Escaping

by Henrietta Taylor

  CHAPTER EIGHTEEN

  Who’s the Boss?

  THE DREAM OF STARTING my own business had finally been realised. Now all I had to do was make it work!

  I’d now taken over Sylvie’s job, and my life started to revolve around greeting and farewelling clients, stripping the houses bare, carting the washing home then bringing it back for the following week. Piles of sheets, doona covers, mattress protectors, pillowslips, towels, bathmats, hand towels, serviettes, tablecloths and dressing gowns all had to be lugged to my car. Usually there would be three large bags of washing, weighing about fifteen to eighteen kilograms each. The bathroom in Chemin St Roch would become a sea of white, metres high and just as deep. Raymond would help put the washing on the lines at the back of the garden, but in his haste he would often leave telltale footprints stamped onto still-damp sheets.

  This was not quite the life I had envisaged for myself. It was starting to feel like boot camp. But there was no alternative. Raymond told me I needed to cut as many costs in the first year as possible.

  Saturday was becoming by far the worst day of the week. It takes fifteen minutes to drive from Chemin St Roch to Saignon on a weekday, but Saturday is market day in Apt and frequently the traffic comes to a grinding halt. When I reached Saignon, the clients were often not ready to leave by ten o’clock. Even if they were, they would always want to talk about all the fantastic things they had done and the hilarious things that had happened to them à la Peter Mayle. The first time it was fun, but it could be a real bore when I was pressed for time.

  The hour or so wasted put the three to four hours needed to clean each house in jeopardy. I was learning to ask clients to strip the beds, which saved me valuable time, but the bottom line was that running two houses by myself was extremely demanding. Sometimes Raymond had to come and help in the afternoon, making beds while I cleaned. It was nonstop and exhausting.

  Sometimes the next set of clients turned up early and wanted access to their house before the official time of four o’clock, which added to the stress. But it was even worse when they turned up late. I would sit in the main square of Saignon beside the fountain and wait for them, even though I didn’t know what they looked like and vice versa. Sometimes they didn’t turn up until 7 pm, because they had miscalculated how long it would take to get there, or decided to do the shopping before coming to Saignon. Some even had the nerve to arrive at 10 pm, because they had gone to dinner first.

  Sundays became a day spent at one if not both of the laundrettes in Apt; commercial washers and dryers were so much more efficient than the little second-hand washing machine I had bought for our home. While the machines whirled around, my brain would go into overdrive, trying to think of solutions to my latest round of problems:

  1. How to cost-effectively do all the linen and towels

  2. How to minimise my efforts on Saturdays

  3. How to enjoy the short remaining time that Raymond had with us

  4. How to spend more time with the children when they weren’t at school.

  The French school year was due to end in June, just a month after Rose Cottage opened for business. The children found it peculiar to finish up in the middle of the year and not begin the new school year until September. In Australia their summer holidays had lasted five or six weeks; it was unheard of to have two months without school.

  After six months at their new school, both Mimi and Harry had made impressive progress and were capable of understanding the basics of the French language. The New South Wales Department of Education had been prepared to enrol them in long-distance education, so I had come over to France armed with a swag of textbooks. I was so unsure of our future that when we were still in Sydney it had seemed a great idea for the children to continue with their Australian studies after school. This was to cover the eventuality that we would only stay a year in France. But both children decided after a couple of months that they just wanted to do French school, not Australian lessons as well. After grappling with the French language all day, they had no inclination or energy to attack more work on their return from school in the afternoon.

  When they first arrived at St Saturnin school, they had found themselves in classes that were six months ahead. At the same time they had to master French as rapidly as possible, after their failure to absorb any of the language back in Saignon. Mimi had managed to scrape through the tough system — but only just. As for Harry, the principal decided that it would be best for him to repeat a year, as his comprehension was way below Mimi’s.

  I was devastated. To repeat a year in an Australian school is tantamount to social suicide; you are an outcast with a shadow looming over your shoulder. However, the opposite is true in France, where the ability to pass from one year into the next is not taken for granted. Children have to be able to prove that they can master a whole range of given tasks and there is very little slack cut for borderline cases. In fact, Harry was pleased that he was going to repeat — he was rapidly becoming French in his thinking. He was over the moon that in September he would have his old friends in CM2, the year above him, and new ones who would be joining him in CM1.

  Céleste, as she was still called at school, was about to leave the primary school in St Saturnin and attend junior college in Apt, about twelve kilometres away. She was going to have to travel by bus every morning with the other kids from the village. I wondered how I was going to help her over the hurdles that would be coming her way. The mother–child bond was loosening. At eleven, Mimi was about to enter a new system that would make her days in primary school look like a picnic. At junior college, serious work is expected from the start, in the form of take-home tests and endless hours of homework. She would attend four days per week for the first two years of high school, and a half-day on Wednesday would be added thereafter. Classes began at eight o’clock and finished at five o’clock, with a two-hour lunch break in the middle of the day. It just seemed an impossible task for such young people. The priority would be keeping Mimi up with her peers. She was only too aware that a great deal of extra work would be required for her to maintain the pace of the others.

