IV
Escaping a foster home is not a cakewalk. With a rapist on the loose, Ariadne had to be very careful. The only way she could escape that hell hole was by killing the rapist. The night seemed opportune. Ariadne had been waiting for an opportunity to strike back. Her foster mother was not at home for the night. The brute was alone in the bedroom. She had to wait patiently for him to be in deep slumber. She was not a woman who would settle for a charity home where her supposed protector would get to rape her whenever he felt like. The worst part of the entire situation was, the man molested her in the name of God. She heard the brute snoring. Ariadne wondered how he slept so peacefully after everything he did. The idea of criminals like him masquerading as saints disillusioned her. She had to kill him just on the basis of principle, if not anything else. Ariadne tiptoed her way into the kitchen downstairs and stole the knife from the fruit bowl. With the knife in her hands, Ariadne lost no time and in a rush she entered her foster father’s room and stabbed him 12 times in the chest. It was a messy affair. The first hit had awaked him and he had tried hard to defend himself. Ariadne had to slash his wrists to limit his movement. She had to stab him another eleven times before he stopped breathing. She was covered in blood. Ariadne disposed of the knife and left her father to rot on the bloodstained carpet. She could not venture out in her bloodied clothes. She took a deep breath and washed herself. She took her bloody clothes and put them in a plastic bag. Ariadne ran out of the house and ran as fast as she could till she finally came to the highway having disposed off the bag in a dumpster on her way. There she hitchhiked her way out of criminal proceedings with the help of a pimp. She had to sell her body to keep it out of prison. Once her picaresque journey started in the whore house, life took a different turn and Ariadne turned into a woman of vision. Joseph was her first boyfriend. He was a pimp and an excellent peddler, the best in New York. Joseph swam in money and booze and was a favorite at parties and among women. He found Ariadne on the highway, drenched in sweat and pouting in despair and sleeping on a two dollar blanket. She was too afraid to say anything. She was still in shock. The only thing that Ariadne wanted at that point of time was safety. The need to kill the brute, who had attempted to violate her, drove her with unimaginable confidence to finish him as brutally as possible. But now that the deed was done, reality struck her hard. She realized the magnitude of what she had done. Fear gripped the girl. She was ready to pay any price for her safety. Her defenseless honesty turned Joseph on. He struck a deal with her. She had to give him a blow job to get to a safer location. Once they landed themselves in a quieter and safer place, Joseph sealed his deal with Ariadne and became her personal protector. Days rolled by and Ariadne’s business flourished. She had the virgin appeal. Every man wanted to be with her or at least share her with someone preferable. Ariadne and Joseph recognized their partners in one another and started living together. They were doing fine till Joseph started getting personal about his girlfriend’s profession. He lost himself to madness and ultimately asked Ariadne to quit her job and run with him to some other place. Ariadne knew better. She knew what she had to do and she did the right thing. Joseph and Ariadne broke up on a very ugly note. A lot of bones were broken and a lot of personal remarks were made. Ariadne’s heart was broken again and she swore never to turn to a man again. Ariadne quit Joseph’s circle and became a successful escort girl, lithe and professional- one to die for. Since her first break up, Ariadne had been to therapy and to church. She tried to restore her faith in God but failed when confessing her sins didn’t make her feel better. She was only advised to return to the path of God. But for a high school dropout with a history of abuse, God’s ways did not really satisfy the raging fire of hunger in the stomach or the flames of ambition. She tried talking to a professional and realized that some things can’t be expressed. Escorts did not have the luxury of other individuals who survived in the mainstream society. They could not tell everything without compromising their stance. Their pains were inevitable and they were expected to deal with it themselves. Sometimes the pain and the agony are so acute that conventional reactions are numbed out and what remains is a solid block of passive understanding. Ariadne always understood her situation and never questioned fate. She had learnt to live her life in isolation because nothing hurts more than shattered expectations. She lived the life of a hermit, separated from the soul of the society but connected to the flesh. She literally counted her days on Earth because she was tired of living. Suicide seemed too grand and superfluous an idea. It also seemed cowardly and exhausting. She had mulled over the idea and found that it was risky too. In case she did not die and her attempt failed, it would create a lot of problems and she would be asked a lot of questions. She did not like answering questions pertaining to her personal life. The only thing that could be achieved through suicide was closure. Ariadne was in no need for a closure. She needed to wait for the day when she would cease to exist. Each day that Ariadne breathed was cursed and filthy. She was cursed by the overwhelming misery of her family. Every woman in her family seemed to be fighting a ghost of misery unsuccessfully. Ariadne did not want to end up like her mother. She battled a constant fear of not turning into her mother. The more miserable she felt with time, the more she feared she was turning into her mother. She was determined to not end up like Sue in a pool of vomit writhing to stay alive. She slept hungry nights and lived in disease and decrepitude. There was money in her account and her shoe box, but she did not have an appetite. Her blood works were normal but she cried every moment she was alone. She was the picture of grace and sophistication when she went about her job, but inside she was a broken individual trying hard to gather up the pieces. It took a long time for Ariadne to save her money for a spa. She had to face far too much at a far too tender an age. Ariadne Silver would go off to sleep every night, humming a lullaby to herself. She kept herself warm with the palms of her soiled hands and drank water whenever she felt hungry. Ariadne Silver lulled herself to sleep at the end of the long hard day. In her dreams she soared over the valley of the hyacinths and ruled the Mad Tea Party. In her dreams she was truly Alice, slipping down the eternal rabbit hole, living an upside down life. Ariadne ‘Alice’ Silver was safe in her dreams.
