Plan C (32 page)

Now there’s a smart woman. I always had her pegged for a few fries short a Happy Meal. But Bebe may just have pulled herself together. “I want Tamara on my own terms,” she continues. “Just us girls. Mother and daughter.”

“I can understand that,” I say. “So when do you arrive? Oh my God, wait until I tell Kitty.”

“Well, first we’re going skiing in Gstaad…”

“For real then? Cool.”

“Come, Libby. We have a big chalet. We’ll be there for Christmas and then we’ll be in Paris for New Years with you, our Auntie Heylib.”

“No, I’m staying put. But listen, we’re having a big dinner party at Jacques’s – some famous chef Kitty knows, blah, blah, blah. He lives upstairs from my apartment.”

So how is Paris? Tell me everything…”

“No,” I say, “You go first.”

Always the question one should never ask Bebe, and I always regret it the second the words come from my mouth. One thing about Bebe…ask her what’s she’s doing and
she
really
tells you. Right down to the type of omelette she just had for lunch. There’s nobody as busy as a person who has nothing to do.

“Well, if you must know,” she begins. “We got Tamara fitted for ski boots today. Had to go to seven stores because the first two didn’t have her size. Took her forever to squeeze a foot into one and then I couldn’t figure out how to attach the clasps….”

I make the sign to my waiter for my check or the “addition,” as they call it in Paris. He waves under his chin to say, “No charge.” I smile.

“Then her tummy was a bit upset so I went to find some Pepto Bismol,” says Bebe. “I had six emails to write and returned two business calls…”

Another day, another arrondissement, another café – God, this is getting old. Especially since my French lessons aren’t quite paying off. The CD taught me to order a piece of chocolate cake but I don’t want “un morceau de gateau!” Instead I grab for a healthy
“Scoop.”
I’m on the last chapter of his classic novel about journalistic shenanigans in early 20
^th
century England. I take a sip from my coffee and then flip the page. So much caffeine, so little booze, so much spare time.

And still no emails from Ben, so I left my computer back home, alone, where it belongs. Every time my mailbox fills on my Outlook Express, my heart leaps with anticipation. Even the contract I received to write about a restaurant in the charming hamlet of Barbizon isn’t thrilling me. Not without Ben to share the news. Not without Ben to share the town. We used to go there. Together.

When is my wild and crazy Plan C going to kick in? I’ve smoked a few cigarettes, had a few drinks, had one too many hangovers, went to several too many parties, but even here the French call it a night early because they have to work the next day. And the lonely nights feel too long. I used frequent flier miles for this?

Two men sit at a table next to mine, but they’re a little too handsome for my taste. I like a guy who’s a bit of a nerd; about a third of a nerd, but not more. Too much more and he’s not sexy; any less and he’s boring. I like the kind of a guy who couldn’t quite get the girl. The kind of a guy that when he gets me, he thinks he’s with some movie star, even though he’s usually the one with some level of star quality. And I want to look better than he does even when I’m at my worst. I like a guy with an edge, a bit of naughty, but alot of goofball. A pedigree isn’t bad either. But not man-overboard royalty like Prince Charles. More blue collar with a hint of diamond-studded collar. Underdog is where it’s at. The losers…who are quietly winners.

I size these two up from perfectly-coiffed head to their Prada shoes. They’re GQ types – much more Bebe bait than Libby lust. One of my table neighbors catches me staring, and he winks. I smile. Still not my type. Kitty wouldn’t find them her type either. She needs more of a wild, eccentric and unavailable “artiste.”

Then a handsome man with that blend of nerd and sexy pulls up a chair at the next table, smiling and nodding at me, loosening the woolen scarf from his neck, and draping it carefully over his coat. Okay, this one could work. As he sits, I straighten my posture, put my shoulders back the way my mother always taught me to when she’d run her hand inside my shoulder blades, fluff my hair and suck in my stomach. My belly’s a little larger than usual from too much “fromage.” French for cheese. And weakness.

But keep your wits about you, Libby. Just imagine what stunt he might pull, naked, with a shoe suspended from his cock.

“Salut! Comment ca va?” he says, rubbing his hands together and blowing on his very large fingers.

