Without Her

by Rosalind Brackenbury

  “Bonjour, Claudie. So. You’ve seen her?”

  I sit down beside him on the bench. Up here, everything is so untouched—or has been restored to its former glory? Light filters in through the thicket of flowers growing outside the windows. Everything is all of a piece, art deco down to the glasses. “Yes, I’ve just come from her hotel. She felt tired, she’s having a rest.”

  “So, you know? She told you what she wants?” He sounds almost angry; certainly agitated. I haven’t seen him like this in years.

  “Yes. She told me you’d said she must ask me first.”

  “How was she?”

  “Oh—calm, decisive. Not in bad shape, physically, yet.”

  I’m hoping the waiter will come soon to ask me what I want to drink. The champagne I drank with Hannah stings still at the back of my throat and I have a slight headache and am very thirsty.

  “You know it’s illegal?” Of course, he’s a lawyer; I almost forgot. Of course, this aspect of it would come first with him. We sit beside each other like plotters, not lovers; as if neither of us wants to turn our back to the room. A Chinese woman in what looks like a designer silk suit comes upstairs to use the toilet, glances at us on her way; otherwise the upstairs room is empty. The mirrors show you who is coming up the stairs, before they can be seen in reality. He must have seen me come up, my mirror image before me; maybe braced himself for what we’d have to say.

  “She’s not planning to do it here. She’s doing it in Switzerland. She’s already been there to sign up.”

  “Claudie, why must you always do what she wants?” Alexandre keeps his voice low—in case the Chinese woman hears, on her way out? He sips his Perrier. The wood paneling of the room makes it feel like a club, but the orchids and palm leaves at the windows let in today’s hot late afternoon light as if we were in a greenhouse.

  “Why do I? She’s my friend. More to the point, why do you do what she wants, Alex?” I see that he doesn’t know what I mean. “She told me about you and her, and what happened. You never told me. You both lied to me. How do you think that feels?”

  He makes a restless dismissing gesture with one hand. This infuriates me. “You will not diminish this like you have so many things.”

  Now he’s really rattled. “It was forty years ago,” he says, looking down at the table. “It was a mistake.”

  “A mistake! A mistake happens once. More than once is not a mistake. You lied to me, that’s what hurts most. And finding it out all these years later makes me feel like an idiot.”

  “She asked me not to tell you, Claudie. She said it would hurt you too much.”

  “No, you asked her not to tell me. Admit it.”

  At just that moment the waiter ascends the stairs, white-jacketed, mirrored too as he comes. “Another Perrier, please,” I say to him.

  Alexandre has his head propped in his hands and isn’t looking at me. I want a sign from him, just one. That he understands me, at least. The waiter has seen everything, and these days sees and hears it in a dozen different languages every day. On the wall, a group of badly dressed Parisian intellectuals looks down from the only photograph and I wonder who they all were. Did we really come up here, when we were young? It would have been expensive, even then. Didn’t we drink at a smaller, unknown café down one of the side streets off boulevard Saint-Germain? I couldn’t, now, remember. I wait for him to speak, agitated, even slightly ill with tension.

  Alexandre looks around him as if still afraid to be heard; but we are alone. “You know how we were then, how easy it was, it was a whole different era. We’re not the same people anymore. You can be upset about it now, of course, Claudie, really. But you must see, it was so long ago. Also, you know that there have been other women. We have always said that it doesn’t make any difference to us, no?”

  “Others, maybe, and actually that was hard enough. But not Hannah. Not her.”

  I remember his theory, the one he explained to me when we were young and his infidelities still hurt: that he was completely present with me, body and soul, here and now, and that this, what we had, was eternal. I wonder now if he has said exactly the same thing to other women. To Hannah, even.

  As for us not being the same people—I want to say, then who are we? And why are we together?

  The waiter comes up the stairs again with a round tray, and more bottles of Perrier; we both seem to hold our breath.

  He looks up at me. “Claudie. It was something that happened, without either of us expecting it. I probably shouldn’t have done it. I’m sorry, that you had to find out now.”

  “Well.” I swallow my fizzy water.

  He says quietly, “Don’t let’s fight, Claudie. I’m sorry, I said I’m sorry. I’m sorry I did it, I’m sorry I lied. I really never wanted to hurt you. But would it had been better if you had known? This passion for telling everything is very American, it seems to me.”

  “What are you trying to say?”

  “Would it have made you happier, would it have made things better or different if you’d known about it back then? We might not have had all the times together, the love, the attention for each other that we have had.”

  I look at him. He has a point, of course. I would have been angrier, more upset, when I was younger. I have to accept that it could have been much worse, and done more damage, and yes, it could have put an end to what became a long liaison that has brought both of us a great deal of pleasure. I also think, we have been having our first fight in years, if that is what it is. But what is a relationship, really, if it consists entirely of pleasurable sex and never an argument, never a scene like this one where we sit stubbornly opposed to each other, not giving way? I realize that Hannah has put us here; she has orchestrated this, we can blame her—or, be grateful. The world is caught up in so much misunderstanding and antagonism, my only chance is to be different from that, to accept what is, and not fight it. I think, for some reason, of the old woman sitting on the rocks on the shore in Greece, everything lost to her, except her life. The woman whose photograph I saw.

