the porch. “I guess I was distracted.”
“I guess you were,” he said, and let out the deep, comforting laughter that never failed to pacify Emilie’s stormy thoughts. She laughed and hugged Maurice. On warm summer days like today, they sat on the porch instead of staying in the parlor. “Helen had somewhere else to be but will join us later, so we can start talking about your book first if you want.”
Maurice sat in his favorite wooden rocking chair and Emilie seated herself on a small wooden stool facing him. The one time Helen was not there to chat about her charity work and mundane events was the one time Emilie would have welcomed it. It would have given her more time to pull her thoughts together. Fortunately, Rose gave her a little of that much needed time when she came out on the porch to serve them tea.
“How are you doing on such a beautiful day, Rose?”
“I can’t complain, Miss Levesque,” was all Rose answered before she went back inside, leaving the teapot on the low square table that separated Maurice’s rocking
chair and another that looked just the same—even though Maurice swore it was different—from the two stools Emilie preferred. Emilie reached for her leather mailbag and timidly placed Nana next to the teapot on the table.
Maurice read the title and laughed again. Emilie looked at him and thought she could see him blush through his beard. “Oh, my dear Emilie, you can really pick them, can’t you? Sometimes I wonder if giving you full access to my library is such a good idea. You do realize you couldn’t find some of the books you read in the public library, don’t you?”
“I do. And I’m very grateful for the opportunity.”
He kept laughing, embarrassed as much as amused. Emilie knew he would never keep her from reading any book she wanted, though, even if discussing certain books sometimes put him in an awkward position. Like today.
After Maurice finally stopped laughing, they managed to talk as seriously as they could about prostitution and about how Emilie saw Nana’s death as a way for Zola to show that Nana’s actions could only be punished by a horrible death. They always found a way to tackle any subject, Emilie realized with relief. Yet she still hesitated to ask about the one aspect of the book that most intrigued her. And since Maurice read her like an open book, he knew it. “Something else in that book got you raddled up, young lady. What is it?” He smiled at her but the smile was inviting, different from his usual mocking grin.
Emilie opened her mouth and nothing came out. Finally she took a deep breath and found the courage to speak. “You’re right. There’s something else. I was wondering about the relationship between Nana and Satin.”
Maurice shifted positions uncomfortably in his chair. “Hmm. What about it?”
Emilie hesitated again when she realized the question caused Maurice some discomfort, but it was too late to back out, so she continued. “I was wondering if it’s something that really happens in France. Two women who have the same kind of relationship a man and a woman would have.”
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