‘Hello,’ said a voice beside me, in English. ‘You want come and talk?’
‘Um – no thanks,’ I said, heart pounding. I didn’t want to talk to a stranger, not to mention this guy was at least ten years older than me and looked like a murderer.
But he wasn’t taking no for an answer. I had to speed up, walking faster and faster, until he finally dropped behind.
That was the second time that had happened today. The guy before had known I was English too. I wondered how high their success rate was – did anyone ever turn round and say, ‘Yes, actually, I would love to hang out with you, sinister park stranger’? I didn’t know if it was a cultural gap or just harassment, but either way, it wasn’t nice.
If I’d had my normal resources, my instant reaction would have been to message all my friends, or even post a tweet saying what had happened. And I would have had a ton of messages in support. But now that I was offline, I had to manage my bad feelings all by myself, and I didn’t like it one bit.
Chapter Eighteen
When Sunday came, and it was finally time for our boarders’ outing, I was practically clawing the walls.
The group waiting in the reception area was much smaller than I’d expected. The girls were all there, bar Fletcher, but hardly any of the boys had shown up. The only males to make it were Jun, a very tall and silent Chinese boy and Richard, a very small English guy with glasses and an eager expression. Even our Head of Boarders – Mr Woods, a hipstery American guy who taught English – looked like he was dreading it. Clearly the Boarders’ Outing was not an A-List event.
‘Hey!’ Richard said to me. ‘Live long and prosper!’
‘What? Oh.’ I looked down. Unable to decide on an outfit, I had pulled on my Star Trek T-shirt – a gift from my dad after his most recent Trekkie convention. I had thought it was discreet, but Richard could obviously spot a tiny Enterprise logo at twenty feet.
Like a twit, I heard myself saying, ‘Live long and prosper. Or as they say in Vulcan: Dif-tor heh smusm.’
Richard’s mouth dropped open. ‘Wow,’ he said. ‘You speak Vulcan?’
‘No, no.’ I was already regretting this. But I didn’t want to be unfriendly, so I said, ‘Just that phrase. And a bit of Klingon.’ In the background, behind Richard, I noticed that Tariq had arrived. Surely he would have better things to do?
‘Klingon!’ Richard said. ‘That’s even better! Say something in Klingon.’
His eyes were riveted on me. What a pity I’d never had a boy my own age look at me that way.
‘Sure. Um …’ How was this happening? ‘Qastah Nuh. It means, “What’s happening.”’
‘Quester Nuck,’ Richard repeated obediently.
Tariq was approaching us. I said, ‘Great.’
‘Quester – no, I’ve forgotten it. What is it again?’
‘Qastah Nuh,’ I told him, dying inside.
‘She speaks Klingon!’ Richard told Tariq.
I smiled weakly, wishing the ground would swallow me up. Tariq said, ‘Cool!’ and escaped quickly; I couldn’t blame him.
Soon Mr Woods herded us into an awkward crocodile and we were off, down rue Bonaparte. On our right was the Place Saint-Sulpice, at its centre a white marble fountain guarded by four enormous stone lions. The sun sparkled on the falling water; pigeons scattered as people went by in their Sunday best. And this wasn’t even one of the sights of Paris. It was just a square. Though I’d seen all this before, I would never get tired of it.
Ahead of me were the three blonde girls, their perfect bottoms swaying in denimed unison. Jiao and Huan were somewhere behind me, chatting happily together. They were like the toys in Toy Story; they only came alive when you left them alone. Unlike me. Being left alone seemed to be making me even weirder.
‘Hi!’ said a voice beside me.
I braced myself for more Klingon lessons. But it was Tariq. I was torn between relief that he’d rescued me from being alone, admiration at his good manners, and shame that he was having to do it again.
‘How are you?’ he asked. ‘What’ve you been up to this weekend?’
I hesitated. The truthful answer was: homework, wandering around Paris by myself, and doing a Buzzfeed quiz on which item of stationery I was. (A pencil, apparently).
‘Mainly working. Oh, and I went out for sushi on Friday night with Vee and Kiyoshi and Priya,’ I said, happy to show him I had friends – just not on me. ‘How about you?’