  We should be talking about Hannah, her decision: not about ourselves. It’s best for all of us that I don’t stay angry with her. I should be able to let go of this. But what we should feel is not always what we do feel, and therein lies the whole confusion of life.

  I look at him. “Hannah wanted to tell me the truth because she’s going to die.”

  “Of course. And for her it makes sense, perhaps. But can I tell you something? You can believe it or not. Me, I can hardly even remember how it was, what it was, how she was. It was probably nice. It was also not important, compared to everything we have had, you and I. But I also want to say that we all go to our deaths with secrets, with things not said. It’s how life is.”

  At last, after a long silence, I say to Alexandre, here in the Café de Flore, “All right. If we don’t say any more about it, where does this leave us?”

  “Well. She has left us in this position, asking us to go with her.”

  He is right. Once again, and in another context entirely, Hannah has preempted us. I wonder what must it feel like to know that an enemy is marching inside you, wreaking its damage day by day? To have gone alone, first of all to face a diagnosis, then to make the arrangements for your own death? To prepare yourself to give up the world? To ask friends for help, and not be sure that they will come through for you? I look at my lover of forty or more years, and think, yes, this is a test of us together, of what we have made.

  “I think that we have to go. I think we have to help her.” As I say this, he reaches out and for a couple of seconds squeezes my hand.

  We are who we are now. He is a successful French lawyer and I am a college professor from the United States. We are nearly old enough to retire. We have obligations, ties to other parts of life, we are social beings. And yet, here we sit in the café of our youth—for we did come here, an
d what’s more, I remember the pattern in the carpet—the same carpet, or its duplicate—in a café where we met once when he lived in the rue du Dragon, in a maid’s room under the eaves of pigeons and rusty gutters and squares of the Paris sky above rooftops.

  Alexandre spreads his hands upon the table and looks at them. I imagine he does this in court, before he begins to speak for the defense. While he looks at his hands— Hannah is right, he does have long thin fingers; why was I not suspicious when she mentioned them?

  Then he says, “You talked with her about her husband?”

  “Yes. She says he would try to stop her. She wants to present it as a fait accompli.”

  “But in fact, could he stop her? If he did, perhaps it would be for the best. Maybe this illness can be endured for a long time. We don’t know the quality of other people’s lives.”

  “Alex, you obviously don’t know about ALS. It’s horrible. The suffering it brings. I’ve known people who’ve had it. No matter what I want, what she wants makes complete sense to me. Especially because it just gets worse and worse. And every case is a death sentence. You don’t get better from it.”

  “True.” He looks sideways at me, slides back in his seat. “You know, it is complicated.”

  I say, “No, it’s actually simple. It’s yes, or no.”

  “No, it’s complicated for us. To be with her there. Because we are not relatives. Will they accept us? Will we be accused of trying to kill her, of persuading her against her will? There is all this to consider.”

  “Well,” I say, “you’re the lawyer.” For a lawyer, I’m thinking, his arguments are fairly illogical. He must be as confused by this as I am. “They can’t accuse us of anything, surely?”

  He frowns. “I’m not sure. I have to look at all sides. You must see this. Yes, we must help her, but is this the best way? Is there not another way?”

  “What other way is there? This is assisted. It’s dignified. It’s what she wants. And what she wants makes sense to me.”

  Is it at this moment that I see what has changed? We are no longer in a bedroom, focusing simply and willingly upon each other. That is what we know how to do. This is different. With everything he says, I see him slipping away. He is right, of course, in the real world where we sit. Yet where it matters, in the country of the heart, he is not.

  “Allons, let’s go.”

  “But where?”

  “I have to go back to my office, at least for an hour or so. Will you go back to see her?”

  “Yes.” I want to say, what about later?

  “And we can have dinner?”

  “If you’re free.”

  “Of course. I’ll book. There’s a place at the end of boulevard Saint-Germain, Chez René, number 10, I think. You can find it?”

  “Of course. Anyway, call me if you need to, otherwise—what, seven-thirty? Eight?”

  “Eight, rather.”

  “And Hannah?”

  “Ask her, if she wants to come. But we can’t talk about all this over dinner. We must talk about something else.”

  He leaves twenty-euro notes for the expensive bottled water at the Café de Flore, and goes down those stairs, mirrored, his jacket over his shoulder, his elegant work-self on its way to the next meeting. Again, he’s had the last word. But what was it, exactly?

  As soon as I leave the café to cross the wide street and walk up rue Bonaparte back to Hannah’s hotel, I know that we can’t do this: we can’t all three sit in a restaurant and, as Alexandre has stipulated, talk about other things. Hannah’s request, Hannah’s confession, Hannah’s death fill all the space available, whether we like it or not. I’ll call him, tell him no: what you are asking is impossible, even in the context of French manners and behavior. Hannah and I are not French, we can’t do this, we aren’t even going to pretend. In her room, she’s still lying on the bed and I realize I haven’t been away long in real time. I’ve knocked, she’s called out, it’s open.

