I Looked for the One My Heart Loves (25 page)

42

In La Palette,
Anne
closed the magazine she had been reading and took her wallet out of her handbag to pay her bill.

Then she heard, “Is it too late for us to have coffee together?”

Anne shivered as she recognized the voice.

“May I sit down?”

Unable to say anything, Anne simply nodded.

“I knew I could find you here,” Alexis said.

How could he have so much poise, when emotions were overwhelming her? She felt her eyes welling up with tears.

“Please don't cry,” he said, taking her hand in his.

Just as he had done before the exodus in 1940, he offered her a handkerchief.

“Thank you,” she whispered.

They were almost alone in the back section of the café. Anne glanced at the mirror next to her. She wasn't dreaming. There they were, sitting at the same table, looking a bit stiff.

“I thought I'd never see you again,” she said.

“You know me better than that!”

“All the time that's passed since …”

“We can always make up for lost time. …”

“At our age, it passes much faster.”

“It's not like we're elderly,” he joked. “Not just yet anyway.”

Seeing Anne smile, he brought a hand to her cheek and caressed it. She looked him straight in the eyes.

“You came back,” she said.

“I never was very far from you.”

“Me, neither!”

As the waiter took their order, she examined Alexis. He had lost a bit of weight, but he hadn't aged much. Just a wrinkle in the corner of his eyes. …

“Would you have gone to the gallery if you hadn't found me here?”

“I wanted to meet you on neutral grounds. After we talk, you can decide if you want me back in your life.” Without giving Anne a chance to say anything, he added, “We didn't have a second child. Geneviève had a miscarriage during her sixth month.”

“And you didn't tell me!”

“I couldn't imagine coming back to you with that news as though nothing had happened. Before seeing you again, I had to deal with some problems first. Geneviève certainly didn't make things easy. After her miscarriage, she had a breakdown and wound up in the hospital. And what made the situation even more difficult was that Guillaume had a very hard time getting used to Vienna. He was totally lost there, so unhappy. I didn't think I'd be able to deal with all this. …”

Anne could tell that Alexis had a hard time talking about that period of time.

“But the worst of it all was our breakup. When you sent back my letter unopened, I took it as a way for you to tell me you didn't want me to write anymore. Through Phil, I learned that your gallery was doing really well. In fact, I thought you didn't need me anymore!”

“You were wrong. I needed you. I needed you so much!”

After a moment of silence, Anne announced, “François and I are getting a divorce. He said he wanted his freedom.”

“That means that you're now free,” Alexis said.

“Unfortunately, you're not. …”

“Actually, Geneviève went back to Montreal. She said she needed her parents. She always did.”

“What about Guillaume?”

“He didn't want to leave his mother. For a few months now, I've been living by myself in Vienna. And I started working on something that I love. …”

As Alexis told her about his new life, Anne started to believe that finally the stars were aligning. After so many hurdles and obstacles, so much pain, she almost felt dizzy. Once again she turned to the mirror. There they were, the two of them …

“I have to go back to the gallery,” she said. “But I'm closing at seven. Come join me there. …”

Until the end of the day, Anne was giddy. Feeling like she would soon be going on a first date, she worried about her looks. Was she as attractive as Alexis remembered? She stood in front of a mirror and examined herself. People kept telling her that she didn't look like a forty-three-year-old woman. A few months earlier, she had cut her hair very short and, happy with the result, had kept the style that showed off her small ears and graceful neck. As interested in fashion as ever, Anne still bought clothes that were at once classic and trendsetting. It made Isabelle jealous, since she thought she wasn't as attractive as her mother. …

Alexis showed up at seven sharp.

Walking over to the vase he had bought in Vienna, he said, “I was hoping you hadn't thrown it against a wall.”

“I almost did,” Anne said. “More than once.”

She and Alexis tentatively made their way to the room where they had fought last time they were together, three years ago. Once there, they timidly held each other. They were together again, but they weren't the same as before. Trying to control their impulses, they slowly found each other all over again.

As he held Anne in his arms, Alexis knew she had no idea what he had been through. When she told him to leave, he had hoped that she would eventually change her mind. The next few months in Vienna had been horrible. Though he enjoyed his job as a teacher, he had nothing else to hang on to. He felt a huge void in his life. Anne refused to share in what they had built together! On top of that was Geneviève's deteriorating mental health. After her miscarriage, she wouldn't leave her bed. Lifeless, silent, medicated, she spent all her time in her room, curtains drawn. Hiding the fact that he was happy not to be a father again, Alexis took care of Guillaume as much as he could. The next two years were terribly taxing, both mentally and physically. What could be more draining than living with a recluse who nothing ever satisfied? When Geneviève told her psychiatrist that she no longer wanted to live away from her parents and that they were ready to welcome her back home, Alexis had jumped at the chance. There was one heartbreaking aspect to the situation, however: Guillaume had decided to go with his mother.

