Paris, He Said

by Christine Sneed

  What I ask of the artists I support is nothing sordid or extortionary, only that they keep working. Some of the women I have lived with have also been artists, but from them I also expect friendship and ardor, respect and loyalty.

  Anne-Claire was the first woman I lived with, for a little over two decades. I think of that now and wonder how we did it without one of us ending up in an asylum. It must have been because we had two children to raise and had to keep the household in order for their sake, and because we had careers we enjoyed and friendships outside of the marriage. We each also had the confidence that we were always right. Our occasional flare-ups and entrenched resentments kept us more or less sane too—anger is more clarifying and motivating by far than depression or melancholy—even if these resentments rotted the marriage from the inside out.

  Agnieska was the second woman who lived with me. She stayed for seven months, a few years after the divorce. She eventually became a Vie Bohème artist, and is a painter of both male and female nudes. She is also the firstborn child of a French father and Polish mother and was a friend of my son’s, older than him by three years; her younger brother was Frédéric’s friend.

  I think that my son was briefly interested in blond, impulsive Agnieska a year or two before she moved in with me, but she has told me that she has always preferred older men, and my son never spoke of his feelings for her to me—it was his sister who did, and angrily too, as if I had stolen Agnieska from him, which was not at all the case. I don’t believe that Frédéric would have made her happy, and I don’t know if he makes his wife happy either. (They have been married for four years; he was only twenty-six, Léa twenty-five, when they married. Your child’s marriage is something you regard with both curiosity and a little doubt—you know this child’s flaws, his tendency to find fault where there is none, to forget to say thank you, to believe the worst, to get angry when he does not get his way.) Agnieska moved to Montpelier to help her sister, who had had twin girls; it was supposed to be a temporary situation, but Agnieska stayed on, after discovering how much she liked warm weather and sun. She teaches painting classes down there and continues to paint and exhibit at Vie Bohème from time to time.

  My third domestic companion was Brigitte, for about year, two and a half years ago. She is a friend of Fabienne’s too, but we are the same age—she is not an older woman like Fabienne is. Brigitte and I met on a day in late April so perfect, the air so light on our skin, it seemed as if nothing in our lives had ever been or ever would be dull or frustrating or tiresome.

  One night toward the beginning of my relationship with Brigitte, she, Fabienne, and I had quite a good time together in my home. This is not the sort of event that has occurred often in my life—one attractive and willing woman is plenty to keep me happy—but Fabienne is hard to deter once she sets her mind on something, and Brigitte wasn’t afraid or skeptical, nor was I. We had some wine and good food, and soon there was some laughter and teasing, and Brigitte, who is an obstetrician, twice divorced and sexually adventurous, was as fearless as Fabienne.

  After several months of living together, Brigitte began to speak of marriage, noticing that I had not, and when I gently made it clear that I did not intend to marry her, a few more months passed before she was able to remove the renters from her apartment in Montmartre and reinstall herself inside its sunny top-floor rooms. We still talk from time to time and meet for lunch or a glass of wine if she stops by the gallery near closing. She has since married for a third time, this husband also a doctor, but a psychiatrist rather than a deliverer of newborns.

  Sofia lived with me too, for three weeks, when she was between apartments, just before I left for New York. I should not count her as a cohabitant, because, in part, she regarded my place as she would a hotel—temporary lodging with certain useful amenities. A good place for sex, for indulging one’s appetites for fattening foods and throwaway movies. She loves to eat and walk around naked and laugh at silly films and television shows. She is, I suppose, a true Bohemian, and although she preferred me to André and his sweaty, grasping style (he is a man who will swallow nearly whole something that should instead be savored), she bestowed a few of her favors on him too. I was jealous, one of the few times in my life where I strongly felt this airless, ugly urgency. But having had such affectionate relations with his ex-wife some years earlier, I tried to convince myself that a little time with Sofia was his due.

  And presently I live with Jayne. It is a month now before her March show at Vie Bohème. When she flew home to Los Angeles to see her sister and their truce-observing parents over Christmas and New Year’s week, I stayed here and felt my home’s sudden stillness settle around me during the hours when my son and his family were visiting with Anne-Claire and Jeanne-Lucie, and I knew then that I would not want to live alone anymore. I have wondered often if Jayne will be ready to leave my home after her show goes up at Vie Bohème because that is my hunch.

  Why have I not already shown her the door, knowing that she has met her old boyfriend on a few isolated afternoons and returned home to rue du Général-Foy with the vague, dreamy look of a teenage girl who has just been kissed by the golden boy of her fantasies? And knowing as I also do that she has been painting this boy’s portrait in the studio that I have made available to her, a portrait she readily admitted was of him when questioned, her honesty something I admired in spite of myself? And why, if I would prefer that Jayne forget Colin, have I not sworn off my own occasional meetings with other women?

  What I know is that we cannot always do the things that our better judgment dictates we do, not all the time, and certainly not with joy.

