The French House

by Nick Alexander

  ‘Yeah,’ I say, glancing over at Distira’s and seeing a light go on. I reach out and switch off the gas. ‘It can wait a bit, actually. It was just to avoid being invited over.’

  Victor laughs and moves towards me, slipping his arms around my waist. ‘I asked her about plumbers and stuff,’ he says.

  ‘And?’

  ‘She said no-go. Says there’s no way anyone will come up here in this season.’

  ‘That’s crazy,’ I say, leaning into him and now looking over his shoulder towards her house in the distance. ‘I mean, people up here do have plumbing. It must have got here somehow.’

  ‘Judging from this place, they don’t have much plumbing,’ Victor says.

  ‘What will you do then?’ I ask.

  I feel Victor shrug against me. ‘Get a book on plumbing, maybe.’

  ‘Eek. That sounds like a recipe for disaster. Couldn’t you ask Goat-Man?’

  ‘Georges? I doubt he does plumbing.’

  I sigh. ‘Ask him for an address, silly. He must have a plumber.’

  ‘Now that . . .’ Victor says, gripping my shoulders and leaning back so that he can look at me, ‘is a very good idea.’

  As Victor paces up and down outside, speaking into his phone, I pour a bowl of nuts and serve myself a glass of wine. I watch his breath rising in little steam-train puffs.

  ‘Sorted!’ he declares when he clambers back in.

  ‘Really?’

  ‘Yep. He has a guy who does plastering and building and electricity and plumbing!’

  I pull a face. ‘Mixing plumbing and electricity sounds even more dangerous than you doing it.’

  ‘And he’s invited us to dinner tomorrow.’

  I grimace.

  ‘Oh, come on. They seem really nice. Plus he’s going to try to get the amazing DIY superhero over for the aperitif so we can meet him.’

  ‘But it’ll be frozen prawns and lettuce-in-a-bag all over again,’ I say. ‘Followed by a night of vomiting. You mark my words.’

  ‘They’re farmers,’ Victor says, grabbing my waist and giving me a peck. ‘I bet you it won’t.’

  ‘Oh yeah? How much?’

  ‘Um . . . washing up.’

  ‘Ooh, I hate washing up here.’

  ‘Exactly.’

  ‘OK. For how many days?’

  ‘Till you leave.’

  I sigh. The sudden reminder that I’m leaving in less than a week is sobering. I had almost forgotten.

  ‘OK, just for two nights, then,’ Victor offers.

  ‘No,’ I say. ‘No, the whole week is fine. And when is the dinner from hell happening? Tomorrow?’

  ‘Yes.’

  I pull him tight. ‘Yippee!’ I say, sarcastically.

  The next morning, we head out early. Victor wants to buy various DIY bits, and we decide to make this our final day of sightseeing before getting stuck into some serious renovation tomorrow.

  Just as we reach the main road, we cross paths with Distira and Carole coming the other way in the Lada.

  Victor brakes hard and slithers to a halt, and I wind down my window so that they can talk.

  ‘Bonjour!’ Victor shouts enthusiastically, and I follow suit, albeit more quietly.

  Distira, looking directly past me at Victor, shouts something back, cackles, and then accelerates immediately off up the track. Carole, for her part, doesn’t even turn her head.

  ‘What did she say?’ I ask, once the window is back up.

  ‘She asked if we were going to buy some water,’ Victor says. ‘Cheeky bugger.’

  ‘She didn’t look at me once. She totally blanked me.’

  ‘Hmm, well . . .’ Victor says vaguely.

  I turn to look at his face, but it’s giving nothing away. ‘Hmm well, what?’

  ‘You don’t want to be getting paranoid, that’s all,’ he says, shooting me a small smile.

  I think about this for a moment. ‘I’m not getting paranoid,’ I say eventually. ‘She blanked me.’

  Victor laughs. ‘Oh, they’re just . . .’

  I wait a moment and then prompt him with, ‘Just what?’

  ‘Dunno . . . rustre,’ he says.

  ‘Which doesn’t help because I don’t know what rustre means.’

  ‘And I don’t know how to translate it. I’m not sure that we have a word in English. It’s kind of . . . wild . . . untamed . . . but more personality-wise.’

  ‘Abrupt?’ I say.

