“I prefer that to a magpie or a screech owl,” I said.
He laughed. To make Claudio laugh, especially at night, was my ultimate reward.
And not everyone can be born a nightingale.
“How do you put up with me?” He had been astonished another time when despair made him more disagreeable than usual. “Don’t think that I ignore all that people say about me: selfish, offhand, boorish. Do you stay out of pity?”
“Not at all. It’s pure self-interest. I’m well paid, I adore traveling and luxury. Not to mention free concerts.”
He had laughed then, too, before becoming serious again, almost imploring.
“Ask me for something, Laura. You never ask for anything. Would you like a piece of jewelry? A dress? A car to replace your wreck? Ask and you shall have, I promise.”
“Be careful: what if I asked for the moon?”
“I would arrange for it to be taken down for you.”
I would remember that.
That day, December 20, I accompanied Claudio in some Christmas shopping. His driver, Jean-Pierre, dropped us in front of a perfume shop near the Champs-Élysées, a shop out of a fairy tale.
He was a regular. A swarm of saleswomen, each one more beautiful than the last, surrounded him and led him to the manager, a beautiful woman of about fifty. They shook hands. I stayed discreetly aside as he made his choices.
For Hélène Reigner, he chose a large bottle of perfume that he named without hesitating. For his mother, who was coming to spend Christmas with him, a box of lily-of-the-valley-scented soaps. Finally, for David, who was amused by coquetry, some eau de toilette.
“Gift wrap, Mr. Roman?” Claudio’s hand reached for my shoulder.
“Wait! We forgot the most important: this young lady.”
Everyone looked at me who, until then, had been unnoticed. My cheeks burned. The manager smiled at me.
“What perfume do you usually wear?”
I confessed, a little ashamed, “None in particular.”
“We need something rare for Laura,” Claudio said. “A perfume that resembles her, light and wild at the same time.”
Field sparrow?
There was some gentle laughter. Claudio was amusing himself; amusing himself with my embarrassment. I wanted him to do that. Those who said he was indelicate were right.
“OK, we’ll find that,” said the manager.
She sprayed several fragrances on my wrist and on Claudio’s. After a while, they all blended together. It was too much; I couldn’t choose.
“That one,” Claudio suddenly decided.
An eau de toilette, called simply “Her,” that smelled of grass and freshness. I also merited gift-wrap.
“You will put that in your stocking,” Claudio ordered when we were back in the car. “You’re forbidden to open it before the morning of December twenty-fifth.”
As every year, my stockings would be by the fireplace in the kitchen in Villedoye. Christmas fell on a Thursday. There were no trips scheduled for Claudio before mid-January. For a good, long week, I intended to become a Normand again.
10.
This morning at the bakery I played shopkeeper, the best way to renew my ties with my village. Everyone came by, including old friends from school, most of them now married and mothers. “So, Laura, when will it be your turn?”
They knew that I worked in music, but the name Claudio Roman meant nothing to them. If I had been working with Michel Sardou or Johnny Hallyday, I would have been basking in my moment of glory. I didn’t try to enlighten them. It was good to become just Laura again. Laura, the sparrow of the fields and apple trees.
On the other hand, Bernard, Agatha’s lawyer husband, knew the singer well. And the fact that his little sister-in-law had the honor of accompanying Claudio on his tours left him speechless.
During the Christmas holidays, which we all spent together at my parents’ house, he constantly spoke highly of Claudio. Smitten with opera, he had seen him in Carmen and Cosi fan tutte, among others.
“Fabulous! He didn’t just play the role, he was the character. It must have been terrible for him to have to give up the stage.”
I remembered his closed face as he replied to the journalist in Nice, Opera is finished for me, and the despair that I felt in those words.
Agatha interrogated me about our travels, the luxury hotels, the press, television. She was agape.
In Deauville, we had New Year’s Day lunch at her stylish house. Her husband was successful; her children, six and eight years old, boy and girl, were charming; she had someone to help her with the house: a great life. She pouted a little when I pointed this out.
“You think?”
After the meal, we all went for a ritual walk along the boardwalk. It wasn’t much fun: it was warm, gray, and windy. I was happy to go back home.
“You use perfume now? That’s new,” my sister said, surprised. “It wouldn’t be the famous Her? It just came out.”
“I didn’t know that it just came out, but it is Her.”
And it was from Him. I couldn’t keep myself from telling Agatha. I took every opportunity to mention Claudio’s name. She looked at me slyly.
“Hey, you! You wouldn’t be in love, by any chance? Bernard showed me a photo of your singer on a CD, when he still had his eyes. It’s true that he was sensational.”
“He still is. And if I were in love, it would be without any hope,” I replied, laughing. “Women fall at his feet.”
“That doesn’t prevent him from calling you nonstop…”
The last time, it had been during lunch, and I had left the table to answer the phone. I didn’t tell Agatha that Claudio wanted to excuse himself for having woken me on New Year’s Eve.
He had called at one o’clock in the morning. With the help of champagne, I was sleeping deeply and my heart jumped. Had my parents heard my cell phone ringing? My room was right next to theirs.