Alone in Vienna, Alexis moved out of his apartment to rent a room in a guesthouse. Since he did not have to put up with his wife's emotional blackmail and whining, he was able to think freely about Anne. In order to give himself the best chance of winning her back, he decided he needed to regain his footing, emotionally speaking. At the same time, he tortured himself with questions. Did Anne still feel anything for him? Had she gone back to her husband? Did she have a lover? The thought of it all made him mad with jealousy.

Anne, snug against his chest, was breathing calmly. He lowered his head and kissed her temple and then, with his fingertip, caressed her forehead, down the ridge of her nose, the length of her lower lip, and finally the nape of her neck.

“When did you start wearing your hair this way?” he asked.

“If you don't like it,” Anne said, “I can grow it back the way it was.”

“I was a bit surprised at first,” he said. “But I like it. I like it very much.”

They kissed.

In her car, Anne wondered what Alexis had in mind. She had closed the gallery a bit earlier than usual, but he had been adamant, saying, “Arrive no later than six thirty.”

She found a place to park and met up with him in Place du Tertre. He looked at once nervous and happy.

“Let's go,” he said, guiding her toward Rue Norvins.

After a hundred yards or so, he opened the entrance to a building and asked Anne to step into the hall. They took a few steps, and then Alexis unlocked a door. When he stepped aside, Anne saw a small room. Then they walked to the adjacent room, which was larger.

“Nothing too extraordinary so far,” Alexis said.

He then pulled open the blinds covering a glass door. In the yard was a small garden filled with wild weeds.

“It's like we're in the country!” Anne said.

“That's what made me fall in love with the place!”

“Whose is it?”

“I have until tomorrow to buy it.”

“What?”

“I've been talking to Montmartre real estate agents for a while, from Vienna. One of them sent me photos and the description of this apartment, and I took the plane … with the idea of taking you here to see if you wanted me back in your life. I saw it for the first time yesterday after our conversation at the café.”

“That means you're moving to Paris?”

“I can't leave Vienna for now. I was transferred to the Lycée Français there for a few years. … The obligation is my alibi for not joining my family in Montreal. But I'll come regularly. …”

43

Alexis bought the apartment.
He said nothing about it to Geneviève. Only his mother knew that he had invested the money he had made when he sold the house in Evian in some secret place in Montmartre.

“One day,” Alexis told Anne “you're going to meet my mother.”

“You talked to her about us?”

“Yes, when I was in a bad way. …”

“Does she know we're back together?”

“Yes, and she's very happy for me.”

After a moment of hesitation, he added, “She never liked Geneviève much.”

By mutual agreement, they decided not to tell anyone about their relationship. Anne didn't want her ex-husband to know about it until their divorce was finalized. As for Alexis, the last thing he wanted was for Geneviève to have any suspicion, even from afar!

∙∙∙

Over the summer break, Alexis rented a camper to take his son to the Rockies,
a father-son trip! At the same time, Anne rented a cottage near Lake Annecy with Isabelle and Aurélie. If not for the fact that she heard from her lover regularly, the vacation would have been hellish, as Isabelle was getting more and more difficult. Anne sighed with relief every time her daughter went on a hike or a boat ride with friends her age.

Anne was also getting impatient with François. Since their separation, he kept saying he was off on business trips as a pretext not to take care of the girls. Anne, who was no fool, was afraid that he would turn his back on his responsibilities for good. …

Before the beginning of the school year, Alexis made a long stop in Paris to be with Anne. Since they had gotten back together, both were dealing better with the times when they were apart. Their frequent letters and phone calls brightened their existence.

The renovations in Alexis's apartment had begun a few weeks before, with Anne overseeing the work.

“Wow!” Alexis said as he walked in. “This is going to be great.”

“Good thing you didn't see it at the beginning,” Anne said. “It was a huge mess.”

Instead of keeping the two rooms, Anne had the wall knocked down and a suspended ceiling and movable partitions installed. This way, Alexis would have a view of both the street in front and the garden out back. The floor had just been finished, and the kitchen was being modernized.

The contractor promised everything would be finished by the first of November.

∙∙∙

On that date, Alexis arrived from Vienna with some luggage. The truck he rented was parked in front of the building as the movers unloaded the furniture, housewares, and decorations Alexis had kept after selling the house in Evian.

For three days, Alexis and Anne cleaned, unpacked, and put away his belongings. When fatigue overcame their enthusiasm, they collapsed in Alexis's large bed and, cuddling, took long naps. In spite of all their stops, the dishes and glasses wound up in the oak sideboard, the books in the bookcase, and the records piled up next to the stereo. Once in a while they danced to the sound of Marvin Gaye's languorous music, which gave way to erotic games between them.

“Well, now,” Anne said, “who undressed me?”

Could he have ever imagined, when everything had seemed lost, that they would one day reunite in an apartment, their own, even though she wasn't settling in for good, at least not yet? Could he have pictured them in his mind, fooling around and laughing the way they were now?

While Anne cleaned up some of the garden's flowerbeds, Alexis took the cover off his typewriter and set it on the table. He had another one in Austria, but he wanted to continue his work when he was in Paris. Fascinated by the culture of turn-of-the-century Vienna, he had begun to write a book about the Secession movement. His growing knowledge of the architects, decorators, artists, and writers of the movement enabled him to make good progress on the work. Without going into details, he told Anne about the research he was doing on the topic. In this apartment, he had find the peace and quiet to write. That was the reason he hadn't tried to make his way up in the world of academics. He didn't care about promotions. He had inherited from his father the desire for independence that prevented him from toeing the line. He loved nothing more than reading, listening to music, thinking, and writing.

