Chapter 9
9
On my second night in Saint-Tropez, Mrs. Wilder declared that Faye and Pippa really wanted to take me for dinner at their favorite place, Bar Sube, and show me around the port. I was wary of the plan—clearly her idea and not Faye’s—but still I found myself in a smooth black SUV, Faye at the wheel, Pippa in the back chirping comments up to us.
“Sorry you’re saddled with me tonight,” I said to Faye, trying to strike the right note of irony. “I’m sure you’ve better things to do than take me around.”
She shrugged. “Things are quiet this time of year, most of my friends aren’t back for the holidays yet.”
“Well, I appreciate the tour. I’m hoping I can find my way around a little, soon, the buses and all that, so you all don’t have to babysit me.”
Faye grinned, her neat white teeth showing. “We don’t even babysit this one,” she said, tipping her head to the backseat.
The pretty port town was closing in on us, denser and tighter along the narrowing streets. I tried to take it all in so I could describe it perfectly in my journal later. Strings of lantern lights hung over the water, crisscrossed over the cobblestones, stretched between café awnings and trees and lampposts. Boats and glowing yachts bobbed right along the sidewalk.
Faye swung the car abruptly into a parking spot and tugged up the brake. “Let’s go,” she said, door already open. “I’m starving.”
I followed her: across the cobbles, through a hotel, up a grand interior staircase, and into a dimly lit bar. Bar Sube. Tables lined the walls, every piece of furniture in varying shades of silky leather: tan, mahogany, chocolate. The hostess welcomed Faye and Pippa by name, and then led us without hesitation to the nicest table, overlooking the port.
“Don’t sit there,” Faye said, nudging Pippa from the chair she’d reached for. “Give Anna the seat with the view.”
“Oh, I don’t care,” I said, but then Pippa made a show of pulling out the chair for me like a gentleman, and I sank into it, giggling.
When the waiter came by, I expected menus, but Faye ordered for all of us in rapid French: a few dishes and a bottle of rosé—just two glasses, please. Pippa huffed and ordered a spritzer of some kind.
“It’s tapas here,” Faye said when he’d left us. “So I got us a bit of all the good ones. We can get more plates later, if you want.”
A long shadow fell over us. I assumed it was the waiter bringing wine, but Faye leapt from her seat.
“You’re here,” she said, throwing her arms around a tall, handsome man in a dove-gray button-down shirt. “When did you get in? Theo said you weren’t coming for two more weeks?”
He was as beautiful as she was: that same easy grace, the born-with-it good looks. I could see others in the restaurant turning back to their meals after watching him walk by, because they couldn’t not look.
“I was supposed to be with my aunt and uncle in Lisbon, but they decided to go to my cousin’s in the country,” he answered. “So here I am.”
When Faye released him, he took a step back, and his eyes fell to Pippa and me. Some flutter of recognition crossed his face. Presumably for Pippa, since there was no way I’d have met a man like this, from Faye’s set.
“We’ve only just sat down,” Faye said. “Pull that chair over.”
He tipped his head to us, apologetic. “Oh no, I don’t want to interrupt. I was just going to sit at the bar.”
But Faye insisted, and Pippa and I made space for him between us. Who wouldn’t make space for him? He looked to be my age, with thick, silky, coffee-colored hair, long enough to fall across his forehead as he bent over the chair. He had delicate features, almost feminine in their perfection: dark eyes, long lashes, smooth cheeks and sharp cheekbones. A jawline any man would kill for.
“Pippa, I’ll bet you don’t even remember me,” he said, turning in his seat.
“Let’s see—Carl? Calvin?” she said, teasing, pretending to rack her brains. “Sorry, I’m shit with names.”
He laughed, a genuine laugh but also a generous one, encouraging. “I guess I didn’t make that much of an impression.”
“Anna, this is Callum,” Faye said finally, leaning back in her chair. “He’s a friend from London. A lot of old school friends end up here, for the holidays.”
Callum reached a hand across the small table and shook mine briefly. “Nice to meet you, Anna,” he said. My hand looked white in his, which was much tanner. I would’ve guessed that he was Spanish, or maybe Italian. His accent was British.
“Callum—isn’t that an Irish name?” I said, eager to hold his attention. “My father’s side of the family is Irish.”
“Scottish, actually, in my case,” he said. “On my mother’s side. But most of my family is Portuguese.” Of course—he’d said as much when he arrived, family in Lisbon. I was already making an ass of myself, just trying to talk to him.
“You’re visiting from London?” he asked politely. “What part?”
“But she’s American, can’t you tell?” Faye cut in. “From the States originally. She’s here for the month, to tutor Pippa.” And now he knew the score: that I was the tutor, living on wits alone.
Pippa scowled at Faye. “It’s not like I’m remedial. The tutoring’s for the SAT tests, so I can go to uni in New York.”
Callum nodded and smiled. “The American fascination with test-taking, I’m familiar.”
“I’m just here to make sure she has everything she needs to do well. The material itself isn’t a problem for her.” I nodded at Pippa, hoping I’d helped.
Callum tipped his head to the side, his dark eyes regarding me curiously. “Isn’t it more important to know the material than to know how to regurgitate it on a test?” A little smile drew my eyes to his lips.
I returned the smile. “Isn’t being able to present and communicate your knowledge just as important as the knowledge itself?”
“Ignore him,” Faye said, waving her hand. “We all do. Thinks he’s our resident intellectual, just because he’s doing a law degree.” Callum made a face at her, and she made it back. Like they were siblings, cousins, old classmates. It didn’t seem romantic, but still I felt a thin throb of envy.
