The Night That Started It All

by Anna Cleary

  In the bedroom she felt driven to experiment in ways that surprised even her normally inventive self. Was it hormones, rivalry or sheer insanity? Every time he looked gloomy, she felt challenged to distract him in some new and sensuous way.

  She was at risk of turning herself into a femme fatale.

  Luc came home early one afternoon when she was working on her book. The dining room’s light with its romantic view of the rooftops and chimney pots of Paris had made it the obvious choice for her workplace. To spare the furniture, she’d spread a sheet over the table for her paints and paraphernalia, and pinned up some paper to protect the silken walls from splashes.

  ‘Ça va.’ He kissed her, tasting of coffee, the city, man and desire.

  ‘You’re early.’

  ‘Oui.’ He noticed her painting and bent to examine it, exclaiming, ‘Aha. The carousel in the Luxembourg. You know, my papa used to take me there when I was a little kid.’

  ‘Oh, did he? It’s so beautiful there. It must be the best gig in the world for a juggler.’

  ‘But I don’t see your owl,’ he said, searching the picture.

  ‘Ah. No. I’ve abandoned him until I’m in Australia again.’

  He frowned, as he often did when she mentioned Australia. She guessed the reminder of Rémy’s business shenanigans there still stung like crazy.

  ‘See?’ Shyly, she showed him her initial sketch, and some beautiful old posters she’d unearthed from the famous Cirque d’hiver. ‘I’m still working on the face. It’s not so easy to do the juggler.’

  He compared them with her painting, exclaiming about the little telltale signs she’d used to make the setting obvious to Parisian children. ‘It’s so good. It’s … exceptional. Magnifique. You are a great talent.’ Glancing about at her protective measures, he indicated the room with a sweep of his hand.

  ‘Maybe you’d like to change all this. Find a new look for the apartment. Make this a proper studio.’

  ‘But that would be so much trouble, wouldn’t it, when we don’t even know how long-term my stay here will be? I’d hate to cause you all that expense for something that might well turn out to be temporary.’

  ‘Shari …’

  She looked enquiringly at him. He looked almost pained, then his jaw hardened. He threw out his hands. ‘Chérie— There is something— I have something I must discuss with you.’

  Clunk. For some reason her heart hit a pothole. She picked up a cloth and wiped her hands.

  He took her shoulders and looked gravely at her. ‘I have had news. Your visa can’t be changed from within France. I’m sorry, chérie, but the laws here are very strict. If you wish to apply to be a resident, you must do it from Australia.’

  ‘Oh.’ It was a shock. ‘You mean—go home? Already?’ Disappointment, and a zillion obstacles flashed through her mind. Being with him. Their life. Her hopes and dreams. Her French lessons, her clinic appointments. Leaving him. Leaving him.

  He lifted his hands. ‘The immigration and visa laws have tightened here as everywhere. This is why …’ his dark lashes screened his eyes ‘—I am suggesting—to spare you the trip—we should get married.’

  Her brain spun for a giddy minute or so. When it slowed down she noticed a certain rigidity in him. A waiting stillness. Then the full implications of the words hit.

  Pain sliced her heart like a knife. ‘Oh. Oh. Married. Heavens, has it come to that?’

  His eyes glinted. ‘It may look like an extreme solution, but in your condition … Surely a long flight wouldn’t be advisable?’

  ‘Oh, that’s just …’ She smiled bitterly and shook her head. ‘Pregnant women can fly right up until the thirty-sixth week.’

  ‘Are you sure? How do you know?’ His voice sharpened. ‘Have you been checking?’

  ‘Emilie. She wanted to come for the … Anyway … Anyway …’ She laid her palm on her forehead. She felt flummoxed and prickly, as if all her fur had been horribly ruffled and she might just burst into tears. ‘If I go home, who knows how long I’ll have to wait for a residential visa? I’ll just have the baby there, I guess.’

  ‘No. No, Shari …’ He made a sharp movement but she turned away from him. ‘Don’t think of leaving, chérie. No need to give up. The marriage ceremony is nothing. Just a formality. A banal, bureaucratic formality.’

