Plum Blossoms in Paris (14 page)

I look up at the great domed ceiling, an architectural marvel, and my mind, streaming, turns toward the burning and brilliant minds that brought it to life over the decades. It is a noble, beautiful building they raised, in spite of my religious pathology. Centuries later, I sit inside their inspiration, and I fancy their attendance here, lording over the site of their creation, bound to it like a mother to her child. Would they trifle themselves with the purity of my presence within, or care that I doubt the divinity of their savior? Or would they simply hope that I was awed by their craftsmanship, by their scope? If their faith isn’t enough to make me believe in Jesus Christ, their commitment to this
idea
makes me believe in their, and my, larger humanity.

This building is a monument to all creation, and my trepidation has no place within its walls. It is a fear born of a leaden myth that binds us down with burdens too great to cast off in a single lifetime, and which tunnels our vision so that all we see in this worldis what we
can’t
see. But my wonder belongs up there, scaling these forgotten masters’ buttresses and lofty domes, and is beholden to a very human act that leaped at transcendence. I smile. They must have felt such pride at its completion.

Mathieu was wrong about the Café Flore. Ghosts exist. Sometimes they even talk.

Stronger now, I say, “Or maybe things aren’t so easily broken down into abstractions: faith versus reason, truth versus fiction. I think that we travel in muddier regions of the spectrum. And some of us need our myths to help us find the way.”

Mathieu maintains his penetrating gaze. He’s like one of the walls surrounding us, yielding nothing.

“I wore that medal because it was a gift from my grandmother, who died last year. She insisted I wear it on trips because St. Christopher is the patron saint of travelers. I wear it mostly for her memory, but yes, I have a silly superstitious belief in it too, and rub it like a rabbit’s foot on takeoffs and landings. I’m not a very good traveler, Mathieu, so I can use all the help I can get.

“Sometimes people act upon a weak understanding of probability. ‘Okay, I don’t have much faith in this, but if I don’t do it, nothing will happen, whereas if I do it, something might happen.’ It’s a muddled way of proceeding, I grant you, but it works for a lot of people, including me, and if it doesn’t sound enough like a personal philosophy to you, you can join Jesus up there on his cross,” I suggest, jerking my chin toward the Son of God, “because you sound just as sanctimonious as he did, and I’ll be pretty well sick of both of you in five minutes.”

To my surprise, he laughs, grabbing my hand to kiss it before scooting back his chair. “You are charming like this, Daisy. I want to provoke you more often.”

Enjoying my little moment, I pluck my hand away. “Please don’t.”

Now
he
looks uneasy. Oh, divine justice …

Mathieu’s eyes flit about, like a moth searching for a flame. He lands upon something, and, stuffing his hands in his pockets, says, “Would you like for me to share my silly, irrelevant anecdote now?”

Hmph.

Mathieu sighs. I admit some interest through the tacit turn of my head. He licks his lips and murmurs, “Please, Daisy. You promised. This is difficult for me.”

I allow a slim nod.

He takes a deep breath and declares, “I regret to say that I have never been traumatized by the ghosts of airplanes past—or present, though I cannot speak for the future—or by my parents forcing wine upon me during predictably pious and public brainwashing exercises.”

My mouth falls open, but he checks my outrage by slipping to one knee and grasping my hand. “Sorry, Daisy. But I could not resist.”

Actually making fun of me. The nerve! I glower at him, and he makes a poor show at staunching his laughter by biting on my knuckles. I withdraw my hands and look pointedly at the forbearing Virgin.

He looks too damn good on that knee.

“But more to the point,” he says, struggling to his chair, “did you know,
mademoiselle
, that Victor Hugo was married here in 1862?” He adopts his best tour guide voice.

“Hmm.” Though still playing at being miffed, I absorb this bit of trivia and look around the cathedral with increasing curiosity, trying to imagine what kind of bride Victor Hugo had. If she felt intimidated by the grand setting. And the grander man.

