Though I couldn’t.
I broke my race at the priory, leaning against a tree to breathe. The visitor’s center was miraculously open, so I dashed inside, glad for the respite from the sun’s scorching rays.
My eyes darted across the tiny room. So much for a visitor’s center: it only had tables and benches, empty hooks on the walls.
So back outside I went, instead slipping into the small chapel. Tiny colorful stained-glass windows let the light trickle in on ancient stone, four people spread out in the room praying or simply sitting in silence. Astonishingly, on one of the walls, a tiny glass shadowbox displayed a hat and two shirts for purchase.
Ok, so not here either.
I found myself outside again, turning on the spot, lost. For a tiny priory, this place was a maze.
“Pardon, parlez-vous Anglais?” I asked, reaching for a man in one of the shirts I had just seen inside, “Do you speak English?”
“A little bit,” he said, “can I help you?”
“Do you work here?”
“I am bénévole. How you say, Volunteer?” He replied.
“When did they renovate the cross?”
“The cross? About… 2004?”
Crap.
“When they did, did they find anything… strange?” I urged, “like, a letter? A hidden letter?”
“A hidden letter?” he scratched his head. “Non.”
“Are you sure? Please, it means a lot to me. I’m looking for a very special letter.”
“I think… come with me.”
He led me to the exit of the priory, as if we were going to climb to the cross again, but instead turned a key in the wall and opened an old-fashioned iron gate. Inside, the ancient hallway was recently refurbished, with bright LEDs and panels on the wall. A dark door waited at the end of the tunnel.
Ok, so he was either going to open a portal to another realm or murder me. I didn’t see anything in between.
But I was wrong, again. A small glass box waited under one of the banners, containing what looked like knick-knacks found during the refurbishment. An old coin. A fancy knife. A letter.
A letter.
“Oh,” my jaw dropped.
“Is yours?”
I pulled the other letters from my bag, nodding.
“I sure hope so.”
He took a key off his belt and unlocked the small glass box, reverently. He extracted the letter: this time it was in an envelope, the word Amour printed on the front in a wide and elegant hand. Not something I would see dad writing, but beautiful.
I opened it, recognizing at once that beautiful typewriter script. And I fell into the words my father had left for you, seventeen years ago, the treasure at the end of the hunt.
Mon Amour,
You did it, darling, you found all my clues! Now you’re here, standing at the top of the world, a cross above you and, if I timed it right, with me standing right behind you.
Surprise!
I want you to keep reading, though. I think if I was to try and tell you all this, I would start sobbing and would not be able to stop. I have so much to tell you and it’s hard to put them into words. Writing this letter gave me time to think them over, so I think it will the best way to tell you everything I feel.
When we kissed in the cave in Cassis, my heart didn’t stop. I didn’t feel electricity or heart or anything the romance novels said. Instead, I felt calm. For the first time in my life, I was truly calm. Kissing you felt like coming home.
I think we both knew from that moment that this was special. I had dated others before, and so had you, but that was somehow different, light years behind us. It sounds cheesy, but finding you was like finding another part of myself that I didn’t know I was missing, and now I cannot ever live without.
When we got stuck in Les Baux and waited for hours to get a ride back, I wasn’t scared. Being lost with you wasn’t a harrowing experience. I knew it was going to work out, and it did. All the while you held my hand, running your thumb over the skin for hours until it was almost raw, but I didn’t want you to ever let go.
I remember thinking about that rude man from the car, who was so insulted by the fact I was speaking English, and how I wasn’t offended by that, but by the fact he thought I was an American. Isn’t that odd? I so desperately wanted to fit into this country, that failing to do so broke my heart. I wanted to tell him I was hopelessly in love with France I even fell for a Frenchman, and that this land nursed me back to life when I thought there was nothing of me left to restore.
Ok, he was a total jerk, though. I know he had no idea we knew more about French culture and symbolism than he ever would. Maybe I’m exaggerating, but that hurt, dammit.
You were there to comfort me, guide me. I came to France lost and broken and you helped me find the pieces of me in every little place we visited. You helped build me back together by showing me new sides of myself I had never known.
I found another piece in Arles, when we fought at the theatre. Sure, that’s one of my worst memories of our time together so far. But that day I found my voice again, and used it to say no. No. Such a beautiful, powerful word. I found it hidden between the marble blocks and the grandstands filled with ghosts. I gave it to you. You listened.
I had missed having my voice heard.
I found more pieces of me everywhere we went. Under the eaves of the conservatory, I found my laugh. Under this cross on St Victoire, I found my strength.
All I know is that I feel whole again. When you met me, you only saw a part of me, missing chunks of who I am. So I understand if now you don’t want the full me. You don’t want the girl who was hurt and ran away from her problems rather than face them head on.
This letter brings you bad news. We both knew our relationship had an expiration date. We both knew when term ended my visa would expire and I would have to go back home. And I am. I am going back home. The tickets are booked and my dissertation has been handed in.
But I am coming back.
