Paris Times Eight (19 page)

He led me solicitously through the swirl of Paris traffic encircling the theater, never once letting go of me. He held my hand as a father might do, proudly leading me to his place of work, showing it off to me and me to it. He was smiling and walking at a quick clip. His feet were turned out in that splayed position shared by all ballet dancers as a result of having distorted their skeletons at a young age in service of their art. Which is to say, he walked like a duck.

He led me toward the back, through the stage-door entrance, which led to a slow decline from the street, a downward walk into the bowels of the theater. The cavernous passageway had low ceilings and perspiring stone walls. The lighting was scant, and as our footsteps echoed down the tunnel-like corridor, I saw our lengthening shadows darkening the pathway before us.

I didn't know where we were going but I mutely followed along, trusting him emphatically. With each step I became aware of others who had walked there before me, all the great dancers and choreographers and set designers and composers and musicians and impresarios and directors and patrons and writers and seamstresses and scenery painters and broom pushers and secretaries and patrons and groupies—anyone great or small with some connection, major or minor, with Paris and its wondrous world of art.

Nureyev turned me left and right through this backstage maze. Along the way we encountered a cleaning woman, her head wrapped in a kerchief, and an elevator operator who took us up and up and up. The backstage of the Palais Garnier is so deep it is said to harbor a subterranean lake. Nureyev squeezed my hand. He must have known he was giving me the thrill of a lifetime, and he seemed to be enjoying the moment every bit as much as I was.

We emerged from the darkness toward a shaft of light. We were suddenly in the wings. He looked at me, grinning. He put a finger to his lips, urging me to be quiet. Some of the Paris Opera dancers were rehearsing, and he wanted to watch them unawares.

In the pit, members of the orchestra tuned their instruments. Three dancers, dressed in sweats and heavy socks, a Degas-like vision of the toil and tedium behind the glamor of theater life, fell into position on the steeply raked stage. A ballet mistress barked out their counts. The music played.

Together, the trio rose on
demi-pointe,
extending their back legs into an arabesque. Collectively they turned, locking hands to perform a
pas de trois
, a lyrical dance for three. They stumbled over a tricky section of choreography requiring them to end their series of turns with a forward thrust of a pointed foot. One arm was simultaneously to go onto the hip while the other swept outward in a gesture of welcome. With each stumble, the ballet mistress loudly clapped her hands for the music to stop, making the dancers take their positions from the top. I could see their beautifully squared shoulders slump from frustration. The moment reminded me that ballet is an art that constantly reproves the dancer, making her feel rarely good enough. Dancers have told me that no matter how spectacularly they may have performed for an audience the night before, the next morning there was always a daily class where the ballet coach would, despite the fatigue and sore muscles, make them go through their paces again, one step at a time. The stay at the top of the mountain was never long.

Nureyev watched his put-upon babies with an arm wrapped around his barrel-like chest. He also held one hand to his face to hide a devilish smile that was growing there. The sequence the dancers were trying to perform was hard. He knew, because he had created it. It was his
Don Quixote,
the ballet about the man who chases dreams in the form of windmills. He seemed to relish their struggle, like a parent watching a child stumble in taking its first steps. At lunch he had told me he was proud of the Paris dancers. He called them his artists. I had the impression that he allowed them their mistakes on the road to perfection, if only to encourage them to be better.

But he had seen enough. Pushing me gently aside and, without saying a word, but right on the music, Nureyev burst from his hiding place in the wings. Just like that, he executed three flawless turns, thrust his leg forward, as if saying ta-dah! with his body. He brought his hand sharply to his waist, making a sweeping gesture that, when he did it, no longer looked like a polite hello. It was more a bugle call, a signal to look his way, drop everything, and salute!

The dancers squealed with delight. They loved the surprise of him, the impishness of him waiting silently behind the curtains before making an impromptu entrance, upstaging them all. It was instantly clear that he was still the gold standard. The idea was to imitate him. The mere presence of him got the dancers excitedly moving again. They hurried to take their places. They mimicked his steps and, above all, his supreme self-confidence. Despite his advanced years, Nureyev was still capable of working magic, of transforming the dancers into superdynamos, of galvanizing everyone around him merely with an artful kick of the leg.

