The Little Perfume Shop Off the Champs-Élysées

by Rebecca Raisin

  ‘You don’t understand the significance, do you?’

  ‘Not really.’ Measurement didn’t seem very auspicious to me.

  ‘To some it might be a marker which distances are measured from, but for others it’s something much more significant. It’s a wishing place.’

  ‘What do they wish for?’

  ‘For true love! You’re supposed to spin in a circle on one foot, make a wish and then voila, very soon your heart’s desire will appear. A man, a perfect specimen of man, tall, dark and handsome…if you’re into that.’

  I laughed nervously, as Sebastien’s green-eyed gaze popped into my mind and I silently berated myself once more. Didn’t I just give myself a talking to about focus? I could’ve sworn my sister had inhabited my body and was running things. It just wasn’t like me to worry about anything other than perfume, but the idea of love kept swirling and I couldn’t think why. I had a clear five-year plan (OK, so it needed tweaking after Jen’s bombshell) and men didn’t figure into that. Especially broody French men who lied about who they were…

  I cleared my throat, shrugging off my inner turmoil. ‘I’m not really into men.’

  She did the duck lip face and said, ‘Well, petite, fair and pretty then.’

  ‘What…?’ Oh! I slapped my face. ‘No, no, I meant, I’m not into men right now. I’m more worried about my future. You know being almost thirty and all that.’

  She gave me a dubious look. ‘No need to justify anything to me.’

  Great, she didn’t believe me. The situation was suddenly hysterical, once again we’d got off track, so I tried to bring it back to the matter at hand.

  ‘Point Zero is a romantic spot, as whimsical as it might be. Goes to show, we really don’t have any idea what we’re up against with these challenges. We’ll be on our toes that’s for sure.’

  ‘Especially if they’re going to be so…’ she folded her arms ‘…random. Like how does that place equate to perfume?’

  I contemplated the link too. It would help if we knew why they chose such a place. Surely it wasn’t just by chance. It had to be significant for a reason. ‘I get it!’ I said, holding up a finger. ‘It’s symbolic, our journey should start at the very centre of Paris… Add some romance into the mix by choosing a location where lovers kiss, or people wish? It’s perfect. Perfume is romance, after all.’ Nan’s whole mantra about the language of love sprang to mind. Perfume was love, love was perfume, it was how you translated it that mattered.

  ‘Of course, you’re totally right.’ She sighed. ‘How could I miss that? I can see it now in hindsight, but I went straight for the Musée du Parfum. It wasn’t there, too obvious, right? Like Sebastien said earlier, we have to think outside the usual parameters of perfume, and this just proves it. You can’t count on anything! It’s going to be a hell of a ride.’

  I nodded, grateful that I had someone to chat to after the whirlwind day.

  She continued: ‘I have to think faster, today was a complete write-off in terms of the competition. I can’t even summon up the energy to move but I know I need to.’ Her face twisted, and lemony scent of worry perfumed the air.

  It was my turn to sigh, I felt the same, zapped of energy and down about not finding the key. Outside the day cooled as the sun dropped. ‘It’s getting late,’ Kathryn said morosely, her enthusiasm vanished.

  This had been the girl alongside Clementine who’d been hell bent on studying everyone’s social media profiles, finding out every tidbit of information about us all and the first day had leached her confidence.

  I raised my hand for the bill, and paid for Kathryn’s coffee, hoping she’d appreciate the small gesture of friendship.

  ‘Come on, Kathryn, it’s not the end of the world. Get yourself together and get back out there. Wow them with your perfume and forget about the key. It’s over and we’ve just got to press on.’ If anyone had to worry, it was me, the wildcard of the group.

  ‘Yes, darling, I’ll think perky thoughts, or intravenous coffee might help,’ she said through half-slitted eyes.

  I left her cupping her head in hands, and collected my things and wandered into softly falling twilight.

  ***

  Hours later, as moonlight cast gauzy fingers onto the Avenue des Champs-Élysées, I turned into our little side street and trudged upstairs to our apartment, fatigue making my mind fuzzy. Every muscle ached and I was ready for bed. The thought of taking off my boots and freeing my poor blistered and bruised feet was all I was focused on.

