Paris for Two

by Phoebe Stone

  “Around this time there was a big World’s Fair coming up. It was to be in Chicago in the United States. The Jumeau doll company would be featured in the new women’s pavilion. They would have an enormous glass vitrine, a huge display case in the center of the building. The company was in great excitement and great activity. You see, it was very important. All the seamstresses and couturiers in Paris who worked for Madame Jumeau wanted to create a dress that would be accepted by Madame Jumeau and sent to this big fair. Such excitement! Such anticipation, you cannot imagine.

  “Madame Jumeau and her team of seamstresses planned the special outfits for all the dolls. But what about the spy? No one knew who it was. How could they keep the spy from seeing the new dresses?

  “One afternoon when Delphine went with her mama to the workshops of Ernestine Jumeau, Madame Jumeau took them aside. She whispered to Delphine’s mama, ‘As you plan a new dress for the big World’s Fair coming up, don’t bring it here. I do not know who the spy is. She could be anyone among us.’

  “The spy was probably a woman because only women and girls worked for the Jumeau company, with a few exceptions. ‘Please,’ Madame Jumeau whispered, ‘bring the dresses wrapped in tissue to the Luxembourg Gardens.’ She pressed a tiny key in my great-grandmother’s hand. ‘There is a little hidden box inside the marble pedestal behind the statue of the cupid standing over the pond. You know the pond tucked among the roses. Unlock the little box and set the dresses within. Lock it back up and I will come and pick them up after dark.’

  “Ernestine Jumeau looked around her workshop at all the faces of the women and girls who worked for her. Some were in shadows and some in sunlight. Some were dressing dolls in lace costumes. Some were preparing them to go into their boxes and others were sewing last-minute buttons on dresses. Some were carrying bolts of printed silk ordered from Lyon. Others unrolled crisp checked cotton onto the worktables.

  “Madame Jumeau sighed and put her arm around my great-grandmother and her daughter Delphine. ‘I know I can trust you two. I will keep all the doll dresses that will be considered for the fair. I will pick the best for the show. But I do not want the spy to see any of these dresses. These will remain a secret. And I will make my selection in private.’

  “Delphine and my great-grandmother left the workshops of the Jumeau doll company. They walked home wondering and worrying. Who could the spy be?”

  Now the concierge looks at me. Her eyes fade from lavender to a blue gray behind her almost tears. And her curly, henna-colored hair seems softened by the story and the filtered light in the bedroom. She looks at me for a long time and then she puts her face in her hands again. “The dress you are wearing. It reminds me. It reminds me. It is so like something.”

  “Oh, I am very sorry,” I say. “I didn’t realize. I … I wouldn’t have … But who was the spy?”

  “Ah yes, the spy,” says the concierge. And more sadness and clouds fill her eyes. She pulls a lacy handkerchief from her pocket. “Call me Collette, ma chérie. Since I see you wearing that dress, it feels as if you have come here as if sent by my grandmother herself. Tell me how you came to sew it.” She takes my hand and squeezes it tightly.

  I pull back a little, feeling torn. Should I mention the present I so thoughtlessly opened? Will the concierge be angry with me for breaking a lock and then opening a gift that was not mine? And did we not swear to secrecy, Jean-Claude and I?

  Just then Dad is calling me. I hear his hurry-up voice echoing in the hall. “All set! Petunia, we’re ready to go out!” I look at the concierge whose name is Collette and I feel a terrible urge to tell her about the doll dress. But there is too much to explain and not enough time. I take a few steps backward and say, “Um, my family is going somewhere. I’ll come back later. Okay? Bye! Merci!” And I wave to Monsieur Le Bon Bon and to Collette.

  I rush to the door but I turn around and look back just before I leave. Collette is now sitting with Monsieur Le Bon Bon on the edge of his bed. Le Bon Bon is opening his mouth like a baby bird and Collette is putting drops of vitamins on his tongue with a small medicine dropper.

  I find Mom and Ava sitting on the staircase. Ava has stubbed her toe and Mom is leaning over her.

  “Oh, Mom. I’m just going to change my dress, okay? Don’t worry. I won’t wear this outside,” I say, scooting by them.

