What's Not True

by Valerie Taylor

  “I don’t think so, Hercule.” Kassie picked up the note she’d received from Tom and read it aloud for what was probably the tenth time.

  “‘Kassie, Sorry to intrude’ . . . yeah, right, he’s already succeeded with that. Thank you very much.” She waved the letter in the air. “Blah, blah, blah.” She paced the room, rubbing the back of her neck. “‘Since you’re in town, Mimi wants to bounce an idea off you.’” She stopped in front of Chris, who lay across the bed, lifting one garment at a time out of her suitcase.

  “Stop that.” She grabbed her red bra out of his hands and slung it across the room. “Next thing you know you’ll be sniffing my clothes.”

  “What’s wrong with that?”

  “Just stop it. This is serious. My whole career may ride on what happens tomorrow.”

  “You’re being a bit melodramatic.”

  “Am I? Mimi has an idea. An idea doesn’t sound like she’s giving me a package to bring back home, does it? And then he says, ‘I know I can count on you.’ What a crock of shit. Finally, after years of my loyalty, dedication, and being pissed on, he says he can count on me.”

  “Whatever it is, Tom knows you won’t screw it up.”

  “But I have nothing to wear. And it’s all your fault.” Kassie covered her face with her hands and dropped to the floor.

  Kassie recovered when Chris offered to postpone their excursion to the Louvre until Wednesday and suggested a better idea: shopping. A shopping spree would take her mind off the why of the meeting and concern herself with the how. It should be easy to find something to buy in Paris that was business appropriate, and while she was blowing up her credit cards, he could window shop, because according to Chris, isn’t that what men mostly do? God forbid they shop for themselves and try something on.

  “Do you think the internet exists so men don’t have to shop in public?” Kassie asked.

  “Look it up. There must be stats comparing online versus brick-and-mortar buying behavior by sex.”

  “Doesn’t matter. I do both.”

  “That’s obvious. Shoes. Maybe I’ll look for shoes. Or a belt. Anything leather,” Chris said as they scurried like starving mice to the boulangerie across the street for their morning coffee and pastry. Two days in a row they’d started their day this way. On the third day it would officially become a habit, according to people who professed to know these things. Whatever would they do when they were back in the States?

  “How do French women stay so thin?” Kassie whispered as she spread butter and raspberry jam on her croissant. “At this rate, even if I had a suit with me, I probably wouldn’t fit into it.”

  “Not to worry. We’ll work it off later.” Chris stroked her hair.

  Kassie sighed and leaned into his warm, sturdy body.

  “This is good.” Kassie didn’t mean the croissant. At first, in Venice, she was unsure of the viability of taking up with Chris again. In reality, it took less than seventy-two hours to suppress her anxiety. It was déjà vu. The butterflies she’d felt years ago on the Rialto bridge in Venice sprung loose once again. Flooding her heart. Filling her lungs with the love she once had for him but was forced to surrender when she discovered he was Mike’s son.

  Over the last year, she’d convinced herself her number-one priority was her career; not Chris, who obviously was persona non grata; not Mike, who was soon to be her ex; and certainly not her mother, who actually was dead. No one was stopping her. No one in her way. Her time had come.

  “Go for it, girl,” her assistant Vicki had encouraged her as they fist bumped after a week of long nights at the office.

  Sitting there now with Chris, in Paris, seemingly away from the stresses of business and divorce, she wondered whether she could have both—her career and Chris—and succeed at both. Would she be happy having one without the other?

  “What’s that you’re humming?” Chris interrupted Kassie’s meanderings.

  “Oh, you probably wouldn’t know it.”

  “Try me.”

  “My mother used to sing it to me. ‘Love and Marriage.’ Frank Sinatra, if I recall.”

  Kassie sang the lyrics softly, hoping only Chris would hear it. Then she explained, “You can’t separate love and marriage. You can never have one without the other. They’re like Laurel and Hardy.”

  Chris gave her an oh-come-on look.

  “Or Belichick and Brady,” she said, confident he’d get the more contemporary reference.

  “Marriage? Is that what’s on your mind?”