  My bed had been freshly made and I was seconds away from slipping beneath the covers for a power nap until Clementine came noisily down the hall, and all thought of peace quickly disappeared.

  ‘There you are, Del! What an exciting day, non?’ Somehow her make-up was still as perfect as it had been in the morning – was it really only this morning that we’d set off? It felt like aeons ago – and an eager smile lit up her face. How had she remained so fresh? Perhaps being Parisian helped. There was no studying up on tourist attractions or Metro maps, she’d have known them all, but still she hadn’t found the key.

  ‘Yeah, exciting,’ I said, weariness tinging my voice, as I noted Clementine could go from foe to friend as swiftly as the blink of an eye.

  ‘Ooh la la, you’re tired. You look a sight with your wind ravaged ’air, and…’ She leaned in to survey me. ‘Did you go swimming?’

  ‘Swimming? No. Where would I swim in Paris for god’s sake?’ Not in the Seine that’s for sure.

  ‘You’d swim on the barge, ’aven’t you seen it?’

  ‘No?’

  ‘Piscine Josephine Baker, a swimming pool built on a barge in the Seine. You ’aven’t been there swimming, are you sure?’

  ‘There’s a swimming pool on a barge?’ Paris really had it all. How long would it take to hunt out all the hidden gems in the huge city with its twenty arrondissements, curling around one another like a snail shell.

  ‘Oui. We swim laps there, my maman says I must because of the cherry clafoutis, but for me it’s more about the men. They wear the little trunks, those teeny tiny…’

  I interrupted in case I spent the next hour listening to her wax lyrical about men’s nether regions. ‘I get it,’ I said. ‘But no, I haven’t been swimming, Clem, as nice as the piscine sounds. I’ve been running madly all over town.’

  She scrunched her nose. ‘You are ’ow you say, fresh faced. Sans make-up. To be quite honest you look a little misérable.’

  ‘Oh,’ I said, her question making sense. ‘That! Well, Anastacia tried to sabotage me and I ended up with a green face mask on and had to run out of the Ritz in the middle of a treatment without paying. And of course I ran into Sebastien when I resembled the Hulk. And to hear she found the key, well if I had a voodoo doll…’

  ‘I know a place we can get such a doll.’ She held her finger up to her lips as if it was a secret. ‘You just say the word, non?’

  ‘Erm, thanks, Clem. I’ll keep it in mind.’

  She arched a brow. ‘You think I’m joking? Non, you must take extreme measures or she’ll always pick on you. Cunning as a box she is.’

  ‘A fox, you mean?’ I shrugged. ‘I think pretty much everyone is cunning, Clementine. I don’t trust anyone.’ Who knew what they really wanted? Kathryn’s arrival at the café might not have been innocent. Even Sebastien kept his real identity secret when he had so many chances to tell me. They were all suspicious.

  ‘Oui, you’re correct,’ she said as she took off her earrings. ‘But you’re still not playing the game right, Del. You may as well wear a flashing sign saying NICE GIRL. Your perfume skills might be fantastique, but you’re too nice. Nice never wins. You have to start thinking like they do. And they’ll do anything to win, so don’t let them.’

  I flopped back onto the bed. ‘Yeah, well, that’s easier said than done.’

  ‘Not really. Strike before they do. Or stay the ’ell away from them all.’

  ‘Aren’t you a little disappointed tho
ugh, Clem? Like I was expecting we’d all be friends, and this would be some life affirming competition and despite the prize on offer, we’d make these everlasting friendships, and have lunch when we were in whoever’s town. I didn’t expect sabotage.’ And really, Clementine was up there with Anastacia, shady as hell too.

  She harrumphed. ‘Non, I did not think it would be like that, that is for TV, that kind of fairy tale,’ Clementine said with a shrug. ‘Who knows what will ’appen. Just focus on fragrance, we’re not here to make friends.’

  ‘You said we were friends.’ I couldn’t help but tease her, but I sensed Clementine picked and chose her friends on whatever whim she felt at the time.

  Her features softened. ‘Oui, of course we’re friends! What’s the nice girl going to do to me? Nothing, that’s what! She’s too nice!’