V
France welcomed Ariadne at the peak of her summer beauty. Our Alice from Arizona was finally standing on the soil she had often dreamt of, but had never seen. Paris looked like a veritable dream. Ariadne could stare at the men and women for ages and not get tired of their flawless skin and dainty gait. Paris was all about love and art. She took a sniff to find out if that peculiar cocktail of odors was simply imaginary or not. It was real. It was the aroma of perfume, freshly baked cakes, roses and the cool breeze of the Seine all mixed together to create a concoction so special that you would feel a strange sense of nostalgia connecting you to the city of lights. Ariadne fell in love with the Parisian sun and wished she could take a slice of summer home to Arizona. Ariadne ‘Alice’ Silver felt like she was the lady born with a silver spoon in her mouth. She had misplaced her spoon for a short while. Everything was probably alright now. There were no mad tea parties anymore. Life was all about the Paris sun and the rich vineyards. Ariadne’s instinct urged her to make a dash for the dream shops and eat at a dainty parlor but she controlled herself against her will. She had to meet the probate officer first. After all, that is what she had come to Paris for. She had to meet a certain Lucien Valier who would guide her through the last remaining official formalities required to transfer ownership of the property. Her first stop in Paris was to be at Charles de Gaulle, a cozy café in the heart of the city. Lucien Valier was supposed to be waiting for her there with the necessary documents for the transfer of ownership. Once there, Ariadne would begin a new life, an unplanned, unexpected life. The first thing that she would do with that money was give herself a treat.
Journey to Charles de Gaulle was rife with a series of delightful faux pas. Ariadne spoke broken French to get to her desti
nation and got mesmerized by the fluent French of the passersby. She blushed when a man excused himself as he took hold of her hand in the middle of a busy street and kissed it unabashedly. Such was the charm of her actual wonderland that Ariadne felt she was home at last. The more she traipsed along the orange-yellow roads of Paris, the more besotted she got. When she finally arrived at Charles de Gaulle, Ariadne had lost all of her stern businesswoman pride and seemed more befuddled by the color and exhibition. Ariadne had rediscovered the lost innocence of her childhood under the bright summer French sun. She was all smiles. Her face looked radiant as she smiled pleasingly to every passer-by that she exchanged a word with. Their fluent French sounded like music to her ears. She imagined a lover singing her love songs in the language. She would trade the fantasy of a Mad Hatter for a Frenchman who could sing. Ariadne Silver felt like a normal young girl on the streets of beguiling Paris. She felt like a spoilt heiress being guided by beneficiaries of royalty till she understood how to use her riches on her own. She was enjoying her fairy tale very thoroughly indeed.
“Bon jour mademoiselle Silver, j’mappele Lucien Valier.”
“er.. hey, I am Ariadne. So, you must be my probate officer.”
“Oui, mademoiselle Silver. Vud ew like ze eet zumthing?”
Ariadne found this Valier person very interesting. He had that characteristic French appeal about him. His skin was smooth and hairless and he spoke with a heavy accent. Although Ariadne wasn’t fluent in French, she could understand the basic salutations. She found Lucien Valier’s English downright funny and adorable to boot but she was careful not to make a fool of herself on her first day in Europe. She did not want to tell her probate officer that his English was awful and cute. Ariadne did not know why but Lucien Valier seemed like the kind of guy who would not mind her bittersweet compliment. She rebuked herself for getting carried away by devastating European good looks and boyish charm. She had work at hand, probate. With an imperious air, Ariadne joined Lucien Valier for a professional meeting over her dead grandmother’s property.
III
Lunch was lavish that day and Ariadne was spoilt by French gallantry. She could not help but lose herself to the suavity and genteel charms of the polished Frenchman. The more she drank wine, the more confident she felt about the entire situation. She not only forgave her life for all the miserable events and traumas that she had to live with but also thanked her life for providing her with an opportunity to visit Paris. She was in a stupor.
