Death in Montmartre

A phone rings. It is half tucked under Jude’s head, a small dark pillow. She thinks the noise is her alarm. She tries to turn it off; she answers the call instead.

‘I know it’s early,’ a boy’s voice. ‘It’s too early, isn’t it?’

Jude presses speakerphone so she doesn’t have to sit up. The voice is muffled by the mattress: ‘Shit, you were sleeping, weren’t you? I woke you up, didn’t I?’

‘No…’ Unconvincing. She has one eye open. She swallows. Cigarettes, gravel.

‘It is three to be fair. But it’s Sunday, it’s early. I tried to wait. I waited. But I just needed to speak to someone.’

‘Are you OK?’

‘Speak to you. Anyone would have done, but you, I wanted to speak to you, really.’

‘You’re OK, though?’ she asks.

‘Yeah. Yes. Well … yeah.’ There’s a pause. A long one. ‘I’ve got the dead thing.’

‘What do you mean?’

‘It’s fine. It’s not a big deal. You know, when you’re sure you’ve died. You get that, right? It’s normal. Paranoia, we all get it. It’s a normal thing.’

‘OK.’

‘But I haven’t. If I’m talking to you, that means I haven’t. Right?’

‘You sound very alive.’

‘You want to go back to sleep, don’t you?’

‘Maybe. For a bit. You’re not dead, though. I don’t think you’re dead. Promise.’

‘Thanks.’ He slows down. ‘Thank you. Appreciate it.’ They are both silent for a second. ‘I watched the news. It had changed. I mean, there was loads of new news. If you were dead, the news wouldn’t change, would it?’

‘You’re alive.’

‘Thanks.’

‘You are alive.’

‘OK.’

They say bye. Jude pushes her phone under the blanket, presses her eyes into the proper pillow, and tries to trace her steps back to sleep.

She does not make it. Black plastic shakes and rings again. She answers, phone still under the cover.

‘Can I come over?’ he says. ‘I know I’m being mad but I just want to be sure. Can we walk? I want to walk. You should wake up anyway. It’s three in the afternoon. Let’s walk. Is it OK if I come over?’

She doesn’t like to be alone either on days like this, so she says yes. He talks more slowly in real life than he does on the phone. It’s the time pressure, the cost, the fact the other person can’t see you.

He doesn’t live far away, so she tells him to walk slowly. She wants to wash her hair. Head over sink: that has to be slow too. She didn’t use to get hangovers quite like this. Only a summer or two ago they came with vague happiness, headachey euphoria, surprise. Now, it is less of a surprise. She folds back one panel of the blind; the sun is searing. Even though it’s late, she puts on music for the morning – Chet Baker, maybe. Something jazzy. She still has to brush her teeth and put on makeup before he gets here, cover-stick the cracks.

She has a doorbell, but he knocks, eight times. She kicks last night’s clothes under the sofa and opens the door; they kiss.

‘You look nice,’ he says. That’s how he says hello.

‘Liar.’

He shrugs. ‘You look fine though. Normal.’ He looks over her shoulder, at himself in the mirror. He presses at the skin underneath his eyes. His eyes are blue, his hair Tabasco red. It’s a striking look, however much sleep he hasn’t had. ‘This is what I mean. This is the whole thing. After nights like that, I don’t know how to feel. We could have died. We always could have died. Sometimes I think we should have died. So I think I have – I’m sure I have. But,’ he touches her, then touches his own chest, ‘we’re still here. So maybe we should feel immortal? I just can’t work it out. You’re not listening, are you?’

Jude’s been putting on big earrings, to compensate for feeling poisoned. ‘I’m kind of…’ (talking slowly because she’s doing mascara now and has to tense her mouth) ‘… halfway in between. Half dead, half alive. Undead.’ (Mascara done.) ‘Stop touching my things. No, don’t sit down. Stop looking around. Stop. I know it’s untidy. Stop looking. Stand up. Up. Come on, come on, we’re leaving.’

She ushers him out of her front door with flat palms, grabbing sunglasses, leaving the music, deciding not to take a jacket.

‘Sun’s bright, isn’t it?’ he says when they are out on the street. ‘Almost too bright. Heavenly, you could say.’ He has his hands up to his eyes. ‘That was another thing. How heavenly it was when I woke up. Do you get it? Like we might be in heaven.’

‘We’re not dead.’

‘Look at the clouds though. I mean it. Heavenly.’

‘You’re doing that thing where you italicize with your voice.’ It was annoying when he did it. ‘It doesn’t suit you. This one?’ It’s not the nicest café on the street, but if they sit down he might stop talking about the sky.

Jude had known this boy, Seb, since St Andrews. The same halls in first year; a shared bathroom. The date at the Thai restaurant; the email when she was on Sark. She hadn’t replied until she found out that he, too, ahead of her, was here in Paris. But they had become friends, and good ones, now they were both English people away from home.

The waiter sweeps by, polishing their table in a single circle. She wants Coke, he wants coffee.