My head under the covers, I had spoken with him until his anxiety had eased: a family portrait in Villedoye. He liked it a lot. We had fun with it. I had even told him about white-bread Agatha. If she had known, she would have killed me.
“You’re lucky,” Agatha sighed. “It’s you who lead the great life.”
I gestured toward her husband, walking in front of us, surrounded by the two little ones.
“That’s not bad, either.”
Again she pouted. “Yeah, not bad.”
The beautiful one envied me, the little one, who, on this very boardwalk, had long ago searched in vain for glances from boys and had to pay for the drinks?
Once again I compared; this time not Agatha and me, but the Agatha of yesterday and today.
Her hair was still as golden and certainly better styled than when she was sixteen. Her eyes, more blue than ever, were emphasized by a knowing application of makeup; her lines were the same, her figure was impeccable, despite two pregnancies. But something had changed. A light, a charge, had been dimmed, dulled. Her gait wasn’t the same, either, that way she had, as a young girl, of moving with her chin held high, as if saying, “Look at us, Life!” Or, more simply, “For me, it’s party and boys!”
Agatha gave out less of that.
My aunt Jeanette expressed my feelings loud and clear when, out of curiosity, she paid a visit to Mom and me.
This time I shared the coffee and the conversation. Paris, my work, my hobbies, she wanted to know everything.
I embellished a little to keep her going the rest of the winter.
“It’s funny,” she said after I finished. “Now it’s you who shines and Agatha who is fading.”
“Who is fading, who is fading…” Mom protested, always prompt to defend one or the other of her girls. “What are you saying? She’s bored, that’s all. With her work and her husband always on the road. Do you think that’s fun, especially for her, who always liked to party?”
“Now it’s the little one who parties,” my aunt concluded, smiling at me.
&nbs
p; I remembered that summer day when not fewer than two cars had come to fetch Agatha to take her to the beach and when a few words spoken by Jeannette had driven me to compare myself to my sister.
Where would I be today if I hadn’t overheard the conversation about the lily and the wildflower? Who knew if, being the more gifted at school, I wouldn’t have become a teacher, as Mom had wished?
For a minute, I wanted to tell them how, in a certain way, they had given me the impulse to push myself to better things. But would they understand? The result surprised me too.
I preferred to keep quiet while eyeing the Barbara Cartlands on the shelves, winking at my little friends with their Prince Charmings. These novels only spoke of love, broken hearts, flushed cheeks, sunsets. Just like Mozart’s lieder, actually. The only difference was that the lieder always ended with a separation or death, while for Cartland’s heroines, the end was necessarily happy.
“Thank you for not asking me when I plan to marry,” I said to my aunt as she was leaving. “Everyone else has.”
“So: when?”
The most unhappy to see me leave was he who had spoken least during my stay, except with his eyes and a few big kisses on my cheek: my father. He had always had a secret preference for brown bread.
I went to find him at the bakery to say good-bye.
“Do you know what the singer I work for said? He said that bread and music are the two indispensable foods for life. He even puts bread ahead of music.”
A smile of pride lit up the baker’s face.
“If some day you both pass by here, you must introduce him to me.”
11.
March, already. When the buds began to sprout, a cold spell hit the countryside. Everything was white.
In my pigeon coop, heated by a single electric radiator, the temperature was just right. It was ten o’clock at night, and I was preparing myself for a hot shower before taking refuge under my duvet with my book when my cell phone rang.
“Laura? Come. I beg you, come quickly.”
Claudio’s voice was muffled, barely audible. It seemed as though someone was strangling him.
“Right away.”
I was afraid. Rich, alone, blind: ideal prey for cowards who chose to attack the defenseless. David had tried many times to persuade Claudio to have someone live with him. The house was huge; he wouldn’t be disturbed. But in vain. “I don’t need anyone.” Even Maria, the faithful nana, failed.
I quickly pulled on pants, sweater, coat. My car was parked not far from my apartment. While I avoided using it in Paris, it had become useful again since I began to travel regularly between Montmartre and Neuilly. I rushed along the roads, my stomach in knots. What could have happened to Claudio? I beg you: come quickly. Apart from our travels, he had never asked for my assistance at night. And he never begged. Should I have tried to contact David before leaving…like a madwoman?
But David was in Greece, in Athens, where he was working with a young singer. Claudio wasn’t his only client. He already called this afternoon and I had told him that all was well.
But what was awaiting me in Neuilly?
The street where Claudio lived, in a residential area, was quiet.
A man in a sheepskin coat was walking his dog by the trees, which the frost and light from the streetlamps transformed into ghosts. My fingers trembled on the key pad at the entry gate. At the end of the garden, the lights were on in the living room. I heard music. I let myself in.
Claudio was on the couch, facing the television, which was on at maximum volume. I went toward him.
“Claudio, it’s me.”
I was always afraid of frightening him.
Without turning his head, he motioned for me to sit down by his side. His hair was a mess, his face like a stormy night. He extended his hand toward the screen.
“Listen. It’s La Traviata.”
The Verdi opera, based on The Lady of the Camellias by Alexandre Dumas, filmed by Zeffirelli.
