Hungry Woman in Paris (21 page)

“What kind of sauce is this?” I asked Chef Sauber.

“Truffle sauce,” he responded. I wanted to ask how he’d made the sauce, but I didn’t really care. When was I going to have
the money to buy lots of truffles and make sauce like that? I ate the first quail and, feeling as stuffed as the bird, was
ready to fake my headache when the chef pulled out a marijuana joint and smoked it in front of us. Sage and I looked at each
other, ready to make our hand gestures for “Let’s go.” Chef Sauber took a hit and made a funny face that broke up the seriousness
of our moods and we laughed. He imitated Cheech and Chong and I didn’t know whether to be offended or amused by this Frenchman’s
interpretation of them.

“I am so bad, no?” he asked. “But we are friends, no?” he said with his cute little French accent that would make you forgive
a poodle humping your leg.

“I have a headache. I’m starting to feel not so good,” I said, trying to sound convincing.

“Try it,” he commanded, sticking the joint in my face. “The headache will go away,” he advised me. In her inebriated state,
Sage encouraged me to take a hit. I told her to do it first, hoping she would not go through with it. Unfortunately for me,
Sage took a hit and poured herself some more whiskey. She took another hit and giggled like I’d never seen a tough broad do.
They both looked at me, waiting for me to do it too. I didn’t want to do it, not because I’m a good girl and I was saying
no to drugs, but because I was afraid of my libido. I hardly ever smoked pot, but on the few occasions when I had, it was
for medicinal purposes—when I was younger I couldn’t have an orgasm because of Catholic guilt, but a couple of hits silenced
the chanting comadres in my head telling me I was going to go to hell for having sex before marriage.

I smoked it, pretending like everything was fine, but then I gave Sage the hand signals. She didn’t exactly ignore me; Sage
was just mesmerized by Chef Sauber and his magical dishes. I ate the rest of my dinner and it seemed like the most delicious
food I had ever tasted.

“Are you ready for dessert?” he asked. After a few hits, I was so ready for anything. Our emergency signals were soon forgotten
and there was no resistance.

He brought out miniature soufflés and informed us that they were made with pear. The plates were decorated so beautifully
with pear sorbet and a raspberry coulis. He carried a small bowl with fresh whipped cream and fed a spoonful to Sage.

“I want you to taste what fine handmade whipped cream tastes like,” he said proudly. Sage licked the spoon, and then he fed
me a spoonful.

“It’s delicious,
n’est-ce pas
?” he asked me. I stared at him and debated who was more delicious, the dessert or the chef feeding it to me. I finished eating
the dessert with my spoon and then I licked the coulis left on the plate. He was so flattered by my gesture that he took out
his large cock and put it on my plate and I continued licking. Sage’s eyes widened as I put his warm cock in my cream-filled
mouth. I was so aroused by the food and his touch and I wanted him to come in my mouth. I wanted to taste him. I licked him
like a hungry woman and my tongue explored him. I buried my face in his pubic hair and smelled his essence. He caressed my
hair and called me all sorts of beautiful things I couldn’t make out in French. I’m sure he called me beautiful; all women
are beautiful to men at this moment. I caressed his balls with my fingers and he gasped. I kept doing that and licking him
harder, taking him in all the way back to my throat. He gasped louder and even Sage was aroused by now. She got up behind
him and put her hands under his shirt and massaged his chest and his nipples. He gasped louder and tried kissing her. I grabbed
his pelvis with my two hands and thrust him into my mouth. He went deep and I could feel by his pulsating penis that he was
ready to explode. I yanked his penis out of my mouth and gently put my lips around his hole and he was coming. Would he be
as delicious as the food he made? His sperm filled my mouth and I could feel my wet vagina dripping. At that second I realized
that I love to experience life through my mouth. I was like a little baby discovering the world with my tongue and my mouth
again. Flashes of all the men I had loved and tasted came to me like a heavenly menu of forbidden pleasure. Each man was a
meal or an appetizer, enjoyed and digested.

Chef Sauber pulled away and sat down on the couch. Sage tried to continue stimulating him, but he was too sensitive. He needed
a few minutes to breathe. I left to go to the bathroom and looked at myself in the mirror. Had I wanted something more than
just sexual pleasure from Chef Sauber I would have felt ashamed, but up to this point he was the most delicious man I had
ever consumed with my mouth and eyes, and I didn’t even love him… I actually loved food and dessert more than sex. How
wonderful that a man who gave me both made me realize that. I washed my face and looked in the mirror again, knowing I couldn’t
care less if I placed or got a
stage;
nothing meant anything. I had nothing to lose and nothing to gain from this. I was a woman in no-woman’s-land.

In the mirror behind me, Luna appeared holding a letter. I turned around and she was not there. I shook my head—the shock
of seeing Luna brought me down and I began to think of the ramifications of what I had just done. Would there be rumors that
I’d had the chef for dinner, or would Sage get crap for this later? Would this affect Chef Sauber’s ability to grade me? I
adjusted my clothes and was about to tell Sage to leave with me, but Chef Sauber and Sage were in the middle of a second course.
He was on top, humping her and licking her exposed breasts. They were having too much fun to be interrupted. I just hoped
Sage had remembered to bring condoms with her so she wouldn’t be rumored as the second American girl to have Chef Sauber’s
bastard child.

I led myself to the door and left before they looked up. I walked around looking for the metro and realized I was in Henry’s
arrondissement. I thought about going to his apartment and just surprising him, but he was probably getting it on with Bassie.
I would hate to have him think I actually cared about him.

