Frankie in Paris (15 page)

“Well,
Franc
."
 
  
He
pronounced my name the same as his native money.
 
I was beginning to get used to that, "You
are about to get a real French haircut!”
 

***

After
the events of my day, I almost didn't care if he was scamming me.
 
However, it was comforting to enter through
the doors of an actual salon.

“Pierre!”
 
someone called.
  
It was a woman with frizzy grey hair and a
cigarette sticking out of the side of her mouth.
 
She rattled off some French, and
 
I was able to pick out “lover’s quarrel”
—
and that she was teasing him about it.
 

Pierre
leaned close to
my ear.
 
“Zat one.
 
She eez a beetch.”
 
I figured he wasn’t talking about the sands
of Santa Cruz.

Pumping
a foot pedal to raise my seat, he snapped a black cape around my neck and
turned me until I was facing the mirror.
 

“I
sink we need to come up here and leave zees here.”
 
He wanted to give me an A-line haircut.
 
Sounded
bien
.

“What
do you want to do wiz zees bangs?”

“I
was going to grow them out.”

The
shapely eyebrow raised, and his lips were doing that French thing.
 
“
Non
.”
 
He wagged his finger at me and began to work.

The
woman stylist sounded like she was coughing up a lung.
 
Or a small animal.
 
After styling the man in front of her, she
waddled behind a curtain.

“I
hate her.
 
She eez horrible.
 
Someday, I will open my own shop.”

“That
sounds like a good idea.”

“
Oui
.”
 
Pierre
took a short sleeved, black button up shirt from a coat rack near his station
and put it on.
 
He flipped up the collar
and added a black leather utility belt with pockets for his tools.

Trying
to smooth his tangled locks, he caught his own reflection in the mirror.
 
“Look at zis mess,
non
?”
  
Tears were still
hiding in his voice.

“Are
you okay?”
 

He
paused for a moment, but didn’t make eye contact with me.
 
“Ah,
oui
.
 
Just a leetle argument.
 
My boyfriend
—
he is angry weez
me for somesing stupid.
 
I am too
sohnsiteeve, sometimes.”

“Me,
too.”

“Us
bleeding hearts, we have to steek togezer,
non
?”
  
He snipped away at the back of my head.

“Where
did you learn English?”
 

“I
originally learned from movies and TV, but
—
”
snip, snip,
“but zen, I moved to zee U.S.
 
I lived in Georgia for one year.
 
Zat was enough America for zis Frenchman.”

I
dared not ask what Georgia
thought of my skinny new, Parisian, gay hairstylist friend.
 
The only time that I had ever seen Georgia was
from an airport layover.
 
There had been
a confederate flag on top of a building, visible on our way down.

“Why
Georgia?”

Most
of my hair was still there, but what he had done was amazing!
 
I had to agree with him about the bangs,
too.
 
They were short
—
almost too short
—
and straight
across my forehead, but positively superb!
 
The loss of length in the back made my hair bump up.
 
In the front, it landed in little points at
my chin, very artfully done.
 
It was
fabulous:
 
I looked like a china doll, or
a silent film era starlet.
 

“Pierre, you are just too
wonderful!”

“
Oui
, I know zat.” The dimple made
another appearance when he grinned.

I
felt worlds better.
 
Good enough to deal
with my grandmother, even!
 
“
Merci beaucoup
!
 
How much do I owe you?”

“You
know,
Cherie
, let’s call it
even.
 
I sink we bose needed zees.”

Catching
the faint scent of incense, or maybe patchouli oil, I jumped up and gave him a
hug.

“Let
me at least buy you a cup of coffee?”

“I
weesh I could, but it looks like I might have a visitor.”
 
A young man stood outside of the window,
looking at my hairstylist with soulful eyes.

“Got
it.”
 
I nodded.

“Now
zat one
—
he
can buy me a
cup of coffee.”

The
congested woman wheezed her way back into the room, just as Pierre deposited his belt on the coat rack
and went out to greet his boyfriend.

“Pierre!”
 
she yelled toward him, but he had already
exchanged a kiss with his lover and swaggered away with a bounce in his step.

***

Heading
back to the hotel, I felt better than I had for days.
 
My hair looked
très
chic
and I had made a
sohnsiteeve
, interesting new friend.
 

Henri
was at his station when I entered the building.

“Everysing
okay?”
 
His warm eyes looked concerned.

“Yes,
Henri.
 
Thanks so much.
 
Everything is perfect!”

Taking
 
in my new hairdo, he chuckled,
 
“
T
rès
magnifique
!
 