I had read the book and seen the film. Violetta, the young, beautiful courtesan, falls in love with Alfredo, the son of a good family. She renounces her dissipated life for him. They love each other madly. Alfredo’s father, believing his family is dishonored, persuades Violetta to break with Alfredo by making her believe Alfredo no longer loves her. The end is tragic: Violetta dies of tuberculosis in her lover’s arms.
“Listen,” begged Claudio, taking my hand and squeezing it until it hurt. “Listen.”
It was the end of the opera, the third and final act. Violetta in his arms, Alfredo sang. With a broken voice, Claudio sang the words in French.
Your health will improve,
You will be the light of my life,
And the future will smile upon us.
He let go of my hand.
“I’m Alfredo!” he cried. “That should have been me. The rehearsals began when the criminals killed me.”
He leaned forward. He seemed to be trying to penetrate the screen to take his rightful place, the one the criminals stole from him.
The opera is finished for me, didn’t you know? he had hurled at the journalist in Nice before slamming the door.
I hadn’t imagined the depth of his wound.
Alfredo and Violetta sang together. Tears streamed down Claudio’s face. Until then, he had known how to keep them from me, to hide them behind his anger, mask them with aggression, to be just the little boy who stomped his foot and demanded that the door be left slightly open so the light could chase away the ghosts.
The ghost of Alfredo?
Violetta sang alone. She was weakening, the end was near. I had to listen carefully to understand the words that Claudio continued to translate for me, murmuring to himself.
To die so young,
To die so close to seeing, at last, the end of my long tears.
And finally:
Tell him that I still want to live.
“Tell him that I still want to live,” Claudio repeated.
I wanted to turn off the damned television. I couldn’t; he would have killed me. It seems as though a century passed before the curtain fell on Violetta’s last words, and death freed her from her suffering:
O gioia!
“Oh joy!” Claudio repeated with a terrible laugh. “Oh joy…You hear that? Where is the joy?”
He turned off the television before hurling the remote across the room. Silence fell. He closed his eyes. He seemed exhausted. What could I do to help him, except stay here? I took his hand. He placed it on his chest and I felt the beating of his heart.
“When I sing those goddamned lieder, Alfredo is there, Alfredo the prisoner.”
Suddenly he pushed me away, got up, and turned around as though lost. Then, his hands outstretched, he walked toward the French windows, opened them and went out into the garden, into the glacial cold, barely clothed, his throat exposed.
Imagine if I lose my voice, he said one day. What would be left?
His voice: his instrument, his life.
I ran to him. Standing in the middle of the garden, his face upset, he sang again.
I loved you without knowing,
This love that is the breath
Of the entire universe.
“You who believe in love, Laura, Violetta is love,” he said. “She sacrifices everything for Alfredo. And this poor bastard, who doesn’t see anything, who waits until he loses her to understand…”
The poor bastard…
I would have laughed if I hadn’t wanted to cry. He didn’t play the role, he was the character, my brother-in-law had said.
I took his arm and, with all my strength, tried to pull him toward the house. He resisted.
“Claudio, please. Let’s go in. I beg you, you’re going to get sick.”
Get sick? It was already done. He wanted to die. Why live when he would never be Alfredo?
The phone rang in the living room. All of a sudden, his shoulders sagged. It was as though he were coming back down to earth. There was no teleph
one in La Traviata, nothing but words of love, hate, regret, despair. A wireless life, from heart to heart.
He let me guide him into the house. The ringing stopped. I quickly shut the French windows. Hélène Reigner’s voice ended her message on the answering machine.
“Call me to tell me what you thought of it. Arrivederci, caro.”
“The bitch,” Claudio said.
He reeled toward the rolling table that functioned as a bar, fumbled among the bottles and flasks, took one that he opened, filled a glass to overflowing, swallowed the alcohol in one gulp, and started again.
“Do you want some? It’s cognac.”
“No, thank you.”
He came back to me, guided by my voice.
“I’m quitting,” he decided. “I’m quitting singing. Finished. Tomorrow, you will cancel all my meetings. And make sure that David doesn’t stand in my way.”
He dropped onto the sofa. He was wearing the corduroy trousers that he wore in Auxerre when we walked together, and a sports shirt. What had David said one day? He can’t do sports anymore, but every day he climbs the Himalayas, he swims across the Channel, and no one realizes it.
Yes. Me, my love.
“Come here,” he ordered, patting the place next to him.
I obeyed. He put his empty glass on the carpet, encircled my shoulders with his arms. And his mouth searched for mine, while his hands searched for my breasts.
“No!”
My heart was racing. This time, it was not a game: he was serious. I turned my head away, pushed his hand away. He laughed.
“Why no? You don’t love me, field sparrow? You don’t desire me?”
He grabbed my hand and pressed it to his groin.
“Do you see how much I desire you? Do you feel it?”
Hot, hard, throbbing beneath my fingers. I greatly desired you some days; I wanted, beyond endurance, your arms around me, your lips on mine, you inside me. Since Auxerre, six months ago, no other man has touched me as you have. Some tried and I laughed, the same painful laugh as yours, and I said, “No thanks, I’m not available.”
Love Story Page 5