“Tres bien, merci.” “Et vu?” And you? My mouth hits the rim of the glass and I size him up. Technically I’m not really fine with my phoney “Tres bien, merci” - but what am I supposed to do? Pour my heart out to the handsome stranger who would prove impossible to talk to anyway? I can speak conversational French but I’m truly incapable of “I don’t want to be with a man that I have to fight with just because of his spoiled ex-wife.” Instead I do the sensible thing, sip my café crème and check him out. Good hair, good teeth, good shoes and who knows what else. Bebe would so far approve.

“This smoking ban is proved to be such an annoyance,” he says in perfect English, which tells me that technically I
could
pour my heart out to him, though I refrain. He continues, now tossing a frustrated hand in the air. “People are drinking less, smoking less, spending less…” He has a point. I glance around at the many empty tables and chairs.

“But they’re
French!”
I say. “It can’t be like this!”

“It is. Best enjoy that wine you’re sipping. It could be your last.”

“What do you mean?”

“Wine makers in Bordeaux and Burgundy are filing bankruptcy.”

“Oh that’s horrible,” I say. And it is. This can’t be true, not now, not when I’m finally here living the French café life I’ve always dreamed of.

“Yes, the French are not
acting
like the French. They are no longer eating and
drinking
like the French.” he says, again the arms going up like he’s fly swatting. “Look
at this,” he says, picking up a baguette from his bread basket. “Soggy inside, stale on zee outside.” “We have become like the Americans. It’s over. The cafe is dead.”

“What do you mean the café is dead? No, don’t say that. Stop it right now…” I say pushing away my coffee cup. Who is this jerk-off?

“Do you know when I was a boy in the 1960s, there were over 200,000 cafes. Now, it’s down to just 40,000. Things have changed.”

“Surely you’re mistaken.”

“Grab a sandwich
to go,
grab lunch
to go.
The young drink to get wasted, not to savor the leisure moments.”

“No, stop!” I say.

“They even use paper cups…”

“Paper cups!? Oh, that’s just wrong.” Except for when an American needs a coffee to go, of course. Then it’s okay.

And then as though I can’t imagine it could get any worse…

My dreams are shattered by the sight of a woman clearing the only busy table just a few misplaced chairs away. She looks like Kitty. I lean in for a closer look, squinting my eyes to be sure. It can’t be Kitty. It’s surely her double. A second look and…

“Kitty?” I call out, with a tone of feeling stunned and at the same time sorry for the discovery. The French guy looks over his shoulder to see who Kitty is while I want to hide under my table to spare her the embarrassment. But just as I’m about to do so, she spins around as she shoves change into her apron pocket.

“Libby?” she says, calmly, gathering the empty glasses and napkins. I’m speechless, waiting for some explanation. “Don’t ask, all right?” says Kitty clanking glasses together. “It’s only temporary. I have to. It’s for my niece.”

“The pregnant one? Your fisherman brother’s daughter? That niece?” This was my lame attempt to conceal my devastation, but at the same time reassure myself more than reassure her.

“Yes,” says Kitty, turning to the patrons at another table. “C’mon finish up your crepe I have dishes to clear. Shove that bite down, let’s move it!”

“But this is a Paris!” says the chubby American tourist. “We’re
supposed
to be able to sit all day. And besides, this place is empty.”

Kitty swings back to me. “Look, Lib, these are hard times. I saw Anna Wintour taking the Metro last week.”

“I don’t know what to say…”

“Nothing to say,” says Kitty. “It’s only temporary.”

“Oh? I mean
oh.
Of course.” There’s a moment of dark realization that bounces between us like a solider nursing his bunkmate in a foxhole all the while knowing he’s about to bleed to death. “Listen, Kitty. You don’t have to explain. I mean, look at me. The moment I go back to the States I’ll probably be filling out applications for jobs right alongside my daughter, Madeline. It’s okay. Really. I mean, CEOs of major companies are working retail now, you know?”

“Well, it’s not like that,” she says, running a wet rag over the table. “It’s like Basquiat.”

“Huh?”

“Somebody swooped down and took Helmut.”

“Somebody who?”

“Marian Goodman, that’s who,” says Kitty.

“What? So fast?” I say. “But I don’t understand. Another woman? Another muse?”

She shakes her head. “She’s no muse. She’s a gallery.”

“But nobody could love his penis – um, I mean, his art, the way you do. He’s huge!”

“He’s not so huge anymore. Turns out his amazing cock was all in his head.”