I’m not going to stay long over there. Just long enough to face Josh and make him apologize for shattering me. To use the voice I found again and that beautiful ‘No’. I don’t know what I’m going to do, but he’s going to face retribution.
You’re probably wondering what this letter is, now. Is it a break up letter? Oh, hell no. Quite the opposite. Mon Amour, there’s nothing that could ever make me want to leave you. Which is why my gift to you is stapled to the next page. I’m going to give you a second to look. I’ll wait.
Surprise! I got you tickets! I left the dates blank so that you can come and go whenever you want. I don’t want you to feel obligated to come with me when I face Josh. I’m strong enough to handle that on my own, though having you there will make me happy to no end. But you showed me your world, and I want to show you mine - before I pack up and join you here.
I have accepted a job at the university. It’s small, but it was enough on paper for me to apply for a work visa. The fact I got my masters here certainly helped my application. So when I get back, fully and entirely me, I’ll be ready. Ready for what? I don’t know.
Ready for us, maybe. If that’s what you want too.
Your mother hates me, I know. She thinks I’m using you. I’m just another American girl coming to France to find my destiny. To settle down with a good French boy and, I don’t know, tend a vineyard or something? What is it that those girls in movies end up doing? Or maybe she thinks I’m stealing you back to America with me, in which case she probably wouldn’t be too happy with the tickets I just got you.
Which is why I bought her tickets, too.
I know, it’s probably not the smartest move. I mean, it seems a little counter-intuitive to invite a woman who thinks globalization is diluting the cultural heritage of her country to come to America. But I figure, it’s the gesture that counts. France was willing to accept me at my worst, and I have done everything I can to embrace that culture, to build it up.
When that man yelled
at us in the car - and all those other strangers who yelled at us in the street for our language choice - I felt like an outsider finally found out. I wanted to shed my American nature like a skin and just be French. But that’s not humanly possible. Part of me will always be American, and I want her to meet that part. She might not accept it, but it’s not going away.
I want her to understand that I don’t want to make you an American. And you don’t want to make me French. Together we’re two different cultures building each other up. I know that scares her, and she sees that as eroding her heritage, but it’s that heritage that drew me here in the first place. I don’t want to hurt it. It’s the last thing I want to do.
I’m rambling now, aren’t I? I guess what I’m trying to say is that I’m ready to build a future with you. My gift to you, the treasure at the end of this hunt, is an invitation. An invitation to see where I’m from, and an invitation to see where we can go.
What do you say?
Love you, Always,
Ta chérie
You wrote the letters.
I would have dropped this one, I had been shaking so much, but my fingers were clutching it so hard it would have been impossible to pry from my dead body. This entire hunt hadn’t been for you, but from you. Dad hadn’t set this up to show you the country he loved, but you had created this to show him how much you loved his country.
How much you loved Provence.
“Alors?” asked the volunteer, “Is good?”
“Yes,” I said, wiping my tears on my sweaty wrist, “yes, it is. Everything is going to be fine now.”
Valentin was waiting at the bus stop when I arrived, sitting on his old red bicycle. It looked about as ancient as the priory I had just come from: half of the paint was covered in mud, the handlebars grey from years of sun damage and dust.
“Salut,” I said, unable to resist smiling as I saw him there. “What are you doing here?”
“You crazy American,” he chided, “biking all the way here.”
“Well, what would you have done?”
“Probably stayed home.”
“Then you wouldn’t have found this,” I replied.
It would have been much more dramatic if I had just whipped the letter out of my bag right then, but after twenty years, I was terrified of ripping it. Instead, I tapped on my backpack. It was enough for Valentin’s eyes to bulge.
“I cannot believe you found it,” he stammered.
“You see? This is what happens when you actually climb your mountains.”
“Oh, I believe you, you know.”
Before I knew what I was doing, I had wrapped my hands around his neck, and pressed my lips against his. He melted into me, his hand slipping through my hair to cup my face to his, and I found myself slipping into the comfortable smile that came when you were with someone who made your broken heart beat.
But the broken heart wasn’t broken anymore. Just like you, the pieces that had shattered were together again, filled bit by bit by the country around me.
I felt whole again. Whole again, and happy. Whole plus whatever it was that I was feeling for this silly French boy, this cute face that was kissing mine.
When we finally pulled away, it was only because we were out of breath. That, and the sun was still hot at this time of day. I freed the bike from the rack and mounted it, following Valentin on the road back to the home of my Mamie.
“So, what was the treasure?” he asked, “ Was it a poem?”
“You and your poems,” I chided, “it was better. The letters were from Mom, this whole time.”
So I told him about the tickets you had bought for dad and Mamie to come to see your home, and the job you were taking to stay in Provence. I told him how much it must have hurt, knowing neither dad nor Mamie had seen this gesture before you ran from here.
“I read Mamie’s book, La fin du printemps?” I added, “but it doesn’t make sense. She makes it sound like my mother stole me away from one day to the next. But when she went on her rant, it sounded more like she was the one to kick dad out.”
“Maybe she regrets?”
