The Loveliest Chocolate Shop in Paris (12 page)

“Oh no! Why not?”

Laurent held up his hands. “Just father-son stuff…nothing, really.”

“He seems pretty happy to me,” I said.

Laurent looked quite fiery. “Really? That is why he weighs six hundred pounds maybe? This is what a happy man looks like?”

I looked nervous. “Well, your mother seems to keep him in line.”

“That's not my mother.”

I figured I'd probably said enough for one night, as Laurent finished his coffee up. He looked up at me, his smile back, his shortness forgotten.

“Sorry,” he said. “I don't think I make a very good first impression.”

“Apart from the attempted mugging and the terrible parent issues,” I said, “you're doing totally fine. Do you want me to pay for the coffee too?”

He looked a little shocked till he saw I was joking.

“No,” he said. “Are you any good? At chocolate, I mean. Not violence.”

I shrugged. “My old boss said I had a nose, whatever that is. But your father does things very differently. I'm going to try my best.”

“Hmm,” he said. “Maybe I should poach you.”

“Good luck with that,” I said, smiling. Suddenly I felt exhausted. “I…I owe someone a favor,” I said. “To stay. And do what I'm doing.”

I looked around onto the street, still thronged with night people.

“Even if coming to Paris is a bit…”

“
Un
peu
trop
?” said Laurent quietly, in French. A little too much?

“It's been a long day.”

“Come on then,” he said. “I came to take you home. I will.”

I followed him out onto the street, wondering where his car was. But it wasn't a car. Tucked up just under a railway bridge, about three hundred feet away, was a beautiful shiny little powder blue Vespa.

“Only way in town,” he said, when he saw me look at it.

“It's cool,” I said.

“It's essential,” he said, even though he looked too big for it. He unlocked the seat and handed me a pale blue helmet that matched the bike, putting on a vintage black one with large old-fashioned goggles of his own.

“What is this, the girl's helmet?” I joked, before realizing it smelled partly of hairspray. Well, of course, he must have a girlfriend. Probably tons. I felt a little odd putting it on.

“You've been on a scooter before?” he asked.

“Oh no, I haven't,” I said, the helmet halfway up my head. “Is it just like a bike?”

“No,” he said, scratching his head. “No, it really isn't. Uhm. Just. Okay, move when I move, okay? Like, if I lean over…”

“Lean the other way, for balance,” I said promptly.

“Uh-oh,” said Laurent.

“No?”

“The opposite. When I lean, you lean.”

“Won't we fall over?”

“Probably,” said Laurent. “How bouncy are you?”

- - -

Riding through the Parisian dark, clutching a large man on a tiny bike (with a man bag over his shoulder—all French men had them, I noticed; they seemed to make perfect sense), I tried to follow his lead as to when to lean (it got easier after the first few times). It was hard to predict though, as he never signaled and often didn't wait for lights to change, simply plowing straight ahead. The first few times, I buried my face in his soft leather jacket. After that, finding myself still alive, I attempted to trust him and began to take some notice of my surroundings.

We roared down the Champs-Élysées, its broad pavements and tall white buildings glowing in the moonlight, and the buildings, tall and stately, glowing in the lights. The cars honked, and every time we turned slightly toward the left, I would see it there, following us like the moon: the great, unmistakable form of the zigzagging Eiffel Tower, lit up with spotlights like a VIP, which of course, she is. I couldn't take my eyes off her, standing there so brazenly, nothing tall around her that could lessen her impact.

“What are you doing?” growled the voice on the front of the bike as I twisted my body to get a better look.

“Sightseeing,” I said back, half my answer lost in the wind rushing past us.

“Well, stop it. Follow me.”

And he grabbed my right knee quite forcibly and tugged it more tightly around his waist. I clung on tighter and let the sights of Paris come to me as they would; a church here, its square belfry askew; the great shop windows of the stores glinting in the streetlights; the occasional snatches of west African rap from passing cars; once, on a street corner, a couple slow dancing to music only they could hear. A crescent moon, a gentle scent of perfume and flowers as we passed the Place des Vosges, the air fresh but not cold against my skin, Laurent in front still traveling at what seemed to me terrifying speeds, the old street lamps flashing past us.

Suddenly, even though I didn't know where I was or what I was doing, not really, and quite possibly with the help of two martinis, I felt amazing. Nobody, nobody in the world, apart from Laurent, who didn't count as I didn't know him—nobody knew where I was, or what I was doing, or what I was up to. I didn't know what lay ahead, I didn't know what I was going to do with the rest of my life, whether I was going to succeed or fail, meet someone or stay single, travel or go home.

It sounds so stupid seeing as I was thirty, had no money, eight toes, a garret rental with a socialite giant, and a temporary job. But suddenly, I felt so free.

1972

S
paghetti Bolognese.”

“No.”

“That is not possible.”

“I tried spaghetti hoops,” said Claire, lying back on the grass.

“I do not know what that is.”

“They're all right.”

“All right. All right. Why would you put something in your mouth that is only all right?”

