Secrets of Paris (34 page)

L
YDIE STUDIED A
road map showing the way to the Loire Valley, and realized that she had a new appreciation for the precision of maps. Four-lane highways, dead-end roads, scenic routes, public parks, historical monuments: all were marked. In the past, on trips outside the city with Michael, Lydie had relied on road signs and her sense of direction instead of maps; their rate of success for reaching their destination without major wrong turns was about fifty percent.

Reading the map, Lydie thought of Patrice and Kelly. Patrice, so forthright, with her clear sense of loyalty and betrayal, and Kelly, with her single-minded drive to escape poverty by getting to the United States, had inspired Lydie by their precision. They carved out their places in the world instead of taking what was thrown at them. Lydie thought of how she had come to Paris with
a vague sense that her marriage was going bad, with a stalled desire to live again—to really live, without always halting to consider the consequence of every small action. To take events as they came, with more pleasure and less apprehension.

She thought it incredible—revolutionary—that she could keep going, surer than she had in years, now that Michael had left her. Every morning she wakened with his face in mind, the blank sense that he wasn’t in bed with her. But then she would make coffee, make a mental list of things to be done for the ball, for Kelly. The list would push everything else out of her mind: her troubles with Michael, her father’s death, her mother back in New York.

The ball was just a week off. She studied the road map, plotting the best way for the d’Origny entourage to travel from Paris. Police cars raced down the quai, startling her. Then came a knock at the door.

Michael stood in the hallway. Lydie held the door open a crack, regarding him. “Hi,” she said.

“I want to talk to you,” he said.

The sight of him forced the checklist, the road map from her mind. The satisfying sense of precision was gone. “Come on in,” she said.

He held her shoulders at arm’s length, easing her into a chair. Then he sat in the chair opposite. She traced the textured bargello pattern on the chair’s arm with her thumb, afraid to look at him.

“Lydie,” Michael said. She stared at the pattern for a minute before raising her eyes. She felt startled to see his brown eyes, usually so clear, now bloodshot. Lack of sleep? Crying? Neither seemed impossible. “I want to start over,” he said.

“Starting over sounds good,” she said dryly. “But when? Before tonight, before coming to Paris? When?” She knew the two-parted answer: before Anne, before Neil’s death. But she wasn’t prepared for Michael’s response.

“Eleventh grade,” Michael said, deadpan.

“
Eleventh grade?
” she asked. “But why?”

“Why didn’t you like me then?”

Lydie frowned. “I
did
like you. I used to love watching you play basketball. But we didn’t know each other very well—we were in different crowds.”

“I wanted to ask you out,” Michael said. “I was dying to, every time I saw you.”

Lydie was dumbfounded. Michael had told this story before, usually in an offhanded way, at a party, as in “I was crazy about Lydie in high school, but she had no use for a jock.” Now his expression was totally serious, as if he had been dwelling on this for a while and needed an answer. She studied his hands, his wrists, his face. His features were exactly the same as they had been in high school, along with some accumulated sadness.

“I would have gone out with you,” she said. “I’m sure I would have.”

Michael shook his head. “No, you were in love with the priest.”

Lydie was about to laugh, to deny it, but Michael was right. She
had
loved Father Griffin. She remembered the nights she had lain awake, torturing herself with thoughts of what would happen if he broke his vows. She supposed that her crush on the priest had prevented her from dating high school boys, including Michael. “But that was just high school,” she said. “I fell in love with you the instant we reconnected—in Washington. For me it was love at first sight.”

“For me too,” Michael said. “Only my first sight took place about six years earlier than yours did.”

Lydie felt thrilled by the notion that Michael had been harboring such a romantic resentment all these years. He rose from his chair and began to pace, a frown on his face. He walked to the window, stared out at the Seine, gave her a sidelong glance. Then
he came to her, pulled her out of her chair and into his arms. Lydie said nothing, but she let him kiss her. It was a long gentle kiss, and it tasted so familiar she could hardly believe it.

When they pulled apart, his face was close to hers, and she could see an expectant look in his eyes. “What?” she asked.

“Is this starting over?” he asked.

“I can’t forget what happened,” she said, giving him a little involuntary push away. “I want to, but …” She couldn’t think how to finish the sentence. But what? But you’ve had an affair, but you betrayed me, but I’ve been a jerk …

“It probably can’t happen all at once,” he said. “I thought maybe it could. You know what it’s like when you go over and over something in your mind, till it’s all worked out and seems so clear and obvious? And then you mention it to someone who hasn’t been thinking about it at all, and you can’t understand why they don’t accept it instantly.”

“Oh, I’ve been thinking about it,” Lydie said. Her heart raced. Michael had been working this out in his mind? And what had he decided?

“I’m sorry for what I did to you,” he said. “I’m sorry for leaving. I’m sorry for … Anne Dumas.”

Even the sound of her name on his lips made Lydie feel cold. But she saw such regret in his eyes that she forgave him. “I know you’re sorry,” she said. “I can tell.”

“You can?”

“Yes. Your voice is shaking. And you look a little afraid—as if you think I’m going to hit you.”

“You should hit me,” Michael said. “But that’s not what I’m afraid of.” He made a move toward her, as if he wanted to touch her, but he held back. “I’m afraid I hurt you so badly you won’t have me back.”

I’ll have you back, Lydie wanted to say but couldn’t quite get
the words out. He
had
hurt her badly. She felt not at all confused, but she wasn’t quite ready to start over. She needed time to catch up, to do some of the thinking Michael had done, and, now that she had forgiven him, to forgive herself a little. Instead she said, “It wasn’t all your fault. I know life with me hasn’t been a trip to the beach.”