  ‘Not quite. It’s that special sort of abruptness that people have when they’re not very well-educated. No, that sounds snobby. When they’re not very socialized, maybe,’ Victor says. ‘Or does that sound worse?’

  ‘Like rustic?’

  ‘In a way, yes.’

  ‘Yes, well, she’s rustic all right.’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘And I’m not paranoid.’

  Victor glances over at me and pats my knee. ‘No,’ he says, ‘of course you’re not.’

  In another industrial zone, this time in a town called Grasse, we buy various tools, lots of reels of cable that Victor says are half the price of anywhere else, and a bathroom heater.

  We then head into the gritty (and poor) mediaeval centre of the town, populated in this season, exclusively it seems, by aged Arab men sitting around in groups, chatting happily and smoking. After coffee, we take the van again and head along another nerve-racking mountain road towards a town called Gourdon, which Victor promises is spectacularly beautiful.

  As we drive, my mind drifts onto the subject of what Victor used to do for work, something we have never discussed in detail. ‘What’s it like being a gynaecologist?’ I ask.

  Victor pulls a confused face, then smiles and glances at me. ‘Where did that come from?’ he asks.

  ‘Not sure,’ I say.

  ‘It’s like anything else, I suppose. You get used to it. It becomes quite mundane. There are only about ten procedures that take up ninety-nine per cent of your time, so . . .’

  ‘Right,’ I say thoughtfully. ‘But it is kind of intimate.’

  ‘It seems it for patients,’ he says. ‘But that’s because they don’t come that often. When you’re doing that all day . . . Well, it becomes pretty routine.’

  ‘But you must fancy the women who come in sometimes, right?’

  Victor wrinkles his nose and changes gear.

  ‘Oh, I bet you do!’ I tease him.

  ‘Honestly, not really,’ he says. ‘It’s kind of a different part of the brain, if that makes any sense.’ I remain silent for a minute as I think about this, but then he continues. ‘Often there’s some infection. Thrush or warts or discharge or whatever. None of that’s very sexy.’

  ‘Yuck!’

  ‘I suppose sometimes you open the door and think, Wow, what a cracker. But as soon as you get down to the nitty-gritty, well, it’s just plumbing, really.’

  I nod. ‘OK, but what about me? You already liked me when I stumbled into your surgery.’

  My mind flashes back to the moment we met and I remember how shocked I was to discover that Mark’s friend Victor – who I still assumed was gay – was my new gynaecologist. Who would ever have believed that we’d end up together, here, in France?

  ‘You thought I was Russian!’ Victor laughs.

  I smile. ‘Yes. SJ was calling you Doctor Yinkchovsky instead of Ynchausty. That was funny.’

  ‘But yes. I liked you, but . . . It’s just work. It’s different.’

  ‘So what about out of work?’ I ask. ‘Does it change how you feel about sex, for instance? Being that au fait with so many women’s bits?’

  ‘It makes you pretty wary of STDs,’ he says. ‘Hepatitis, HIV, syphilis . . . But other than that, how would I know how other men feel about sex? And if they feel any different to me.’

  ‘You never discussed it? Or don’t guys talk about sex the way girls do?’

  ‘About what they get up to, maybe, but even then – other than a bit of boasting – not much. But they definitely don’
t talk about how they feel about it.’

  ‘You never asked me about STDs.’

  ‘I didn’t need to,’ Victor laughs. ‘I had your file. I gave you the results of all the tests.’

  ‘Of course,’ I say, suddenly aware that the conversation is making me uncomfortable, but not sure why.

  ‘And I know I’m all clear, too,’ Victor says, ‘so it’s not really an issue.’

  I look over and see a village perched on the farthest edge of a rocky outcrop. ‘Is that it?’ I ask, grateful to change the subject.

  ‘Yep.’

  ‘What is it called again? Gordon?’

  ‘It’s G-O-U,’ Victor spells. ‘Gourdon.’

  ‘It’s pretty.’

  Gourdon, it transpires, is famed for glass-blowing, so the tiny main street is stuffed with tourist shops selling glass knick-knacks of every imaginable shape and size. Even today – on a Monday in January – a busload of tourists are milling through the streets.

  ‘Nice, huh?’ Victor says.