  I lobbed a pillow at her for good measure. She ducked and it sailed over her head. ‘That’s more like it, Del!’ she said proudly. I could only shake my head, she really had no idea who I was and had pegged me for a sucker but that was probably a good thing. Better if I was no threat to her.

  She kicked off her heels (how did she spend all day in heels!?) and sat at the end of my bed. ‘You know, I helped Lila out with directions? Silly girl must have misheard me and got on the wrong train, she ended up visiting Versailles…’ Her eyes twinkled mischievously. ‘Whoops.’

  My mouth fell open. Lila must’ve ran into Clementine after she left Place Vendôme. ‘You didn’t!’

  ‘I did. One less person to worry about. But now we have Anastacia with the advantage.’

  Poor Lila! Out of the group, she was the one hanging back, eyes darting nervously around. For Clementine to do such a thing was plain mean. ‘Clem, that wasn’t cool. Lila is young, and this is probably her first time away…’ (Mine too!) ‘How could you be so mean?’

  She shrugged, and blithely went to the balcony and flung open the doors, letting in the balmy evening breeze. ‘Pah! It’s part of the game! You’d do well to learn from me.’

  It took all of my might to swallow the scoff that bubbled up.

  She continued unabashed. ‘I’m not worried about Anastacia finding the key and ’aving the advantage of using Vincent’s personal studio because she’s not the best perfumer.’

  ‘What makes you think that?’ Anastacia was here, and that meant she was a threat as far as I was concerned. Everyone had been subject to the same rigorous selection process as we had.

  Clementine unwound her colourful scarf, and scrutinized herself in the mirror, puckering her lips and batting her eyelashes before turning to me. ‘I’ve done some digging on Anastacia, and well, her style is pared back. Minimal. She believes you don’t need to complicate fragrance. A handful of aromas and that’s all she uses, she doesn’t layer the scent. Lazy, non?’

  Dragging myself vertical once more, I took off my boots, wiggled my toes, relishing in the freedom. By the sound of it Clementine had spent an inordinate amount of time internet stalking the contestants when she could have spent that time perfecting her own style. It made me wonder if her own perfumery lacked a little je ne sais quoi…

  ‘We don’t know if Anastacia’s style is lazy or genius, Clem. Maybe she’s on to something, we could be muddling perfume by adding unnecessary elements, and how could we know unless we try?’

  Like writers, or artists, perfumers each had their own style, their own voice, and their perfumes reflected that. Anastacia’s style was understated and I was interested to see how it worked. Less is more appealed to me, I often made herbal tinctures with only a handful of ingredients and they turned out just fine. Perfume was more complex, but I could envisage it working as long as the scent was perfectly balanced. Anastacia’s style had piqued my interest and reminded me that I was here to learn, and soak up as much as I could while I had the chance.

  ‘Pah!’ Clementine said again, a word that for her brooked no argument. ‘I may as well rub a sprig of rosemary on my wrist and be done with it! And why are you standing up for ’er? Didn’t she do the wrong thing by you today, Del? You should be planning revenge not ’aving that doe-eyed deer look in your eyes.’

  I laughed. ‘Oh, Clementine, you speak of me like I’m this timid little bird! I was plotting revenge for a good few hours as I raced over Paris, but you know what? It distracted me, it stopped me thinking about perfume and this week’s challenge. I’ll let the rest of you sabotage each other, while I dream about fragrance and what I’m going to do when I win.’

  In Clementine’s perfume was the scent of wind and rain, and zephyr of challenge. She wasn’t intimidated by anyone and part of me thought it would be her downfall. But what the heck did I know really, except Paris wasn’t all rainbows and butterflies and neither were the contestants.

  ‘I’m going to shower,’ she said. ‘And then we are to attend dinner.’

  At the mention of food my stomach rumbled but after the long day, and the memory of them clustering around gossiping the night before, I was put off. I’d grab dinner in one of the cheaper bistros in the 5th instead. And truthfully, I didn’t want to have to stare at Sebastien all night. ‘I’ll pass,’ I said. ‘I’m so tired, I just want to eat as fast as possible and sleep.’

  She tutted. ‘I thought you Americans were a little more fun!’

  ‘My feet are about to fall off.’

  ‘Pah!’ she said.

