WINTER WONDERLAND (23 page)

‘Guy Laliberté used to perform here as a stilt-walker and fire-breather.’

My heads clunks the window. This is where Cirque du Soleil began? I can’t help but get a thrill.

‘Now you can go around the corner and eat at his restaurant – L’Auberge Saint-Gabriel. We’ve had some good parties there … ’

I take out my notebook and write down the name, intending to make that my dinner spot later.

‘This may be a silly question, since the whole world is in awe, but is Cirque du Soleil well received by the locals?’

‘Oh yes, very much so,’ Sebastien affirms. ‘Everyone has great respect for all they have achieved. And every year Guy shows his gratitude to the province by putting on a show for free.’

‘That’s fantastic!’

‘The headquarters that he built here with the training facility, he deliberately chose a poor part of town and employed local people to bring that area up.’

‘Wow,’ I say. ‘How many people would you say work there today?’

‘About eighteen hundred.’

‘What?’ I exclaim.

‘About four hundred of those are in the wardrobe department.’

‘My goodness.’

‘This is Boulevard Saint-Laurent by the way … ’ He motions beyond the windscreen. ‘It bisects the city from north to south. The French-speaking typically live to the east, the Anglophones – that’s your people – to the west.’

‘How interesting … ’

‘All the way up here you will see different immigrant communities – Jewish, Chinese, Italian, Portuguese, Greek, Arab, Haitian … ’

‘Just like Cirque du Soleil!’ I laugh.

‘Do you know about the One Drop foundation?’ he asks as we turn off into a new neighbourhood, one with more of a trendy, boutique feel.

‘One Drop?’ I shake my head.

Sebastien explains that Guy Laliberté has partnered with Oxfam to bring water to people in countries where access to this vital resource is lacking – El Salvador, India, Honduras, and so on.

‘I went out to Nicaragua last year with one of the touring shows and it’s not just the water projects they’re working on,’ he enthuses, ‘they’re doing all this great work to promote gender equality and get the young people motivated about building a brighter future.’

‘Really?’

He nods intently. ‘We ran these workshops with all these kids and teens, got them involved. It was
incredible …
’

Watching Sebastien talk about this is like meeting a new person – his grumpy shell falling away as a dynamic, passionate and
com
passionate man emerges.

As we pull up outside Toi, Moi et Café, I turn to him, unable to keep it in any longer.

‘Aren’t you tired?’

‘I’m fine,’ he says, unclicking his seatbelt. ‘I don’t need much sleep.’

‘I mean of watching over Jacques. Don’t you miss having your own
utterly remarkable
life? Being around your fellow performers? Working on such meaningful projects? Doing what you love and what you are obviously brilliant at?’

A cloud crosses back over his eyes. ‘Yes I miss it. Of course I do. But I’d miss Jacques a whole lot more if he were gone.’

‘But what if he’s not going anywhere?’

‘Have you ever thought you had lost someone?’ he turns on me, blunt as ever. ‘Had someone taken from you before their time?’

I shake my head.

‘When I got the phone call, that Jacques had fallen in the frozen lake … the line cut out. And while I was stood there, shaking, waiting to reconnect, I thought they were going to tell me he had died.’ His lips purse as he fights to steady his voice. ‘In that moment, I experienced losing him. I felt it, as if it was real. So when they told me he had survived, it was like I had been given a second chance. That’s when I knew I had to be there for him. Because I never wanted to have that phone call or that feeling ever again.’

I sigh. ‘But Sebastien, do you really believe he would want to take his own life?’

‘Who knows what anyone would do under those circumstance, until it happens to you. Everyone reacts differently. I have Russian friends at the Cirque who heard that a family member died just minutes before they were going on stage, and they carry on and perform as flawlessly as ever – it doesn’t even faze them because for them it’s the norm, a part of circus life. The high wire is dangerous, the trapeze is dangerous … ’ He pauses. ‘But to feel somehow responsible for another person’s death, as Jacques does with Rémy… ’

‘That has to be nigh on unbearable.’ I concur.