  I worry that Jayne has become an addiction for me: her soft skin; her ascending, girlish laughter; her powdery, clean scent; her shyness; how the tender flesh between her legs sometimes tastes slightly of brandy; her awakening belief in her talent as an artist. She is more grateful than Sofia was for what I have done for her, and more generous in her opinions of other people. If not for the threat of another man reclaiming her heart, I would be content—or as content as it is possible for me to be.

  Jayne will have five new paintings in the March show, which André and I decided to name Intérieurs intimes. She wasn’t sure at first if she liked our choice of a name, but eventually she agreed that it seemed fitting because Susan, her mentor, is showing six canvases that are all part of a series of paintings based on photographs of a maternal aunt’s Manhattan apartment, and Jayne is showing two interiors—one of her childhood bedroom, the other of her maternal grandparents’ kitchen—as well as one painting with a window view onto a verdant yard and two portraits of people whose expressions I’d describe as contemplative, as if each subject has recently received disappointing or worrisome news. Chantal Schmidt will show five paintings of three different couples—Chantal and her girlfriend, two young men, and a heterosexual couple—lying in their beds, nude or partially clothed, the sheet or blankets kicked to the end of the mattress or missing entirely.

  Colin is planning to attend. Jayne’s phone revealed this fact on the day I read the long thread of their clandestine communications. I am still trying to decide if I should tell her that I know about him.

  Sofia will also attend; it doesn’t surprise me that she is curious about Jayne. I think, under different circumstances, they would like each other quite well. Maybe even under these circumstances, but I have to doubt it.

  The Intérieurs intimes opening is on March 21—the same day that Beethoven, one of my favorite composers, debuted his Quartet no. 13, op. 130, in Vienna in 1826. It is also the day on which, in 1859, the Scottish National Gallery opened in Edinburgh. Jayne was especially pleased by this latter coincidence. “That museum is still open,” she said. “It seems like a good sign, don’t you think?”

  “Yes,” I agreed. “If you are looking for a sign.”

  “Oh, of course I am. I think we all do. Don’t you?” She smiled, but her dark eyes were clouded with doubt. Why was she so worried, I wonder
ed. Her work would attract attention. She would make her former teacher proud, and her parents, who would not be able to attend the opening but planned to come to Paris in early April, when her mother would have her spring school vacation.

  “I don’t think I look for signs,” I said. “If I did, it would mean that I am waiting for something to happen, yes?”

  She regarded me. “I suppose it would.”

  “I am happy with things as they are,” I said, but even as I said this, I knew that I didn’t mean it, not fully.

  CHAPTER 7

  Final Questions

  Something I have begun to notice with increasing frequency: why is anger so often the first emotion we reach for?

  I heard Jayne murmuring in her sleep a few nights ago, after we had gone out to see an American movie that we argued over in the taxi on the way home—she thought the female lead, who was having an adulterous affair with her brother-in-law, was treated much more unfairly than the brother-in-law by their respective spouses and most of the film’s other characters. I thought they were equally miserable by the time the movie ended—both had been forced out of their houses and were in the process of getting a divorce. He had more money, and his parents were still speaking to him, but I wouldn’t say that he was any happier than the woman was. “He might be just as unhappy,” said Jayne, “but he’s not as badly off. She lives in a shithole apartment and never gets to see her kids and can barely afford to eat and pay her rent!”

  Did it bring back memories of your own awful apartment in New York? I almost asked, but knew she was talking about something else.

  Very early the next morning, she startled me from a sound sleep when she called out, “Where is it?” At first I thought she was awake and talking to me, but when I looked over at her, her eyes were closed and I could see that she was still asleep. In the morning she had no memory of this outburst.

  “Where is it?” she repeated, bemused. “I have no idea what I meant. Have I done something like this before?”

  “No,” I said. “Not that I’ve noticed. Have other men told you that you talk in your sleep?”

  A peculiar look crossed her face. She was deciding if she should lie, I realized, but I didn’t understand why; I hadn’t asked her to tell me who it was, or what she had said. “No,” she murmured, brushing away the hair that clung to her sleep-creased cheek. “But I once accidentally hit someone in the face.”

  “I hope you won’t do that to me,” I teased.

  “Me neither.”

  “Did he hit you back?”

  She blinked. “No. Thank goodness.”

  “Well,” I said. “I hope you didn’t hurt him too badly.”

  “He was fine. After he got some stitches.”

  “What?”

  She laughed, her voice croaking. “I’m kidding. I didn’t hit him hard at all. It just woke us both up. But we did break up not long afterward, for other reasons.”

  “I guess he was afraid he’d wake up one night and find you standing over him with a knife.”

  “Ha-ha,” she said.

  “Or a baseball bat.”

  “That’s not funny. Things like that freak me out,” she said. “I watched too many scary movies when I was a kid, I think.”

  “I could put you in a straitjacket before we go to bed, if you’d like me to,” I said.

  She sat up, her body rigid, her expression one of unequivocal distaste. “That’s so creepy, Laurent. How can you say something like that?”

