I breathe in deeply as the early-morning mist rolls around the valley and up the hill towards the house. I’m taking a moment to settle my nerves. It’s barely light. I have been up baking from, well, the middle of the night. I have packed all the biscuits and shortbread into boxes Fabien got for me from the greengrocer on the main street, and I make a note to shop there by way of saying thank you and to take her some apricot jam. And I think of Fabien’s grandmother, with a sunny orange face and her apricot trees.
I finish my coffee and look out on the mist again, rolling up the valley, burning off the morning dew, promising a glorious day, and try to calm myself. I have to make this work. It’s my only chance of earning some money and staying on here.
I walk over to the lavender hedge. There is a smell in the air, the same smell I noticed on the morning after the mistral, when I hadn’t returned to the UK and had decided instead to stay. It is the scent of a new dawn and a new day. The cobwebs on the lavender are covered with dew, which sparkles like diamonds. I pick some of the lavender and hold it to my nose. It seems to calm me. What’s the worst that can happen? I ask myself. That I don’t sell anything. Panic grips me again.
As if on cue, I hear a friendly toot and the crunch of tyres on the stony ground at the front of the house. My stomach flick-flacks. This is it! I’m going to make it work. I want to be a part of this community, at the heart of it, and I want it to be my home.
Ralph practically falls over himself, trying to co-ordinate his legs in his excitement at greeting a visitor. He barks, then catapults to the front of the house, banking round the corner, probably taking out Fabien’s legs from under him as he bowls into him with sheer joy.
‘Whoa!’ I hear Fabien laugh. He could charm anyone with that laugh. If he can get Ralph to do as he’s told, I’m sure he has women falling at his feet all the time. But he and Carine are a solid couple.
‘Ralph! Ralph!’ I call, and follow him to the front of the house. ‘Ralph!’ The morning peace is shattered.
I round the corner, slow to a standstill and catch my breath. Ralph is sitting obediently, his tongue hanging out, panting, raising his paw to Fabien for him to shake. Fabien, wearing his battered leather jacket and a bandanna around his neck, smells delicious, I realize, as I move closer.
‘Bonjour, Del. All ready?’ He steps away from Ralph and kisses my cheeks, the delicious scent wrapping itself around me, like a hug. Ralph barks at him impatiently, but Fabien ignores him.
‘Bonjour, Fabien.’ I felt his breath on my lips as he kissed me. Dawn is breaking on the skyline and the cockerel down the road crows. Night turns to day in what feels like an instant. As light begins to seep through the trees, there’s a spring in my step.
‘Oui!’ I smile.
‘Have you slept?’
‘Not a wink!’ I laugh. ‘I’m too excited. And I’ve been up baking!’
‘It smells delicious,’ he says, and follows me into the kitchen to pick up the boxes. I lay a tablecloth on top of one. I found it in the bundle I bought from Fabien. A beautiful Provençal print, slightly faded but still full of colour and life.
‘I have a table for you in the back of the truck and Carine has organized your pitch with the mayor and his office. It is a little out of the way,’ he shrugs, ‘but they don’t know you yet. You are from out of town. It is a start, though.’
‘Merci,’ I say, as I follow him out to the truck where his little dog is waiting patiently in the cab. Ralph seems to be doing the same beside it, as if he’s expecting to come too. ‘I’m so lucky to have met you and Carine,’ I say, as we put the boxes into the truck and he climbs in to tie them in securely.
‘The feeling is very mutual,’ he says, his green eyes twinkling at me. As he pulls the ties tightly into place, a shiver runs up and around me. I rub my arms.
‘Do you have everything?’ he asks, climbing down.
‘Yes. I’ll just put Ralph inside.’ I call him, but Ralph doesn’t move. He just stares at the cab in contained anticipation.
‘He can come with you? Non?’ says Fabien. ‘Keep him on a lead.’
‘Oh, I don’t know …’ I say. Then I think about the shredded blanket and the upturned water bowl. And now I have furniture in place, maybe it would make more sense to have him where I can keep an eye on him.
‘Okay, come on, then, Ralph. But you have to promise to behave!’
‘Move over, Mimi,’ Ralph tells the Jack Russell, as he gets into the driver’s seat.
I open the cab door and Ralph jumps straight in, much to Mimi’s chagrin. She resettles herself and stares out of the window, ignoring Ralph. He tries to copy her but can’t stop panting, filling the cab with his hot breath. Fabien and I sit at either side of him and laugh. That’s certainly put paid to any attraction I might have felt, had I been riding next to Fabien in the truck. He is a friend and the last thing I want is to find him attractive. Thank God for Ralph, I think, as I wind down the window and breathe in the warm, pine-scented Provence air as Fabien sets off down the drive.