“That’s exactly what it’s been,” Michael said. Now he did touch her. First he put his hand on her shoulder, and she looked him straight in the eye, daring him to hug her. He did. “A trip to the beach. Some days are clear and fine, and then you have a tropical storm.”

“A hurricane,” Lydie said.

“A whopper,” Michael said. “Hurricane Gloria.”

And wasn’t it interesting, that he would name this personal, romantic hurricane “Gloria”? “Gloria,” to Lydie, sounded so hopeful, exuberant, even exultant. She wondered: was this the eye of the storm? Or had it moved out to sea, blown itself out over water?

“It’s been a little wild,” she said.

“A little,” Michael said, watching her.

“Would you mind if we lie down for a minute?” Lydie asked. “I’m feeling a bit light-headed.”

“We wouldn’t want you to faint,” Michael said. They walked toward their bedroom. Lydie
did
feel slightly dizzy, as it occurred to her, unbelievably, that in all the times she had walked with Michael into their Paris bedroom, this was the happiest she had felt.

“Much better,” she said, lying back on the pillow. Her hair must have fanned out above her head because Michael was touching it, tucking it behind her ears. His touch sent a tingle down her spine. She closed her eyes, and the next second he was kissing her.

“Are you still light-headed?” he whispered.

“Much more so,” she whispered back.

They lay there holding each other. Lydie kept her eyes closed some of the time. When she opened them, there was Michael, watching her. They touched each other’s necks, wrists, hair. She stroked his back, feeling the rough texture of his cotton shirt. Something kept them from taking off their clothes. She felt content, and so did Michael, to just lie still, next to each other. It was perfect, really.

After a long time, when it had grown dark and the pastel lights of the tour boats shimmered along their walls, Michael hitched himself up on his elbows. “Time to go?” he asked.

“I guess so,” Lydie said. It was true that she loved him but wasn’t ready for him to move back home. That it
was
his home she had no doubt. But she wanted to catch up with her feelings of love—they had come on so strong and suddenly after all that had happened.

“Is there something you want to ask me?” Michael asked.

Lydie considered. “Everything. But nothing in particular right now.”

“Maybe I should have said, ‘Is there anything you want to ask me
to
?’ ”

She grinned. “The ball,” she said.

He regarded her, saying nothing, waiting for her to go on.

“Will you come with me?” Lydie asked.

“I’d like nothing better,” Michael said.

W
HAT IF THE
worst happened and the petition was denied? Kelly lay on her bed, trying to calm the thrill that ran all through her body. It was her day off; soon her sisters and brothers would be home, and Kelly had done hardly anything around the house. All she could do was pace the floor, flip through old magazines Patrice had given her, and listen to music. Right now Barry Manilow was singing about love in New England. Kelly wondered what New England was like. Patrice had told her it snowed there, and Kelly knew what snow was. She had seen it at least six times during the eighteen months since she had arrived in Europe.

“Hello, lazybones,” Marie-Vic said, interrupting Kelly’s thoughts.

“Yes, I’m lazy,” Kelly said. Usually she and Marie-Vic had the same day off, but Marie-Vic had a new part-time job cleaning the apartment of her employers’ daughter.

“What are you doing? Daydreaming about the States?”

“A little,” Kelly said.

“Do you think the fish markets are the same there?”

“I don’t know. I don’t even know if the fish are the same there.”

“I think it is so strange that a country like the States doesn’t
have a national fish,” Marie-Vic said. “Maybe because it is so big and there are too many fishes to choose from.”

“I’ll miss milkfish in the States,” Kelly said.

“I’ll miss you,” Marie-Vic said, giving Kelly a pang in her heart. Kelly was Marie-Vic’s favorite sister. Marie-Vic told everyone that Kelly’s christening was one of the high points of Marie-Vic’s life. She couldn’t get over, especially, the importance of Kelly’s godparents: twelve vendors from the market, plus the son of the governor. So what if her parents had never met him? Kelly smiled fondly at Marie-Vic. “Are you the one who cast the spell?” Kelly asked. “The day of my interview?”

“Yes,” Marie-Vic said with a solemn smile.

Kelly thanked her. Their mother came from Visaya, a very remote island full of magic, phantoms, and a witch. She had two kinds of powers, Barang and Mankukulam, and had passed them on to some of her daughters. Kelly had never got the hang of it. Marie-Vic, the best at Mankukulam, had a drawerful of dolls that represented people they knew. If she met someone new she wanted to help or curse, she simply made a new doll. Their mother used to be known throughout the province as the best at Barang. She had plenty of bottles of insects, especially beetles, and when someone had an enemy they could visit her, pay her some money to do a ceremony, and the enemy would swell up and need an operation. Barang was the most dangerous. Kelly knew only two ways to protect yourself from it: either curse the witch, which took more bravery than most people had, or carry atis, the delicious fruit with smelly leaves.

“I want you to get to the States,” Marie-Vic said, “and to have dignity there. Don’t get caught doing what Annette did.” Kelly knew she referred to the time their sister disgraced herself in California. In their province it was customary for people to cook
foods, then go outside calling out that they had good foods for sale. But when Annette tried that in San Diego, someone called the police. For the next month their sister Darlene had pretended she didn’t know her.

“Lydie will tell me what is proper and what is not,” Kelly said.

“You are so lucky to have Lydie and Patrice,” Marie-Vic said. She sat at the end of Kelly’s bed, her legs tucked under her. People thought Kelly and Marie-Vic looked alike, which pleased Kelly because she thought Marie-Vic, with her light skin, big dark eyes, and silky hair, was very pretty.

“You can work for Patrice after I leave,” Kelly said.