  Dad shakes his head at me in wonder. “Pet,” he says, “another dress! Wow! Just look at that!” My dad kind of follows me partway upstairs. Everything amazes my dad.

  “Dad, you were going to run down and buy me a Band-Aid, remember?” says Ava, looking up at Dad with those green pond eyes, full of pain.

  “Oh, sure, sweetheart, Pumpkin. I was just … I’ll go right now,” says Dad, bumbling forward.

  I hurry up to our floor. I rush into our apartment and change into jeans, because that’s what Mom wants.

  Then, checking that I am truly alone, I creep quietly into Ava’s room. This is a tactic I am used to taking. I mean, if I didn’t do this, I would have no idea what Ava is up to. That could be dangerous. I cut past Ava’s perfectly made bed. I mean, you could bounce a euro on that thing it’s tucked so tightly. I slide toward her dresser, the natural landing place for papers. And there it is, the announcement of the fashion show and the rules and all that. The fashion show is called “Sew, You’re in Paris!” I knew it! Ava got this when she walked Logan home that afternoon.

  I look at the guidelines quickly. Hmmm. And I don’t see anything about age mentioned. Hmmm. You just have to be an American student. I slip the paper in my jeans pocket.

  This is an ordinary day in a younger-sister’s life. This is common practice. This is nothing more than typical survival tactics of a second born.

  As we troop down the rue Michel-Ange, Mom and Ava with arms locked together, me and Dad bumbling behind, Dad announces that we are going to the Luxembourg Gardens. It’s true he has been talking about this for days. Still when he says those words Luxembourg Gardens, I feel almost like laughing or hiccupping. As soon as you take note of something, it begins popping up everywhere. Like the time Ginger announced she was sleepy when her mom was driving me home. And just about a minute later we passed a turnoff and a signpost that said “Sleepy Road.” Everybody in the van laughed, especially Ginger’s mom, who chalks up stuff like that to the beautiful spook of everything. “We’re all connected,” she always says to Ginger. “And we’re not supposed to know it. But sometimes there’s a little hole or rip in the cloth of life and we see by mistake. I am reading palms later today, Pet. Interested? I can do you a freebie.”

  The Luxembourg Gardens are a deep emerald green, a waxy dark green. And as we walk through the gate, I say, “Dad, I don’t want to go in the Luxembourg Palace. I just want to sit on this bench until you guys get back. Okay?”

  Dad hesitates but my mom and Ava pull him forward. Soon he’s chugging along, the cheese in between two slices of bread. I wave to them. When they go around some clipped bushes, I take off. I have to find a copy shop. Now!

  I hurry, passing a mossy pool in the garden where a marble cupid stands watching over its murkiness. This must be the very pool Delphine Rouette and her mama moved toward carrying a small parcel of doll dresses wrapped in tissue.

  In my mind, I see them in their long skirts tripping past me, looking behind themselves in a nervous way, being cautious about the spy who might be following them. Then they go over to the cupid and kneel behind him to find the hidden box.

  Suddenly I too work my way through the tangle of rosebushes and damp white blossoms. I get up close to the cupid, who stands luminous and shining among the leaves. Why was the little dress hidden in the drawer all those years? And what is it that makes the concierge cry? The cupid, softened by rain and wind, stands above me. His face seems to know everything. But since he is made of stone, his mouth is frozen in time and he cannot tell me.

  Now I hurry out through the park gates and along the boulevard. I have no idea where I might find a copy shop.
Whizzing and oblivious French cars rush past me. Then along a construction wall I see another one of the Windel Watson posters. My heart sinks again. How much farther can it drop? Does Erin Barslow play the piano too? Is she in town as well?

  I am standing here with the Parisian wind, warm and swaying around me, the leaves speaking an unknown language, clicking together, whispering. Suddenly I see Madame la concierge walking down the street toward me. She seems to be part of the wind, her shopping bags billowing.

  “Madame!” I call out.

  “But here you are!” she says, sailing toward me.

  “You too,” I say. “And so far from our building.”

  “Oh, you know, I walk,” says the concierge, looking down. “And I had some things to do nearby.”

  “Gee, I was hoping there was a copy shop around here,” I say, the application in my hand fluttering in the wind. “I have something I need to copy.”