“If she ever did, then why didn’t she try to talk to dad before now?” I shook my head. “It makes no sense.”
“This sounds like a movie,” Valentin added, “where everyone has their side of the story, but no one talks to each other so they never know the whole picture.”
We pedaled up the gravel driveway, ditching the bikes near the empty fountain. I took deep breaths, trying to steady myself, but the closer I got to the house, to more difficult it was to keep my head on right.
“Pas de panique,” said Valentin, “It’s going to go fine.”
I nodded. He was right: things could not get any worse between me and Mamie. Whatever I would risk today would make it either all go away, or I would never have to see her again.
“I’ll text you,” I said to him.
“If you need me, you can find me,” he replied, leaning over to exchange a last kiss for the night. It was enough to make my chest all fluttery again, and for a second I was flying instead of anxious about my grandmother. Then it was over and he was pedaling away, and I had to face this dragon alone.
I opened the kitchen door. Mamie sat at the table polishing off a meal of meatballs and a glass of red wine. She looked up as I entered, inclining her head slightly.
“Bonsoir, Jammy.” Good evening, all prim and proper. If this were England, I would imagine I was in Downton Abbey.
“Bonsoir, Mamie.”
“Tu rentres tard,” she said. You’re getting home late. I found myself blushing red.
“Mamie,” I said, “We have to talk.”
“A propos de ton copain?”
“Non, not about Valentin,” I replied, “A propos de toi. And me. And dad. And mom.”
I pulled my bag onto my lap and pulled out the letters, stacking them from beginning to end, and handed them to her. She pushed her plate to the side and picked them up.
“Qu’est-ce que c’est?”
“Read them,” I urged. “I read your book. Your end of spring. Now you read these. Then, we talk.”
“I do not read English.”
“Yes, you do.”
I would have sat there at the table, watching her read, but there was something about the letters that just needed to be absorbed alone. I didn’t tell her you wrote them: that would be for her to find out on her own, just like I had.
I waited in the living room, turning on the old lights for the first time since I had been there. The room looked smaller now, and in even more disarray. There was a chaotic emptiness about it, like it was underfilled, yet nothing was in its place.
When Mamie eventually emerged, she said nothing. She walked straight to me, wrapping her arms around me, tight, and sobbed into my neck. I joined her, our tears mingling, mourning the years we had never had together.
“I am sorry,” she said, articulating every syllable, “I am sorry, I didn’t know.”
I wanted to be mad at her. I wanted to yell and scream and kick and fight. I wanted her to feel the pain that came from this distance, the pain of believing you were the reason your world was so broken.
But she already knew that pain. She had inflicted it upon herself.
“Valentin said that we are like a movie,” I suggested, sitting down with her on the couch. She reached for a drawer, extracting a massive box of tissues. The two of us partook of a good cry like one would share a bottle of wine. “That none of this would have happened, if we had just… talked.”
“It is not easy,” she replied, “as we do not have the same language.”
“Then we learn. We learn how to speak to each other. We learn how to communicate so we can understand. It doesn’t matter the language. You and dad spent my entire lifetime not talking, and you both speak French. It’s not a question of language. It’s a question of will.”
“All these years, I could not call. I knew I could not fix what I had broken, but your father
did not call either.”
“Then have the courage to take the first step. Someone has to, or this will go on for the rest of your lives.”
She nodded, slowly, her gaze distant. I could not forgive this woman what she had done, but I could listen.
“You need to stop clinging to the past,” I urged her, “It’s what’s keeping you from living your present. It’s what’s locking you in your tower. It’s what’s keeping you from telling Jean-Pascal how you feel. Or your son that you’re sorry.”
“I am so… ashamed. I thought your mother wanted to steal my culture. I didn’t realize she wanted to learn from it.”
“Will you talk to her now?” I asked. No, begged. The urge to shout at her was hard to suppress. “I can phone her, right now.”
“No.”
My newly healed heart went cold. But her hand reached for mine, squeezing it gently.
“After seventeen years, I must do better. Be better. Are the tickets…” she paused, pursing her lips. “I need to make a phone call.”
The tickets you had left for Dad had, of course, expired. But that wasn’t a problem for bestselling author Colette Martin, which meant Mamie and I were soaring over the Atlantic before the next day was out.
And eight hours in a tin can with her? Much more fun than the flight over, alone. Without the wall between us, Mamie was one of the most brilliant people I had ever spoken to. When I asked about the only book of hers I had ever read, she refused to comment on the ending.
“The ending belongs to the reader,” she said, “but if I open your mother’s door and see me standing there, I will still die of shock.”
I didn’t quite want her to die, especially not after I had just met her. The real her, this time: not the woman who isolated herself from me, from us, out of fear of herself, or making this worse, but the woman who rolled French and English words into one, making a sentences I could somehow understand though only half the words were ones that I knew.
The only setback to our little plan was customs, though I helped her fill out the ESTA quickly. Spontaneous visas to the USA did not come cheap, but she didn’t grumble.
Aix Marks the Spot Page 24