  ‘Look, I just need to think for a while. Excuse me while I go for a walk.’

  She grabbed her bag and almost flew out of the apartment. Down on the ground floor she rushed blindly past the concierge’s office, then headed to the nearest métro. The closest station to the Luxembourg was only one stop further on from Saint-Placide where she travelled for her lessons. Several times already she’d walked from there to the gardens to help her story cook.

  Naturally, like the thoroughly emotional woman she was, she cried on the train. Then she cried on the way to the gardens, which was silly because she bumped into people and some of them were quite rude.

  Then she walked past the children’s garden, past the carousel, all the way to the fountain where she’d first told Luc she was expecting. As a coincidence, it was late afternoon again, not many people about.

  She sank into a green chair and sat with her head in her hands. These last few weeks she’d been living in a bubble, she realised, and now it had burst.

  But if you loved someone, what did it matter? A marriage proposal was a marriage proposal. She probably didn’t deserve roses and pretty words and kneeling on the ground. The alternative was to leave him and fly home. Leave him without his baby? How could she even contemplate such a thing?

  If she did make that long journey, would she ever come back? Would he even want her back?

  So he wasn’t ‘in love’. He was a decent man. Straight, honourable and good. Gentle. What was she quibbling about? There were women who would give their eye teeth to be where she was. He’d be good to her, she supposed, since she was the mother of his child. His first child.

  She waited for the ache in her heart to ease. Eventually the peace and beauty of the place soothed her enough that she could pull herself together. Then she hauled herself up and caught another train home.

  When she walked in she noticed with surprise Luc holding a whiskey in his hand. She’d never known him to drink alcohol, other than with a meal.

  He scrutinised her carefully, his eyes burning strangely in his taut face. ‘Did you walk far?’

  ‘I—went for a stroll in the Luxembourg. Thought I might as well check on something while I was in the mood for roaming. Oh, and about that other thing. Okay. I’ll marry you, if you insist. But let’s not make a fuss about it, eh? No white dresses and all that palaver. Just regular old clothes.’

  Frowning, he looked at her uncertainly. ‘Are you sure?’

  She half turned away. ‘Well, it’s just a formality, isn’t it? Let’s do it without a fuss.’

  ‘Chérie …’

  Whatever he’d been going to say, he thought better of it.

  They avoided each other’s eyes after that, and there was a strain during dinner.

  In their bed that night, she lay with her back to him, her heart aching too much for sleep. While Luc’s breathing was steady and regular, a certain tension in him made her aware he was awake.

  She tried to cry silently, until she felt his touch on her thigh and a burning, treacherous tingle ignited her blood. Desire and resistance warred in her flesh, until with a groan he reached for her and pulled her into his arms, murmuring, ‘Chérie, don’t be sad. Everything will be all right.’

  And once again he was the most virile, passionate and demanding of lovers. He rode her, he owned her, he possessed her like a king. Then he changed tack and became the warmest, the tenderest, the most considerate.

  In his powerful arms she melted, she surrendered, she showed him all the love blazing in her soul. And from the tenderness in his embrace, anyone would have thought the man truly loved her.

  CHAPTER FOURTEEN

  ‘I’M NOT s
o sure about wearing old clothes to our wedding, chérie.’

  Shari scowled. Until this moment she’d been enjoying her breakfast. Until this moment croissants and toast had never tasted so good. She was doing her best to be gracious over the travesty of a wedding she was forced to settle for, but that didn’t mean she should have to discuss it when she had serious things on her mind.

  Things like wilfully endangering her baby just to pander to some totally unfounded suspicions. Sure, it had been her suggestion, based on an insane and quixotic impulse, but the fact that Luc was going along with it even after he’d thoroughly read that pamphlet, interrogated the doctor to within an inch of the poor woman’s life and researched the whole question on the Internet ad infinitum spoke for itself.

  He still didn’t one hundred per cent trust her.

  And if he didn’t, how could he ever love her? She knew from her own bitter experience the end of trust meant the end of love.