  “Yes, I see that. What are you applying for?” she says.

  “Oh, um, a fashion show,” I say.

  “Ah,” says the concierge.

  “I mean, it’s a secret. I mean, Mom and Ava … But Logan said … I am not sure … so I am nervous, but …”

  “Oh?” says Collette. “You know, there’s a little store with a copy machine up on the corner two blocks down that way. I just walked by there.”

  “Oh my gosh. Thank you!” I say.

  “Mais bien sûr! After all, my grandmother sent you, did she not?” says the concierge, smiling at me.

  “No, I don’t think so,” I say, laughing a little.

  But I feel a light twitch of wonder as the concierge walks away. She waves. I wave. Her shopping bags full of wind blow forward with her light coat flapping. So too, small green flower petals from the trees above lift and wash across the sidewalk. The falling glitter of coincidence.

  It’s my job today to gather up all the dishes around the Barbours’ apartment. So I venture into Dad’s office. It is kind of a mess. He has about five cups of coffee sitting on his desk. I put the cups on a tray and set the tray by the door. I am just about to pick up some newspapers from the floor when I happen to look up at a framed drawing on Dad’s wall. I take a deep breath and look again.

  What? It’s a pastel drawing of the Eiffel Tower in red. Red! Just like my drawing. “When the Eiffel Tower was first built, it was red,” the lady at the bakery told me. “This is something you Americans in the States don’t know.”

  I look at the drawing again. My heart tips over, crashes, tumbles. A tower of blocks smashing to the floor. The framed drawing is signed Ava Beanly.

  “Mom!” I shout out and I go rushing through the apartment from room to room. “Mom!”

  Mom is sitting at a small table on the shady balcony off the kitchen. She has some postcards she’s written to friends at home scattered before her on the table. One of them says in her curly handwriting, Feeling a little lost these days.

  Mom is looking down into the courtyard below. From here the plane trees seem to form a thick canopy of green, blocking the view. Maybe Collette is sitting down there with Albert the parrot. I wish I could see them.

  “Mom!” I pull on her sleeve. “Mom, Ava copied my Eiffel Tower drawing. She saw it in my room. She copied it!”

  “Oh, Pet, you are the living limit! Angus really likes Ava’s drawing. She framed it for him, for goodness’ sake. Please don’t spoil that,” says Mom.

  “Mom!” I say. “But …”

  “Pet!” says Mom. “Angus hung it up right near his desk! Ava was just so proud of that. And I was proud for her.”

  “Oh,” I say, backing up. I pause for a moment in the doorway. I look at my mom. She seems so far away with her head turned and all her postcards spread out before her.

  This afternoon Monsieur Le Bon Bon has gotten out of bed and is taking Jean-Claude home on his bicycle. Jean-Claude rides on the handlebars, waving at me as I stand on the front balcony. “I am going home now but don’t forget to visit Albert while I am gone,” he calls. “He is my great love, next to you. Maybe I even love Albert more.” Jean-Claude throws me kisses from the rickety handlebars.

  “Hold on to the bicycle, Jean-Claude,” I call back.

  “Do we still have our little secret together? Something only you and I share?” he shouts.

  “Shhh, Jean-Claude,” I yell back. “No we don’t, okay? Bye.” The bicycle wobbles off down the street. Monsieur Le Bon Bon keeps smiling and not looking straight ahead, and a tiny three-wheeled truck screeches around them. I stand here worrying as they disappear.

  The balcony smells of Ava’s suntan lotion. Ava’s towel is draped over a chair and her magazines are splashed around. It feels like Ava’s balcony. I have a sinking suspicion the whole world belongs to Ava too and perhaps there is no room for me anywhere. I will not cry.

  Logan stopped by to pick up Ava a while ago. He told me he was taking Ava to visit a tiny old sweet shop where some say Marie Antoinette used to order little pastel bonbons over two hundred years ago. Then Ava showed Logan the framed Eiffel Tower drawing that she did. I just stood there in the hall near the landline phone and didn’t say anything.

  But that pressing feeling is bothering me. And I guess I have a case of the Beanly blues. At least I can go to visit Collette. I’ll probably show her the doll dress I found. I do not know what she will say or do about the whole thing so I am nervous.

