Mirepoix, France, Summer 1981
After that day in his shop when she lied about her age, Frances didn’t see Benoit again before she had to return to England. Yet every remaining moment in France was spent thinking about him, lost in thought about what he was doing. “Why are you so quiet?” Amélie would ask, and Frances would just laugh and say, “Never you mind,” and that was the end of it until the next time she would ask. What was there to tell? A brief touch, not much else. Their lips had met, but that was all. What they had shared was barely even a kiss. Still, thinking about it made her mouth curl into a smile she seemed powerless to prevent.
Now, a year later and back in France after months of desperate letters and promises of something more, she was without him again. His first letter had come as a total surprise not a few weeks after she had returned to England. For months she had been picturing her return to France, had imagined them spending every moment together, but now she was there she found herself stuck in a cycle of torturous days without him. Where was he? Had she done something wrong?
On that first night after arriving back in Mirepoix she had gone to his shop just as they had arranged in their letters, although she had to admit now that it hadn’t been what she was expecting. Longing poured from his letters, yet that first night they had struggled to even touch. It had taken them until the following day, when she had reassured him that she wanted to, for him to kiss her in his car, pressed into the seat by his weight with the seat belt straining at her neck. It hadn’t been how she imagined it, but still it had filled her with that same rush as the first night he had touched her over twelve months before. But now, after three wonderful weeks of seeing him every day, he had simply disappeared.
The best-case scenario was that he had become stuck on a work trip. It was the only possibility she allowed herself to entertain. He’d told her about one such trip in his letters, after he’d dashed to Munich on the trail of a Matisse. People will do a lot to acquire such a masterpiece, my love. Munich was beautiful, but this time I regret it was a false lead. That beautiful painting will find its home again one day, be returned to the people with whom it belongs. She had asked Benoit to show her the painting he had been chasing after she arrived in France. “You remembered,” he had said, seeming coy as he hurried to find a book. Falling heavily on his knees, he set the book down, then leaned over her, turning the pages with careful consideration. “Ah,” he said when he found it, his fingers brushing the image of a woman sitting in an armchair, a fan in hand. “Such a beautiful piece. What is she thinking, this muse of his?” Frances found herself fighting back tears as she stared at the woman’s face, such melancholia in her expressionless gaze. It was almost as if the woman in the painting had known right from the moment she sat for the portrait that at some point she would be lost. Would end up somewhere she didn’t belong. “I thought the lead was good, but we were not able to find it. Perhaps next time.” Then he had turned the key in the lock, kissed her mouth, and they didn’t talk about the painting again.
Without his company, Frances walked to the village, moped around the market, always making sure to check Benoit’s gallery, that was now a fine shop filled with myriad trinkets. There was no little sign in the window to explain his absence. To kill time, she browsed the shelves of Edouard’s bookshop, eventually buying a copy of Anna Karenina, a book Benoit had suggested she read. Once again, she told Edouard to keep the change, all the while wondering if her guilt over the first edition theft could somehow be intuited as they exchanged polite conversation.
Frances was sitting on one of the benches in the shade of the farmhouse when she saw Amélie for the first time since she had arrived in France. Clematis dripped from the wall above her, and the aroma of basil was tickled free from the nearby pots by a warm breeze. It was before noon, and she was in the full glare of the sun’s relentless ascent. While the light was bright enough to blur the features of the oncoming girl, there was something so familiar about the way she skipped along, that same gait she remembered from their time together the previous summer. Frances reached for the glass of fresh lemonade at her feet.
“Have you seen him?” Amélie asked as she arrived before her. It was their first meeting this year, and Frances couldn’t help but wonder about the three weeks she had already been in France, and how she could explain her lack of communication. Bringing her hand up to shield her eyes from the sun sharpened Amélie’s features. They had changed, chiseled by another year’s maturity, but that alarmed her less than her friend’s question. Did Amélie know about Benoit? “He is, how you say,” Amélie continued, pausing to find the correct English, “dreamy?” She sat down on the bench next to Frances and reached for the glass of lemonade, as if they had been together only the day before.
“Who?” Frances asked.
“They say he is from Toulouse,” Amélie continued with a sigh, staring into the distance where a small group of painters sat around their subject. “That one day he will be a famous model in Paris. If he goes, I will ask him to take me with him.”