  “Uh, no, not really.” Without thinking, she rubbed her wedding ring. “Not marriage in the literal sense. More like love and career. Can a relationship based on true love and a career based on ambition survive?”

  “Are you talking about us?”

  “I want my career, Chris.”

  “And I love you. So I think we’re like Sinatra’s other song. Two coins in a fountain.” Chris snuck his hand under her arm and tickled her.

  Kassie dissolved into laughter. “It’s three coins, you idiot!”

  An hour later, they walked into La Maison de Paris, stopping dead in their tracks in front of a two-story fountain whose cascading water appeared to change colors. Chris reached over and lifted Kassie’s chin that’d dropped to her chest, kissed her, and slipped three coins into her hand.

  “Did you know, this was the first department store in the whole wide world? Opened 1862,” Chris said.

  “You mean 1962,” Kassie corrected.

  “No, Madame, your husband is partially right. We opened in 1862, ten years after Le Bon Marché, making us the second in the world.” Kassie and Chris turned toward the voice.

  “Oh, we’re not married.” Kassie waved her finger between her and Chris, caring less about the age of the store. She wasn’t there for a history lesson.

  “Dazzling,” Chris mouthed, gazing upward. Kassie hoped he was admiring the five-story atrium with its gleaming chrome railings and glass partitions, not the long-limbed lady with straight pewter-colored hair who’d greeted them.

  “How can we help you aujourd’hui?”

  “I came here with no clothes.”

  The femme fatale’s eyes widened. Dollar signs. She sees dollar signs. Kassie tried to convey her thoughts to Chris.

  “Not no clothes. Just not the right outfits for tonight and tomorrow,” Chris piped in.

  “Plural?” Kassie said.

  “Don’t argue. Take my word for it.”

  “Well, Mademoiselle, I’m Gabriella. I’m happy to be your personal shopper. Be trés sure La Maison de Paris can fulfill your every desire. Won’t you come with me? Comment vous appelez-vous?”

  “Kassie.” Proud she knew that much French, she touched her hand to her chest and then his arm. “Chris.”

  “Um. If you ladies don’t mind? I’m going to leave you two. Do a little shopping of my own.” Chris gave Kassie the “call me” hand signal and said, “When you’re done. Take your time.”

  Kassie gasped, “What the?” as Chris hustled out the sparkling glass doors, leaving her in a fantasy world to fend for herself. “Not sure where he’s going?”

  Gabriella ushered Kassie toward a bank of elevators. The doors opened and dinged as if they sensed their arrival. “Ready, Mademoiselle?”

  “It’s really Madame, for now. It’s a long story. How much time do you have?”

  Feeling like a queen, or even a princess, was not on Kassie’s travel itinerary, no matter where she traveled in Europe—whether vacationing with Annie in Venice as originally planned, or touring in Paris with Chris, or shopping with Gabriella, to be precise. All she needed was something businesslike to wear to a business meeting. Not a lot of hoop dee doo required.

  But Gabriella had other objectives.

  Rather than look through racks of petites and haul mostly separates into a claustrophobic dressing room, Kassie was directed toward a mirrored room three times larger than the walk-in closet she had in the Ricci house back in Boston. A woman named Lo
uisa asked for the clothes she was wearing, which just an hour before were crunched in her suitcase, and handed them to an even younger woman named Zoe, who hung them on hangers covered in pink silk.

  Louisa held her hand and led her to a circular platform, where Kassie was immediately embarrassed upon hearing Louisa announce her measurements to Zoe.

  “Maybe you don’t have anything to fit me,” Kassie said, prepared to grab her garments and run like hell.

  “Absurdité,” Gabriella chimed in, frowning at Kassie’s stretched-out lingerie as she assisted her into a pink silk knee-length robe. “And new undergarments too, oui?”

  “Oui, oui. Kind of sad, but there’s a reason. . . .” Kassie looked down, embarrassed.

  Gabriella handed Kassie a flute of champagne, winked, and gave a nod to her assistants to leave them alone.

  “Sit, s’il vous plaît, Mademoiselle.”

  “Madame,” Kassie corrected, half wondering if she should just give up on that.