‘Are you sure you don’t want decaf?’ Jude says.

‘Yes, I’m sure.’

‘Just that you’re already very intense today. You’re going very fast, Rooks.’ Seb’s name, in Paris, has become Rookie. From rouquin, the French for redhead.

‘Decaf’s carcinogenic.’

‘Yes, but you’re … getting to me. It’s like the marbles in the jam jar.’

He’s rubbing where a beard might be.

‘When I was a kid,’ she goes on, ‘school took us to the swimming pool. We put marbles in a jam jar and shook them under water. You could hear it all the way over in the deep end. It was supposed to teach us about sound waves. Don’t know why, but it made me feel nauseous. Ill for days. Really.’

‘I’m making you feel sick?’

‘Not in a bad way. It’s just a bit abrasive.’ She strokes his arm, and when that’s not enough, she leans out of her seat and puts her lips to his temple. Recently, she’s got better at touching people. ‘In a nice way.’

She’s also, recently, become a more committed smoker. She used to call herself a ‘token toker’, and steal drags only in the dark. But a friend – this friend – got annoyed and told her to buy her own. Her packet of cigarettes is on the table now, perched on top of her wallet. He’s had his eye on it for quite a while.

‘Just look at it,’ Rookie says, ‘I mean, it’s ridiculous. It says, massive on the side, FUMER TUE. It fucking kills you. And it admits it. In capitals. FUMER TUE – foomay too – right on the packet.’

‘Do you want one?’

‘Yeah.’ He flicks open the top. ‘You’ve only got three left. Are you sure? Sure-sure? Thanks. That’s not the point, though. It’s ridiculous what we do to ourselves.’

They light up, three of four hands cupping the lighter to shield it from the wind. The drinks arrive. Rookie asks for an extra sugar, so he can put three in. He drinks his coffee almost in one go, and then scrapes the syrupy sludge up with his spoon.

‘Don’t’, she says, ‘your teeth,’ tapping her own. Three sugars; he will go mad. Madder. But if anything, the coffee slows him down.

He rests his head on her shoulder. ‘Been thinking about life, you know. Life and death.’

‘I know. You called me.’

‘I don’t want to die. I really don’t want to die. In fact, I’m desperate to live – I mean, live-live – and then I make all these shitty decisions.’ He sits up. ‘Beer. Do you want a beer? We should get beers.’

‘Carpe diem.’

‘Carpe diem. It kills me.’

‘It always makes me laugh. I knew these Czech boys once. One of them used to fancy my friend, and whenever we went out, he used to say “Come Sofroniska, we have Carpe Diem”.’

‘Is that supposed to be Czech? Sounds Bangladeshi.’

‘He said it all the time. I remember thinking: seize the day right there? Who does he think he is? One day I said it wasn’t polite. Turned out he thought it was Carpe DM – like Carpe Deep and Meaningful.’

Jude looks at Rookie, trying to catch him in the cup of her smile, but he’s not hearing the story right. ‘Carpe Deep and Meaningful,’ she says, ‘it’s funny.’

‘You don’t think about death like I do. I think about it every day.’

So does she. She’s young too, of course she thinks about death every day. She turns over the bill, thin white paper in a battered burgundy dish, and says she’ll pay.

Before they climb the hill, they stop for supplies at a shop that never shuts.

‘Here,’ Rookie says, emerging with a blue plastic bag. ‘Beer. Also bought you biscuits. Out of date. Only fifty pee –’ (he puts two in his mouth) ‘ – centimes. You know what I mean. Bit soft. Not bad. Here, go for it.’

She cracks her beer, licks its lip then her own. ‘I don’t eat biscuits,’ she says and after saying it takes one, but eats it slowly, a bite every three steps, sucked till soft. They are walking up to the Sacré-Cœur, a Sunday pilgrimage.

They reach a plateau in the path and stop by a pink house. ‘It’s famous,’ he says, then ‘Biscuit,’ dipping into the blue bag. He starts eating, but breathes in too hard mid-chew. A spluttering sound. ‘My back! Hit my back – I’m choking.’

She puts her hand on his arm instead. ‘Just drink. You’re fine, fatty.’

He’s not fat, he is fine. He says something about nearly dying and they carry on, schlepping up the hill in out-of-sync zigzags.

They have a bench they always go to in a small square, slightly Spanish looking, just next to the Dalí museum. Actually, there are two benches, but drinking men, boot-polish dark, usually take one or the other. Today they take the left: foreheads ploughed, forearms baked, trousers starched with dirt.

Rookie looks at the men, and then looks down.

‘Got to start dressing better.’

‘Who? Me?’

‘No, me. Me. Although you…’ The way he shrugs his mouth says ‘you too’. But he looks back down at himself, and stretches out his sweater. ‘I mean, look at this. There’s no use.’

‘Was thinking that. It’s hot today.’

