Honor Thyself (31 page)

“Forgive me. Let me love you and take care of you for the rest of my life. I swear I won't let you down this time.” She could see that he meant it.

“I can take care of myself,” she said sadly, looking at him through the open car window after she got out. “I'm too tired to take a risk like that again.” She turned away then and hurried up the steps of the Ritz, with the CRS guards behind her. Matthieu watched until she was gone, and drove away. There were silent tears running down his cheeks as he drove home. He knew now what he had feared all this time, and hoped wasn't true. He had lost her.

Chapter 18

C
arole was unusually quiet as she sat across the breakfast table from Stevie the next morning, as Stevie ate a chanterelle omelette and several pains au chocolat.

“I'm going to weigh three hundred pounds by the time we go home,” Stevie complained, as Carole read the newspaper in silence. Stevie was wondering if Carole was feeling all right. She had hardly said a word since she got up.

“How was dinner last night?” Stevie asked her finally, as Carole set the paper down. She sat back in her chair and sighed.

“It was fine.”

“Where'd you go?”

“L'Orangerie, on the Ile Saint Louis. Matthieu and I used to go there all the time.” It was one of his favorite restaurants, and had become hers, along with Le Voltaire.

“Are you feeling okay?”

Carole nodded in answer to her question. “Just tired. The walking has been doing me good.” She'd been out with Matthieu every day, and they walked for hours as they chatted.

“Was he upset about the thing in the
Herald Tribune
?”

“A little. He'll get over it. I don't know how he can be righteous about it. They were right. It's a wonder no one figured it out before, although we were pretty careful in those days. He had a lot at stake, and so did

I. He forgets.”

“It'll probably just slip away,” Stevie reassured her. “No one can prove anything now anyway. It's been way too long.” Carole nodded again. She agreed. “Did you have fun?” This time Carole shrugged. And then looked across the table at her assistant and friend.

“He proposed.”

“He
what
?”

“He proposed. As in marriage.” Her face was blank. Stevie looked stunned, and then delighted, but Carole didn't.

“Holy shit! What did you say?”

“I said no.” Her voice was painfully calm, as Stevie stared.

“You did? I've been getting the feeling that you two were still in love with each other, and I thought he was trying to get things going again.”

“He is. Or was.” Carole was wondering if he would speak to her again. He was probably hurt by the night before.

“Why did you say no?” Although he had worried her at first, now Stevie was disappointed.

“It's too late. Too much water under the bridge by now. I still love him, but he hurt me too much. It was too hard. And I don't want to get married again. I told him that last night.”

“I can understand the first two reasons, about your being hurt. But why don't you want to get married again?”

“Been there. Done that. Divorced. Widowed. Broken heart in Paris. Why do I need to risk all that again? I don't. My life is easier like this. I'm comfortable now.”

“You sound like me.” Stevie sounded dismayed.

“You're young, Stevie. You've never been married. You should at least do it once, if you love the guy enough to make that kind of commitment.” She was speaking about Alan. “I loved the men I was married to. Jason left me. Poor Sean died, way too young. I don't want to start all over again, especially with a guy who already broke my heart once. Why take the chance?” She loved him, but this time she wanted her head to rule her heart. It was safer.

“Yeah, but he didn't start out to be a shit to you, from what I understand. At least according to what you told me. He got himself tangled up in his own mess. He was afraid to leave his wife, he was a high-up government official, and he got appointed to another term, which complicated things further. But now he's retired from the ministry, and she's dead, he's not likely to make the same mess again. And he makes you happy, or he seems to. Am I right?”

“Yes,” Carole said honestly, “he does. But even if he doesn't make a mess of it again, then what? He dies and leaves me heartbroken again.” She looked bleak as she said it. “I just don't want to put my heart on the line again. It hurts too much.” It had been hard enough losing Sean, and trying to bounce back again. It had been two years. And five years of misery after she left Matthieu in Paris. Every day, she hoped he'd call to say he'd left his wife, and he never did. He stayed. Until she died.

“You can't give up like that,” Stevie said, looking sad for her. She hadn't realized Carole felt that way to that degree. “It's not like you to quit.”