Nureyev looked to me to see how I was enjoying his impromptu performance. I was delighted, of course, and as I made eye contact, I smiled broadly at him, and he at me. I stayed a while longer in the wings, watching him instruct the dancers. He had them laughing. The image was poignant. The great dancer, in his street clothes, signs of age traced on his face, was imparting to the next generation what he knew. He was passing the torch. I was aware that such greatness might never come our way again. I left to go buy the salmon, returning later to leave $
200
worth of beautifully wrapped fish with the theater's backstage concierge.

WHEN I AWOKE
on Christmas Eve, Danielle had already set the table. On top of a saffron-yellow tablecloth she had laid out three large pink dinner plates and an oversized, handcrafted green-and-purple ceramic candlestick that looked like an eggplant, another well-intentioned wedding gift, no doubt.

“I've always liked the look of Christmas, the lights and color,” she said. She then brandished a list, which was sizeable. She said we had many ingredients to buy because in Paris, Christmas Eve had its own special meal, and we were going to follow the tradition as if we had both been born into it.

We walked together outside her apartment. The air was damp and cold. Danielle, her heels clicking rapidly on the sidewalk, me tagging along, explained what was on the agenda. A goose. And that goose, she instructed, speaking loudly as we squeezed past the surging crowds on the constricted sidewalks of her centuries-old neighborhood, needed to be accompanied by a
boudin blanc
—a white blood sausage. And that had to come with wine-soaked shredded cabbage and roasted chestnuts and, for dessert, an ooze of brie and something sugary called a
bûche.

To get all these ingredients, we needed to go to a half-dozen different small shops, each with a different name—
boulangerie, épicerie, charcuterie, fromagerie, pâtis-serie.
I had rarely experienced the domestic side of Paris before, having usually been an itinerant tourist without a kitchen, and I was enjoying the view, even if it did occasionally involve whole heads of goat in some of the storefront windows.

We walked down the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Antoine, where we had at our disposal a number of small specialty shops selling coffee and snails and chairs and mirrors. The area was once the furniture-making center of Paris and still bore the imprint of generations of wood workers who had come before. I breathed in the air, dreaming of sawdust and other smells associated with an industrious class of people. But my senses were occluded by the tang of fresh-baked bread. Danielle had navigated across the street, to a bakery near the corner of Rue Daval and Rue de la Roquette. She said it was famous for its
pain lyonnais,
a hearty loaf made of whole grains, a bread made for the workers.

It was crowded inside, and Danielle stood in line. The croissants, I could determine from a collective clucking of tongues, were already sold out. I took the chance to study the antiquated interior. On the walls were frescoes of maidens in idyllic fields, gathering their wheat. Gold-colored moldings shaped like spring garlands framed each image. More paintings decorated the ceiling, at the center of which was a portrait of Demeter, goddess of the grain. Danielle elbowed me from behind. “Get going,” she said, as more people pushed inside the bakery's doors. “You're kind of in the way.”

Outside, where the winter sky was bruised black and blue, Danielle offered me a bite from a
ficelle,
a loaf even skinnier than a baguette, about the width of two fingers. “I noticed you didn't eat breakfast,” she said. “That's why you're acting so dazed.”

The bread was hot and moist, straight from the oven. “Worth the wait, huh?” Danielle said, her cheeks flushed and full.

The extravagant visual presentation in the food shops rivalled the Louvre. As we scurried down the Rue de Lappe, I saw store windows full of holiday meats, all beautifully displayed. I paused to marvel at guinea fowl so artistically trussed with filigrees of fat and prune and colored vegetable that they looked more like Fabergé eggs than carcasses. Danielle had seen it all before and, when she went inside, she simply asked for one of the pretty little pot roasts to be wrapped up in brown paper. I watched, spellbound. This wasn't a visit to the butcher's as I knew it: this was a boutique for carnivores.

Danielle was hurrying now, racing against the watery sun. As I tried to keep pace with her, I didn't mind my way. I stepped in dog poop and skidded. I collided with a woman holding a full-to-bursting shopping bag. She glowered, even as I tried to apologize.
“Américaine!”
I heard her mutter as she trudged away.