  “I am only kidding, Jayne. But how could I resist? You’re like Jeanne-Lucie. She is easily frightened too. The things her brother would say to her when they were children. If you think I’m bad—”

  “Poor Jeanne-Lucie. You and Frédéric were so hard on her. She’s told me stories.”

  “She lived through it all just fine,” I said.

  “Barely.” Jayne gave me a scolding look. “Has she told you her idea yet?”

  “What idea?” I asked, sensing controversy.

  “She wants to go to New York with me after Intérieurs intimes opens. We’d go for four or five days, see a couple of plays, visit a few museums, do some shopping. She said she could get Anne-Claire to help Daniel take care of Marcelle while she’s gone. And Martin too. She said he’d help out.”

  “How nice of him,” I said, dryly. “Is she paying for everything?” I wasn’t sure why, but I did not like the thought of my girlfriend and my daughter on the loose together in New York.

  Jayne hesitated. “No, I don’t think so. I’d pay for my share.”

  “You would?” I asked, interested. “How?”

  “With my savings,” she said, not meeting my eyes. “You don’t have to sound so sarcastic.”

  “I’m not being sarcastic,” I said. “I’m just a little surprised that you two have been talking about traveling together. Especially when I’d think your show that’s opening in a few weeks and the arrival of your former teacher and your parents soon after would be more than enough to occupy your thoughts right now.”

  “It is occupying my thoughts,” she said. “But I miss my friends in New York. I’d like to see them this spring if I can. When I couldn’t get together with Liesel and Melissa over the holidays, I told them I’d try to come in April or May.”

  “Then I suppose you should go. As soon as you can arrange it.”

  “Laurent,” she said. “Please don’t be mad.”

  “I’m not mad.”

  She didn’t reply. It was almost eight thirty, and I hadn’t yet gone out for my newspaper and morning espresso. My mood would only deteriorate further if I waited much longer. “You do what you want to do,” I said. “You and Jeanne-Lucie can go to New York whenever you’d like. But your parents are coming soon too, aren’t they? You must be here for that.”

  “We’d go after their visit. Mid-April, probably.”

  “I’ll help you pay for the trip,” I said.

  She must have heard the sigh in my voice because she shook her head. “I have money saved. You don’t have to pay for any part of it.”

  She said this, but knew that I wasn’t likely to permit it.

  It bothered me more than I let on that my daughter and Jayne were considering flying across the Atlantic together, but Jayne must have guessed this. It also bothered me that when Frédéric called and Jayne answered the phone, he liked to talk to her for several minutes, and it was usually she who had to suggest passing the phone to me. From the next room, I could hear them talking, she laughing at almost everything Frédéric said. When had my son become such an entertainer? With me he was sometimes sulky, replaying in his mind our unresolved disagreements, I imagined, probing ancient wounds to see if they still throbbed. He could have called my mobile too, but he stubbornly preferred the landline. Frédéric and Jayne had met in early August when he came to Paris for a weekend with his wife and daughter, a week or so before Jayne’s sister and her two girlfriends from New York descended on us, each of those two visits lasting for six days, Jayne’s mood pensive and a little glum after their visits ended. She spent more time alone in the study painting, making up, she said, for some of the hours she had lost while entertaining her guests.

  And then she had her first rendezvous with Colin—at the end of August, I think it was, but of course I didn’t know this until the winter afternoon when I broke my own rule of not invading another person’s privacy (because I know how it feels to be the one whose e-mails and call logs have been looked at with increasingly furious eyes, assigning blame, assembling clues without being able to see the whole picture).

  What would Jayne have found out about me, if she had known where to look? If she still wanted to look—that impulse should be considered first. Would it be worse to live with a lover who isn’t ever concerned that you are thinking of someone else when you lie together in your sanctioned bed?

  Before anyone judges me, I hope she (or he) will think of all the things she has done in secret. The purchases made on a tertiary credit card and buried i
n the closet or hidden in the trunk until she could no longer keep herself from wearing the new shoes or the new dress or serving dinner on the new porcelain plates the night that guests were dining with her and her family? How many times has she passed judgment on a friend with a guilty conscience but in her most harshly honest moments realized that she wished an attractive and passionate man would come to sweep away her boredom and to look with lust upon the body her husband began to ignore after their third year together? Or perhaps once or twice, maybe more, on a business trip or on a vacation with college friends, she met an attractive stranger and spent the night with him, and all it truly meant was that someone still desired her.

  I have heard that men regret the chances they’ve missed, whereas women regret the ones they took that did not turn out so well. There are exceptions, I am sure, but it seems to me that the women I know who have alluded to such a thing do wish they had behaved more chastely. Men, without much variation, seem to wish the contrary.

  Have I gone off to undisclosed rooms and taken Sofia into my arms during the months that Jayne has lived with me?

  Have I gone off to meet a visiting Fabienne in her hotel near the Hôtel de Ville, her miniature greyhound, Fiona, locked away in the bathroom while I am naked in the clean white bed with her equally naked mistress?

  Have I ever thought, No, I will not, but at the last minute changed my mind?