  But the truth is that although Gourdon is undeniably pretty, the tourist takeover has left it all feeling a bit like a Disneyland version of itself. It’s just too quaint for its own good. Too aware of its own quaintness, perhaps. I prefer the gritty reality of Grasse.

  Once we get to the far side of the village, though, the view – stretching from Nice to Cannes – is spectacular.

  ‘God, it’s beautiful,’ I say, and Victor makes the moment even better by nuzzling my neck.

  ‘It is, isn’t it?’ he says.

  He points out Nice airport, sticking out on reclaimed land into the sea, and Cap d’Antibes, where we saw the millionaires’ houses just a few days ago.

  And then we wander through the tiny streets until we get back to the van, where we pull out the map.

  ‘Are those lakes?’ I ask, pointing to a patch of turquoise.

  ‘Dunno,’ Victor says. ‘I was wondering about that.’

  ‘They look big.’

  ‘D’you want to go see?’

  ‘It looks a long way,’ I say, ‘but, lord knows, I like a lake.’

  ‘We have all day,’ Victor says, ‘Let’s do it.’

  We head back to Grasse and on towards the lake. It takes, in fact, less than an hour to get there. We park the van in the scrubby car park of an out-of-season restaurant and descend the ten steps from the car park to the water’s edge. From here, the water stretches almost as far as the eye can see. All around us are hundreds of tarpaulined pedalos.

  ‘I bet it’s heaving in summer,’ I say. ‘Look how many pedalos they have.’

  ‘Yes,’ Victor says. ‘I reckon you’re right. It’s lovely today though.’

  ‘A shame all the restaurants are closed. I would have liked to eat here.’

  Victor looks around and then says, ‘One of them is open.’

  ‘Are you sure? They all looked pretty closed to me.’

  ‘Chez Victor is open,’ he says, pointing at the van.

  ‘Of course!’ I say. ‘How perfect!’

  Victor heats up some vacuum-packed boiled potatoes and fries some salmon steaks while I pour two glasses of rosé, then we carry it all down to one of the picnic benches. With the water lapping at our feet, we eat our simple cooked meal.

  It’s a perfect moment, in fact it’s so perfect that I dare not say anything for fear of getting weepy.

  A duck glides up to the river bank and I say, ‘No bread, Mister Duck, sorry.’ Then, to Victor, ‘Do you think they like potatoes?’

  ‘I bet they like salmon.’

  ‘Only I don’t want to give it my salmon,’ I say.

  Victor stands and jogs to the van. He returns with a croissant, which he rips in half so that we can both throw crumbs to the solitary duck.

  As the sun sinks lower, its reflection twinkles on the surface of the water. The duck eventually glides away and the sun sparkles even more dazzlingly where the wake creates ripples.

  ‘This is heavenly,’ I say quietly, feeling tears welling.

  Victor hears the emotion and reaches out for my hand. ‘Are you OK?’ he asks.

  I nod and wipe a tear from the corner of my eye. ‘Of course. It’s just . . .’ I shrug. ‘Sometimes you feel so happy, it feels almost the same as sadness. Do you know what I mean?’

  Victor blinks at me slowly and smiles. ‘Of course. But it isn’t the same, is it? It’s much nicer.’ He leans over and kisses my forehead. ‘Now this,’ he says, ‘is the kind of thing we can do.’

  ‘I’m sorry?’

  ‘This we can do even when we don’t have any money.’

  ‘It’s enough for me,’ I say.

  He nods, with meaning. ‘Yes,’ he says. ‘It’s enough for me too.’

  DIVINE INTERVENTION

  As we drive back from the lake, the VW roaring throatily up the hills, I watch the countryside slipping into shadow as the sun fades and try again to imagine what our lives would be like here. Though I know that life will be harsher and more physical, I imagine us enjoying these simple pleasures: spending a Sunday at the lake, driving to the sea for an occasional swim. And then I try to imagine bringing up a child here and think of picnics and pedalos and the whole thing starts to seem romantic instead of frightening.

  We drive past Georges’ farm on the way up but because it’s too early and because I want to shower and change into warmer clothes, we carry on towards La Forge.

  As we pass the farm, I say, ‘You know you told Georges that you only want one or two goats, just as a hobby?’

  ‘Yeah,’ Victor says. ‘I didn’t want him to think I was going to steal his business.’