  I tell her, “He has to think about it, he says, and he wanted us all to have dinner together in some restaurant and talk about something else.”

  She sits up, her hair on end, her legs in their creased black pants, ankles pale and swollen. “Oh well,” she says, “if he can’t, he can’t. I’m over asking people to do more than they feel capable of. Let’s just accept the fallibility, all round, of the male gender. He probably feels squeamish, they all do.”

  “Well, I’ll call him, shall I? Tell him we can’t make it? Dinner, I mean.”

  “But, Claude, don’t you want to? I don’t mind, really. I can probably have something sent up.”

  I say, truthfully, “I’d rather be with you. I could go out and bring us in some dinner, if you’d like.”

  “Oh, I don’t eat a lot these days. But I tell you what, I’d love some good bread, some butter, some ham—you know, like the old sandwiches, jambon-beurre? And probably some more champagne. I might as well enjoy it while I can.”

  “It shall be done.” Relieved to have something simple to do, I set out again to walk what seems like miles to find a bread shop on the rue du Cherche-Midi where they have pain Poilâne, and then to a grocery on rue d’Assas where there is both ham and butter; and of course, there are innumerable wine shops in the quartier that sell champagne in real-sized bottles. At the corner of rue d’Assas and rue de Rennes, I call Alexandre and leave a message. He must be still in his meeting. “Alex, she doesn’t want to come out. I’m buying a picnic for us to eat in the room.” Then I carry back my booty and hide my grocery bags as I go up in the elevator to Hannah’s room. She’s up, and sitting at the table, her hair brushed, lipstick renewed.

  “Claude, if you could but imagine, how wonderful it feels when someone just does exactly what I want, without thinking up something completely different that would do me far more good. You are an angel. Did you have to walk miles?”

  “Yes, there isn’t much actual food around here, these days. But look, we have a real Widow this time, and she’s chilled.”

  “What would I do without you?” It’s rhetorical, but I think—you have never really had to.

  “Did you call Alex?”

  “I left a message. I said we weren’t going. He was in a meeting with a client.”

  “Who would have thought that scruffy kid would have become a lawyer? Wasn’t he going to do something arty, when we met him?”

  “Yes, but he realized doing something arty would never make him any money. He likes money, Alexandre. Or, the things money can buy. And let’s not forget he has expensive divorces.”

  “Are you still in love with him?”

  I pull the gold foil off the top of the bottle and begin to twist the cork gently so that it will be eased out, not forced, and the champagne will flow as it is supposed to. I hesitate to tell her, but I do. It matters to try to be truthful with each other now, whatever Alexandre says about the relativity of truth. “I don’t think so. But we are close. We are very good friends, but I can’t feel the way I used to, no. I just realized it today.”

  “Today! Only today? Because of what I told you? Oh, Claude.”

  “No, not really. You’ve just told me what I’ve always half known, in a way. You know, he and I have been lovers for years, on and off. Of course I knew he had other women, I just didn’t know one of them was you.”

  She dips her head away from me.

  I say, “It’s more that he’s gone too far away. At least, I think so.”

  “Far away?”

  “Into his life, his pursuits, being a lawyer, his complicated divorces—all that.”

  Considering this, she sits up, her glass held out. I think, the champagne is a good idea: we are celebrating, not yet mourning. We are together in these simple acts: opening a bottle, cutting good bread.

  “Was it to do with what I’ve asked you both?”

  “Bring
your glass closer. There. Ah, lovely. No, it wasn’t just that: it was seeing each other out of the bedroom. Metaphorically speaking. If you can stay in the bedroom for more than forty years, that’s something, I know. But now, we’re out of it. I can’t explain more. And, your plan, yes, I suppose so. But it needed to happen.”

  Once, somebody said to me, you have to prefer reality, whatever it gives you, and I recognize now that this is and will always be true. Reality is this. It is these four walls, and Hannah and me together, and this evening’s swallows falling down in the gap between the buildings, dusk coming in at last, and Alexandre sitting in a restaurant without us. It is the age we are, and the world we live in.

  Then I think—my glass halfway to my mouth, the little bubbles sparking at the rim—she wanted to separate us; she wanted this, perhaps even without knowing it. All these years later, she wanted all my allegiance for herself. Now, all I can do is be with her, and accept what comes. Her death preempts everything. This is her end game, it has to be.

  My cell phone rings. I’m halfway through a mouthful of ham and bread but I grope for it and listen. It’s Alexandre. “Sorry you couldn’t make dinner,” he says. “But of course, I understand. Tell her—that I will do all I can to support her.”

  Still so ambiguous. “You’ll come with us, then?”

  “When the time comes, yes. I’ll try. If that is still what she wants.”

  I make a one-thumb-up sign to Hannah and nod to her. It’s easy to forget that it’s her death we’re talking about: it feels more as if he’s simply joining us on some risky adventure.