“I didn't even want to marry Sean. He talked me into it. But I was your age then. I'm just too old to do it now.”

“At fifty? Don't be ridiculous. You look thirty-five.”

“I feel ninety-eight. And my heart is three hundred and twelve. Believe me, it's been around the block more than a couple of times.”

“Come on, Carole. Don't give me that. You're tired now because you've been through a terrible ordeal. I saw your face when we came back to Paris to close the house. You loved this man.”

“That's my point. I don't want to feel like that again. I was devastated. I thought I'd die when I flew out of here and said goodbye to him. I cried over him every night for three years. Or two at least. Who needs that? What if he leaves me or dies?”

“What if he doesn't? What if you're happy with him, for real this time, not stolen or borrowed, or hiding out? I mean really happy, in a grown-up partnership and life. Do you want to risk missing that?”

“Yes.” There was no doubt in Carole's voice.

“Do you love him?”

“Yes. I do. Amazing as that is, even to me, after all this time. I think he's wonderful. But I don't want to be married to him, or anyone else. I want to be free to do whatever I want. I know how selfish that sounds. Maybe I've always been selfish. Maybe that's what Chloe's pissed about, and why Jason left me for someone else. I was so busy pursuing my career and being a movie star, maybe I missed the important stuff. I don't think I did, but you never know. I raised my kids, loved my husbands. I never left Sean for a minute before he died. Now I want to do what I want to do, without worrying if I'm offending somebody, letting them down, pissing them off, or supporting a cause they don't like. If I want to get on a plane and go somewhere, I can. If I don't want to call home, I won't. And it won't upset anyone. There's no one at home anyway now. Besides, I want to write my book, without worrying about whether I'm disappointing someone, or they think I should be somewhere else, doing what suits them. Eighteen years ago, I would have laid down and died for Matthieu. I would have given up my career for him, if he'd asked me to. Or Jason for that matter. I wanted to have babies with Matthieu and be his wife. But that's a long time ago. Now I'm not so anxious to give it all up. I have a house I like, friends I like, I see my kids whenever I can. I don't want to sit here in Paris, wishing I were somewhere else. Worse yet, with a man who might hurt me, and already has in the past.”

“I thought you liked Paris.” Stevie looked stunned by her speech. Maybe it really was too late. She hadn't believed that, but Carole had almost convinced her.

“I do like Paris. I love it. But I'm not French. I don't want to be told what's wrong with my country, how obnoxious Americans are, or that I don't understand anything because I come from a different country, which is uncivilized anyway. Matthieu put half our problems down to ‘cultural differences’ because I expected him to get divorced in order to live with me. Call it old-fashioned or puritanical, I just didn't want to sleep with someone else's husband. I wanted my own. I figured he owed me that. But he stayed with her.” It had been more complicated than that, particularly because of his position in the government, but his insistence about it being okay to have a mistress had been typically French, and always upset her deeply.

“He's free now. You wouldn't have to deal with that. If you love him, I don't understand what's stopping you.”

“I'm too chicken,” Carole said miserably. “I don't want to get hurt again. I'd rather walk away before that happens. It always does.”

“That's sad,” Stevie said unhappily, looking at her friend.

“It is sad. It was sad fifteen years ago when I left him. It was sad as hell. We were both devastated. We both cried at the airport. But I just couldn't stay anymore, the way things were. And maybe now it would be something else. His kids, his work. His country. I can't see him living outside France. And I don't want to live here, not full-time anyway.”

“Can't you two compromise in some way?” Stevie asked, and Carole shook her head.

“It's simpler not doing it all. No one will get disappointed, or feel they got less than they deserved. We won't hurt each other, or insult each other, or disrespect each other. I think we're both too old.” She had made up her mind and nothing was going to change it. Stevie knew how she was when she got that way. Carole was stubborn as a mule.

“So you're going to be alone for the rest of your life, with your memories, seeing your kids a few times a year? What happens when they have lives and kids of their own, and hardly have time to see you anymore? Then what? You do a movie every few years, or give it up? Write a book, make a speech now and then for some cause you may not even care about by then? Carole, that's the dumbest thing I've ever heard.”