  Chapter Eleven

  The next day was mayhem in the lab. Emotions were high. Stress, and grim and gritty determination, shone on my competitors’ faces. We were being judged purely on our mettle and how we coped working in a new environment on a strict timeframe.

  As the day wore on, nerves turned from taut to frazzled and the noise level increased. Someone would push past someone else and foreign curses would ring out. It was interesting that I could always translate a profanity even if I didn’t speak the language.

  For some reason, Anastacia kept coming in and yammering on that the prize of working alone in Vincent’s studio bored her. I’d have given anything to take her place! Working amid this chaos took a toll, I couldn’t think straight with all the noise. Clementine played some bawdy burlesque music, and warbled away operatically and it was all I could do not to scream.

  Anastacia goaded Clementine but I got the feeling Clem relished the drama, going by the back and forth between them. After the third argument in as many minutes, I grabbed Clementine’s phone and shut off her music. ‘Are you purposely riling her up?’

  The Parisian giggled behind her hand. ‘Oui! Isn’t it great? Look at her, you can almost see fire coming out of her nose!’

  I risked a quick glance at Anastacia, who gave me a death stare so fierce my legs wobbled. ‘You are playing with fire,’ I admonished Clementine, and concentrated at glancing anywhere but in Anastacia’s direction.

  ‘Pah!’ she said. ‘If she’s concerned about me, then she’s not concentrating! She should be in Vincent’s studio working!’

  ‘But you’re not concentrating either!’

  She did that thing, a sort of head loll and tongue cluck that implied I was obtuse. ‘I obviously don’t need as much time as everyone else, Del. I am French!’ she said as if that explained it all.

  ‘So?’ I failed to see her reasoning.

  ‘So we invented perfume!’

  That wasn’t actually the way history remembered it but for the sake of saving everyone from another thirty-minute monologue I let her have the point. ‘Right-e-o, Clem. I have to concentrate but just be careful.’ I left the two women to battle it out.

  Katherine with her lovely sleek red locks just shook her head and mouthed, ‘She’s a nightmare.’ I wasn’t sure if she meant Clementine or Anastacia, but I had a feeling it was her Parisian friend.

  Sebastien wandered in, and all talk ceased. I watched him from the corner of my eye as I continued to work. With each contestant he hurried to answer their questions, as though he was in a rush to leave. When he came to Clementine’s bench he deflected her fli
rtatious banter easily so her pride wasn’t hurt. Golly, I could hear her overt attempts from where I stood, and internally rolled my eyes. Nothing was off limits to her. Would it be her downfall, not taking anything seriously and relying on other methods to get ahead?

  The fragrance in the room swirled and shimmied, heightening as he continued to visit each contestant. I wasn’t sure if it was his magnetism that they were attracted to or the fact he was a Leclére, either way it was interesting to watch them flirt, bumble, or mumble alongside him. When he got close to my bench the room was abuzz.

  Sebastien stepped towards me, a question in his eyes. I averted my gaze, and moved around him, brushing his hand as I did, feeling that same sizzle race through me.

  ‘Sorry,’ I said, snatching my hand back as if it had been burned. Do not act like a fool, Del! ‘Have you come to save me?’ The words spilled out before I could stop them. Save me?

  ‘Do you need saving?’ A smile played at his lips. Gosh, they were lovely lips, if you were into lips.

  ‘No, not really.’ I squirmed. ‘But I will definitely be having your larger than average glass of vin blanc tonight.’

  He tilted his head. ‘Why?’

  The room fell silent, I could almost hear them breathing, and they were hanging on to every word we spoke. Best not to rile them up by complaining about them! ‘I’m sure you know, since I poured my heart out to you in the bar that night, not realizing you in fact knew exactly who I was.’ No need to act the ingénue either, better he understood I was still annoyed at his double cross.

  ‘I’m so sorry, Del. I was grappling with so many things that day, and I didn’t actually recognize you until you jumped on my back and attached yourself to me.’

  I gave him a hard stare. ‘I tripped over a baguette.’

  ‘If you say so.’

  I scoffed. ‘You know so.’

  He gave an airy shrug, but I could tell he was just playing with me.

  ‘If you’re free later, I thought we could have coffee?’