We sit for a moment in silence. And then I say:

‘You know one thing I know for sure?’

He looks warily up at me. ‘What’s that?’

‘Breakfast is on me.’

I don’t know that I’ve seen a more cheerful-looking breakfast platter. My two bright white boiled eggs are sitting in crayon-coloured cups, my toast soldiers are golden crispy strips of ciabatta, the melon (both orange gala and green honeydew) comes in smiley slices, there’s a heap of roasted breakfast potatoes, a mini-portion of baked beans, a triangle of cheese and – the pièce de résistance – a baked apple with shiny puckered skin!

My stomach groans with longing.

‘I have to take a picture of this.’

‘I’ve never understood why people do that.’

‘That’s because everything is so beautifully presented here, you’re spoiled. You want to spend a bit of time in England, where most things arrive in a hope-for-the-best dollop.’

‘You know one of your chefs has a restaurant here.’

‘One of
my
chefs?’

‘Gordon Ramsay. His restaurant Laurier is just across the street.’

‘Have you eaten there?’

‘No, but I know he has fish and chips on the menu as well as poutine.’

Oh the dreaded poutine! I can’t help but grimace.

‘You know you’ve got to try it. It’s the signature dish of Quebec.’

Mercifully our conversation is interrupted by the barista coming out from behind the counter. It seems he’s an old friend of Sebastien’s and the two chat intensely in French while I sit back with my baklava latte. I kid you not – honeyed latte, flavoured with four syrups (three nut and one lemon), topped with whipped cream and cinnamon.

I’m telling you, I could practically move to Montreal on the basis of this café alone.

It’s not just the menu – I love the mix of people in here; all ages appear through the curtains shrouding the front door to take a seat at one of the tarnished copper tables. The floor is wooden, the ceiling dark-beamed, and the coffee has its own silver-scooped filing system behind the bar. I like how the special roasts – from Yemen Mocha Mattari to Jamaican Blue Mountain – are listed on a gold-framed blackboard. I like how the waitress remains smiley and attentive despite the crush and I really like the look of the chocolate gateaux in the glass display case …

Maybe I’ll come back later for a slice and a slurp of Tea-quila Sunset – Darjeeling tea with orange juice, triple sec and golden rum. Wow.

But for now it’s time to move on.

We’re just heading out through the door, with me using two hands to carry my tummy, when I remember:

‘Didn’t we have to bring your dad some coffee?’

‘He won’t drink it from here,’ Sebastien replies. ‘He’s purely an Olimpico guy.’

‘Olimpico as in the Olympics?’

‘Well, it’s really more of a spectator sport place. You’ll see. But you do know we held the Olympic Games here in 1976?’

‘Mmm-hmm,’ I say, though of course I didn’t.

‘Are you keeping up with the Kardashians?’

‘Excuse me?’

‘Kim Kardashian’s stepdad Bruce Jenner won gold here that year.’

‘I didn’t even know he was an athlete.’

‘Decathlete,’ he specifies.

‘You’re pretty good with all your facts and figures … ’ I smile.

‘Well my dad’s last girlfriend was a schoolteacher.’

‘Busy man.’

‘Excuse me?’

‘You know, with the women.’

Sebastien stops suddenly. ‘Have you slept with more than three men?’

‘What?’

‘You think because he’s been married twice and had one other girlfriend that makes him some kind of player?’

‘Oh. No. I’m sorry.’ This is awful. Why do I keep upsetting him like this? ‘I didn’t mean to sound disrespectful.’

‘He was with my mother for seventeen years, Jacques’ mother for twelve. Can you match that?’

‘No,’ I say quietly, following him across the road. I’m sticking to neutral subjects from now on. Observations about the city and the range of enticing shops, including this rather unusual furniture store …

‘Oh look!’ I try to jolly things along. ‘This sofa cover is made entirely of jeans!’

No response.

He really is ultra-protective of his family members. Ordinarily that would be an admirable trait; he just seems to take the form of barbed wire while doing so.