“So he just went with another gallery?” I say, sympathetically.

“Yes,” says Kitty, pulling out the chair at my table and plopping down. She fans herself with a menu. “All this bullshit façade I’ve had to keep up – designer clothes, clients, yachts, private jets, Kings, Counts…I’m tired of it all. I think I’m relieved if you want to know the truth.”

“Sure, I know,” I say.

“All those articles in American magazines ‘Who wore it best?’ Who cares anymore? Who cares about labels?”

“Hey, I won’t say I’ve been telling you that for a long time,” I say. “But I have.”

“I’m pathetic on top of pathetic.”

“No you’re not.”

“Oh yeah,” says Kitty. “Did you know that when we were at that party the other night, a casting director came up to me and said, ‘You should sign up to do some commercials. You’d make a great Diva for advertisements.’”

“And?”

“So I did.”

Did you get any calls?” I ask.

“No. Now on top of everything else, I’m a starving actress. But it’s okay,” she says shaking the dish cloth crumbs to the floor. “This is all just for a month or so, just until my new client kicks in.”

“New client?”

“I’m swearing off men for good. This client’s female.”

“Is she going to be
huge?”

“God, I hope not.”

“Well, huge enough to bring in commissions?” I ask.

“Yes. And I’m thinking of becoming a lesbian. Did you know there’s a new trend of women over forty actually choosing women for lovers?”

“But you’re more of a
cock
kind of gal.”

“Oh Libby,” she exhales heavily, “Have you any idea how hard it is to make ends meet? I have a niece who depends on me to help her with that baby.”

“No, I have no idea what it is to be a mother with two kids and be scared and have to get a second job…”

“Okay, you’re right. Of course you get it, but you don’t know the real me…”

“Kitty, I know enough about the real you to write and direct a full length documentary.”

She slumps deeper in her chair dabbing at her eyes with a Kleenex from her pants pocket. “But you don’t get what it is to be dumped by the man you believed in.”

I raise a brow.

“Okay. But Ben didn’t dump you. With Helmut it’s like one thing led to another and then it finally led to absolutely nothing.”

My heart is suddenly breaking for her. For all I know Ben wouldn’t want me back, ever. Maybe he’s moved on to some twenty-year-old chippie like that sleaze bag Jean-Francois did. Except I know in my heart Ben is not the twenty-year old chippie type. But maybe a thirty-five year old chippie – someone age appropriate. “Look, we have to see the positive in life,” I say, rearranging what little is left of my dignity for the both of us. “Look at Mickey Rourke. Back in the 70s everybody was into ‘Dynasty.’ But now everybody is into ‘The Wrestler,’ underdogs, slumdogs, Susan Boyle…” I start singing “I had a dreammmmmm…”

She laughs. “Susan Boyle is so 2009! And besides, I had a dream, I lost a dream, and now my dreams are dead.”

Nevertheless, I’m still singing. “No they’re not dead,” I spout between notes.

“You know what I love about you, Libby…You’re a charmer. Not to mention you find the good in everything.”

“Keep going...” I say between high notes.

“And you’re just fun. God, you make me sick. You’re the best friend a girl could ask for.”

“Really?” I say, thinking there’s a backhanded compliment there someplace.

“And you really care about doing good in the world for people you don’t even know.”

“Well, right now,” I say, standing up and grabbing Kitty by the arm, “you’re my world. You’re my world of peeps. So get your Kitty Kat Morgan groove back and let’s go. We’re going to walk out of this joint. Together. You got that? You don’t need the George V hotel anymore.”

“The George V? Oh honey, I’ve been living at some trashy two star for a week.”

“Pack up your stuff from the hotel, check out, and come to my apartment.”

“Now it’s
your
apartment?”

“Just come on. Let down the guard. It’s the third floor on the corner just above that restaurant Jacques owns. And we’ll be wicked naughty and get drunk every night and watch old movies. We’ll keep trying this Paris thing until we get it right.”

“I can’t get it right, at least not right now. I have to at least finish up my shift and count up the tips jar.”

“Okay, but look, I have a couple of assignments coming in and they’re going to wire me some money, maybe next week, but in the meantime…” I glance around and close in on her with a whisper. “I’m going to give you my credit card to pay for this coffee, but just promise that if it doesn’t go through, you’ll spot me five euros?”