  But all this was still months away; first, it was time to celebrate the end of the school year. The children brought home a slip of paper advertising a big concert at the school, which would be followed by a dinner and dance until midnight. The whole school had been preparing for the concert for months; even the little ones in kindergarten had learnt to sing songs and bash tambourines against their chubby hands. All parents around the world have attended the same concert; language is not a factor. Would we be attending? Could we help before/during/after the event? Stupidly, I ticked every box.

  At 4.30 pm on the final day, the children came home from school, ambling down the hill, kicking stones into gutters and picking cherries off trees. Latin Ray liked to walk them to school in the morning, but in the afternoon they preferred to wander home with their friends from the same street, learning more French pop songs and rude French words.

  The sun was still high and the children’s faces were flushed from the heat. Summer had arrived early. We could all feel the excitement in the air. Harry looked at the clock constantly, until he could bear it no longer and leapt up saying that he was going to have a shower and get ready. Him? Have a shower of his own free will? What was happening?

  After nearly all the hot water had been used, he emerged clean and pink-skinned, dressed in his best shorts and sandals and his only non-stained and presentable T-shirt. He had gelled his hair into hard vertical points, and his fringe was glued into a mass that stuck out perpendicular to his forehead.

  ‘Harry, you are a legend. Yep, too cool for words.’ Big sister had put the stamp of approval on the look. She scuttled off to have a lukewarm shower and transform her own appearance.

  Unlike Mimi and Harry, I didn’t intend to make much of an effort with my attire. I didn’t particularly want to go and have dinner with a group of strangers. I hadn’t had time to meet many of the oth
er parents, as most of my days had revolved around cleaning, washing and ironing for the two properties — and then there was our own house to run as well (though fortunately Raymond was a great help there). All in all, socialising had not been very high on my to-do list. Kamila was constantly busy with her B&B. Lizzie and I managed to grab a few moments occasionally for light lunches or coffees together in Apt, but I had not even got to first base with anyone from our village or parents from our school.

  But the children had insisted that all three of us go to the end-of-year party. Raymond had cited a major university assignment as his excuse, which the children gratefully accepted, since his French was pitiful. It didn’t seem fair to inflict his inability to communicate on the parents of their friends.

  When I said I was ready to go, I saw a crestfallen look pass between them. The words came out of both mouths almost simultaneously: ‘But Maman, try a bit harder! You can’t go looking like that!’

  They rushed into my bedroom. The clothes they picked out for me landed at my feet: a top with a plunging neckline, a tight black skirt and my highest heels. This outfit or nothing. Only the amount of make-up was negotiable — and only if I was dressed properly. Oh, please don’t make me! Unrelenting, they forced me into a cold shower. I bit my lip, suspecting I would stand out like a sore thumb among all the other parents — and more to the point, how was I going to walk up the hill in these high heels?

  The school gates were flung open and parents, grandparents and younger siblings began drifting in and filling up the seats that had been arranged in a large circle in the playground. Every adult had a cigarette in their hand and I noticed a large toxic mushroom of smoke rising above the playground. Without exception, all the women were wearing something tight and revealing. In typical French style, colourful bras peeked out from tight dresses, and all the women were perched on strappy summery shoes. Thank you, children, for forcing me to make an effort. All the younger women were either heavily pregnant or pushing babies in prams, rocking them to sleep before the big concert began. I laughed to myself that there must be something in the water. Some days, deep down I thought I wouldn’t mind another child, particularly with Raymond, but destiny had taken me a step away from child-rearing and towards business. I was having enough difficulties coping with the two I had for the moment.

  The hot sun continued to stream down, hitting the audience square in the face. As we squinted and wiped drops of perspiration from our brows, the concert began with tremendous fanfare. The drums rolled, the cymbals clashed, and the youngest children shook tambourines with all their might. For the last time in their lives, they would be the babies of the school. Bash! Crash! Goodbye to kindergarten! Successive age groups came out to recite poetry or perform musical items, but only the oldest group — Mimi included — felt the full significance of the moment: this was their farewell to the little village school.

  The concert culminated in a finale worthy of a Broadway show and the audience erupted into cheers and claps, stamping their feet with appreciation. Lumps in the throat were gulped down, tears in the eyes discreetly wiped. The glare finally went away with the setting sun. Now it was perfectly still, and the children were beside themselves waiting for the next piece of entertainment: the raffle draw.

  After all the prizes were sent off with their beaming new owners, the children got down to the serious business of a last game of chasings round the school. Meanwhile, large jugs of rosé and plates of thinly sliced baguette topped with thick olive paste were distributed among the adults, and in the background a band of parents started to set everything up for the dinner. Lanterns were put out and coloured lights stretched from one end of the playground to the other, bobbing gently and sending out a colourful, eerie glow. Large trestle tables were placed in position by some parents, while others, cigarette in one hand, plastic glass of rosé in the other, attempted to staple down long sheets of white paper to serve as tablecloths. I stood aside from most of the parents, who were busy in their activities. At these kinds of functions, parents tend to group together with their friends. I had volunteered my services, but nobody had told me what I could do to help. Everyone seemed to know what they were doing except me. Until suddenly I heard a voice calling me.