‘I think I’m going to have a quick nose in this bookshop while you’re in the café,’ I say as he opens the door to Olimpico, all Italian flags and football on TV.

He looks over to Librairie L’Écume des Jours and sighs mournfully, ‘I used to go there with Julie … ’

‘I just can’t win with him,’ I complain to Laurie when I sneakily dial her from the street corner. ‘One minute we seem to be getting along fine, and then he’ll flare up and take offence at the merest thing.’

‘In my experience people who behave like that – all mad at the world – are typically mad at themselves.’

‘Hurt people hurt people,’ I confirm.

‘Right. And I understand that the solution seems so obvious to you – “Move back to Montreal and resume your life!”’

‘
Yes!
’

‘But he’s so blocked, seeing what he’s missing might just piss him off more.’

‘Oh great.’

‘Hang in there. Give him a bit of space. And pick out a cool book for me.’

Laurie and I have this thing that whenever I travel abroad I buy her a book in a foreign language that she will never read but that has a totally intriguing cover or title.

I’m spoilt for choice here:

‘LA LIBERTÉ N’EST PAS UNE MARQUE DE YOGOURT.’

‘ÊTES-VOUS MARIÉE À UN PSYCHOPATHE?’

I even rather like the look of one of those ‘For Dummies’ titles in French.

‘LE SAXOPHONE POUR LES NULS.’

And then I inadvertently find myself in the maternity section, immediately drawn to a book with a cartoon of a mother holding her little bundle of joy up in the air – as vomit spews out of his mouth in a fountain-like arc towards her face.

Though I may not be able to translate all the captions and speech bubbles, the cartoons are easily understood. On the left page we have
La Rêve
: a slim, pony-tailed woman power-walking with her babystroller in the park. On the right we have
La Réalité
: A woman slouched on her couch in front of the TV, hand in a bag of crisps. And then I discover the French word for pregnancy –
la grossesse!
How could a country so chic have a word like that for women in their prime? Or perhaps that’s how they feel when they can no longer fit into their petite Chanel suits.

As I flick through the pages, I am reminded just how much I idealise being a mum. When you are denied something it’s all too easy to focus on all the picture-perfect moments – all that dimply glee and squidgy cuddling – and overlook the daily slog. I don’t even have the basics of domesticity down – my fridge magnet says it all:
I understand the concept of cooking and cleaning. Just not as it applies to me.
And I’m certainly not the type who could pop a kiddiwink in a backpack and continue about my business. If I’m really, really honest about the kind of mother I would have been, the truth is probably chaotic, exhausted, with finger-paint on my T-shirt and assorted cereals in my hair.

‘Ready?’ Sebastien leans his head in.

I fluster a little as I prop the book back on the shelf, hoping he hasn’t seen the title, and hurry to his side.

‘What’s in the bag?’ I ask as we head back to the car.

‘Biscotti,’ he replies. ‘It’s my dad’s favourite.’

I go to make a comment about him having strong teeth, but that would probably imply that I’m surprised that a man his age can still crunch and thus be construed as an insult, so I say nothing.

What I think, however, is this:
Oh my god, I’m about to meet the parent!

CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE

‘I really like this neighbourhood,’ I tell Sebastien as I eye the cute terraced houses with their quirky roof adornments, jutting balconies and twiddly ironwork. ‘Is this where you grew up?’

‘Right here.’ Sebastien pulls into a parking spot outside a big redbrick building with angular bay windows, and honks his horn.

Seconds later a handsome, rather robust-looking man appears at the top of the exterior staircase.

‘That’s your dad?’ I peer up at him.

‘You sound surprised.’

‘He’s so young-looking.’

‘He’s only fifty-six.’

‘I suppose it was all the talk of him visiting the physio … ’ Honestly I was expecting someone frail and entirely reliant on his stick. Here he is grinning down at me like some fair-haired Alec Baldwin.

‘Bonjour Krista! Bonjour!’

He knows my name?

‘What do you think of my staircase?’