Anne walked into the room, and Alexis got up to take her in his arms.

“My hands are filthy,” she said, laughing.

“I love you.”

As they crossed the pedestrian bridge linking Montmartre and Place de Clichy, Alexis stopped to look at the cemetery down below. On this All Saints' Day, flowers covered the tombs of the dead. Arms filled with flowers and plants, people headed for the crypts of loved one.

“What a beautiful place,” Alexis said. “I'd never paid it much attention before.”

Then went down the stone stairs and walked around the cemetery's tree-lined paths. Some plots were well tended; others seemed to have been abandoned.

“The Moulin-Rouge is just a short walk away,” Alexis said, “and the streets around here are filled with cafés and restaurants. The folks who were buried here are lucky to be near all that activity!” With a wink, he added, “Imagine the two of us buried together under a tombstone. Sometimes you'd ask me to dance with you and …”

“Stop that, Alexis! You're not funny.”

“I was only kidding,” Alexis said with a huge smile on his face. “Actually,” he added. “I wasn't completely … I want to spend the rest of eternity with you. When we're very, very old … But you're not allowed to die first. I wouldn't be able to deal with it.”

“What about me? What a selfish man you are!”

“Yes, I am, and I stand by it. The last thing I want to take with me as I leave this world is an image of you.”

“If you leave before me, you won't be able to take care of me anymore. …”

“I'd protect you from heaven.”

“You always say there's no such thing as heaven!”

When Alexis went back to Vienna, Anne concentrated on her gallery. She and Benjamin both agreed not to overestimate the value of their artists' work. That way, they would keep the pretentious collectors at bay, while attracting a new generation of art lovers. Looking for talent, Anne visited artist studios, networked, investigated what her competitors were up to, pored over journals and catalogs. She always had in mind the desire to surprise her customers.

“As long as we manage to stay out of the mainstream and impose our tastes,” Benjamin kept telling her, “we're going to do great. Remember what happened with Phil!”

“Yes, but it was awfully scary at the beginning. Thank God for that critic!”

“You're right, but now the gallery has a reputation.”

Simonetta agreed with him, saying, “Every time you put on a show, you have wonderful reviews.”

The Italian woman's life was more and more “normal.” Was it Isabelle and Aurélie's daily visits? Her friendship with Anne? She didn't seem to feel the need to punish herself anymore. Better yet, she seemed to have genuine fun sometimes. Especially with Benjamin, when they played
scopa
together. She had taught him how to play the Italian card game that she had always loved.

Gatherings were taking place at Anne's. After her divorce from François was finalized, she had painted all the walls a different color, changed the decoration and some of the furniture, hung new paintings, and added a bunch of personal items. The result was a warm environment, a place where Anne's friends, including Benjamin, felt at home. Every time he came, the girls asked Benjamin about their clothes, their hairstyles. Sometimes he helped them with their English lessons and math homework. He loved being surrounded by these women of different ages, including Simonetta, who was particularly good at cheating when they played
scopa
. With a poise that impressed Benjamin to no end, she shuffled the deck, managed to hide some cards while she did, and came out with them just at the right moment. When Benjamin complained that she was a cheater, she replied that he was nothing but a sore loser. Anne loved listening to their mock fighting, their accents. Her marriage had collapsed and her parents were too old to travel, but Anne had found herself a sort of new family. It was a bit odd, no doubt, but it filled her with happiness. After the breakup with Alexis and with things so difficult between François and her, she had gone home after work filled with dread. Now she looked forward to walking into her apartment, especially when she had guests. The only dark cloud was Isabelle's attitude. It was worse since she had learned that her father had a woman in his life. If only she would find a nice boyfriend, Anne thought. But Isabelle had a knack for being attracted to boys who wound up hurting her. … As for Aurélie, she decided not to be affected by her father's situation. People looking at her might have thought she was just a carefree teenage girl, but Aurélie was determined to make her own way in life. Simonetta, though hard to please, thought that the girl's drawings exhibited a strong personality and a real talent. She didn't try to discourage her from becoming a fashion designer.

Though she was discreet about it, Simonetta knew that Anne was in a relationship that hadn't always been smooth. Seeing how radiant she looked, Simonetta knew that Anne was now happy. She wondered who her lover was.

One day, as she was taking care of the gallery in Anne's absence, the phone rang.

“Anne,” Simonetta heard after she picked up the phone.

“Madame Chastel is going to be out until two,” she said. “Would you like to leave a message?”

“No, thank you,” the man's voice said on the other end of the line. “There's no emergency.”

Though the conversation had been brief, Simonetta had liked the voice: low and warm.

Cracking a smile, Simonetta told Anne about the call when she came back.

“The man didn't leave his name,” she said.

“Well, too bad for him,” Anne said, her voice light.