  In this case, love had never begun.

  Despite all his affectionate words and gestures, his concern for her well-being, his apparent pride when he introduced her to people, he’d never once been tempted to say he loved her, when she, on so many occasions, had only just managed not to embarrass him with heartfelt outpourings of eternal love by severely restraining herself.

  Oh, there’d been moments in the heat of passion when he’d come on pretty strong about how he adored her, she’d changed his life, et cetera, but she knew the difference, and so did a sophisticated guy like him.

  He couldn’t even claim it was a cultural idiosyncrasy at work. Everyone knew the French were renowned for their passionate declarations. For heaven’s sake, hadn’t they invented the language of love?

  Even in Australia, where men feared to string more than two words together at a time in case of being thought female, they managed to say deep and soulful things to their lovers in private. Behind closed doors. With the blinds down.

  This whole amniocentesis thing was another symbol of her failure to inspire love in a man. It was shaming to think some women were forced to go through the procedure for very urgent and genuine reasons, while she’d signed on for little more than as a test to prove herself.

  To prove she wasn’t a liar. How sad was that?

  Paradoxically, she suspected Luc wasn’t comfortable with the idea himself. But it had become another of those things they didn’t talk about. Like love.

  ‘It occurs to me …’ he said, casually spooning double cream onto the jam he’d spread inside his croissant. How could the man stay so lean and fit? His abdomen was as flat as a washboard. ‘… That our witnesses are likely to use the occasion of our wedding as an excuse to strut their finery.’

  ‘Well, then, it’s a pity we can’t choose witnesses who aren’t prone to finery. Like perfect strangers walking along the street.’

  Though his dark eyes shimmered, his face continued grave. ‘Yes, that is a shame. Strangers would have been perfect. Unfortunately, the law has spoken. Perhaps we can strike a compromise. Suppose tomorrow we take a stroll through the boutiques? There must be something in Paris you could enjoy wearing to your wedding. A suit. A dress.’

  ‘I doubt it.’

  The truth was, any control she’d had over the event was fast slipping away. Already she’d been forced to give in on the witness question.

  The law was stacked against her. During several visits to the mairie, her situation in regard to her Australian birth and the inadequacy of her visa had occasioned some terse comments from the conseiller municipal who was to perform the ceremony.

  Could she prove her relationship with Luc was genuine and not just an attempt to marry a French citizen by devious means? Could she prove she had genuine links with France and deserved special consideration?

  The doctor’s certification that she was pregnant, and had certainly been pregnant before she left Australia, possibly coinciding with Luc’s documented visit there, only went part of the way to assuage official doubts. Even the dozen or so Australian documents she’d sent home for, along with Luc’s documents, were held as doubtful.

  Her relationship by marriage to Luc’s cousin Emilie was counted as helpful. Even more helpful would be the endorsement of other members of Luc’s immediate family.

  Though Luc argued fiercely with the officials about the ridiculous red tape and bureaucracy that was strangling France and its citizens, he accepted the ruling.

  Shari wasn’t sure how regretful he truly was when he announced they were forced to invite two members of his family to be their witnesses.

  ‘What can I say?’ he’d raged when he broke the news, striding up and down and flinging out his hands. ‘We live in a paranoid society in which citizens are considered guilty before being proven innocent. I’m so sorry, my darling, but our hands are tied. This is why I’m leaving it to you to decide who we should honour with the role.’

  Shari frowned. ‘Two?’

  ‘Bien sûr, the law requires two.’

  Two of his family. It wasn’t that she disliked his family. They’d been very kind on every occasion. Since their announcement of the baby, both the Sophies had invited her to go shopping with them, Raoul and Lucette had invited her and Luc to dinner, and Laraine had called by to drink tea. During the visit the gracious woman had expressed her sincere condolences about all the yellow silk.