Frances breathed a sigh of relief. Amélie wasn’t talking about Benoit, but rather the naked man on the grass about ten meters away. He was lying with his arms outstretched as if he was sunbathing, his legs splayed out so that everything was on show. Twenty or so busy artists worked intently and tried their best to capture what they saw. The truth was, Frances had hardly noticed him.
“Yes, he’s nice, I suppose.”
Amélie scoffed. “You suppose? Do you not see what I see?” Frances supposed she didn’t. “So, tell me. How is it that you have not written to me in so long? And how now that you are here in France you tell me nothing of your arrival? Have I done something wrong?”
Frances felt her insides swell with guilt. “No, of course not.” For six years they had spent their summers together, always writing letters between visits. It had been Amélie she had told when she first got her period, when she first kissed a boy, and when she first got a job in the local library back home. “I’ve just been really busy helping my aunt.”
“You forgot me.”
“I didn’t,” Frances protested.
“Don’t worry, I forgot you too for a while.”
They were quiet for a moment. Frances knew that Amélie was hurt, but she hoped time would allow it to pass. It was impossible to undo what had been done, and she couldn’t tell her about Benoit. She wouldn’t understand even if she did. In that moment she wanted to, but she knew it would have been a mistake. Benoit was adamant they were to be kept a secret.
“I saw your aunt on the way in,” Amélie said. “She told me that he is going to be there for at least another hour. I could sit and watch him all day.” Frances glanced over, took in the curves of the model’s naked form. Thoughts of Greek gods came to mind, the expertly carved bodies rendered in marble that Benoit had shown her in one of his books. The model was what people would think of when asked to describe the perfect man. But still, Frances felt nothing, no spark, no flame of heat that she felt when Benoit was near.
“I’d rather do something else,” Frances eventually said. “I’m not sure he’s my type.”
“If he is not your type, I don’t even want to think about what you might like.” She pointed at the naked man and sighed again. “That is the perfect man. But anyway, if you don’t want to sit and stare at it, let’s do something else. It’s a beautiful day, and so hot still.” It was true that the recent storm hadn’t cleared the air. “We could swim if you like?”
Last summer Amélie and Frances had been inseparable. Even after the brief liaison with Benoit in his shop, she had remained by Amélie’s side. A couple of times Frances had suggested they sneak round the back of the market square to smoke cigarettes, hoping they would bump into Benoit again, but never once had he been there. Although she thought of him it was easy enough then to slip back into her childhood customs. By then Frances knew every inch of Amélie’s body, the way it looked, smelled, moved. They had ridden bikes alongside each other, swam naked without a second thought in L’Hers river not five minutes away. Now, after Benoit, the idea of swimming naked alongside her felt a bit strange.
“I haven’t got my costume,” she said, feeling self-conscious to even consider it now. What with her body used for other things that she only did with Benoit.
Amélie rolled her eyes then poked her in the chest, the tip of her fingers prodding into the soft flesh of Frances’s left breast. “You have not changed so much, and neither have I. We have seen each other before, non?”
Arrogant in her certainty that Frances would follow, Amélie stood up and headed for the trail that would wind all the way down to a soft grassy bank by the river. Just as she disappeared behind the first line of trees Frances took one last look to the gate, and when she saw no signs of Benoit’s little 2CV, hurried to catch up with Amélie.
“The water is so warm,” Amélie shouted as Frances stood on the bank of the river, the point at which L’Hers succumbed to topography, relenting into a natural curve. At this point the course of the river took two routes, parting like a smiling mouth with a treelined islet between. Their side was shallow, rocky in places, which kept boats away. They had never been disturbed while swimming, not even once. Glancing down to the sloping riverbank Frances saw Amélie’s discarded sundress. Her sandals and underpants were kicked off there too, partially covered by long grass. “Come on, what are you waiting for?” Amélie called once more, before dipping under the water and coming up with a splash.
Self-consciously, Frances slipped off her clothes, taking her time with her laces. Then, once naked, she hurried into the water, cool enough to relieve the heat of the blistering summer day. Amélie smiled, reassured that their friendship was unchanged, and proceeded to splash Frances with copious amounts of water, just as they had six years before. And once she was in the water Frances found that her anxieties and apprehensions faded into the shadows, left on the grass with her clothes in the shade of the towering conifer trees that kept them safe from view.
