Chapter 35
35
14 DECEMBER
I’m up early ready to furnish and decorate Library Ana?s. JP has installed a beautiful walnut bar shelf as an early Christmas present for us, which is so touching I promptly burst into messy tears, which Manon gives me the side eye for.
‘Will you stop with all the crying? What’s gotten into you?’ she admonishes.
‘These are happy tears. Look at the hotel! We achieved the dream, in such a short amount of time. Sure, it’s not perfect, but we worked with the budget we had, and it’ll do for now. It’s a million times better than it was. And better yet, it feels warm and welcoming. Like it’s always looked just this way.’
‘It really does have a good feel. I’ve had so many enquiries after we posted those updated photographs on the website and across social media yesterday. Once we get the library done, I’ll take some snaps and post those too.’
‘No bookings yet though? Isn’t that a concern if we plan to open by December eighteenth? I’d hoped by now we’d have at least one or two confirmations.’
‘Not yet. But we will. Don’t worry. I’ve been fielding calls and replying to lots of emails.’
‘OK. Let’s finish Library Ana?s.’ I give the newly painted shelves a dust while Manon carts boxes of books in and deposits them by my feet.
I shelve the books in alphabetical order while Manon makes a start on the Books of the Month table.
We’ve chosen to highlight the jazz era and all those Lost Generation authors who made Paris their home. Seems fitting when we have a selection of those novels in a few languages.
We’ve got a string of tinsel hung along the stand that features our ‘Blind date with a book’. Novels that we’ve wrapped in butchers’ paper, with a few clues about each novel and what genre they are. In the corner close to the fire is our Annotation Station. We’ve supplied pens and annotating paper sets that guests can use to make notes as they read.
‘Coming through,’ JP grunts as he carries in a ruby-red velvet chaise longue.
‘Ooh, the furniture from Palais has arrived!’ Manon and I go the lobby and I help carry in bergère chairs and the occasional tables while JP rolls in the globe that’s conveniently on wheels.
He places it in the middle of the room. ‘That’s the biggest globe I’ve ever seen.’
‘Wait,’ Manon says, and she dusts her hands on her black jeans. ‘ Voilà! ’ She opens it to reveal the bar. ‘Anais is no fun and said I can’t have it for my suite.’
‘Shall we toast this room?’ I say, feeling a well of emotion sweep through me that we’re almost at the finish line. While the library is still a mess of disorderly piles of unstacked books, it already has a warm comforting feel to it with the plush ruby-red chaise longues and gold accented marble-top tables. Also the chandelier, which we polished to a shine after replacing a few crystals that were the wrong size. But isn’t that beauty in itself – loving and carefully mending the damaged thing; hearts, chandeliers – so they can thrive in the next reincarnation proudly wearing those marks of character? In the corner, lights on our Christmas tree flash and sparkle, drawing the eye of pedestrians, who peek in the window.
When all the books are shelved and the fire is crackling in the hearth, it’s going to be an oasis for bibliophiles. There are baskets of throw rugs, and library-card stamped cushions. I can’t wait to add more to it as we go and as funds allow so our guests never forget their stay in L’H?tel Bibliothèque Secrèt.
Manon comes back with a bottle of champagne and pops the cork. ‘To new chapters!’ I say as we clink our glasses.
A few hours later, the room is complete. Books line the shelves patiently awaiting to be read. On the mantle are black and white pictures of Ana?s Nin from over the course of her life. There’s a stack of her books on a coffee table and a range of memoirs written about the woman, who was once called a provocateur. We hang Christmas stockings under the framed photos, and decorate the rest of the room, including moving the Nutcrackers to the doorway, as if they’re standing guard over the many novels on display. For now, the room is finished, but we could always use more books…
That evening, I dress warmly for the wintry weather. Mid-December brings heavier rain and high winds. Still, that’s what vin chaud is for – to warm up those cold bones.
I find Manon in Library Ana?s, writing up notecards. ‘What’s that?’ I ask.
‘Index cards. I just bought the most beautiful old library cabinet catalogue. We can squeeze it to the right of the fireplace. Let me show you a picture.’ She brings it up on her phone. It’s gorgeous, like the catalogue drawers in Bibliothèque Mazarine, only smaller. The wood is marred with thick gouges, and a couple of the drawers are bowed and twisted.
‘Wow, where on earth did you find it?’
‘Geneviève from Palais found it at another flea market and called me and asked if we wanted it.’
‘Of course, it’s gorgeous.’
‘ Oui, it cost very little because of the condition it’s in. She’s asked a friend to deliver it to us.’
‘What a find. There’s cash in my top drawer, just use whatever you need.’
‘I know where your cash is, and your diary.’
I tut. ‘And I presume you’ve read it?’
‘ Oui , I tried but it’s so boring! You and all your talk of feelings. It really is a bit much, all that lamenting.’ At least my secrets are safe. ‘So I’m making an index for the library. Although, I didn’t factor in how time consuming it would be. Won’t it be fun for guests to rifle through the catalogue drawers and search for books the old-fashioned way?’