  “You have un histoire?”

  “History? Me and Chris? Yes, you could call it that.”

  “Handsome, oui. Certainement. I mean, you have a story about why you are here today? What event can I help you with?”

  Embarrassed again. Kassie decided it best to focus on buying clothes, not on Chris, who was off doing who knows what. KISS. Keep it simple, sweety.

  And thus began Kassie’s spiel about her predicament. Starting with the trip to Venice—how her best friend had pulled a fast one on her, which in the States would be called a bait and switch; how the same music played when Chris showed up again in St. Mark’s Square, serendipitous and freaky; how they thought Paris would be a good change of pace, but they’d forgotten about the World Cup—they had to be out of their minds; and how when her boss learned she was in Paris, he had the nerve to schedule an impromptu meeting with Mimi, the head of the Paris office, on Tuesday without asking if she had anything to wear. She didn’t. The nerve of him. That’s why she was there.

  Kassie polished off her second glass of champagne with “Oh, did I tell you I’m having an affair with my husband’s son?”

  “It’s Paris, Madame. C’est la vie. And Monsieur Chris is chaud, non?”

  “Hot? You noticed, like half the women in the world,” Kassie mumbled as she tried on the thirteenth dress. She hoped it was the lucky one.

  “Belle. Belle. This is it, tu ne crois pas?”

  “Yes, I think it’s beautiful.” Kassie slid her hands down the sleeveless midnight-blue tulip-shaped dress.

  “Vos yeux. The cowl neckline attracts your eyes.”

  “Not right for the meeting.” Kassie shook her head and chewed her pinky. “Something a little less sexy. Something that makes a strong statement.”

  “Rouge?” said a soft voice.

  “Non, Zoe, pas rouge,” Gabriella said.

  “Noir?”

  “Oui. Perhaps black.” Kassie wiggled out of the blue dress. “Depending—”

  Zoe uttered something foreign into her headset and disappeared.

  Kassie gazed at Gabriella as she whisked the blue and black dresses out of the dressing room. Clearly this wasn’t Gabriella’s first rodeo. She’d sized up Kassie in more ways than one and together with her accomplices found the perfect dress for the meeting with Mimi. Though a bit cher for her budget, Kassie decided to check with Chris before purchasing either or both of the dresses. As she waited for Chris to return, Kassie wandered around the store, humming the piped-in music, spritzing the latest designer perfumes. For the thrill of it, she felt the luscious fabrics of the latest French fashion trends draping skinny, yet shapely, mannequins. I’d be broke if I lived here.

  In her wanderings, she practiced how’d she’d rationalize the expense. The black dress spoke power and confidence. The simple three-quarter-length-sleeve boat-neck sheath fit her like a glove, and Zoe’s suggestion of a wide silver belt was pure stylistic genius. It accented her smallish waist and suggested Kassie had a flair for fashion. She thought if she could find the right shoes, the ensemble would impress Mimi. And the dress could be worn for many occasions, even a funeral, without the belt. But the blue dress cost twice as much as the black dress. It would be perfect for a night of frolicking in Paris and for special occasions back home. So the cost of it could be spread across multiple events, making the shopping spree a reasonable return on investment.

  Okay, that all made logical sense. But to whom? They were her dresses; there was no need for her to justify anything to Chris.

  Kassie felt his presence before she saw or heard him. He’d found her at the handbag counter and wrapped his arm around her waist.

  “What is it with women and pocketbooks?” Chris said.

  “You sound like my mother. Purses, not pocketbooks.”

  “Are you ready to go?”

  “I haven’t checked out yet.”

  “I took care of it. Where next?”

  “You’re shittin’ me!” Kassie said under her breath but loud enough for Chris to hear.

  “I bumped into Gabriella—nice name, by the way—on my way in. She said you’d selected two dresses like I suggested.”

  “Did she show them to you?”

  “Nope. I just gave her my AMEX card. So we’re good to go. Unless you have more shopping to do.”

  “I need shoes and a purse, not a pocketbook. But it’s too expensive here,” Kassie said as they pushed through the doors to the street. “Where are my dresses?”

  “On their way to the hotel.”

