I heard her the next morning outside my door. Every morning I heard people leave the chalet one by one. I would struggle from a sleep which only relieved me after hours of brooding in the dark, and I would try to ascertain who was leaving, who remained, and what in consequence lay in store for me.
– So it wasn’t like this before? said Françoise.
– Oh no! came the reply of Mme Durebex. I don’t know why they don’t get on any more.
– Well, you know, children fight then make up, just like that.
I rubbed the sleep from my eyes. Laurent and Hugues? They had never got on well anyway. Even now, they could be heard bickering out on the drive. The voice of Mme Durebex floated back as she left.
– Yes, Shona’s still a bit of a child.
I sat up, insulted. A child? Well then, why was I also an English teacher, a cook, practically a maid in this chalet? These responsibilities should preclude treatment as a child, I thought. I had none of the benefits of a child – I wasn’t indulged or excused. I didn’t have the benefits of an adult either – I wasn’t listened to with respect, I had no independence.
Even when I did cleaning jobs in Sydney, I never got treated like this. But my egalitarian upbringing was no advantage here.
A child? Child labour? What came to mind was some sooty-faced ricket-ridden urchin out of Dickens. I didn’t quite fit the bill, in my heated room in a luxurious chalet, so well fed these last two weeks I was having trouble doing up my jeans, my hip bones muffled by fat.
I lay back in bed, alert, exhausted. I grew suspicious of myself. Maybe I was still a bit of a child. I concentrated on each muscle, I coaxed the tension from my body. This body was young, but it felt so stiff and battered. A pain jabbed from my head down between my shoulder blades. All these rigid, sleepless nights. I wanted to curl up in someone’s arms and cry. I wanted to relinquish the reins. Acknowledging the child in me made more sense of things, but it didn’t make them the way I wanted them to be.
I looked up at my family photo. Was that really me, straining to see over the verandah railings? I couldn’t remember the day the photo was taken. Those were my eyes, round and dark, but was I the same person? Had I grown into someone completely different? How much of the child in that photo was still with me? How close were those brothers and sisters lined up alongside me?
I longed to relax into childhood that day, to walk out and not be obliged to do anything for anyone. I wanted to get up and go skiing, alone, to stay out there and eat a hot dog for lunch. I wanted to be back in Paris, living my own life, but there were days and days still to be spent here. They stretched before me, long, boring, arduous, and while I wished they could pass quickly, it was painful to feel time ticking on. It seemed to me that I was losing it, each second dripping from the tap of my resources. I was losing my time to this family.
And time was important. I had a lot of catching up to do. I’d always spurred myself on, running after my family, keeping up with friends – Matthew, all my friends in Sydney, had been older. Keeping on my toes for the Durebex. Wanting to get older as fast as possible, not wanting to lose any time.
It was hard work. I was exhausting myself.
I pulled the bedcovers up to my chin. I looked over them at the dimness. I dozed.
The long table of polished oak, shoulder height, everything out of reach. Three candles burn on the Advent wreath. The fourth waits, unlit; it has a long black wick. Why put a new one in when a half-used one will do just as well? My sister beside me, all limbs and hair.
– Stop fidgeting, Nora. Dad frowned. Whose turn is it to read?
– Mine! said Tom.
– You read last week, said Paul.
– It’s Siobhan’s turn, said David.
I looked up, excited. But David’s smile made me want to cry.
– She can’t read, said Caroline.
– Oh, durrr.
– I can so!
– That’s enough! said Mum.
It was the fourth Sunday before Christmas. My last chance. I looked at the missal and my heart filled with dread. Those strange intimidating words in tiny black print. Nora said she would do it with me. She grabbed the missal. I tugged back and began to cry.
– Cry-baby! Nora whispered in one ear.
– You can do it next year, Mum whispered in the other.
A year?
– David, said Dad, page three hundred and forty. David leafed through his missal. Mum and Dad waited at either end of the table, eyes closed. Mine were open. I looked across the sea of wood at my two eldest brothers. I saw Paul poke David as he began.
– Bless me father for I have sinne—
– Daa-vid, it’s not confession! Caroline groaned.
Paul was sucking back a smile. I hoped he and David would poke each other to death. David was going redder, chin to chest, and Dad was gritting his teeth.
– Who left the front door open? came the voice of M. Durebex. Mireille? Merde, ils sont tous partis …
I buried myself under the covers. There was a way of flattening your body to make it look as though no one was in the bed. But the bed was short and I was five foot seven. Too big for this bed, I prayed for concealment; too small for that table, I prayed for visibility.
David stared at the page, then began again.
– The Lord will make the house of David secure for ev—
It corroded into a snort. Paul was quivering, Caroline began to giggle, then Tom grinned around shamelessly, then Nora, then me. An infection of laughter passed from child to child. I was so scared, so seduced.
Mum opened her eyes, distressed.
– David!
David ran from the room, hand over his mouth.
– Very well, Dad slammed his missal shut. I can see you children aren’t interested.
He strode to the doorway, then stopped. You’ll come to regret this, he said darkly.
Anticipating punishment, we fled to corners of the house. I snuck outside. The hot darkening air and the smells of decay coming from the compost heap seemed to encourage this mockery of religion. From the bamboo at the bottom of the garden issued the hysterical giggles of David. Solitary and wild, they could have been the sounds of an animal in pain.