Claire
giggled. They were having a picnic in the Jardin du Luxembourg. It felt almost magical to Claire that only weeks before she had been looking at the young lovers, so smug and contented with their wicker baskets, their casually discarded bicycles, and empty wine bottles. They made it look so simple; she had been so envious.

And
now, here she was too, lying half on a rug, half on the grass under a blazing blue sky. M. and Mme. LeGuarde had taken the children to Provence for a week. Originally Claire had been supposed to go with them. When Mme. LeGuarde had said she wouldn't be necessary, Claire had immediately panicked and worried she'd done something wrong. Being sent back to the Reverend in disgrace would be more than she could bear.

Mme. LeGuarde laughed at her worried face. In fact, she wanted Claire to give her love life more of a chance without them around, have a little adventure of her own. It hadn't passed her notice that Claire had come more out of her shell; she was loving and carefree with the children, more willing to speak up. She had roses in her cheeks and a light golden tan from hours walking outside and playing with Arnaud and Claudette in parks; her appetite was good, her eyes were sparkling, her French coming on in leaps and bounds. She was already a long way from the worryingly pale, hopelessly introverted schoolgirl who had arrived on their doorstep two months before. Now, Mme. LeGuarde thought, Claire should have a holiday too.

First, she took her shopping.

“As a thank-you,” she murmured, brushing off Claire's stammering that they had already done so, so much for her.

She
took
her
to
her
own
atelier, situated just off the Marais. It was a tiny shop front, with a sole sewing machine in the window and no signage. A woman in an immaculate black knit dress cut starkly to the knee with a starched white collar and perfect cheekbones appeared in front of them.

“Marie-France,” said Mme. LeGuarde. The ladies kissed, but with no noticeable warmth. Then she turned her pale blue eyes to Claire, who felt herself quailing under the weight of such scrutiny.

“Her legs are short,” she barked.

“I know,” said Mme. LeGuarde, uncharacteristically humble. “What can you do?”

“But the lower part of the leg should equal the length of the thigh.”

“I shall have them rebroken immediately.”

Marie-France harrumphed and indicated to Claire, without saying anything, that she should follow her up the perilously narrow twisted staircase.

The
first
floor, in complete contrast to the pokey shop front, was a large, airy room, lit by enormous windows on both sides. At one end, two seamstresses, both tiny bent ladies, hunched over sewing machines without looking up. Another tiny woman was pinning the most beautiful material—a huge, heavy swath of pale gray taffeta that shimmered and reflected the light like running water—onto a dressmaker's dummy, ruching it at the bust, then pulling it in toward the waist, making tiny, invisible darts with a clutch of pins from her mouth so quickly it was almost impossible to make out what she was doing. Claire stared at her, utterly fascinated.

“Disrobe,” said Marie-France without emotion. If Mme. LeGuarde found this in the slightest odd, she didn't let on to Claire with even a twitch of the lips, as Claire took off her cheap cotton summer dress and stripped down to her petticoat and bra. With a
tcch
, Marie-France made it clear that the petticoat also had to come off. Claire felt cross and a bit shaky. Did she really have to be so rude? She'd never taken her clothes off in front of a stranger before. Even thinking this made her think of Thierry and then blush.

Marie-France watched her impatiently, then whipped a long tape measure that had been hanging around her neck like a pale white snake and, at the speed of light, started measuring her up, shouting out measurements—in centimeters, of course, Claire realized, two seconds after she wondered if she'd put on lots of weight without noticing—to the woman who had been pinning taffeta and was now jotting down details in a large, heavy-bound navy blue book.

“Nice flat bosom,” she said to Mme. LeGuarde. Claire had certainly never heard it described like that before. “And the waist is small. Good.”

She
glanced
up
at
Claire
and
addressed
her
in
perfect
English, even though Claire had given every indication that she understood her in French.

“That is what your waist should measure now for the rest of your life. It is in the book.”

Mme. LeGuarde smiled. Claire glanced at her.

“That's good,” whispered Mme. LeGuarde. “If it goes in the book, that means she approves of it.”

Marie-France snorted again.

“I've yet to meet an English girl that could hold on to it.”

She
looked
up.

“The babies come, they think, aha, now I shall lie in a field like a large cow and wait to be fed.”

Claire
thought
of
her
own
mother, with her lovely rounded bosom and strong capable arms. She had always thought of her mother as beautiful. But you couldn't get away from the fact that it was difficult to believe that she and Mme. LeGuarde had been schoolgirls at the same time, were the same age. Mme. LeGuarde looked closer to her own age.

“Raise your arms.”

After
rapidly
jotting
everything
down, Marie-France made a nod to her assistant, who had led them up another flight of stairs. This room was dark and cramped, lined ceiling to floor and wall to wall with every kind of material possible. It was like an Aladdin's cave; there was gold ribbon, and silks in the deepest of hues: turquoise, pink, scarlet. There were many different tones of black, in every possible material, from the finest, softest mohair wool, to the lightest, most delicate chiffon; navy too. Florals large and small, some so loud you couldn't imagine who could wear them, to daisies etched on a heavy sunken cotton so tiny you could barely make them out. There was cut-out voile and large rolls of calico for pattern cutting; stripes in every conceivable colorway, and, over in the far corner, protected by a dust sheet, was the lace, the satin, in white and oyster and cream, for the brides. Claire couldn't help it—she gasped. Marie-France almost let a twitch cross her lips.