  ‘Could you give us a hand?’ My head nodded eagerly.

  The person who had spoken was Claire, a small dark-haired woman of about my age, whom I knew vaguely through my neighbour Pierre. Pierre was a widower whose wife had been killed in a car accident many years earlier, leaving him to bring up their four sons; Claire helped him keep his house and his life in order, as well as running the school journal in her spare time. Pierre’s son Benjamin and Claire’s son Raphaël were both in Harry’s class, and the three of them had teamed up to become great pals and consummate Nintendo players. Claire was thin and wiry, and looked incredibly fit and strong. Although summer hadn’t really started, her arms and legs were already burnished gold from too many indolent hours lying by a pool. Or so I thought — but that couldn’t have been further from the truth. I later discovered that she supplemented her family’s income by picking cherries in the various fields around our village.

  Claire always had a smile on her face and her hands never stopped. She exhausted me. She seemed to be one of those mothers who did everything: went on school excursions, knew how to react in emergencies and was everywhere all the time. I could help her with the evening’s activities but I didn’t want to strike up a friendship with that kind of woman; she was too busy and restless for me.

  Claire introduced me to other helpers, handing us all rolls of paper and stapler guns. I was taken to the end of the row of tables to begin work. The two girls with me looked barely twenty, but knowing what the women round here were like it wouldn’t have surprised me if they were already mothers to a couple of children. We attacked our job with a vengeance, keen to get all the tables covered and set up so we could get back to the baguette and rosé.

  Claire came over to check on our work and began removing all the breadbaskets that I had only just placed equidistantly on the tables.‘Who did that? Don’t be stupid. The bread will go hard if you leave it out like that. Bring that all back!’ She handed me a pile of ashtrays to replace the baskets.

  I rolled my eyes at the two girls, observing that Claire was the bossiest person I had come across in years. They both burst out laughing, responding that this was only the tip of the iceberg. They started chatting about the demanding exams that they were in the process of completing and their plans for the summer holidays. The penny dropped. I breathed a little sigh of relief. These girls weren’t mothers from the school but someone’s elder sisters. Then they mentioned that they had a brother called Raphaël. Ah, the penny dropped once again. Perhaps the reason why they knew so much about Claire was that she was their mother! More pennies dropped. The reason I didn’t know about them was because they lived in Grenoble and were in the middle of their studies at university there.

  As everyone began taking their seats, ‘Bossy Bessie’ Claire waved me over, cigarette in hand, and invited me to sit beside her and her husband, Patrick, who had the largest handlebar moustache I had ever seen. But there was no way I was going to join their table, where the ashtrays were brimming over and every single person was smoking. Even outdoors I couldn’t abide the smell of cigarettes — and certainly not while I was eating. When I explained this, Claire announced that there was always room for a compromise; she made everyone at the table extinguish their cigarettes and asked her daughters to remove all the ashtrays.

  Large platters piled high with delicious salads, meats and other culinary delights arrived at our table. All the children had gravitated to the tables set up for them at the far end of the playground and had managed to demolish large quantities of baguette and cordial. As the jugs of wine were emptied and replenished, I could see that — contrary to first impressions — I was going to get on famously with Claire and her family. When the overloaded cheese plate arrived and our hands reached for it at t
he same time, I realised we had more in common than I’d suspected. I could never have foreseen it back then, but now I couldn’t cope without Claire in my life.

  Finally it was time for the dancing to commence. The smaller children leapt up straightaway, but the older ones preferred to finish their scrumptious dessert first. The makeshift dance floor, on one side of the playground, featured a disco ball that projected splinters of colour into the black night. Above us the round lemony moon shone brightly, in a velvety sky embroidered with twinkling stars. It might have been the alcohol, but I couldn’t help thinking that life didn’t get much better than this. Two steps forward and up a little ladder.

  As we walked down the hill towards home, my high heels in my hand, we heard a noise that stopped us in our tracks. It was the sound of running water. A lot of running water — they were filling up the municipal swimming pool. Summer had officially started. Our first summer in Provence!

  The children and Raymond paid endless visits to public swimming pools in the area and I joined them when I could. Hours were spent lying around in the heat, reading books and doing jigsaw puzzles and other restful activities. Other children from the village would descend on us and spend hours giggling and laughing with mine. During the week, we would go out exploring towns and villages in the district. There was just so much to see and do.

  Now that the houses were up and running, things seemed to be better between Raymond and me. Mimi was kept busy with a long list of requirements for the beginning of her new school year in Apt. Harry was looking forward to going back to St Saturnin school to see his friends after the long eight-week holiday. He was going to celebrate his birthday the day school started.

  The hot summery days were drawing to a close when I invited an old, old friend and her family to come and stay in Rose Cottage.