Frances had no idea how long they had been in the water, but her skin was pruned and her stomach rumbling by the time they scrambled up the bank. By then her nudity had ceased to be a problem, and so they sprawled out on the long grass as they had during summers before, her skin itching as the soft blades bristled against it. Carelessly she picked at the petals of a daisy.
He loves me, he loves me not.
“Do you remember that boy who used to walk around with a placard on his shoulders?” Amélie asked after they had been sunbathing for a while. “The one who sold dry baguettes?”
Frances wrinkled her nose at the memory. “The one that smelled bad?”
“Yes.” Amélie nodded. “His name is Gaspard and, well, we did it.”
“Did what?” Frances asked, but even as she finished asking the question, she knew the answer from the smile on Amélie’s face. Her mouth stayed open, her words unfinished. “Oh my god. You did it? With him?”
“He doesn’t smell anymore,” Amélie reassured her.
“Still,” Frances said, half horrified for Amélie, and half for herself that she was yet to do it. Benoit had promised that he was happy to wait. Now the thought that Amélie was doing it with Gaspard, the boy they had ridiculed the year before, made her feel like a childish prude. Maybe, she thought, this was her chance to settle her concerns. “What was it like?”
“Perfect,” Amélie said, but even as the words left her lips she was already correcting herself. “Well, that’s not really true. I guess it was okay. It was all over pretty quickly.”
“Did it hurt?”
“No,” she said, shaking her head, and breathing heavily at the memory. “Well, maybe a little at first, but then not at all. Maybe he has a small, how you say . . .”
“Amélie!” Frances slapped her with one hand and used the other to cover her mouth to stifle her giggles as she rolled onto her back. Amélie was giggling too, so much that her sides began to hurt. Of course, Frances was no stranger to the male form; it was impossible to remain uneducated in that topic while living at her aunt’s retreat, La Muse. But her only information regarding that particular part of the anatomy was aesthetic, and even though she had felt the hard, knotty lump of Benoit’s body when he suggested she touch it through his trousers, she didn’t really know what it did or how it felt. That was when her heart began to beat to the rhythm of panic. Was that it? Is that why he had left?
“You have to tell me everything, Amélie,” she said, the panic still there on her face, the frown etched vertically between her eyes. “I have to know.”
Amélie sighed with the pride of a girl with one foot into adulthood. “What can I tell you? It was all over in about two minutes.” Then suddenly shy in a way she had not been before. “But I liked it. We did it a lot by now.”
Frances looked at the grass and suddenly felt unsure about wanting to be lying there. Benoit was out there somewhere, and she had to find him. Very suddenly she had to find him and show him. The air was cooling, a cloud passing overhead, as if giving her a nudge in the right direction. Reaching for her dress, she slipped it over her head and got to her feet.
“What are you doing?” Amélie asked.
“I have to go.”
“Where?” she said, sitting up. “Why such a rush?” Frances hurried her feet into her sandals. “Do you have to go and meet Benoit?” As soon as she heard the name Frances stopped lacing her sandals and stared at Amélie. “It’s okay, don’t worry. I didn’t tell anybody.”
Frances’s mouth had gone dry. Peeling her tongue from her gritty palate she spoke, her words crisp around the edges. “What do you think you know? Benoit is a friend of my aunt’s.”
Amélie shrugged. “You don’t have to lie. I saw you together. I was walking up the road toward the town and I saw you climb into his car. I stopped, watched for a moment, and then he reached over and kissed you. It was just a few days ago.”
“Who did you tell?” Visions of people who knew, like the gossiping women in the café, raced before her eyes. Was Edouard quiet with her the last time she was in the bookshop? She had thought it was her guilt over the book, but perhaps he knew what she had been doing with Benoit too. That was why he had disappeared, then; he had been cast out, or her aunt had driven him away, or told the . . . No, she couldn’t even allow herself to imagine it. Jumping to her feet, she scrambled about for her second sandal.
“Why are you being like this?” Amélie asked. “I didn’t tell anybody.”
Frances shook her head. “I don’t believe you. You told people and that’s why he’s disappeared. That’s why he’s gone.”
“He hasn’t gone. He went away on business.”
Frances stopped in her tracks. “What?”