The sound of children’s laughter. I surfaced from my memory, hearing it still. It was so hot in my room. The crazy laughter of Laurent when he fired his cap gun. The laughter of Hugues when he pinched a toy from Laurent.
The Advent ritual was never done again, and punishment never did eventuate. We were never punished, we were never beaten, we just lived with Dad’s lingering disapproval.
What would you do, what could you do, with six giggling children? I couldn’t control one, or two, let alone six.
But I wasn’t asking so much. And they weren’t my children.
It snowed heavily all morning. I stood at the kitchen windows, watching it as I prepared lunch. You can get dizzy watching snow fall, it just goes on and on. So many flakes, so many brief lives. Each flake is different viewed up close, each descends with a different momentum and all too quickly is buried by the next.
If you look at it as a whole, one falling mass, it’s easy, it’s calm and comforting, like a blanket descending. But as I looked at it, a primary school science book opened up in my memory and the pages began to turn. I saw close-up photographs of the crystals that make up snowflakes, the exquisite detail of these ice crystals, how each is unique, while certain idiosyncratic structures then place them into groups. Like species of animals, like families of plants, the crystals grow according to temperature, velocity, moisture; these in star shapes, those more like needles, others in prisms. They could change in mid-flight too, I remembered that, from a star shape to a needle as they joined other crystals to make up a snowflake. Snowflakes, the starfish of a winter sky.
A gust of wind flung a constellation of snow across my view. It clung for a few seconds, then melted down the glass. I turned on the hot tap to rinse a saucepan and the window fogged up.
I made leeks with an egg sauce. I cut up cucumbers and made a green salad. There was fish, and still the turkey, offering its ravaged carcass to the fastidious eaters. Their voices echoed through the foyer. I went down.
Françoise was beating her walking shoes at the front door. Claudine was standing in front of the gilt mirror, hitching up her leggings, puffing out her shirt. She ran her hands through her hair and spoke to her reflection.
– Right, what’s there to do? Oh, I’m so tired! Fatiguée! Fatiguée! I can’t sleep, I’m sore all over. Ah, it’s old age. Ooooh, comme je suis fatiguée!
Her husband was in the entrance, hanging up his coat. When Françoise was walking past him into the foyer, and he was sure no one else was looking, he blew me a kiss. M. Laplanche would have been a sloppy kisser, I imagined, and the kiss wouldn’t have gone further than the back of poor Françoises neck.
– I’ve made the lunch, I said, then walked back up the stairs.
We all stood in the salon, searching the blur outside for Mme Durebex and the two boys. The snow had risen. The corner of the verandah dipped into it. I stood with my face against the glass, aware of M. Laplanche behind me. Then they appeared, Mme Durebex ploughing a track for the boys to follow in.
– At last! said Françoise, and went out to the kitchen with Claudine.
Suddenly I felt M. Laplanche push up against me. I froze, pinned to the window by his big body. His erection fitted into the small of my back. It seemed like hours before I plucked up the courage to push him away. In those hours I killed everybody I’d ever hated, including myself. I went into the kitchen, still frozen, enveloped in a sort of covering, as though I had been outside in that weather. Françoise was alone. She raised her eyebrows at me.
– He sure comes on to you, that Rufus, eh?
– So you’ve noticed? I said nervously. Maybe she had felt that misguided kiss after all. Maybe it had fallen in front of her and she’d trodden in it. I resisted the urge to check the soles of my own shoes.
– At first I thought it was a paternal thing …
She clicked her tongue. I asked her if she thought Claudine had noticed. Françoise said Claudine was probably too busy noticing herself.
– Vieux sac, she grinned, showing me her very even, stained teeth.
Laurent came in. He scanned the table.
– Oh! There are some good things for once.
M. Laplanche came in the other door, from the salon. He had a Scotch in his hand. Have a stiff drink, I thought, wondering how it was said in French. He swilled it around.
– There are always good things to eat, Laurent, he said, then sent me a supportive smile.
But I wouldn’t be eating any of them today. I went to the sink for a glass of water, and the ritual began behind me.
Claudine: Eat your cucumbers, Hugues, or we’ll put you to bed this afternoon.
Mme Durebex: Eat your leeks, Laurent. Here, I’ll cut off the green. (A pointed look in my direction.)
M. Durebex came up the stairs as I was leaving the kitchen and demanded pasta. Mme Durebex began to fiddle with pots. She burnt herself on a hot plate and reacted automatically.
– Shona left it on.
I continued down the stairs. I went into my room and sat at the table beneath the family photos. If Christmas had to be spent with a family, I would have chosen mine any day. I bet they were having fun right now, even if they were fighting. I grabbed a pen and paper and began a letter to Nora.
Heeeelp! Get me out of here! I came to the Alps to renew my visa and ski. I thought it would be a breath of fresh air, but I spend most of my time in this tiny room, breathing in my own carbon dioxide. Otherwise I’m in the kitchen, breathing in everybody else’s. Theirs tastes even worse. This letter feels like a suicide note, though by the time—
– Shona! Shona!
I ignored her shouts coming through the foyer. Her footsteps approached.
you get this I’ll be—
Mme Durebex was at my door, asking me to come and ski with her that afternoon. The children were staying in to do French with Claudine.