  “You think of everything, don’t you?” Kassie stuck her hands in her pockets and smirked. Not sure I can get used to this.

  16

  Lunch with Tiffany

  As they pushed their way out the revolving door of La Maison de Paris, a tall blonde Uber driver greeted Kassie and Chris. WTF? Is every woman in Paris a ten? The driver looked to Chris and asked, “Quelle destination maintenant?”

  “Ou est le meilleur shopping?” Once again Chris demonstrated he was comfortable asking for directions whatever side of the Atlantic he was on.

  “Rue du Commerce, Monsieur. Anything you possibly could want to buy you’ll find there.” The driver caught Chris’s eye in the rearview mirror and winked. “American?”

  “Oui. Yes,” Kassie responded, smacking that interaction in the bud.

  “Me too.”

  “Where?” Kassie jumped in before Chris could.

  “Chicago.”

  Oh, Christ. Here we go. Kassie slumped in the seat, giving up. She might as well have been left behind on the sidewalk.

  The next five minutes sounded like an episode of “This is your life, Mademoiselle Uber driver.” Though ten years younger than Chris, the driver had lots of friends who attended the University of Illinois, just as he did. What a coincidence. She had a degree in art history from the Art Institute of Chicago, which of course he had frequented when he lived there. Of course he did. She’d applied for a position at the Louvre and picked up this driving gig in the meantime. He applauded her for that, saying he’d do the same thing if he was in her shoes.

  At least he didn’t say in her pants. Kassie gazed out the window at the Paris hubbub, as the multilingual chatterboxes carried on their tête-à-tête.

  Kassie’s ears perked when she heard the words Chicago Cubs. Finally, baseball. Her turf.

  “You don’t look like the typical Cubbie fan,” Blondie said, admitting the White Sox were her team.

  “Red Sox will win the series this year.” Kassie tried to join the confab, not really understanding the genesis of her prognostication.

  “That’s because my first allegiance is to the Giants,” Chris said.

  Did he just ignore me?

  The driver’s sister lived in San Francisco. Oh, no, here we go again. Blah, blah, blah. Apparently, she’d visited a couple of times but couldn’t live there.

  “Tremblements de terre!” Miss Coquette rocked her hand from side to side.

  “I get it. Earthquakes. Rumblings
, like my stomach.” Kassie put her hand on her waist. Her intestines were talking to her. At least something was.

  “Hungry?” Chris finally took notice.

  Just in time, Kassie grabbed Chris’s attention and his hand and let her nose steer them toward the aroma of chicken frying and grease oozing from sizzling burgers. Sure enough, Le Petit Café was two doors down from where the Uber siren dropped them. One more minute in that car and Kassie wouldn’t have been responsible if Bad Kassie had eaten her alive.

  Standing outside the café, Chris stared at the sign that posted the hours. “Look.” He pointed to 14h30 and checked his watch. Always the help, Chris stopped her from counting on her fingers. “They close at two thirty. It’s only one, we’re good.”

  “Let’s eat inside.” Still holding his hand, Kassie led the way past those who chose the sidewalk tables. “I have to pee,” she mouthed to Chris.

  Billed as a small restaurant, Le Petit Café was anything but. And fancy too. Crystal water glasses, off-white plates, white linen napkins, and what looked like, but couldn’t possibly be, gold-plated forks and knives decorating the white tablecloths. Dull yellow and white tile laid pattern-less, most likely by a Parisian who’d had one cognac too many, broke up the monotony in the room. But it was the vintage French magazine posters that hung haphazardly around the restaurant and the mirrors that stretched from the ground floor to the ceiling of the second tier that made Kassie say, “Wow.” This was not your typical hamburger joint—be it French or American.

  “We’re lucky we got a table. Seems World Cup mania continues.”

  “Maybe it’s just uber popular.” She peered over the top of the menu, expecting him to get the joke.

  His eyes twinkled back.

  “Look at this menu, Chris. Is it the smells in here or reading the menu in French that’s making my mouth water? Asking for pommes de terre frites sounds so much better than saying, ‘I’ll have fries with that.’”

  This time he laughed.