by Jim Jennings
***
Ten minutes after his surprise encounter with Giorgio, Laurence met with Brigitte at the entrance of the Gare du Nord. While he had been filling his stomach, Brigitte had been filling her suitcase and changing her clothes, something Laurence badly needed to do. She looked even lovelier than before in denim shorts, a red vest top and a pale white shirt. She had a very peaceful air about her, Laurence thought, and she was constantly wearing a pleasant smile. They got on the ten to five train to Nice, a non-stop juggernaut that cut its way through France like a knife through butter. Having located a pair of seats together, they settled down and looked out to the awe-inspiring French countryside. The long journey allowed Laurence to become better acquainted with his exceptionally lovely companion and he asked her to tell him all about herself.
Brigitte Girard, though she spoke perfect English, was the daughter of a French criminal lawyer and Belgian accountant, who was educated at the Cheltenham Ladies’ College, one of the finest and most expensive private schools in England. She had excelled in sport, science, mathematics, languages, technology, drama - everything! She was a prefect, a team captain, head girl and the apple of many a young man’s eye. Despite all these enviable qualities however, Brigitte was more interested in books than boys, and she was particularly interested in history. Seeing a bright future for her, Brigitte’s parents decided that she was going to be a politician. Brigitte decided otherwise. She pursued an acting career, turning down the chance to study Politics, Philosophy and Economics at universities ranging from Princeton, Oxford and Yale to study at RADA.
‘I bet your parents didn’t like that!’ Laurence said, interrupting Brigitte’s lengthy monologue.
‘No, they didn’t. They said it was nonsense. I never got to audition for RADA. They said it was a useless profession and I would be wasting my life. They told me that I was going to the Sorbonne to do French Literature. They had already set up a job for me at the European Parliament.’ Sadness filled her eyes. ‘I refused them. They cast me out. I haven’t spoken to them for years. And so I decided to turn to my second love, classics. Through classics I found the perfect combination of drama and literature and finally I graduated from Cambridge with a PHD in Classics. I owe it all to you.’ She looked meaningfully into Laurence’s blue eyes, which now doubled in size in wonder.
‘Me?’ The word shot out of his mouth in a squawk.
‘Well, maybe not all. But the day after I left home I saw your beaming face on the front cover of your book, ‘An Idiot’s Guide to Greek Mythology’, and I fell in love.’ Both of them looked away in embarrassment. ‘With classics, I mean. I fell in love with classics! And so I decided to study it. So thank you, Laurence.’
‘No, thank you!’ He replied, although he didn’t really know why. ‘Thanks for buying the book! I’m glad someone did, other than my mum and I.’ She giggled at this and Laurence’s knees wiggled at its delightful musicality. ‘And how is the job?’ Brigitte let forth a long sigh that seemed to carry the weight of the world with it. She loved classics but hated her job at the museum. She was tired of being surrounded by remnants of other people’s adventures. She wanted one of her own and she saw the opportunity to have one with Laurence. Their earlier meeting had garnered more excitement than the previous seven months in the job combined. There was something about the man that she found supremely attractive; was it his nervousness whenever he spoke to her that she found endearing? Perhaps it was his chiselled jaw-line that made him look, or so she thought, like a Greek statue. Or more than all these physical attributes and characteristics put together, was it his act of attempted heroism in the museum that had catapulted him into her heart. She had never been lucky in love, but perhaps it was time her luck changed. Now, it was her turn to ask Laurence all about himself and explain just how he came to be in the museum’s storage room.
He didn’t hold back; he told Brigitte everything from what his favourite colour was to the first song he had learnt to play on the guitar. The way he painted it, his life had been something of a failure, a series of unfortunate misunderstandings and mishaps. He, like Brigitte, had enjoyed a private school education courtesy of his wealthy grandparents but he had not followed his brothers into a structured and organised career plan. Whereas they had attained top degrees from the best British universities, he was a university drop out, one of those statistics the Government liked to hide away. He wanted to travel; Prague, Copenhagen, Helsinki, Bucharest, Stockholm!! These were just a few of the cities in Europe that he hoped to visit. Unfortunately though, he could not find a job to pay for all these planned escapades. Instead he turned his hand to what he knew already and wrote his books. The books were failures and to make ends meet Laurence took a job at the Natural History Museum, rising from cleaner to head cleaner and finally to tour guide. To many this story was a story of failure, but to Brigitte the story was one of a nice man treated cruelly by the hands of fate. Though Laurence feared it would put her off him, even though he severely doubted a woman like her, a woman with a PHD, unparalleled looks and innumerable talents, could be interested in him anyway, it had quite the opposite effect; she only found herself falling for him even faster.
‘You know, I’m not without acting talent, Brigitte.’ He smiled, pleased with himself.
‘Really?’ Brigitte responded, taking a swig of her water.
‘Yes, I was the star of our school’s Shakespeare season. People still ask to see my Bottom.’ Brigitte spat the water out. ‘Are you alright?’ He asked her. She said she was and then her eyes lit up in remembrance.
‘Oh Laurence, I have something for you!’ She stood up and shifted past Laurence to get her bag out of the overhead compartment. The bag was brought down gracefully and in a moment she had produced a folded set of jeans, a white t-shirt, a sky blue shirt and a zip-up burgundy hoody. Laurence looked more perplexed than ever.
‘I thought you could do with some new clothes, yours look a little…used.’ He looked down at his once designer clothes that looked as if they had been dragged through a desert in the past few days. He took the clothes with gratitude but asked,
‘Where did you get these? An ex-boyfriend?’ Laurence’s heart sank.
‘No, no, these are my brother’s clothes, but he’s out of town at the moment so I’m sure he won’t mind.’ Laurence’s heart rose. He left to find a place where he could change into his more casual attire and when he returned Brigitte was fast asleep, like a fallen angel.
Hours later, their train arrived in Nice. Brigitte awoke to find Laurence’s head slumped on her shoulder. She didn’t jerk it off in horror. She liked how it felt there. He then opened his eyes and was immediately fumbling about for an excuse as to why he was resting on her. He rushed off the train and onto the platform, followed gingerly by a smiling Brigitte. A ten-minute bustling walk brought them to the ferry port. Laurence surveyed a row of parked white trucks nearly identical to the one he pursued through the streets of Paris earlier in the day. There was no feeling left in his legs; he was exhausted by the constant travelling. In the early hours of the morning, the cold grey clouds began to make way for the bright gleaming rays of the sun, and Laurence and Brigitte made their way onto the ferry.
Chapter Seven
Blood Vessel