‘No, I mean, what if I get run over? Who’s going to save me? Who’s going to save them?’ He’s dropped his volume; he points with his eyes at the boot-polish men. ‘No one. But you see a man in a suit lying by the side of the road? You pick him up. It’s the suit; you need the suit.’

‘You’re twenty-three. You can’t wear a suit on a Sunday. We’re eating biscuits.’

‘Should always wear a suit.’

‘You’ll look like a Christian.’

‘It’s safer.’

‘I won’t be your friend.’

‘It’s safer.’

They’ve nearly finished their beers now, the cans are light. Rookie rings his like a bell, the dregs skitter at the bottom. But clutching empties makes them feel closer to the other bench, so they stand to go.

‘Can I have your last cigarette?’ he asks. ‘I know it’s rude. We can share.’

Jude puts it in his mouth. ‘Hands,’ he says, and they cup the flame.

It’s downhill from here. They’re not sure exactly where they’re going, just downhill. Rue Chappe, Rue Berthe, the park on Rue Burq. It’s Sunday, and on Sunday they walk slowly.

They are nearly at Abbesses when the money falls from the sky.

It’s not exactly like that. It’s something moving fast in the corner of their eyes and then a bangsmack, and a bounce on the pavement. It’s a wallet that lands in front of them.

They look up before they look down, by instinct, just to make sure no more is on its way, but then pick it up. It’s beige, (‘pleather,’ Jude says) with a zip. They open it and fill it with fingers. One note, five euros, a few coins, a small key. It’s not to steal, just curiosity.

But they find no name. They walk backwards to the kerb, so they can see to the top of the building. Finally, from the fourth floor, a tiny face looks down at them. A child’s face, a small girl, smiling, leaning out of the window over a flower basket.

‘Did you throw this?’ Rookie shouts up to her.

‘She’s French,’ Jude says, ‘obviously. Say it in French.’

‘She’s laughing. Why’s she laughing?’ The small girl is laughing. She’s picking petals off the flowers now, and throwing them out of the window like the slowest confetti. She can’t be more than six. ‘What if she throws the TV?’

‘Too heavy.’

‘Where’s her mum?’

‘Bonjour!’ Rookie shouts up to the child. ‘I’m – leaving – the wallet on the – roof – of the – car, OK? Tell your – mummy – it’s on the – roof – of this – car.’

The child laughs again and throws another hand-squashed rose.

‘OK?’

She throws one last flower. The petals pull apart in the air, but before they land the wallet has been left, and Rookie and Jude walk away.

They are in Place des Abbesses now, just by the carousel. It looks nice from a distance, but up close it’s horrible – spray-painted clowns and clunky lightbulbs. He is happier though, something about his walk says it. He uses one hand to leapfrog a bollard.

‘You seem perkier,’ she says. ‘Are you proud you didn’t filch that fiver?’

‘Filch?’

‘You’re proud, aren’t you?’

‘Who says filch? No one says filch. Anyway, that’s not it.’ He leapfrogs another bollard, one leg higher than the other. ‘I know I’m not dead now.’

‘Why? Don’t do another one. Seriously. You’re going to crack your head, I can see it.’

He does one last leapfrog and stops, ever so slightly out of breath. ‘I know we’re not dead now. We’ve got to be alive. It’s the wallet.’

‘Merde.’ Jude’s looking in her bag. ‘No fags.’

‘Everything up till then was normal, you see. Me phoning, you sleeping, us walking. The bench. All this. We always do this. I could be dead and I’d still see all this, I think. I hope. But money’s never fallen from the sky before. That’s how I know it’s not all in my head.’

‘Can you think of a tabac near here?’

‘The point is, we’re alive, Jude.’ He looks as if he is going to kiss the bollard he just jumped over.

They go home up Caulaincourt, a gentle spiral staircase, curved walls and light green leaves. Each waits for the other to suggest a final beer, on a terrasse, to say goodbye to the sun and Sunday.

They wait too long, and so they come to the fork in the road where they must separate. They hover, finish their conversation, half start a new one, hover, hover, hold hands for a moment, then say goodnight.

They sleep alone, thickly and deeply, and wake up early the next day. The mirror is kinder this morning. Their colour has come back: light spring tans, bright eyes, cheeks that look kissed. She has time for lipstick and he lifts weights. They are not dead, and somehow they will not die, either of them, for a long time.

Yes, they feel well, and they are early, and so they cycle to the places they have to go, sun in their eyes. Because they don’t take the métro, they don’t read the paper. And besides, the story they might have seen is only small.

There’s been a death in Montmartre. A little girl has fallen from a window. There’s a mention of a wallet, a phone number to call; but the story is so small, that nobody notices.

*   *   *

Six days later, it is Sunday again. They walk their walk, Rookie and Jude – coffee, bench, pilgrimage – and just before Abbesses, they see bouquets on the pavement.

‘Magic place,’ he says. ‘Wallets and flowers.’

He pulls out a lily, still a bud, ‘so it lasts’, and he gives it to her.