It’s not even 7 a.m., but the town is alive with chatter and the clatter of stalls being erected, shouts of directions as vans are parked, goods unloaded and displayed. It feels like the opening night of a big musical and we all have our own part to play in it. Fabien talks briefly to the woman from the mayor’s office who points to my pitch. It’s down the alleyway, between the square and the main road leading to the car park. A bit off the beaten track maybe …
Fabien seems to read my mind. ‘So it’s not the best pitch … but it’s a start.’
‘It’s great,’ I try to enthuse, but it really is out of the way and I’m terrified that all our efforts will have been for nothing.
‘They don’t know you. You’re from out of town – out of the country! You’ll have to work for your custom. If you want it, you’ll have to go and get it,’ he says. Again, I feel he’s challenging me. What he means is, I have to prove to the mayor and the locals that I’m really here to stay.
‘But at least it’ll be out of the sun.’ Fabien smiles one of his killer smiles.
‘And right next to Henri’s bistro,’ I add, thinking how much I’d love a coffee right now. Just then, Henri comes out to greet Fabien and me.
‘Welcome! And bonne chance!’ he says. Ralph is darting this way and that, taking in all the smells, and cocks his leg on an olive tree in a pot outside the smart chambre d’hôte next door. Fabien and Henri laugh. I tie him to the table once Fabien has set it up and thrown the cloth over it.
‘Wait!’ says Fabien, going back to the truck. ‘A chair, for quieter times,’ he says. I decide to tie Ralph to that, rather than the table.
‘Merci, Fabien, for everything. You have been a good friend. You and Carine,’ I emphasize.
He smiles. My stomach flick-flacks.
‘Perhaps you would like to join me for lunch after the market?’ He tilts his head to one side.
Is he asking what I think he is? I bite my lip.
‘And Carine?’ I ask tentatively. ‘You and Carine?’
‘Carine is … She has an appointment,’ he says. A flash of irritation crosses his face.
I’m uncomfortable. I’m not sure how Carine would feel if I was to have lunch with Fabien on my own. I wouldn’t have liked Ollie to have lunch on his own with female friends.
‘I’m sorry, Fabien. I can’t.’
He frowns. ‘I thought … we could get to know each other … understand each other better, non? Lunch. It’s what we do here in France.’
‘Well, I may have only just moved here, and I want to be part of things, but where I come from …’ I stop and think to myself. ‘Where I come from we do not go out with our friends’ partners for lunch to “understand each other”. ’That was where it went wrong for Ollie. ‘I’m really grateful to you and Carine for everything. But I can’t meet you for lunch. Perhaps we can meet with Carine, soon.’
He nods slowly, as if not quite understanding. I thank him again. He wishes me luck as he turns to go and open the brocante, hands shoved into jeans pockets. He is in a relationship with a friend. It was the right thing to do. And then, as I watch him go, I wonder why I feel so disappointed that I had to say no. Just for a moment I wonder what it would have been like if Ollie had stayed, if we’d tried to be part of the community instead of just hanging out with the expats. Life might have been very different. I feel lonely again. Just like I did when I told Ollie I wasn’t going back with him. I take a deep, restorative breath. Right now, I need to be me, on my own.
I start to lay out my tuiles and shortbread with shaking hands. I’m not sure if it’s nerves about showing the world my cookery or that Fabien has put his cards on the table and so have I. I lay out some macarons too, hiding the wonky ones under the better ones. I drop sprigs of lavender across them, and sprinkle over some of the flowers. Then I put a bunch in a jar on the table. Other stallholders and some shopkeepers are in the main square opening up, or pass me on the way to the car park and wish me a good morning, eyeing me and my products with interest. Will anyone buy anything? Or will they just walk past?
Henri comes out with a coffee for me, and a mini croissant. ‘A welcome gift,’ he says, refusing any money.
‘Merci, Henri.’ I smile gratefully.
I sip my coffee as the market in the main square begins to fill with people. Even Ralph settles down to watch them passing without expecting to greet everyone.
‘You need to let them try your goods,’ Henri tells me. ‘They need to know the story of the food and where it came from, from the hills around here.’ He squeezes my shoulder and returns to the bistro. ‘Tell them your story,’ he calls back to me, ‘why you fell in love with the place. Why this food matters.’