Deep… deeper…
Ariadne had the sensation of sinking in water, that pleasant feeling when the warm water kisses the skin. For a couple of moments, she was oblivious to the situation she was in. She sank deep in her measured inebriation.
“Mademoiselle Silver? Eww okay?”
“I am fine, thank you!”
Ariadne could not act the goat on her very first day in France. She collected herself and chided herself for getting carried away. She knew that letting her guard down, even for moments could be disastrous. She simply could not let the French air make her forget about the lessons life had taught her. She had a lot to see and lot to learn. Lucien Valier seemed like a nice person. Ariadne was completely taken over by French customs and Lucien’s frankness with her. He offered to show her around and guide her in every possible way to get the probate formalities out of their way. Ariadne knew very little French and kept herself limited to simple answers and smiles.
Ariadne ‘Alice’ Silver wanted to explore the night life of the city, feel the cultural capital of the world throb with life and art. After their preliminary discussion on probate was more or less done with, Ariadne wanted to know if Lucien knew of a theatre Ariadne could visit. To her surprise, he volunteered to take her out that evening and show her the rest of Paris as it was. Ariadne was to go to her grandmother’s home in Salers where Lucien Valier promised to drop by in the evening.
Several days rolled on one after the other and Ariadne got richer and wiser in terms of wealth and culture. Lucien Valier had been a regular visitor at her grandmother’s house. He proved his worth as a probate solicitor by guiding Ariadne through the complicated laws of property ownership. Now that the money was transferred to Ariadne’s account, Lucien Valier did not exactly have any reason to linger behind. Ariadne suspected infatuation and she would have discouraged him right away had he not been so devastatingly debonair. Lucien Valier took Alice to the finest art galleries and some of the best vineyards in France. Ariadne needed at least three days to finish her tour of the Louvre museum. She almost cried when they visited Versailles and walked among stately palaces and monuments. At Biarritz, in the southern parts of France, Ariadne walked among aromatic vines and cried with pleasure at the sight of such extravaganza. Sometimes she felt she did not deserve so much happiness. Lucien Valier was a steady companion who accompanied Ariadne wherever she wanted to go and guided her through the streets of Paris. Not for once did he try to make a pass at her or ask her out on a date. Frenchmen were indeed different from the guys in America. In France, everyone was well dressed and good looking. They would all mostly talk about freedom and the liberty of personal expressions. Walking through the streets of Paris, Ariadne was mesmerized by the color and glamour of the city. Paris was a living, breathing entity. It was alive and had claimed Ariadne as a victim of its grand opulence. She did not want to go back to America. She had blissfully forgotten about her chain of spas and the booming business she had left behind to take care of her grandmother’s property. With so much of money in France, did she really need to go back to her usual job in America again? She thought of the customers there, the daily hassles, the conundrum and resolved to settle down in Paris. Ariadne had exceedingly high hopes for herself and was convinced that she could open her own spa at the French Riviera. Lucien, of course, encouraged Ariadne vigorously and discussed her plans effusively with her. Was Lucien attracted to her? Ariadne had been meaning to find out for a long time. He was so debonair and handsome that our little Alice almost hoped he would propose to her someday. Lucien Valier was a unique man. For one, he had a dreamlike quality about his eyes and a perpetual smile on his face. Lucien Valier spoke English with a heavy French accent but improved his sentence constructions greatly with the help of Ariadne. At first she really thought he was gay. All the time that Ariadne spent with him, not once did he look at her in a way she was accustomed to seeing American boys look at women on the streets. Lucien walked around with a practiced demeanor and always spoke when he was spoken to. His presence was silent, comforting and enriching. Lucien Valier would not go out of his way to explain the significance of a particular artwork or give the exact date of preservation of a particular kind of wine but Ariadne could rest assured that he knew everything worth knowing about France. He introduced Ariadne to Baudelaire’s poetry while she showed him her copy of Alice in Wonderland. Lucien was so impressed with the concept of a Wonderland that he even managed to sketch his own version of the Wonderland. He later gifted his artwork to Ariadne, whom he referred to as “petite Alice”. Their intimacy gradually grew into a solid camaraderie. Ariadne found a companion, almost what one calls a “consort battleship” in Lucien. Their lack of communication did not interrupt interaction at all. Ariadne had mostly taken to staring at Lucien’s sparkling eyes whenever he spoke. They somehow seemed to understand everything they had to communicate with one another and needed nothing more. ‘Alice’ had everything she needed. She had a job, security and a wonderland. All she was rooting for was the ‘Mad Hatter’.
The Love I Never Knew: Contemporary Romance Mystery (Ariadne Silver Romance Mystery #1) Page 3