Mathieu nods. “Yes, beautiful ceremony,” he adds, like he was there. But his voice is strangled, as if he’s stifling more laughter. “Of course …”

“What?”

“The Marquis de Sade was baptized here too,” he says, eyeing his fingernails.

I let this sink in. Victor Hugo and the Marquis de Sade. Like us in this church, it is the perfect mix of the sacred and the profane. The corners of my mouth start to wander.

Mathieu delicately clears his throat. “Do you think it helped the Marquis to wash away that original sin of his?”

“Mmm,” I reply, not yet broken.

Suddenly, and with great authority, the bell of the cathedral sounds a single, solemn note. We jolt to attention, the vibrations pulsing through our bodies to their completion. It is gone as quickly as it came. We are quiet in its wake, though my heart echoes its thunder. Mathieu and I continue our forward meditation, but my mouth twitches.

“I don’t know.”

“You do not know … ?” he presses, spilling into a grin.

“Think how much worse things could have been if he
hadn’t
been baptized.” I shoot him an arch look, and he stares back for a beat.

We break into laughter, the healing kind. We lean in and rest our heads on one another’s shoulders, bodies shuddering. I breathe the sharp scent of his shampoo in between convulsions. This is what I want to believe in. The smell of Mathieu’s hair. It is enough, for now.

“Come on, let’s get out of here,” I say, and we jump to our feet, racing down the aisle like a couple of pagans dancing through fire, ignoring the pointed, righteous stares, eager to be on secular ground again.

Once outside, the wind whips up my wet hair, while godless pigeons coo at our feet. Mathieu turns to me and yells, “Admit it. You thought the bell was God.”

“Of course not!”

I run down the stairs, leaping off the third from the last to land neatly on one foot. Smiling, I turn with a flourish. Separated by the steps—I looking up, he looking down—we square off.

“Well, maybe,” I acknowledge, unembarrassed.

He shakes his head, but he’s smiling too.

I jerk my shoulders up and explain, “Maybe God didn’t have anywhere else to be just then. You might not know this about me, but I’m awfully important.”

“And you are supposedly the scientist?”

I twist and bend to the breeze. “When I want to be.”

“And it could not be that the clock was simply sounding one o’clock?”

“At the precise moment I needed a sign? Doubtful.”

We crinkle our eyes and grin.

I conclude, “But if that were the case, then God must have known that I was hungry, and tired of all that pretentious conversation.”

I bounce up the stairs to claim him. He descends at a leisurely rate, but I tug more insistently until he trips down, laughing in protest. My stomach is growling.

“I mean, Jesus. What does a girl have to do around here to get some lunch?”

W
e have found a restaurant that gratifies Mathieu’s sense of authenticity and my timid American palette. It is a teahouse called
L’Heure Gourmande
(the Greedy Hour, Mathieu informs me with a wink), tucked up a quiet alleyway. A hinged sign shaped like a teapot welcomes us, and a couple of tables lean drunkenly on the cobblestone. The tables are taken, so we enter and slide into an intimate corner booth backed by textured, gold-washed walls. Above us, in a charming manner that brings the outside indoors, is a recessed ceiling of puffy clouds billowing across the summer sky. I remove my sweater, settling in, and can sense Mathieu checking out my new reveal. Unaccustomed to men admiring me, I casually flaunt my assets, raising my arms to fuss with my damp hair, enjoying the way he ogles the swell of my breasts under my red V-neck while pretending to peer at the menu. I usually feel embarrassed by my limitations, but not today. Daisy Miller, that flirt, has got nothing on me.

I beam at the anonymous faces around me, wondering how their days led them here, bursting to tell them of ours. But there isno need. It should be obvious to anyone who looks that Mathieu and I are only touching down after a morning parade of cloud hopping.

“Are you going to pick out my lunch for me today?” I poke Mathieu, surveying the selections on the menu.

“That depends on what you want to order,” he replies. He is all business with a menu before him. There are right foods and wrong foods to be tagged. His snobbishness should annoy me, but somehow it doesn’t. It is not the superficial, self-satisfied vanity that I am accustomed to. He is so devoted to his struggle for superior living that I have to respect the quest, and find it endearing.

