The Lollipop Shoes (42 page)

‘He doesn’t like Zozie?’ said Roux.

I shrugged. ‘He doesn’t know her really,’ I said. ‘It’s because of that time she snapped at him. She’s not at all uptight usually. She just hates having her picture taken.’

But it wasn’t just that. He showed me today: two dozen pictures he’d printed off from his computer and taken that day in the
chocolaterie
; pictures of the Advent house; of Maman and me; of Rosette; and lastly, four pictures of Zozie, all of them taken at funny angles, as if he were trying to catch her in secret—

‘That’s not fair. She told you to stop.’

Jean-Loup looked stubborn. ‘Look at them, though.’

I looked at them. They were terrible. All of them blurred and looking nothing like her at all – just a pale oval for a face and a mouth that twisted like barbed wire – and in all of them, the same printing flaw: a darkish smudge around her head, with a yellow circle surrounding it—

‘You must have messed the prints up,’ I said.

He shook his head. ‘That’s just how they came out.’

‘Well, it must have been the light, or something.’

‘Maybe,’ he said. ‘Or something else.’

I looked at him. ‘What do you mean?’

‘You know,’ he said. ‘Ghost-lights.’

Oh, boy. Ghost-lights. I guess Jean-Loup’s been wanting to see his weird phenomena for such a long time that he’s totally flipped out this time. I mean,
Zozie
, of all people. How wrong can you be?

Roux was watching me with that carved-angel look. ‘Tell me about Zozie,’ he said. ‘You sound like you’re pretty good friends.’

So I told him about the funeral, and the lollipop shoes, and Hallowe’en, and the way Zozie had suddenly blown into our lives like something from a fairytale, and made everything fabulous—

‘Your mother looks tired.’

I thought –
you can talk
. He looked exhausted; his face even paler than usual, and his hair in desperate need of a wash. I wondered if he was getting enough to eat, and whether I ought to have brought some food.

‘Well, it’s a busy time for us. With Christmas, and everything—’

Hang on a minute
, I thought to myself.

‘Have you been spying on us?’ I said.

Roux shrugged. ‘I’ve been around.’

‘Doing what?’

He shrugged again. ‘Call me curious.’

‘Is that why you stayed? Because you were curious?’

‘That, and because I thought your mother was in some kind of trouble.’

I jumped at that. ‘But she
is
,’ I said. ‘We all are.’ And I told him again about Thierry, and his plans, and how nothing was the same any more, and how I missed the old days when everything was simple.

Roux smiled. ‘It was never simple.’

‘At least we knew who we were,’ I said.

Roux just shrugged and said nothing. I put my hand in my pocket. There was his peg-doll, the one from last night. Three red hairs, and a whispered secret, and the
spiral sign of Ehecatl, the Changing Wind, drawn in felt pen over the heart.

I closed my hand around it, hard, as if that could make him stay.

Roux shivered and pulled his coat tighter around him.

‘So – you’re not really leaving, are you?’ I said.

‘I was going to. Perhaps I should. But there’s still something bothering me. Anouk, have you ever had the feeling there’s something going on, that somebody’s using you, manipulating you somehow, and that if only you knew how and why . . .’

He looked at me and I was relieved to see no anger in his colours, just reflective blues. He went on in a quiet voice, and I thought that it was the most I’d ever heard him say all at once, Roux being a man of not many words.

‘I was angry yesterday. So angry that Vianne could have hidden such a thing from me that I couldn’t see straight – couldn’t listen – couldn’t think. Since then I’ve been doing some thinking,’ he said. ‘I’ve been wondering how the Vianne Rocher I knew could have turned into someone so different. At first I thought it was just Thierry – but I know his type. And I know Vianne. I know she’s tough. And I know that there’s no way she’s going to let someone like Le Tresset take over her life, not after everything she’s been through . . .’ He shook his head. ‘No, if she’s in trouble, it’s not from him.’

‘Then who?’ I said.