“I'm sorry you feel that way. It makes sense to me.”

“It won't ten or fifteen years from now, when you're lonely as hell and have missed all these years with him. He may even be gone by then, and you'll have missed your chance to be with a guy you've already loved for nearly twenty years. What you two have has already stood the test of tragedy and time. You still love each other. Why not grab it while you can? You're still young, and beautiful, and have some life left in your career. But when that goes, you'll be all alone. I don't want to see that happen to you.” Stevie was deeply sad for her.

“So what am I supposed to do? Give up everything for him? Stop being who I am? Give up doing movies entirely? Give up the work I do for UNICEF? And sit there, holding hands with him? That's not who I want to be when I grow up. I have to respect myself, and honor what I believe in. If I don't, who will?”

“Can't you have both?” Stevie said, looking frustrated. She wanted Carole to have more in her life than her charity work, making the occasional movie, and holiday visits with her kids. She deserved to be loved and happy too, and have companionship for the rest of her days, or however long it lasted. “Do you have to be Joan of Arc, and take a vow of celibacy to be true to yourself?”

“Maybe I do,” Carole said through clenched teeth. Stevie was upsetting her, which was exactly what she hoped to do, but she didn't think she was getting through to her.

The two women went back to reading the news papers, frustrated with each other. It was rare for them to disagree to that extent. Neither of them spoke to each other until the doctor came to see Carole at noon.

She was pleased with Carole's progress, and with all the walking she said she'd done. The muscle tone in her legs was better, her balance was good now, and her memory was improving exponentially. The doctor was confident Carole would be able to go back to Los Angeles when she'd planned to. There was no medical reason why she couldn't. The doctor said she'd come back to see her again in a few days, and told her to continue what she was doing. She said a few words to the nurse, and then left to go back to the hospital.

Stevie ordered lunch for Carole after the doctor left, but she left her alone at the table, and ate lunch in her own room. She was too upset by what Carole had said to her to be able to make chitchat with her over lunch. She thought Carole was making the biggest mistake of her life. Love didn't come along every day, and if it had landed in Carole's lap again, Stevie thought it was a crime to waste it. Worse yet, to run away because she was afraid to get hurt again.

Carole got bored alone at the lunch table. Stevie had said she had a headache, which Carole suspected wasn't true. She didn't challenge her about it, and after pacing around the living room of the suite for a while, she finally called Matthieu in his office. She thought he might be out to lunch, but called him anyway. His secretary put her through to him immediately. He was eating a sandwich at his desk, and had been in a rotten mood all day. He had bitten his secretary's head off twice, and slammed the door to his office after talking to a client who had annoyed him. He was obviously not having a good day. She had never seen him like that. And she was cautious when she told him who was on the phone. He picked up the call immediately, hoping Carole had changed her mind.

“Are you too mad to talk to me?” Carole asked in a soft voice.

“I'm not mad at you, Carole,” he said sadly. “I hope you called to tell me you had a change of heart. The offer still stands.” He smiled. It would stand forever, for as long as he was alive.

“I didn't. I know I'm right. For me. I'm too scared to get married again. For now anyway. And I just don't want to. I talked to Stevie about it this morning, and she tells me in ten or fifteen years I'll change my mind.”

“By then I'll be dead,” he said matter-of-factly as Carole shuddered.

“You'd better not be. What was that? A short-term offer, or a long-term one?”

“ Long-term. Are you playing with me?” He knew he deserved it. He deserved everything she dished out to him now, after what he'd done to her in the past.

“I'm not playing with you, Matthieu. I'm trying to find myself, and honor what I believe in and who I am. I love you, but I have to honor myself, if not, who am I? That's all I have.”

“You always did honor yourself, Carole. That's why you left me. You had too much respect for yourself to stay. That's why I love you.” It was a catch-22 for both of them, for him then, and her now. They were always trapped between impossible choices that had to do with respecting both others and themselves, sometimes both at the same time.