“What if I wanted this?” I ask, pointing to a quiche with ham and veggies.

“That is fine, if uninspired. I would recommend this entrée instead,” he says, drawing my attention to the mezzaluna, a mushroom-stuffed ravioli with cream sauce. “It is appropriate for a beginner.”

I am distrustful of any ravioli not stuffed with beef or cheese, and topped by Chef Boyardee’s familiar marinara, but decide to humor him. Nodding my assent, I ask, “And wine, I suppose?”

He draws in his lower lip and looks at me. Redirecting his attention toward the menu, he observes, “I would not want you to suffer so.”

I blush. “I think I can manage one glass.”

Mathieu shakes his head and claps his menu shut. “No, we are at a teahouse. We shall have tea.” He motions for the waitress, an efficient, older woman who looks like she may be the owner. She bustles over and raises an attentive eyebrow while Mathieu orders our food. Bestowing a gracious smile, she turns and is swallowed by the swinging doors to the kitchen. Perhaps she cooks the food as well. The restaurant has the feel of a one-woman show, like we’ve stumbled upon a great-aunt of Mathieu’s who will herd us into her sheltering arms. I feel at ease for the first time in Paris.

This lasts twenty-eight seconds.

“So who is Andy?”

I cough.

“What?”

Mathieu plays with a pack of sugar. “You mentioned an Andy trying to get you drunk on your twenty-first birthday.”

This elicits no reaction except for a swift succession of blinks on my part. Could I have been so stupid?

“The wine, the guilt … surely you remember this,” he insists, throwing me a bemused smile.

“Oh, yes,
Andy”
I think rapidly. “I mentioned that I have a brother?”

“I believe you did.” Mathieu taps the pack of sugar against the side of the table. “I believe he was a
younger
brother.”

The implications of his logic are indisputable. But I swing wildly, anyway. “You’re not so naïve as to think that teenagers can’t get alcohol in America, are you?”

Mathieu laughs and tosses the sugar to the side. Grabbing hold of my slippery hands, he soothes, “It is all right, Daisy. We do not have to tell each other everything.”

I feel foolish, and muddled. This is what happens when you play upon your past: wrinkles in time develop, and all this unconscious stuff is barfed into the present. Why can’t I tell him about Andy? It’s silly, but … “I’m sorry,” I plead. “Maybe soon.”

Mathieu squeezes my hands. Our hostess emerges with a green ceramic pitcher and a pair of teacups decorated in provincial toile, which she sets down noiselessly. Mathieu pours me a cup. I try to regain my composure while sipping the hot brew, but it burns my tongue, and I clumsily set the cup down, sloshing the contents about. My thumb and fingers are those of a giant. I smile feebly and play with my napkin, dabbing at the brown pool of liquid in the saucer. I usually love a good cup of tea.

But today, the leaves trace a long, bitter memory across the length of my tongue.

“Can I make you some tea?”

“What?” I looked up to see Rakesh, with his flip hairdo and hiker’s backpack, braced in the doorway. “Oh, no. No thanks.”

“Why are you still here, anyway?” he asked, after setting a kettle on the stove and lighting the gas burner. Rakesh wiped his hands on his pants, walked over, and sank down beside me, the secondhand couch squeaking like a rusty violin. The state government pays for our clients’ general upkeep, but not for new furniture.

“Missy wanted me for the evening shift. Debbie called in.”

“What was her excuse this time?” Rakesh rolled his eyes.

I smiled. We hadn’t talked much before. As an undergrad, he always “worked” the night shift. It was a good trade: he got paid for studying and sleeping, and they got a warm body. “God knows. I think her kid lost his binky.”

He laughed. “Sometimes I think she had kids just to get out of work.”

I nodded, though my smile faltered. My chin ached.

“Hey, what’s wrong?” he asked, placing a hand on my arm. He had brown eyes and very white teeth. They sliced through the darkness.