“I see you're thinking ahead,” she muttered. Claire colored again and turned back.

“Now,” said Mme. LeGuarde, all business. “Nothing too somber. She's not a French girl; she'll just look like a clumpy English girl on her way to a funeral.”

Claire
was
barely
listening; she was still following the form and feel of the fabrics lining the extraordinary treasure cave of a room. The street noise and traffic of Paris outside had disappeared; she felt as if she were in another world.

Marie-France did a sniff. “She cannot be chic.”

“I don't want her to be chic,” fired back Mme. LeGuarde. “Chic is for spoiled bobo girls who never work a day in their lives. I want her to be what she is; young and pretty and unspoiled.”

“For how long?” said Marie-France, and Claire wondered how such a rude woman could even get up in the morning without everyone she knew wanting to kill her, but she didn't have much time to think about that as Mme. LeGuarde, with a practiced eye, picked out a light cream poplin lined with a navy stripe, and a soft, green fine cotton, with a border of gentle yellow wildflowers.

Seconds
later, to her regret, she was back in the main atelier, where the tiny woman, who didn't say a word through her mouthful of pins, started pinning her at the speed of light, as Marie-France and Mme. LeGuarde bickered and disputed and lengthened and shortened. There was no mirror ahead of her, so Claire let her thoughts wander…to what Thierry would say when he saw her in her new finery, and beyond, what she would do…what she could do…in a week where she would have the entire house to herself. It made her heart beat terribly fast. Of course Thierry had asked her back to his apartment, and of course she had refused. It didn't seem right.

It
wouldn't seem right under her host's roof either, but Mme. LeGuarde had been so matter-of-fact, so open about what she thought was a healthy stage of development that…well, she didn't think she would mind. Claire bit her lip nervously. But would it seem terribly forward? Terribly rude?

But
then, the way Thierry made her feel every time he touched her hand, every time he maneuvered her by the elbow down the street…it made her feel hot and cold and completely overwhelmed, unable to concentrate on anything. And now it was mid-July, and in just a few short weeks, she would be headed back, back to Kidinsborough, and the Reverend, and sixth form college, and then on to secretarial, or the grim teacher-training college they had up the road, not the university her teachers had been so keen to encourage her to. Who would pay for it? Not Mme. LeGuarde.

But
did
she
dare?

“
Bon
,” said Marie-France, finally, without smiling. “You can stop. You stood well.”

“She liked you,” said Mme. LeGuarde, as they stepped out on the hot pavement. They shared a look, then, an instant later, both of them dissolved in giggles, for one instant, more like friends than employee and friend of the parents. Claire didn't think she'd ever seen Mme. LeGuarde laugh like that before. It made her look even younger.

- - -

A
mere
week
later, the dresses were ready. Claire went nervously into the shop, where the wordless seamstress was making final adjustments. Marie-France raised an eyebrow and barked a quick
Bonjour
in
greeting, then marched her upstairs. This time Claire was grudgingly accepting of the fact that she would be stripping down in public and had worn her whitest set of underwear. The first dress shimmied over her head like a light silken waterfall. As the silent seamstress zipped up the side zip, Claire could already feel it fitted her absolutely perfectly. For a tiny second, Marie-France and Mme. LeGuarde regarded her, totally silently, until Claire worried if there was something terribly wrong with it or it didn't suit her. Until Marie-France sighed, just a touch, and said, very quietly, “Oh, to be young again,” and with a move of her hand, indicated to the seamstress to roll out a long mirror that had been hidden behind the wall. The sun streaming through the back windows, Claire suddenly caught a glimpse of herself—not, as she was used to in the bathroom mirror, the pinched, pale-faced English girl with the scrubbed-looking nose and slightly doleful expression, the hair colorless, the shoulders thin.

The
summer
Parisian
sun
had
added
a
very
light, golden tan to her skin and brought out tiny, cute freckles all over her nose. The green of the silk dress pulled out the color of her eyes and gave them an intensity they'd never had before. Her hair had light streaks in it and had grown down past her shoulders, and suddenly her thinness, which had always caused her to be described as peaky-looking, was flattered and emphasized by the dress; her tiny waist was cinched in, then curves had been added to her hips by the full skirt—not at all in fashion, but what did it matter when it suited her so well. The line of yellow flowers along the bottom emphasized the pretty leanness of her calves, without drawing attention to the fact that she was still shorter than average.

It
was
beautiful. And even though Claire Forest, little, scrawny, shy only child of the fearsome Reverend Forest, had never been praised for her looks in her life—her father thought it vain and rather wicked to be proud of the way you looked—Claire too felt beautiful.