‘Usual routine,’ he said. ‘Fencing and study on Saturday …’
Fencing? I knew were were in Paris, but what was he, a Musketeer?
‘Then out with Pris on Saturday night … We saw that film, you know the one where the White House gets blown up during the State of the Union and only the security guard survives?’
‘Let me guess,’ I said. ‘He manages to defeat all the bad guys despite having no weapons, appropriate training or backup?’
‘I’m shocked!’ Tariq said. ‘How did you know? You must have seen it.’
I shook my head. ‘Just a guess.’
‘Tariq!’ It was Mr Woods. ‘Can you come here a second?’
‘Yes, sure!’ Tariq said promptly. ‘To be continued,’ he added to me.
Chapter Nineteen
The metro station was called Mabillon. I was learning that each station had its own character; this one seemed the epicentre of studenty, hip, bustling Paris, always surrounded by teens in skinny jeans and big scarves talking and smoking simultaneously without drawing breath. With its Art Nouveau sign and green-and-white tiles, it was prettier than any underground transport system had a right to be. Maybe that was why everybody here was so beautiful and well dressed, I mused. Living among such beauty, all day every day, some of it had to rub off.
Down on the platform, Tariq was talking to Richard and Mr Woods, so I forced myself to go up to the Three Blondes. They welcomed me in a friendly enough way.
‘Photo op!’ said Kristina. As they leaned in for a selfie, I was almost blinded by all their teeth.
‘Come on, Lola!’ Mette told me, as they went for a second one.
‘No, it’s fine!’ I said, shrinking away from the camera again. ‘I look awful today,’ I added in explanation.
‘No, you look great!’ said Lauren, shaking back her gleaming blonde hair. I wondered if she ever had a moment’s self-doubt or even a spot or a bad hair day.
‘So, do you have a boyfriend?’ Kristina asked me, as we rode the swaying train.
When I shook my head, she said, ‘How long have you been single?’
Seventeen years? I thought. The truth was, I had never really had a proper boyfriend. The closest I’d ever come was five confusing weeks with Dane Willet, whose underwear was always showing and who dumped me on my birthday.
‘A while,’ I muttered.
‘You’ll definitely meet someone in Paris,’ said Mette. ‘Everybody does. I lost my virginity the week after I got here!’
‘I waited a month,’ said Kristina. ‘But I didn’t start enjoying it till I met Fabrice. He’s so much better than Stefan was.’
My jaw was on the floor. They were talking in totally normal voices, like they were discussing homework. And Mr Woods was only a few people away, down the carriage. He could hear them and they didn’t care!
It was official: these were not my people. They were all perfectly nice – but they were terrifying in their extreme lack of self-consciousness. Forget my dodgy past; if they knew I’d been here a week without losing my virginity, I was fairly sure they would disown me.
Eventually we emerged from the train at rue de Rivoli, and crossed the road to go through an arch in a high wall. Once again my jaw dropped, but this time it was from all the splendour around me. The Louvre seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see: a set of imposing facades, gathered around the glass pyramid that was flanked by fountains. Beyond the courtyard where we stood was a huge park, unrolling far into the distance.
‘Ok, folks, huddle!’ said Mr Woods.
We herded together, joining all the other tour groups milling around.
‘I know most of you have already been here. You’ve already seen the Kim Kardashian of the sixteenth century, AKA …’
‘The Mona Lisa!’ said Richard.
‘Right! But, guys, the Louvre wasn’t always an art museum. It was built in the 1200s and soon became one of the palaces of the kings of France. It was François I, in the sixteenth century, who decided to mix it up. He tore down all the old medieval stuff and pimped this crib into the Renaissance pad we see today …’
I cringed inside. Mr Woods was nice, but he was obviously one of those teachers who thought we couldn’t understand anything unless it was framed in slightly out-of-date pop culture references.
‘Then in the 1680s it was pause, record scratch, and the royal court was relocated to where?’