  ‘I got that,’ I say, ‘but how many goats would you need?’

  ‘I’m not sure,’ Victor says. ‘When I did my course in the Lake District, the guy had sixty.’

  ‘Sixty?!’

  ‘But goat’s cheese is more expensive there, so maybe I’ll need even more here. I’m hoping to find out how many Georges and Myriam have and how they sell their cheese.’

  ‘Georges and Myriam? Is her name Myriam? God, that’s almost George and Mildred.’

  ‘George and Mildred?’

  ‘Did you never see that? Dodgy seventies sitcom.’

  Victor frowns. ‘I don’t think so,’ he says.

  ‘You didn’t miss much . . . But if you’re going to pump them for information, they’re going to want to know how we’re going to live too,’ I point out.

  ‘The B&B,’ Victor says. ‘I thought that we’d say that the B&B was our main project. And you never know, that might end up being true.’

  ‘Sixty goats . . .’ I say. ‘That must be a lot of milking.’

  ‘I’m not even sure the whole thing is feasible, to be honest. And I probably will start with two or three, just to see if I can do it.’

  ‘You have to sell the cheese, too.’

  ‘I know. Although I have no idea where. Not yet.’

  I sit in silence for a while thinking about all of this.

  ‘What?’ Victor asks, as if my silence is in some way a rebuke.

  ‘Nothing,’ I say, ‘but I must admit, I thought you would have had this all, well, better planned.’

  Victor looks at me, shrugs and grins. ‘It’s all a bit of fun though, isn’t it?’

  Despite myself, I laugh. He looks about eighteen, and I suddenly want to be eighteen again too. I suddenly want to have unfeasible, youthful dreams and live them anyway because I simply don’t know yet that they are unfeasible. ‘I suppose if you look at it that way, it is,’ I concede. ‘But if it all goes wrong and you run out of money, it won’t be a bit of fun any more.’

  ‘If it all goes tits up, I can always go back to gynaecology. But I really don’t want to have to do that.’

  ‘Was it that bad?’

  ‘Not really. But I’ve been living this safe life for so long, you know? I really needed to give myself this adventure. Do something a bit scary and challenging.’

  ‘I understand that.’
/>   ‘Mark says it’s a mid-life crisis.’

  I laugh. ‘Well, that I can certainly understand.’

  Frost is already forming by the time we reach La Forge. We step from the van and I glance west at the thick band of cloud obscuring what would normally be the setting sun.

  ‘It’s colder tonight,’ Victor says, following my gaze and lightly stroking my back.

  ‘It is,’ I say. ‘The air smells of snow.’

  ‘How can snow smell? It’s just ice. Ice doesn’t smell.’

  I shrug and start to follow him towards the house. ‘I don’t know, but it does. It’s a sort of metallic smell.’

  Victor unlocks the door and then sniffs at the air. ‘Nope. Anyway, I hope you’re wrong.’

  I look around the desolate kitchen again and struggle to resist the wave of depression that hits me every time I step into the house – the house where Distira says I will never be happy.

  ‘Can we sort out—’ I start to say, as I follow Victor through to the bathroom.

  ‘The range?’ he finishes.

  ‘No, well, yes, that too, but I was thinking about the—’

  ‘The bathroom heater?’ he volunteers.

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Sure. I’ll get on it tomorrow morning. I promise.’

  After another lukewarm spray in the freezing bathroom, we dress in our best jeans and cleanest jumpers, then drive back down to the farm. Random wildlife leaps out in front of the van unnervingly every time we turn a bend. In fact, after the first few miles, there are so many that we start to keep tally. ‘How come there are so many out tonight?’ I ask.

  ‘I don’t know,’ Victor says. ‘I guess we’re not usually out and about this late.’

  By the time we reach Georges’s place, I have counted three wild boar, five hares, two foxes, a bat, and bizarrely, in the middle of nowhere, a Siamese cat.

  As we swing around to park the van, the front door to the house opens and Georges steps into the strip of light streaming across the courtyard.

  ‘Bonsoir,’ he says loudly, crunching across the gravel, opening my door and chivalrously holding a hand to help me down.

  We kiss twice and then have a moment of confused pantomime where Georges tries to kiss me a third time and I miss the cue. I then attempt to lean in for the third kiss but Georges has already given up.