You look
très
belle
!”

“Thank
you, er,
merci
!”
 
I smiled and really meant it.

I
was hardly even agitated when I nearly collided with Pierced Eyebrow as he
exited the elevator.
 
I wasn’t even all
that exasperated when the elevator door took forever to close while he stood
and stared at me
—
looking as
though he had something to say.

Whistling
a bar from one of my favorite punk songs, I giggled as I realized that I was
literally creating elevator music.
 
I was
positively giddy.

Until
I opened the door to our room.

***

You
know how sometimes you can wonder what someone is thinking when they do
something outrageous?
 
Well, I’m pretty
sure I know what Lulu was thinking.
 
I
just wonder why she was missing that little piece of... of what, I am not sure
—t
hat mechanism in your brain which tells you that an idea
should remain just as a thought.
 
I mean,
I think it would be super fun to jump from my rooftop to my neighbor’s
rooftop.
 
However, I know that it is an
unwise, unsafe choice.
 
I also think it
would be hilarious to answer the front door wearing nothing but bubble
wrap.
 
But I know that it wouldn’t turn
out so well if a conservative friend was the one doing the knocking.
 
It's just plain old impulse control.
 

And Lulu
had very little of it.

***

The
oppressive heat and lack of air conditioning in our room were undeniably the largest
factors in making my grandmother dream up her plan of packing herself in
ice.
     

“Helooo
Honey,” she called, looking up at me from her bed with a huge smile on her
face.
 

 
A French soap opera blinked across the TV.
 
The bedspread was lined with towels, and she
had removed her clothing: except for a pointy tan bra, a pair of panty hose and
about eighty pounds of ice cubes.

Standing
in the doorway, I couldn’t think of a single thing to say.

“How
did you get all of that ice in here?”
 
was what
 
finally came out.

“I
used our plastic bags from the Champs. I was so hot after our trip out.
 
I just couldn’t get cooled down:
 
it took three trips to the ice machine.
 
That nice boy with the piercings helped
me!”
 
Well,
of course he did.

It
was a bizarre and unsettling vision, and I had had enough of seeing her like
that.
 
Torn between wanting to take a
photo and wanting to run out of the room as fast as my feet would carry me, I
remained in the door, unmoving
,
like one of
Medusa’s victims.
 
A few of the chunks of
ice rose up around her, spinning rapidly, then falling back onto the bed.

I
wasn’t even aware that I had done it.
 
Being
so incredibly drained, I was surprised that I was even capable.
 

Mumbling
something about going to get a soda, I backed out into the hall.
 
She was calling after me, telling me that I had
forgotten to close the door.
 
Keeping my
eyes averted,
 
I went back and closed it
—
although, I am pretty sure that the image of that little body
packed in ice was already burned into my brain.
 
Freezer-burned.

I
didn't realize that I had been running until I found myself gasping for breath
and standing in the elevator, smacking one of the walls with my open palm.
 
The sound echoed through the small space like
a hardback book slamming shut.

So much for feeling good.
 
My hair didn’t even look coiffed
anymore.
 
Thick, short fringe was
sticking straight out from my forehead, shellacked in stress-sweat.
 
I slicked my bangs down the best that I
could.
 
Now what?
 
Where was I
headed?
 

“Where
are you going,
Mademoiselle
?”
 
Henri called out to me as I strode furiously
through the lobby.

“
Je ne sais
pas
.” I had no idea.

As
if angry with it, I pushed through the door
—
exploding into
the bright, humid dusk.
 
I looked both
ways and chose right.
 
For no reason whatsoever.

***

People
stepped out of my way.
 
I must have
looked unbalanced.
 
I felt the part.
 

Notre
Dame was visible in the distance.
 
Would
anyone really care if I entered its esteemed halls and called for
“sanctuary”?
 
Maybe staying there for the
remainder of the trip would be a good idea?
 
It wouldn’t work:
 
probably no diet soda there
.

My
pace slowed to a normal speed, and I leaned against a rough wall to reevaluate
my current situation.
 

***

POSITIVE

I am in Paris
                           

I found Boots

NEGATIVE

I am in Paris

I have not purchased any boots

Lulu is packed in ice

Lulu tried to sell me to a trafficker

I miss
Rich

Lulu stole dirt from a corpse

The Redhead

***

I
stopped because I didn’t really think that Dan was still a negative.
 
I wouldn’t want to be stuck in an elevator
with her for nine hours, but I was feeling quite a bit more charitable toward
her after sharing her personal breakdown. Still, the negatives mightily
outweighed the positives.