‘Louis XIV moved it to the Château de Versailles,’ said Jun in his quiet voice. Jun was in my History class and it was clear that he knew far more about European history than any of us. In fact, I had yet to hear him answer a question wrong in any class.
‘Right! He was sick of living in town, and he wanted to be able to kick back with his nobles and make a place that would be … the Coachella of the seventeenth century.’
Turning away, I caught Tariq’s eye. He was obviously trying not to smile, too.
‘And that was where I think he made his worst mistake,’ said Mr Woods. ‘Because moving the court to Versailles meant that the nobles lost touch with what ordinary people were thinking, which led 100 years later to … Any idea?’
‘The French Revolution,’ Lauren said.
‘Of course, the French Revolution. And during the Revolution they obviously looted all the paintings owned by the royal family and the nobles. Kind of like they did during the London riots, isn’t that right, Lola? And they decided to put them here, for ordinary people to enjoy them. Like us! So in we go.’
I found myself beside Tariq in the queue. He said quietly, ‘So in the London riots, did they focus on seventeenth century oil paintings – or were they more into the eighteenth century?’
‘It was mainly sculpture,’ I said, with a grin.
Tariq laughed. ‘He is really a great teacher,’ he said. ‘He just …’
‘Doesn’t trust us to understand anything earlier than Jay-Z?’ I suggested.
‘The way he put it is that school is analogue and we need to make things digital,’ Tariq said.
I groaned.
Inside, the marble floors echoed to the noise of thousands of visitors, their feet squeaking beneath the serene stares of Greek and Roman marble statues. Our bags were checked very thoroughly and we all had to walk through metal detectors, before we were finally allowed in.
We went straight to the room with the Mona Lisa in it. Mr Woods didn’t have to tell us this; it was obvious from the enormous crowd gathered around one of the pictures. The others all surged forward to take pictures of it over the heads of the crowd – all except Jun, who started carefully examining one of the other paintings. Jiao and Huan were taking pictures of each other methodically in front of every painting in the room.
‘You don’t want a selfie with the Kim Kardashian of her day?’ Tariq asked me.
I shook my head. ‘I hate it when people do that – just take a picture of a thing without even looking at it.’
‘They don’t need to look at it. They just need proof they were here.’
We moved away to look at the other paintings in the room. One of them showed a man who looked like the Mona Lisa except with longer hair, pointing upwards at the sky.
‘Hey guys,’ said Mr Woods, joining us. ‘Pretty rad, huh? This is John the Baptist, also by Leonardo.’
Once he dropped the pop culture references, his explanation of the painting was actually very interesting. The group reconfigured and we went on and on, past endless masterpieces. The names began to blur together; Raphael, Leonardo, David, Delacroix … I could feel myself getting distracted. Tariq was with the blonde girls, who were giggling over some nudes. Mr Woods was explaining a painting to Jun and Hiao.
‘Think of self-portraits as the selfies of their day,’ I heard him say.
‘Lola!’ It was Richard again. ‘Don’t you think this one looks like Captain Kirk?’
‘A little bit,’ I said, looking sideways at the portrait.
‘Which is your favourite episode?’
I tried to come up with a few for him, inwardly deciding that I would never wear that T-shirt in public again. Why had I ever admitted I knew anything about Star Trek? I knew why, of course. I couldn’t resist showing off – even something as pathetic as my knowledge of Klingon. From now on, I would try and think before I spoke.
Chapter Twenty
After we finished in the Louvre, we went outside and walked through the Jardin des Tuileries: another beautifully manicured expanse of gravelled paths, stone fountains and green hedges. It felt as if we should have been sweeping through it in crinolines and powdered wigs, instead of Nike trainers and North Face backpacks. At the end of the garden, a Ferris wheel turned slowly. Beyond it, way in the distance, was the Arc de Triomphe. It lined up so exactly with the arches in the Louvre that it was like looking through the wrong end of a telescope.
It was warmer and sunnier now, and everyone was taking off their coats. We were heading towards a green-roofed little pavilion where the plan was to get hot chocolates. Beyond it I could see what looked like another museum.
