by Jayne Tuttle
I drink in the book like a treasure. Perhaps Eveline was trying to show me that Paris heals, sometimes in mysterious ways. You must be patient, you must persevere.
After three months at Dad’s the brace comes off. Tests show that my spine has fully healed, and with time and care should not cause me any pain. My face has also healed, leaving a neat scar from midway up my right cheekbone into the hairline above my right ear, and a few smaller, unnoticeable scars on my chin.
If you didn’t look hard, you would never know I had been in an accident. But I know, and I’m glad the scars are there to remind me. I don’t want what happened to feel like a dream.
Dad and I walk to his rock and sit on it, watching the waves. Like before, I have no picture in my mind of what I’ll do next.
‘Perhaps you could study to be a spy now. Or prosecute French criminals.’
‘I definitely won’t be able to act for a while.’
‘Sorry about that,’ says Dad.
‘It’s okay,’ I say. ‘I’ll figure it out.’
When we get back that evening there’s a message in my inbox from Marie-France: I know you’re recovering, but I just got a commission to put together a play for a festival in summer in Paris. I propose we make a full-length play of ‘I’m Sorry, We Still Have Time’. If you can’t act, can you write and direct?
One month later, I’m on a plane to Paris.
Jayne Tuttle is a writer who splits her time between France and Australia. After graduating from the Lecoq Theatre School, she lived in Paris for more than a decade, working internationally as an actor and writer and publishing stories about life in Paris in newspapers, guides and magazines. She currently works for Paris advertising agencies as a bilingual copywriter.
Acknowledgements
Thank you to Melissa Kayser, and all at Hardie Grant Australia and UK, for bringing this book to life.
To my brilliant editor, Meredith Rose, and my indefatigable agent, Benython Oldfield, for their persistence and passion.
To my husband and creative partner, Matt Davis without whose eye, patience and endless encouragement this book would have no spark.
To my other most important collaborator, Frankie Davis, my daughter and eternal inspiration.
To my mother, Lyn Tuttle. I wish I could share this with you.
To my grandmother, Niela Laws, reading the dictionary in the sky.
To my beloved family: John, Anna, Rodney and Andrew Tuttle. To Christine Tuttle, Luke Elliot, Anna Hedgcock and Emily Tuttle. To all the Davis family.
To my creative inner sanctum: Marisa Purcell, Mary Kelly, Jemma Birrell, Martine Murray, Anna Elliot, Leigh Whannell, Corbett Tuck, Luke Davies, Kate dan den Boogert, Ashod Simonian.
To those who shaped this book with their friendship, support and creative guidance: Libby Little, Angelica Mesiti, Mathew McWilliams, Sylvia Whitman, Krista Halverson, Michele Davis-Gray, Michael Shmith, Paddy O’Reilly, Toni Jordan, Elsa Morgan, Nick Robinson, Rachael Coopes, Lucy Wadham, France Lane, Kate and Mal Heppell, Alice Retif, Kitty Walker, Suzie Wyllie, Alice Barker, Marylou Gilbert, Luke Milne, Michael Bula.
To Nathalie Delhaye, and Rose.
To SD, for the beautiful adventure of those two years.
To Chrystel Dozias and the Centre Les Récollets in Paris, for being my mothership all these years.
To France, for giving me the mystery grant, that to this day I still don’t understand.
To the École Internationale de Théâtre Jacques and my friends and teachers there. To Faye Lecoq, who supported and encouraged me always.
And to Jacques Lecoq, in spirit.