‘It’s a book nerd’s dream. I can help later.’
‘Where are you off to?’
I wave my hand in the vague direction of outside.
Manon waits me out with a look that implies she can wait all day.
‘To the Marché de No?l Notre Dame.’
Manon claps her hands in delight. ‘Ooh, the Christmas fair! This can wait. Let me get my gloves and coat.’
‘Ah, non, non, we can go together another time.’
‘But we always… oh. You’re going out with Noah!’
I try and tamp down her excitement about me going out with a man who isn’t my ex-husband by acting completely disinterested as I rummage in my handbag for my beanie. ‘It’s not like that. It’s to discuss our findings about the author from the secret library.’
She holds up her hands in surrender. ‘OK, OK, don’t let me stop you. Go find Noah and talk about dead people.’
I roll my eyes, wave goodbye.
I tap on the window of The Lost Generation Wine Bar and Noah jogs over to open the door. ‘Come in, come in. I’ll just be a minute. I’m setting a few things up for tonight. Drink?’
‘Sure.’
He pours me a robust red wine as I take a seat at the bar before excusing himself to change into warmer clothes. I take my glass of wine and walk around the bar while it’s closed to customers, enjoying the freedom of having the place to myself to take it all in. After all, I don’t exactly remember much from my last visit, except maybe the drunken tango, and that I avoided the Christmas movie quiz Noah held the following evening because I was suffering from a bout of pure embarrassment and a hangover from hell.
There are booths along one side and bookshelves at the back that I didn’t see the night of the infamous death metal band. Like any good bookworm, the first thing I check is what’s on the shelves.
There’s an entire collection of Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Don Passos. And Oscar Wilde, whose A Picture of Dorian Gray is one of my favourite novels. Gertrude Stein, Colette, Henry Miller, Proust; all the usual suspects. I run my finger along them before crouching down by a lower shelf that has a range of more colourful spines. I gasp when I see a collection of my own novels that stand out in their absolute pinkness among the more subdued covers. I take one from the shelf. Did he just purchase these? I thumb through The Billionaire’s Runaway Wife to find it’s well loved; some pages are dog eared, others are bent as if it travelled in someone’s knapsack.
‘Sorry, I had to…’
I stand with the novel in one hand and glass of wine in the other. ‘What’s this?’
Colour creeps up his cheeks. ‘It’s your eleventh book, if I remember rightly, and it became your first global bestseller, but I could be wrong.’
‘Ah – how?’
‘I’m a fan, always have been.’
‘But you said…’
‘When you were on the phone to your agent, the day Manon had that horrific incident with the very heavy bookshelf’ – now it’s my turn to blush – ‘you said you were a romance writer, but I didn’t put two and two together and realise you were that romance writer.’
‘Your face fell though, I saw it as soon as I said I write romantic comedies.’
‘That was nothing to do with your writing.’
‘What was it then?’
‘I – I…’ He drops his gaze to the floor. ‘I felt instinctively I could very easily fall for someone like you. And then you asked if what you wrote wasn’t literary enough and glared at me so forcefully, I felt it was best to keep my trap shut for my own safety.’
‘Post-divorce me is a terrifying thing.’ He could easily fall for someone like me? Still, while it’s vague, I feel a small thrill at his confession. When I met him outside that very first day, I felt a pull to him until an alert went off in my mind, warning me to be on guard because I couldn’t suffer another upset like the one before; and men, who could trust a word they said? It was heartbreak driving the engine. Noah isn’t like that. Is he?
‘After that encounter, I had to know what you wrote. I bumped into Manon the next day at Marché Biologique Raspail and she mentioned you were the romance writer Anais De la Croix. Truthfully, I was confused. How could you be so funny on the page and so irate in real life?’
‘Here we go again.’ I roll my eyes. ‘Tell me more.’
‘I don’t dare.’
I laugh. Poor Noah. I did lash out and put him in the same category as Francois-Xavier, which was unfair and unwarranted. ‘When I met you that first time and you berated me about the mess of the broken sign, I knew you were main-character material. I wrote you as my hero many times, but sadly you suffered tragic ends. Once you were even wrapped in Christmas lights and rolled into the Seine.’ Main-character material? Why am I suddenly talking so openly with him? There’s something about Noah that makes me want to share. To be truthful.
‘Wow. I hope I was dead before I hit the water.’
I shake my head. ‘ Non. You were not.’
‘Brutal. And now… am I still suffering horrifying ends?’
‘I’m up to Chapter Twelve and you’ve made it this far, but there’s a big conflict coming and, between us, I’m concerned for you.’
‘I hope I make it.’
‘For your sake, me too.’
‘Shall we go to another Christmas market? I feel like we need to check them all out,’ he asks. ‘I could use a vin chaud , and you can tell me what hero Noah is up against.’
The market is a hive of activity with stall owners serving long queues of people. Children tug on parents’ sleeves and point to the puppet show. A live band plays jaunty music. The scent of garlic is heavy in the frigid air.