A few people pass my stall on their way between the two market squares – the main square and the car park. They’re walking past and looking but no one is stopping to buy. Henri’s right, I think. I should know this from working in the department store. You have to draw people in. You have to get them interested in what you’re selling. You have to let them try. I put down my coffee and, with shaking hands, break up some shortbread and toss a piece to Ralph for behaving so well. I put the fragments on a plate, then take a huge breath, walk out from behind my stall and offer them to passers-by, hands still shaking. The Frenchwomen, smart, with sunglasses on their heads, no doubt on their way to work, raise a hand, decline politely, smile and walk on. It’s going to be a complete disaster! But as the morning warms up, the tourists start to trickle by. They’re happy to try and, to my relief, I start to sell. The more I tell people about what I’m making, the more interested they become in the lavender. I offer them lavender-infused biscuits and explain where I live, that it used to be the biggest lavender farm of the area. I turn to see Henri watching me with a smile. He was right. They seem to like the story, and the fact that I’ve left the UK to live on a lavender farm here. The more I tell the story, the more it seems to grow. The tourists reach into their pockets and purses and buy. It’s the story of a woman turned lavender cook that they buy as much as the biscuits.
‘Well, this looks lovely!’ Cora and her friends have appeared and I feel bad that I haven’t taken them up on their suggestion of a drink at the ‘pub’.
‘Hello, Cora,’ I say, and she makes a big event of kissing me loudly. The French don’t make a sound but Cora does it with a ‘mwah’ each time, making her stand out from the crowd.
‘How very brave of you,’ she says. ‘I mean, living here is one thing, but trying to get the French to accept us, then beating them at their own game, that’s brave!’
‘I’m not trying to beat anyone, Cora. I’m just trying to be a part of things.’ I smile, unsure of what she means. My confidence dips.
‘Well done you. I’d invite you to join us for coffee, but you seem tied up. If you get fed up, you know where to find us.’
‘I do. Thank you,’ I say, knowing exactly where to find them. They’ll be in the ‘pub’, more British than French now, with seating in the middle of the square under the plane trees by the church. A glorious setting with prices to reflect it. It was Ollie’s favourite, too. ‘But I think I’ll be here until we pack up at midday,’ I say.
‘Hope you smash it!’ she says, and wishes me good luck. ‘Au revoir,’ she adds, and walks on without buying anything. Henri is standing in his doorway, wiping his hands on the tea towel tucked into his white apron, which is tied around his gently rounded middle. He smiles, then urges me to get back out there and start selling again. So I do.
The morning passes quietly and I sell about half of my stock, in little clear freezer bags. I pop a sprig of lavender into each one. I plan to get paper bags soon and some stickers made with ‘Le Petit Mas de la Lavande’ on them to underline that my bakes are from a lavender farm. I’m not making a fortune today, but at least I have some money to live off and next week I’ll try to extend my range.
The church clock chimes, signalling midday. The stallholders start to pack up, giving last-minute reductions and making end-of-the-day sales, then head for the café off the car park, which will be full of people greeting each other, shaking hands, kissing, chattering, the smell of cooking, and jugs of wine. Even Henri’s little bistro has filled up and he is taking orders and serving customers with his dish of the day. Every now and again he looks over to see how I’m doing. I give him a nod and a smile.
‘You’re selling?’ he asks, as he brings me another coffee. ‘Did it go like hot cakes?’
I thank him profusely for the coffee, and when he won’t take any money, I offer him a biscuit instead. Suddenly I’m nervous again. What was I thinking, offering a French chef one of my home-baked biscuits? The tray I’m holding wobbles as my hands shake. From the main square I hear the shouts of stallholders as they manoeuvre their vans.
With one hand, Henri pushes back his silver-grey hair, which has come loose from its ponytail, and lifts the biscuit to his nose with the other. He smells it. I watch his face. The little silver beard beneath his lower lip twitches. Then he breaks it in two and nods, clearly impressed. Now all he has to do is taste it. I watch as he lifts one half of the biscuit towards his mouth. I hope I’m not making a complete fool of myself here. Maybe I am. Maybe he’s laughing at me. ‘Brave’, Cora had said. Did she really mean ‘stupid’? Maybe she was right. Henri opens his mouth, and I have an overwhelming urge to grab the biscuit from him and say, ‘Don’t bother,’ but I watch and cringe.
At a shout from behind me, then another and a bark, I swing round. Henri spins round to look in the direction of a commotion.