‘That’s the Orangerie museum,’ Mette told me. ‘And across the river – the big building that looks like a railway station – that’s the Musée d’Orsay. Great place to meet guys!’
I was starting to realise how much there was to see in Paris, and how little I had seen of any of it. If I stayed here for years and years, I wouldn’t even touch the surface of it.
‘Isn’t it great?’ said a voice beside us. ‘I always feel like I should be in a periwig and silk trousers when I’m here.’
It was Tariq again.
‘Yes, I was just thinking that!’ I shook my head. ‘It’s so beautiful though … it’s almost overwhelming.’
‘I know,’ Tariq said. ‘Sometimes, when I’ve been here for too long, I get sensory overload. I just feel like I need to see some concrete or barbed wire or something to let my brain rest.’
I laughed; Mette looked puzzled.
‘Luckily my parents live in Dubai, which is extremely restful, because there’s a bit less to do there,’ Tariq said.
‘Is that where you’re from?’ I said. I didn’t think so, but I didn’t want to assume either way.
‘No.’ He sounded very empathic about it. ‘I’m from Lahore. In Pakistan.’
‘I know where Lahore is,’ I muttered. Then I kicked myself. He was probably always having to explain where it was. ‘Are there good museums there?’
‘Why, yes, there are. Actually we have the oldest museum in Pakistan. It’s very famous – though the Louvre is a slightly bigger deal.’ He grinned.
Mette, obviously bored, drifted off to join the others. I tried to think of something else to say.
‘So,’ said Tariq, ‘Are you doing Klingon as your language option?’
I went horribly red again. ‘No! It’s my dad, he’s really into Star Trek. So I’ve picked up bits here and there.’ Why did I keep on talking about my dad and Star Trek?
‘Have you got brothers or sisters?’
‘One brother. He’s thirteen going on fourteen.’ I added, ‘My parents just bought him a Segway.’
‘A Segway? Gosh. I got a new bike when my sister went to boarding school. Now I feel short-changed.’
‘Really?’ I stopped short. ‘Is that a thing?’
‘I don’t know if it’s an actual, official thing. But it definitely happens. It’s like they feel sorry for the one who won’t have the joy of wearing pants with their name sewn into them for eight weeks at a time.’
I laughed, though, like a loon, I f
elt myself blushing at the mention of pants.
‘I am lucky that I’m boarding in Paris, though,’ he said. ‘My sisters all boarded in England for their secondary school. But I wasn’t keen on that, for various reasons. Not least, the boarding schools are all in the middle of the country. There’s nowhere to get your hair cut, or buy clothes, so you end up looking like a homeless person.’
I thought he must have led a sheltered life if he thought boarding-school kids looked anything like homeless people. He looked immaculate as ever, even though he was dressed down today – with jeans, a black woollen coat, and a navy scarf looped around his neck. Even his white Van trainers looked clean. I considered saying, ‘Damn, Tariq, at it again with the white Vans,’ but I decided we’d had enough out-of-date pop culture for the day.
‘So how many sisters do you have?’ I asked.
‘Three. One lives in Dubai with my parents, one’s at Cambridge, and one lives in Islamabad.’
‘So … If your parents live in Dubai, and Pakistan is home, how did you end up in Paris?’ I asked curiously.
He laughed ‘It does sound shady, doesn’t it – like they were trying to get rid of me. Basically, we lived in Lahore until I was twelve. Then we moved to Paris, and I enrolled here at Jean Monnet. My dad got a job in Dubai, last summer – he’s a diplomat. I didn’t want to move again, especially since there was the option to board – so I stayed here.’
‘Oh, I see. That must have been hard?’
Ahead of us, Jun was leaning in for a picture beside a grinning Mette.
‘A little. But … Jun came here at the start of the year, by himself, to learn English and French. He’d didn’t know anyone here at all; he’d never been away from China before. So that puts it in perspective.’
‘Oh. I suppose.’ I felt a little embarrassed. Now I was the one who sounded sheltered.
‘I don’t think I’d want to live in Dubai anyway,’ he said. ‘I want to go back to Pakistan again. But first I’ve got my five-year plan.’
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