I
forgot to drink water and I was hungover the next morning. At about one p.m. I realized that it wasn’t a hangover but depression.
I had no reason to get out of bed. For the next ten weeks, while I was out of cooking school, I had no reason to even leave
my apartment. But if I didn’t get out of bed La Calaca Flaca would visit me again, and death didn’t look so bad from her perspective.

“You don’t gain weight ever again and the pain is gone forever,” she would whisper seductively, tickling me if I didn’t listen
to her.

I had to get out of bed, I told myself, and I scrambled to come up with reasons to go outside. I reminded myself how little
money I had and that I was forced to make some money one way or another.

I walked past an American art school in the Eleventh Arron-dissement and saw a flyer seeking models to pose nude for the basic
drawing class. It was 80 euros a sitting. All I had to do was be still. I walked into the office and the French art teacher
looked me up and down. The French art teacher spoke some English, and she told me I would make a good life-drawing model.

“Normally all the models are so skinny, it’s boring, but you are interesting with your little balls of fat here and there,
nice little circles,” she said in her best English.

“Curves? You mean curves?” I said nicely.

“Yes, curves, that’s what you Americans like to call them. I like that for my students. They need to draw all sort of bodies,
not just pretty petite ones.”

The first class was nerve-racking, but after losing my robe and twenty minutes of the same pose, my spirit left my body and
floated first over the Seine, then across the Atlantic, and then across the United States to my mother’s house in Boyle Heights.
My mother was leaving the house sucking on a milk paleta. She went to the local botânica on Cesar Chavez to meet with Doña
Elvira, a curandera who would close her eyes and see me naked in Paris. They conversed in Spanish and discussed what I was
doing.

“I don’t want to tell you this, but your daughter… How shall I put it… ?”

“You can tell it to me straight,” my mother told her.

“Your daughter likes having sex with many men… not at the same time, but she—”

“She is a puta, yes, I know that, but will she come back and marry Armando?” My mother kept pressing Doña Elvira for the future.
Doña Elvira looked deeper with her mind’s eye and I began to shake my head to tell her no, but the art teacher coughed to
let me know I shouldn’t move and I snapped open my eyes to the reality of many men watching me naked. I stared back at them,
admiring each of their manly qualities. They grew uncomfortable feeling naked and exposed in my gaze. I thought, Yes I like
to have sex with different men. They are the spice of life. Why settle for just one spice or flavor when your palate is hungry
for more?”

My work as a nude model was rewarding. However, I still needed to make more money. I walked dogs and placed an ad in the
FUSAC,
seeking English students. I taught English to old French men at cafés, who were really just interested in flirting with me.
As long as they were paying for a drink and a lesson, and kept me company, I would talk to them for an hour or two. Most of
them were married and I would repeatedly turn down their requests to take me out to dinner. It was my rule that I would not
date married men… Okay, I admit it: once I accepted an invitation with a married man, but only because I had promised
myself I would go to Jules Verne in the Eiffel Tower.

As an aperitif my date ordered me a kir royal, champagne with cassis syrup, and I was hooked. We ordered the
dégustation menu
for only 120 euros and had seven little courses with
amuse-bouche
after
amuse-bouche
. I drank three kir royals throughout the meal but then my stomach started talking to me. It would make funny noises until
it was tired of talking and decided to explode. I pushed down my stomach and quickly excused myself to the ladies’ room. I
prayed as I rushed to the restroom that there would be an empty stall for me. The horrors of having to wait in line made my
heart skip a beat. I opened the door to the bathroom and jumped into the only stall. The bathroom was empty and I opened my
mouth. I quickly vomited 200 euros’ worth of food and drink. The carbonation in the champagne was too much for my body and
my stomach was completely cleansed. When I stood up and washed out my mouth I looked in the mirror and thought, Wow, this
is what it must feel like to be a supermodel.

When I was a young writer learning to put sentences together I always fantasized about being a starving writer in Paris. Paris
is wonderful when you can share it with someone you love, but it’s torture when you’re alone and suicidal and see couples
walking around making out like they’ve found their happy ending and women in wedding dresses strutting around as if they own
Paris and are the only ones who know romance.

I used to think New Yorkers were rude, and then I moved to Paris. Now I like New Yorkers. Even the pigeons in Paris have attitudes.
I’m pissed and I’m walking and the pigeons don’t fly out of my way like regular pigeons. New York City pigeons step away,
but the Parisian pigeons look at you like they’re telling you, “You move. You’re the tourist. I live here!” The Parisians
hate tourists, but after putting up with Parisians for almost seven months I decided that the tourists were the best thing
about Paris. Tourists are usually happy and moved to joy or tears at all the beauty that surrounds them. Parisians who are
so used to beauty become ugly and jaded; nothing impresses them anymore.

As much as I wanted to avoid taking a French class again, I broke down and signed up for one. The three-week intensive course
was guaranteed to get me beyond the “tourist level.” So I paid the precious money I was earning posing nude and walking dogs
and teaching old Frenchmen English, and thought this would be the best way to finally learn French.

Surprisingly, I was the only American in my section. There were a few Mexican students in their early twenties, but they hardly
showed up to class. They had a reputation of being the rich kids from the Mexico City bourgeoisie who only came to Paris to
party. They had to sign up for classes to keep their parents off their backs, but they cared more about dancing the night
away at the clubs at Bastille and on the Champs-Élysées than learning French.

For the first few days we worked on the present tense and I could understand a lot of it because I spoke Spanish. The more
French I learned, the better my Spanish got. I learned to introduce myself and tried to explain my life’s dilemma, but no
one understood me, or my French. We were not allowed to speak anything other than French, so the memories of being a child
all came back to me. I remembered learning English by watching TV, so I tried watching French TV, but I found it was mostly
dubbed bad American shows that I wouldn’t watch in English.