1.

‘Bon anniversaire, madame.’

The customs officer at Charles de Gaulle raises an eyebrow at Evelyn from over her passport, and she raises an eyebrow back. Gives him a taut smile.

‘Vous êtes très gentil, monsieur.’ You’re very kind.

The officer looks from Evelyn to Terra and Frida, both giggling and tossing their hair at more men in uniform. He asks, ‘Vous fêterez à Paris avec vos amies? ’

Evelyn glances over her shoulder, feeling nothing but the coldness of cash strapped to her body. She says, ‘Elles sont mes sœurs.’ They are my sisters.

‘Elles sont belles.’ The officer stamps Evelyn’s passport.

His fingers brush Evelyn’s as he returns the passport. But he’s staring at Terra and Frida.

Evelyn marches ahead with her suitcase, comparing the D.O.B. under her passport photo with the fresh date stamp:

July 22, 1975.

She is thirty years old today.

They take a room at a small hotel in the Latin Quarter. A queen bed with a striped coverlet and a matching sofa. ‘I can take the sofa,’ Terra offers, eyes shining sanctimoniously.

Frida looks from Terra to Evelyn, chin squared, arms crossed. Most likely, Frida would’ve made the same offer, if Terra hadn’t beat her to it.

‘I’ll take it. I’m shortest.’ Evelyn places her suitcase on the sofa, starts slipping off her sandals. ‘Frida, you can have the first shower. Terra, why don’t you get us some maps from reception?’

Once Terra is gone and water is rushing behind the bathroom door, Evelyn unlatches her suitcase, hunts among the precious Tampax boxes for her tape recorder. She slips in a new tape, switches it on, sticks it inside her leather tote. Sets her tote on a spindly table midway between the bed and the sofa.

The early evening light tumbles through the curtains, dusty and yellow as apricots.

‘I got us some maps of the city and a map of the Mee-tro.’ Terra bursts in, brandishing the maps like a winning hand of cards. ‘I don’t know, are we gonna use the Mee-tro?’

‘Métro,’ Evelyn corrects. ‘We’re only here for the night.’

This is news to Terra, but she doesn’t ask questions, just bounces over to the window. ‘Mind if I open this?’

Evelyn shakes her head. Terra pushes aside the curtains, hoists up the window and, with a sigh, leans outside it. After a while, she asks, ‘Do you hear music? Like, harmonicas or something?’

Evelyn looks up from the map, spread napkin-style across her lap. She listens.

‘“Le Chant de Partisans”, I think. Yes.’

When Frida sticks her head out of the bathroom a few minutes later, she is all heat-flushed paleness, dripping hair. ‘So … either of you pack any real Tampax?’

Before Evelyn can shake her head, Terra is crossing the room to her own handbag, beaming. ‘Our moons are in tune!’

‘If you need more, there’s a pharmacy on practically every Parisian street corner,’ Evelyn adds. That she has not bled in months is irrelevant. She refolds her map and looks at Frida. ‘I want a shower, too, once you’re done.’

‘Sure,’ says Frida. ‘Just as soon as my cunt is corked, I’ll be right out.’

They laugh. Not just at Frida’s dirty mouth, but at the Southern drawl that crops up when she cusses — the result of a rebellious adolescence near Fort Benning.

‘Sure,’ Terra echoes, though nobody asked her. ‘You should have the next shower, Evelyn. I don’t mind at all.’

In the locked bathroom, Evelyn takes off her blouse, her skirt, her money-belt. She takes off her underwear and considers her body, plastered with US dollars.