  I go to my armoire and pick up the little dress. The velvet is so soft, the silk so delicate. Every tiny stitch seems to be a part of a story, the story the little dress must tell me. I wrap it up and tuck it into my backpack.

  As I look around my room, I have a feeling someone has been in here. It just feels like things are moved around a little bit. For instance, the scissors are lying in a different way on my table. Oh but maybe I just forgot how I left them. I feel unsure here in Paris of everything. I don’t understand anything; even my room baffles me.

  I shake off the chill that flutters up my back. Then I am off down the hall and out the double doors past Dad, who is vacuuming the rug in the outer hall. Dad loves to vacuum. Nothing makes him happier than plugging in that noisy machine and sucking around corners and under chairs with it. Mom loves to direct him. “Angus, over there! You missed that part of the rug!”

  When I get down to the foyer I hear another distinct sound coming from Collette’s apartment. It reminds me of a train chugging along a steep track. I lean through her open door. “Madame!” I call out. And then I add with a meeker voice, “I mean, Collette! Vous êtes là?” I attempt to say in French “Are you there?” I mean, oops, I probably got that wrong.

  But then I hear, “Oui! Ici, ma chérie, viens ici.”

  Collette is calling me. I follow the noise of the train, the hum, the roar, and I realize as I get closer, it is the sound of a sewing machine humming along.

  I wind my way through the clutter, following the sound until I get to a room that opens onto the courtyard. Collette is sitting at a sewing machine. She nods at me.

  “Bonjour! Yes, I am sewing. You have inspired me. I haven’t sewn in a long time. I am making a, how do you say, shirt and une cravate, a necktie for Le Bon Bon. He won’t find a woman to love him dressed in his worn-out suit. It has holes at the elbows. No woman likes to see elbows like that. I told him. But you know what? He refuses! He refuses to go to a boutique to buy a new one. He is too shy. So I will sew him a shirt and necktie en soie! In silk. Can a woman resist a shy man in a silk shirt? No. No. Never!”

  “I love to sew,” I say, “but everything I do is weird and nobody likes my dresses. Not even me, I guess. But I found the copy shop. Thanks for that.”

  “Mais oui!” says the concierge, looking at me carefully. “Have you ever heard of Coco Chanel? She was a little bit different too. Her clothing designs ended up changing women’s fashion forever. Do you think it is good to create things that look like everybody else’s?”

  “Um, I don’t know,” I say.

  She pats the se
at of the chair beside her and I sit down. “Did you know that Le Bon Bon can dance the swing?” she says. “Oh yes! But he won’t go to the Hôtel Magique, where they have music for dancing. Too shy! I will have to go along and, you know, I am seventy-nine years old. Not a baby kitten! But I know the patron. He will help Le Bon Bon.”

  “The Hôtel Magique?” I say.

  “Yes, where people dance!” says Collette, pushing her foot down on the treadle. The machine begins to roar along. The silky shirt collects the light as it lies on the table.

  “This is an old machine. You know, of course, to whom it once belonged?” she says. “Ah, I worked very hard to understand your whoms and your whos when I studied your English! It is the most confusing language of all. It makes no sense.”

  “Did this sewing machine once belong to Delphine and her mama?” I say.

  “Oui. Yes,” says Collette. “Isn’t it beautiful with all these gold and red flowers painted all over it?” Then she pauses and puts her face in her hand and sighs. “Oh mon Dieu! Oh mon Dieu! Sometimes I cannot bear to think. Sometimes I cannot bear to remember.”

  “Oh, Collette, was it the spy? Did something happen because of the spy?” I say.

  “Oh, there are things I have told no one. Even though it is worse to not talk about things, you know that, Petunia? Things can grow bigger in the dark, I mean if you don’t bring them out, like clothes on the line. They must see the sun.”

  “I know,” I say, thinking about Ava and all the things we never talk about, like her biological dad. “You-know-who hurt me so much when he left me,” Mom often says to Ava. “So, let’s just forget him, shall we?” Ava always nods her head in agreement, staying loyal to Mom.

  “You see, Petunia, when I saw you in that dress, I knew! I knew you had come to me. You had come to me for a reason. When I saw you in orange silk and maroon velvet I must confess I nearly died.”