  ‘It doesn’t suit every complexion,’ she’d said sympathetically. ‘I’m not sure it even suited Manon. And it can be very wearing on the nerves. Probably on relationships, I wouldn’t be surprised. Make a couple a little irritable, hein? I know my son has always detested yellow. In your case, ma chérie, a warm white, pale cream, perhaps even a très, très watery shade of blue could be to your advantage.’

  Laraine was right about one thing. Yellow was irritating.

  In fact, ever since Luc had made the proposal, if anyone could call it that, things that hadn’t bothered Shari before bothered her now. That was one good reason why this so-called wedding didn’t deserve to be classed as a celebration.

  She tried not to look at him, all crisp and fresh in his city suit, his handsome jaw cleanly shaven while she was still a classic frump in one of his old tee shirts and straggly hair. It wasn’t fair that a man should always be beautiful.

  He was absorbed in reading his tablet, but every so often he remembered she was alive. ‘Have you thought any more about the witnesses, chérie?’ he said absently. ‘We will have to give them some warning.’

  ‘I’m not sure who in your family would have the time for such a banal formality. It’s hardly a social event. Merely the signing of a contract.

  Behind their dark lashes his eyes glinted. ‘It shouldn’t be impossible to find two who are willing. I dare say everyone in my family would like to witness my wedding.’

  She glanced at him, but his face was entirely innocent as he perused Le Figaro, making occasional stabbing gestures with his forefinger at articles that infuriated him.

  ‘Well …’ She studied her toast, which could have been improved by a very thin smear of Vegemite, if only the French knew it. ‘I suppose it would be nice to ask your mother.’

  There was a moment of silence. Then, ‘You think?’

  She said gloomily, ‘Though if we ask her, we can’t possibly not ask Tante Marise.’

  He nodded. ‘Although Oncle Georges would be overjoyed to be included. Still, it’s difficult with only the two. But what can one do? Papa is in Venice, but even he might feel he has a claim …’

  She could see the crack widening in the dam wall. ‘I suppose … one could invite some of them as guests.’

  He glanced up, his face illuminated with a sudden devastating smile that wrung her heart. ‘Only if you would feel comfortable with that, of course.’

  She shrugged, gracious in defeat. At least he could be happy. ‘Oh, sure, sure. Invite them all. And the children. And their dogs. But you know what that means, don’t you?’

  He was smiling at his iPad. ‘What?’
>
  ‘Printed invitations. Flowers. Photos. Receptions. All that stuff. Stuff I know nothing about arranging.’

  ‘You can leave all that to me. What about Neil and Emilie?’

  ‘Are you kidding? The twins are barely three months old. Em won’t want to travel with them. And she’s breastfeeding so she can’t leave them behind, even if she wanted to. No, I’m doomed to go it alone.’

  ‘Tsk, tsk. So depressing. At least on Saturday we can see about your dress. That will be something beautiful to think of, n’est-ce pas?’

  She heaved a bored sigh. ‘Whatever. Choose what you like. Just so long as it’s yellow.’

  She could tell she’d made some impact with that. He looked at her long and hard.

  But it gave her no real satisfaction. Did she want to disgruntle him and send him off to the office looking stern for another day of terrifying his employees? No, she wanted him to be happy. She wanted him to have everything in the world he wanted. Even if it wasn’t her, all that much.

  Of course, once she had proved her case about his paternity, he might see her in a different light. If she didn’t throw herself off the Pont Neuf first.

  After he’d kissed her goodbye, then strode off to catch his train, she drifted around for a while, half-heartedly tidying things like a nineteen fifties housewife and feeling miserable about the whole damned thing.

  It was lowering to know that a man would never have dreamed of marrying you if you hadn’t been pregnant. And just to underline that fact couldn’t even be bothered to dress up his proposal with a few flowery words.

  Lately, she’d even given up the effort to dress herself up. Most days she mooched around in shorts, shirts and sandals, her hair in a daggy ponytail. Occasionally she’d drag on a skirt for the shops, but that was her biggest concession.

  She felt Luc’s gaze on her often, anxious, troubled, but she didn’t feel like explaining. If he couldn’t work out that a woman liked to feel at least equal to his ex in his regard, what was the point?