Danielle had kept on walking. “I'll have to have a bath when we get back to the apartment,” I said when I caught up to her. The wet tobacco–colored turd under my foot smelled violently sour. I stopped to scrape my sole against a curb, but was almost hit by someone trying to park. A horn blared loudly.

“I'm concerned about you,” said Danielle. “You have no sense of time. You just do what you want, when you want, talk without thinking. You're out of control.”

Her words wounded.

We continued in silence. I had fallen into a sulk. “I'm just trying to be your friend, you know,” Danielle finally said as we trudged with the parcels up the five flights of curving stairs. Several times, the hallways plunged into darkness after the timer on the light switch had run its course. Danielle fumbled in the dark to push buttons on the various floors to allow us to see our way.

Inside the apartment Max had erected a tree. As lean as Danielle was fleshy, Max squinted up at us from behind gold-wire glasses, asking us heartily if we'd had a good time. Danielle dropped her bundles in the kitchen and went over to kiss him, with a
hmmm
sound, on his pale, puckered lips. He was on his knees in a corner of the living room. He had found a spot just big enough to accommodate the dwarfish evergreen, and was just then stringing it with lights.

He looked at Danielle, then at me, then at Danielle.

“Everything okay?” he asked.

Danielle shot him a narrow-eyed look that said, we'll talk about it later. Married only months, and already they had a shorthand. I told Danielle I needed a peeler for the potatoes and retreated to the kitchen.

I worked quickly and quietly. I cut the tops off the green beans. I washed the lettuce. Danielle put the meat in the oven. We were civil with each other, saying please and thank-you and excuse me as we worked like two chefs in a very small kitchen, an efficient cooking team, to get the grandiose meal ready in time. When I announced that I really had to take that bath—I needed to wash away the day's worries—Danielle shrugged and said, “Go ahead then.”

The doorbell rang. I was wrapped in a towel in my makeshift room. I reached for a dress and chose the emerald-green satin, thinking it right for the occasion. I poked a wet head of hair out my door to ask Danielle to fasten me. “You're incorrigible,” Danielle said to me as she zipped me quickly. “But anyway, Merry Christmas,” she said. “Merry Christmas,” I replied, as together we opened the door to a beribboned bottle of champagne.

Rosemarie and I embraced. I introduced her to Danielle and Max. They all embraced each other in turn, acting very cosmopolitan, very French. Rosemarie had dressed up for the party in a sparkling blouse and shoulder-length earrings. I told her she looked nice. “Nice dress,” she said to me after sitting down on a chair in the living room. The edges of her mouth rode up and down, her eyes darted left and right, just like a puppet's. “You look like one of those Christmas presents you get wrapped at the mall for free.” Her comment made Danielle laugh. Max laughed, too. I smiled and offered to pour the champagne.

Rosemarie's long and naturally wavy hair was already streaked with silver, despite her being just thirty-four years old. When she talked she played with it, wrapping it around her fingers and piling it on top of her head before letting it drop over one shoulder and then the other. She asked Max how long they had had the apartment, how much they paid for it, did they know of any places in the neighborhood coming up for rent. She said she liked the location. Max told her about the renovation. Rosemarie touched his knee and nodded. Danielle and I went into the kitchen to begin bringing out the evening's various courses.

I ladled the oxtail soup, on top of which Danielle had sprinkled freshly chopped parsley, and thought, I won't last the evening.

Rosemarie had now tied her hair to the back of her head in a loose knot, tendrils falling at the side of each ear. She flirted with everyone at the table. Her liveliness was what prevented the party from becoming an utter disaster. Danielle always had a soft spot for eccentrics, and she seemed to like Rosemarie. That night she laughed at Rosemarie's naughty jokes and encouraged her to tell of her Paris adventures at Willi's, an American wine bar near the Bourse where she worked part-time as a waitress. Max leaned in as Rosemarie described the so-called expats, financiers like him, in their suits and ties. The literary scene had long ago decamped for New York. “To hear them talk,” Rosemarie said, tucking into the white blood sausage that squirted transparent juices and a fragrant smell of fennel, “Money is the new poetry. Seeing how expensive it is to live in Paris, I think they're right.”