He looked at me. ‘There’s something about your friend Zozie. Something I can’t put my finger on. But I can’t help feeling it when she’s around. There’s something too perfect. Something not right. Something almost – dangerous.’

‘What d’you mean?’

Roux just shrugged.

Now I was starting to feel annoyed. First Jean-Loup, and now Roux. I tried to explain.

‘She’s helped us, Roux – she works in the shop, looks after Rosette, she teaches me things.’

‘What kind of things?’

Well, if he didn’t like Zozie, I was hardly going to tell him
that
. I put my hand in my pocket again, where the peg-doll felt like a little bone wrapped up in wool. ‘You don’t know her, that’s all. You should give her a chance.’

Roux looked stubborn. When he makes up his mind, it’s hard to change it. It’s so unfair – my two best friends—

‘You’d like her. Really. I know you would. She looks after us—’

‘If I believed that, I’d be gone by now. As it is—’

‘You’ll stay?’

I forgot about being mad at Roux and threw my arms around his neck. ‘You’ll come to our party on Christmas Eve?’

‘Well . . .’ He sighed.

‘Fabulous! That way you can really get to know Zozie. And you can meet Rosette properly – oh Roux, I’m so glad you’re staying.’

‘Yeah. Me too.’

But he didn’t sound glad. In fact he sounded worried as hell. Still, the plan worked, which is what counts. Rosette and I managed to change the wind—

‘So, how are you doing for cash?’ I said. ‘I’ve got . . .’ I looked in my pocket. ‘Sixteen euros and some change, if it helps. I was going to buy Rosette a birthday present, but . . .’

‘No,’ he said, a bit sharply, I thought. He’s never been good at taking money, so perhaps it was the wrong thing to say. ‘I’m fine, Anouk.’

Well, he didn’t look fine. I could see that now. And if he wasn’t getting paid—

I made the sign of the Ear of Maize and pressed my palm against his hand. It’s a good-luck sign that Zozie taught me; for wealth and riches and food and stuff. I don’t know how it works, but it does; Zozie used it in the
chocolaterie
, to make more customers buy Maman’s truffles, and though obviously that won’t help Roux, I’m hoping it’ll work some other way, like getting him another job, or a Lotto win, or finding some money in the street. And I made it glow in my mind’s eye, so that it shone against his skin like sparkly dust. That ought to do it, Roux, I thought. That way it won’t be charity.

‘Will you come round before Christmas Eve?’

He shrugged. ‘I don’t know. I’ve got – a few things to sort out before then.’

‘But you’ll come to the party? Promise?’ I said.

‘I promise,’ said Roux.

‘Cross your heart and hope to die?’

‘Cross my heart. And hope to die.’

9

Sunday, 16th December

ROUX DIDN’T COME
to work today. In fact, he hasn’t been there all weekend. It turns out that he left early on Friday, checked out of the hostel in which he was staying, and hasn’t been seen by anyone since.

I suppose I should have expected as much. After all, I asked him to leave. So why do I feel so strangely bereft? And why do I keep looking out for him?

Thierry is incandescent with rage. In Thierry’s world, to walk off a job is both shameful and dishonest, and it was clear that he would accept no possible excuse. There’s something about a cheque, too; a cheque Roux cashed, or didn’t cash—

I didn’t see much of Thierry this weekend. Some trouble with the flat, he’d said, when he dropped in briefly on Saturday night. He’d mentioned Roux’s absence only in passing – and I hadn’t dared ask for too many particulars.

Today, he told me the whole thing, calling in at the end of the day. Zozie was just closing up; Rosette was playing
with a jigsaw – she makes no attempt to link the pieces, but instead seems to enjoy making complicated spiral patterns with them on the floor – and I was just starting a last batch of cherry truffles when he came into the shop, clearly furious, red in the face and ready to explode.

‘I knew there was something about him,’ he said. ‘Those people. They’re all the bloody same. Shiftless, thieving –
travellers
.’ He gave the word the filthiest inflexion, making it sound like an exotic oath. ‘I know he’s supposed to be a friend of yours. But even you can’t be blind to this. To walk off a job without a word – to mess up my schedule. I’ll sue him for that. Or perhaps I’ll just beat the crap out of the ginger bastard—’

‘Thierry, please.’ I poured him a coffee. ‘Try to calm down.’

