Chapter 8 #2
‘What me? Oh nothing really, just enjoying the place.’
‘N’importe quoi – or should I say whatever, ma belle, you’ve spotted someone. Like a lioness and her prey. Allez, tell me who it is,’ she insisted.
I felt like a schoolgirl again, pointing out the guy I liked.
‘Ah, yes I see, il est mignon, non? He’s cute. Why don’t you go over and talk to him?’ she suggested, just like that.
‘What? I wouldn’t know what to say!’ She might as well have asked me to take all my clothes off then and there. It was unthinkable.
Nicole rolled her eyes in that impatient manner she had with dilly-dalliers.
‘You don’t have to say anything. Just walk by on your way to the restroom and give him the look,’ she replied.
‘The look?’
‘The look, you know, the look that says, “Come and get me.”’ She laughed, before pouting seductively.
I thought about it for a second; I mean, here I was, starting a new life, and things were actually beginning to fall into place for me.
I felt good about myself, my hair was coiffed, my red lipstick was on, what did I have to lose?
Besides, sitting around and waiting for the man to come to me seemed ridiculously old-fashioned, even for me.
‘Right, I’ll do it!’ I announced, knocking back the rest of my cocktail, which unfortunately went down the wrong way, inducing a temporary coughing fit.
‘Allez, come on, you’re fine,’ Nicole soothed, giving me a napkin. ‘Just walk over there and be hot!’
‘Will do!’
I shimmied my way through the maze of tables, trying to seem as though shimmying was my natural state.
As I was about to pass by the bar, my target’s features had returned to those of a brooding grizzly bear, so I aborted the entire operation and took a swinging right turn towards the gents.
Backtracking along the blue velvet drapes at the rear of the club, I managed to edge my way along to the ladies and dived into a cubicle.
My heart was racing, as though I had just cheated death.
‘So much for being hot,’ I whispered to myself, hoping no one had witnessed yet another one of my most embarrassing moments. After a couple of minutes I opened the cubicle door and stood at the sink.
‘Oh, well, maybe next time,’ I muttered half-heartedly before reapplying my lipstick.
I would just have to resign myself to the fact that I would never be a movie siren, just plain old Edith.
I walked back into the club, which at this stage was really humming with smooth jazz and hard liquor.
I gave a sideways glance at the bar and, to my disappointment, I noticed that ol’ blue eyes had left his seat.
I knew it shouldn’t really matter. I mean, I didn’t even know the guy and the chances of him already having already met someone with an ounce of confidence were disappointingly high.
But I felt my heart sink a little at not getting to find out.
People had taken to dancing wherever they happened to be and I almost ended up in something of a ménage à trois in an effort to get past a couple lost in a slow dance.
So I didn’t even notice when I returned to my seat that Nicole was now chatting animatedly to a man in a grey suit.
When he looked up into my face and gave me an ever-so-cool nod of recognition, my heart actually stopped for a second, as did everything else in the room.
‘Ah, Edith, I would like you to meet Hugo Chadwick. Hugo, this is my friend, Edith, from Ireland.’ Nicole did the honours without the faintest trace of guile in her wide, innocent eyes.
I instinctively went to shake his hand, forgetting all about the obligatory kisses, whereas he stood to embrace me appropriately or ‘faire la bise’. This miscommunication meant that I had embarrassingly greeted his groin while he lightly kissed me on my temple as I bent forward.
‘Enchanté,’ he said, kindly overlooking my faux pas. I couldn’t remember anyone in my life ever having been genuinely enchanted to meet me. His deep, sultry voice reverberated in my ears and sent ripples along my skin. As we all sat around the table again, an awkward silence descended.
‘Hugo has just arrived from London.’ Nicole spoke to me as though speaking to a child unwilling to take advantage of an opportunity that had dropped neatly in her lap. Her widening stare provoked me into action and I grabbed the lifeline with both hands.
‘Oh, you’re not French, then? I thought with a name like Hugo…’ I trailed off, aware that my voice sounded remarkably nothing like me.
‘Half and half. My mother is French and my father is English,’ he replied, still with that serious look that made it difficult to decipher whether he liked you or was simply tolerating you.
‘C’est comme Johnny et moi!’ Nicole interrupted, then realised that neither of us were really listening and so excused herself to move closer to the stage.
I was ridiculously nervous and my heart began to thump in double-quick time. Here was this attractive, intelligent, cosmopolitan guy and I couldn’t think of the first thing to say. Do you come here often swam around my head a few times before I formed a less clichéd question.
‘What brings you to Compiègne?’ Well done, Edie, I thought, that almost sounded like something a normal person would say.
‘Oh, this and that,’ he said with a non-committal shrug, but to my delight, he moved to Nicole’s chair to sit closer to me. I took a large gulp of my Mai Tai.
‘Do you like jazz?’ he countered.
Before I could even answer, he began shaking his head, as though he’d said something wrong.
‘Sorry, I’m a bit out of practice.’
I couldn’t believe it. He seemed nervous, which oddly put me more at ease.
‘Actually, I love jazz,’ I said. ‘I grew up listening to all of the old standards, so this place is like heaven for me.’
His features brightened a little.
‘Oh, good, because my French side was thinking of asking you to dance.’
‘What was your English side thinking?’
Oh, my God. I was actually flirting. Where had that come from? He gave me a sidelong glance and it felt as though his mind grazed lightly on my figure.
‘Now that would be telling,’ he said playfully, before taking a sip of his drink.
I giggled, yes, giggled like a foolish teenager and pretended to look at something very interesting on the dancefloor.
‘Well,’ he said, leaning closer to my ear. ‘Do you want to dance?’
‘What, here?’
‘Well, preferably on the dancefloor, I think that’s what they generally had in mind when they set the tables up around it.’
I burst out laughing. His deadpan delivery was very disarming.
‘Are we doing this?’ he asked, standing up and offering me his hand.
Was I, Edith Lane, about to dance with this gorgeous guy?
It felt as though there was some kind of catch.
But watching him standing there, waiting for me to place my hand in his, I suddenly felt like all of my Christmases had come at once and maybe, just maybe, this was how life could be if you just said yes.