“He went to Paris and he’s coming back tonight or tomorrow. Anyway, why are you getting so upset? It’s not like it’s something serious. It’s barely even real. People wouldn’t even care if they knew. This is not England, you know.”
Frances wished she had something to throw at Amélie then, but she had already laced her second sandal. With her heart rocketing along she took a deep breath, tried to calm her rage. “It is something serious. Benoit loves me.” It felt magical to say it aloud. There was no point in denying it anymore.
Amélie shook her head. “The only time that what is happening between you and Benoit becomes something serious is when your aunt finds out.” As if they were discussing nothing more than a television drama, Amélie rolled onto her back at the same time she rolled her eyes. “That’s if she doesn’t know already.”
Frances ran as fast as she could until she was back in the gardens of the farmhouse, Amélie’s words sounding in her head. By then the artists were gone, and she was close to tears. Her eyes were all hot, like they were when she fought with her father about her studies, when he insisted she become a doctor. Tears were going to leak out all over the place, she knew it. The idea of somebody seeing her and asking what was wrong terrified her, as she wasn’t altogether sure she wouldn’t just tell them the truth. So instead she headed to the artists’ barn, bursting in, panting and wiping the first tears from her cheeks. Before she even knew what she was doing she had snatched up the nearest pot, filled with brushes and speckled in paint, and launched it at the dusty ground with a shout, watching as it shattered into hundreds of pieces. Still she felt no better, so she grabbed a second pot and was about to launch that too when she heard a shuffle behind her. Standing there in a pair of jeans and a white T-shirt was the life model from earlier. With his clothes on she barely recognized him at first.
“Why don’t you put that one down, eh? Breaking it won’t help.”
It felt heavy in her hands, ready for smashing. Sometimes she did that, broke things to feel better. Never changed anything when she did, though. It never helped. Carefully, her hands trembling, she set the pot back on the side, the model nodding his head as if he agreed with her course of action.
“Want to talk about it?” he asked, and she shook her head. “Are you sure? Sometimes it’s just what you need.”
Perhaps it would help her to talk, she thought. Perhaps she could find somebody who agreed with her, who would tell her that things would be okay. That Amélie was wrong, and that what she shared with Benoit was as serious as it could get. But how could she talk about Benoit, or the way she felt? How could she tell this stranger that she loved a man almost fifteen years her senior who had told her that they must keep what they had a secret?
“And sometimes it doesn’t,” she said, deciding against it.
Racing away, she fled through the other side of the barn without another word. Out in the open she ran across fields, through the door and into the farmhouse, before rushing up the stairs. Once she was safely in her room she flung herself onto the bed and cried, Amélie’s words still ringing in her ears.
Her aunt called her downstairs shortly after that, and that evening they ate their way through a cassoulet with a rich tomato sauce and great big hunks of rabbit. Her aunt complained about cats in the barn again, breaking her pots, and Frances wondered if that was the conclusion she had reached or if she knew the truth and was angling for a confession. Had the model told her aunt? The very idea of it added fervor to her concerns. If Amélie knew about Benoit, it was more than a possibility that other people knew too. The food was too heavy, too rich in her stomach, and it stuck like bones in her throat.
“Auntie, I’m not feeling very well.”
“What’s wrong?”
“Time of the month,” she lied. “I’m not hungry. Mind if I go and lie down?”
Moments later she was back in her bedroom, under the covers. All she wanted to do was shut out the world, forget that any of this was happening. It all felt so unfair, so messed up, in that special way the whole world rotates on your own personal axis at sixteen years of age. Yet despite the predicament she found there was only one thing that settled her.
Thinking of Benoit and the things he used to tell her made everything else fade out. There was a moment the week before, where they had pulled in at the side of the road after leaving the beach. Breathless and sweaty, he whispered in her ear, “It all feels so easy with you, Frances. Life is so simple when I think of how I love you. Do you know how many hours I spend thinking of you? How I long to touch you, kiss you, listen to your sweet voice? You are the best form of escape from real life, Frances. All I want is you.”
Feeling better at the memory, her heart rate began to slow, and the sick feeling that was lingering in her stomach settled. Because there was no denying it; she was his fantasy. Surely, she thought to herself then, alone in her bedroom, waiting for him to return, there could be nothing more real or important than that.