But where the subject of Roux is concerned, it seems that this is impossible. Of course, they’re very different people. Solid, unimaginative Thierry, who has never lived outside Paris in his life; whose disapproval of single mothers, ‘alternative lifestyles’ and foreign food has always rather amused me – till now.

‘What is he to you anyway? How come he’s such a friend of yours?’

I turned away. ‘We’ve been through this.’

Thierry glared. ‘Were you lovers?’ he said. ‘Is that it? Were you sleeping with the bastard?’

‘Thierry, please—’

‘Tell me the truth!
Did you fuck him?
’ he yelled.

Now my hands were trembling. Anger, all the more violent for being suppressed, came rushing to the surface.

‘And what if I did?’ I snapped at him.

Such simple words. Such
dangerous
words.

He stared at me, suddenly grey-faced, and I realized that the accusation, for all its violence, had just been another of Thierry’s big gestures; dramatic, predictable but ultimately meaningless. He’d needed an outlet for his jealousy, his need for control, his unspoken dismay at the speed at which our trade has improved—

He spoke again, in a shaky voice. ‘You owe me the truth, Yanne,’ he said. ‘I’ve let this go for much too long. I don’t even know who you
are
, for God’s sake. I just took you on trust, you and your kids – and have you ever heard me complain? A spoilt brat and a retard—’

Abruptly he stopped.

I stared at him blankly. Finally, he’d crossed a line.

On the floor, Rosette looked up from the jigsaw she was playing with. A light flickered overhead. The plastic shapes that I use for making biscuits began to rattle against the table-top, as if an express train were going by.

‘Yanne, I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.’ Thierry was trying to regain lost ground, like a door-to-door salesman who still sees a chance of nailing that elusive deal—

But the damage was done. The house of cards, so carefully built, now swept away at a single word. And now I can see what I’d missed before. For the first time, I can
see
Thierry. I’ve already seen his pettiness. His gloating contempt of the underling. His snobbery. His arrogance. But now I can see his colours, too; his hidden vulnerabilities; the uncertainty behind his smile; the tension in his shoulders; the odd stiffening of his posture whenever he has to look at Rosette.

That ugly word.

Of course I have always been aware that Rosette makes him slightly uncomfortable. As always, he
over-compensates, but his cheeriness is a forced thing, like someone petting a dangerous dog.

And now I can see that it’s not just Rosette. This
place
makes him uncomfortable; this place we made without his help. Every batch of chocolates; every sale; every customer greeted by name; even the chair on which he sits – all of these things remind him that we three are independent, that we have a life outside of him, that we have a past in which Thierry le Tresset played no part at all—

But Thierry has a past of his own. Something that makes him what he is. All his fears are rooted there. His fears, his hopes, his secrets—

I look down at the familiar granite slab on which I temper my chocolates. It’s a very old piece, black with age; already worn when I acquired it and bearing the scars of repeated use. There are flecks of quartz in the stone that catch the light unexpectedly, and I watch them shine as the chocolate cools, ready to be heated and tempered again.

I don’t want to know your secrets
, I think.

But the granite slab knows different. Spackled with mica, it winks and gleams, catching my eye, holding my gaze. I can almost see them now, images mirrored in the stone. As I watch, they take shape, they begin to make sense, glimpses of a life, a past that makes Thierry the man he is.

That’s Thierry in hospital. Younger by twenty years or more, he’s waiting outside a closed door. He has two gift packs of cigars in his hand, each tied with a ribbon – one pink, one blue. He has covered every base.

Now it’s another waiting-room. There are murals of cartoon characters on the walls. A woman sits close, with
a child in her arms. The boy is maybe six years old. He stares vacantly at the ceiling throughout, and nothing – not Pooh or Tigger or Mickey Mouse – brings the smallest gleam to his eye.