‘Ooh, escargot,’ I say, pointing to a pan of delicate little garlicky snails.
Noah screws up his nose.
‘Oh, come on,’ I say. ‘Have you actually tried them?’ Escargots are a delicacy in France and, if you can separate the fact they’re snails, you’ll enjoy a buttery garlicky taste explosion.
‘ Non, and I will not.’ Serious-faced Noah is back, standing ramrod straight as if ready for flight, like I’m going to force-feed him snails or something.
‘You’re missing out, Noah. Really.’
He shudders. ‘I’ll take your word for it, but isn’t Christmas at the Paris markets all about the potatoes?’
I laugh and lace an arm through his as we wander slowly around. ‘ Oui , markets like these were originally a German tradition, which then spread to Paris. Now we get the best of both worlds, German and French food.’
At a stall with a smaller line, Noah orders a plate of Tartiflette , which is similar to a potato bake but elevated by the use of reblochon cheese and salty crispy lardons. From the stall next door I order Choucroute , an Alsatian dish, and am given a plate heaped with sausages, meat, sauerkraut and boiled potatoes.
We find a table. ‘ Vin chaud ?’ Noah asks with a smile.
He soon returns with two aromatic glasses of mulled wine.
‘Sit here,’ I say and pat the bench seat next to me, ‘so we can share our food.’
We eat in companionable silence, delighting in the rich dishes, as part of me wishes Christmas lasted all year.
‘Try this,’ Noah says, lifting a fork with cheesy potato goodness to my mouth. ‘Good, isn’t it?’
He’s a whisper away from me, and it’s all I can do to think as the man feeds me and takes great care doing it, as though his only concern is my enjoyment. What is this? I’m not used to a man who is so kind and considerate. Eventually, I manage, ‘ Oui , it’s delicious. Try mine.’ I don’t go so far as to feed the man from my fork because my pulse is racing, and it feels so intimate. My thoughts turn to mush as his leg brushes against mine. I’d forgotten what this felt like, being fuzzy with the hopes of what might be.
I close my eyes, willing myself to get back on track. Make a joke about snails again; something, anything. Noah surveys me as if the mild panic I feel is evident on my face.
‘We should, uh, go,’ I say. ‘Have you tried Galette des Rois ? The king’s cake?’ I don’t give him time to answer. I’m out of my seat and edging away. ‘It’s feuilleté pastry layers filled with frangipane and citron. It’s a tradition to serve it January sixth to celebrate the Feast of the Epiphany…’ I’m rambling, and worse, I’m rambling about a cake, for crying out loud. A very nice traditional Christmastime cake, but still.
‘Anais.’
‘Usually there’s a fève hidden in the layers and whoever finds it is celebrated as the king or queen for the day. And, one year, Manon swallowed it and she…’
Noah laughs. ‘Is this how I am when I’m prattling about authors to you?’
My jitteriness soon evaporates as I make sense of what he means. Is Noah just as anxious and unsure as me, so he fills those awkward moments with inane chatter that I’ve put down to him being some sort of literary grandstander? An egotistical maniac? But, really, it’s his nervousness around me?
I swipe a lock of hair back at the same time Noah steps forward, and manage to elbow him straight in the face. ‘ Mon Dieu! Sorry, Noah.’ My cheeks flame. How am I so bad at this?
He rubs a spot on his forehead. ‘I’m fine. But, for safety’s sake, would it be all right if I put my arm around you as we walk?’
I bite my lip before saying, ‘You’d better. These elbows have got a mind of their own. But first—’ I step forward and grab the collar of his jacket to pull him close. I gaze into his eyes and see the same desire reflected back. Kiss him! My body vibrates with longing. I close my eyes as I?—
‘Anais! Bonsoir! ’
My eyes snap open and I jump back from Noah. ‘Père No?l ? ’ I try to shake the muddle from my mind.
‘It’s me, Timothee, under all this padding.’ He slaps his oversized belly. What unfortunate timing!
I cough, clearing my throat as I’m sling-shotted back to reality. ‘Ooh, of course, Timothee. How’s the new job going?’
‘It’s hectic. Kids are the worst . Zac has it much harder being stuck in the photo booth where they rip his beard off or scream in his ear. But the stall owners give us plenty to eat, so it’s not so bad.’
I laugh, thinking of these twentysomething backpackers who probably have no real experience with children and are having to play the part of Father Christmas for hours on end every day.
A spotty-faced teenager rushes by and yanks Timothee’s red velvet cap off before letting out an evil cackle and making a run for it. ‘ Give that back!’ Timothee yells. ‘Guess that’s my cue to leave!’ He chases after the teen, his white curly wig flapping in the wind behind him.
‘I don’t know,’ Noah says, ‘Something tells me he’s not the real Santa.’
I laugh. ‘I think you might be right.’
The earlier spell is broken, so I clasp his hand and lead him away from the chaos of the market, my lips tingling at the almost kiss.