“But you won’t impress Anna with your law degree,” Faye said to Callum. “She’s already in a master’s program.”
“What is it you’re studying?” he asked.
“Anna loves books,” Pippa said to him, like she was telling him I kept pet rocks and he should be nice about it. “Always banging on about them.”
“So it’s a literature program?” Callum said, pronouncing the word like my classmates did, sharp T ’s and only three syllables: lit-tra-ture. I was used to the accent, of course, but coming out of his mouth, it was distractingly charming. I wanted him to talk to me all night.
“Yes, I’m at Queen Mary. What about you?”
But then the bottle of rosé arrived, sweating in a tall silver cylinder, and Callum turned away to ask the waiter if he might bring us one more glass.
Faye put one long-stemmed glass in my hand and filled it. She said something about the vineyard, the year, to Callum, and I mentally excused myself from a conversation I could add nothing to. I settled back into my armchair and looked out over the terrace. Behind the mountains that ringed the bay, the sun was setting. The horizon flushed gold and orange, the dark descending from above like a heavy theater curtain. “Happy” was not quite the right word—that required a level of ease I did not feel. It all seemed unreal, immaculate. The wine in my mouth was cold and light.
“It’s so pale,” I said when Faye topped off my glass. “Almost clear.”
She smirked. “The best rosé is. More dry and delicate.”
“Oh, please don’t get her started.” Pippa flopped dramatically back into her seat. “I’ve had enough lessons for today.”
Callum grinned at this. The wine glowed in my empty stomach, and I wanted to touch his bottom lip, just lightly, with the tip of my finger.
“This won’t be on the test,” I said to Pippa in my strict-teacher voice. Turning to Faye with my glass, I said, “I assume it’s French?”
Faye smiled, pleased with my curiosity. She seemed less on guard, less catlike and smug than yesterday by the pool. “It’s local wine,” she said, leaning forward. “Provence is the home of rosé. Drive an hour inland—the vineyards there make better wine than you’ve ever tasted.”
“I haven’t tasted much,” I said. “And what I have hasn’t been great.”
“Well, you’re American. That can’t be helped,” Faye said, waving a hand at me. “Americans have no real sense of wine.”
“No real taste at all, really,” I said, nodding. “We only recently started walking upright.”
Callum laughed out loud, and Faye put a hand to her mouth, holding in a smile until she could swallow her sip.
Pippa, still slumped back in her chair, was watching her sister carefully: taking in her looseness, the growing good mood. It looked like she was doing some mental calculations.
“Can I have a little wine?” Pippa held out the glass her drink had come in. “Please?”
Faye weighed this, her hands settled on the wide arms of the chair. “Fine, but just a little,” she said at last. “You know Mum doesn’t like it.”
“All the French kids drink, even younger than me,” Pippa said.
Faye tipped an inch of wine into her glass. “We’re not French, are we? You should have to sneak and beg like we all had to.” She nodded toward Callum, who smiled and shook his head.
It was hard to imagine that either of them had ever had to sneak or beg for anything. They were just that sort of people. Everything would open for them—doors, bottles, bodies, velvet ropes, and top schools.
“What do you think of Saint-Tropez, Anna?” Callum asked, while Pippa teased Faye for a heavier pour.
“Oh, this is about all I’ve seen of it,” I said, gesturing around the restaurant. “I only got in yesterday.”
“Did you fly into Nice? Or Toulon-Hyères?”
“Toulon,” I said. Absolutely no chance I was going to pronounce the second part right. “The drive through the mountains was spectacular. The traffic at the end, less so.”
Callum nodded. “Oh, that was nothing. You should see it in the summer. Total gridlock. And all the old money blue bloods flying over you in their helicopters.”
“Next time I’m definitely coming by superyacht,” I said. Was he not an old money blue blood himself, then? He certainly looked the part. There were always shades of British class snobbery that I missed, as an American, but still—it was impossible to imagine any set that wouldn’t want Callum in it.
The waiter arrived, fanning out pretty plates over the tabletop. We had seven dishes to share. When Andre and I ate together, he always teased me for my American cutlery habits, and I shrugged and changed nothing. But here, I mimicked the others: I switched the fork to my left hand, tines pointed politely down, not up (Andre called tines up “the American shovel”). I kept the knife in my right, cutting and then loading the fork, nudging food onto the tines. I hoped it looked natural, but it felt ridiculous.
The food was unbelievable, of course. Fingerling potatoes smashed flat and crisped in goose fat, chorizo in a cast-iron skillet (delivered to the table still in flames), whipped ricotta drizzled with honey and pistachios, discs of pink salmon on crostini sprinkled with dill, tiny hand-folded pies with lamb and rosemary inside. It tasted so good, they were lucky I used cutlery at all.
All of us seemed to be loosening slightly—from the food or the wine, I didn’t know. Callum managed some sarcastic banter with Pippa—the queen of that kingdom—and then asked more sincerely about her university plans, her favorite subjects at school. He had questions for me as well, about my time in London, my course at Queen Mary. He seemed genuinely curious—not just polite—and warm. Warmer than Faye, though that wasn’t hard.
After the plates were cleared, a man in all black came to our table and talked with Faye in a mix of French and English, asking about the food, asking after her mother. He said a familiar hello to Pippa in English, with a hope that her schooling was going well, and nodded politely to Callum and me. They all talked on—about the food, the weather, the wine—and I leaned back in my chair. I was happy to stay quiet. It seemed that if I opened my mouth, I might say too much, say something silly, like how I felt—unlocked by the pale wine and the open possibility of this beautiful night continuing on, and all the beautiful nights after, also possible and open.
But then the man turned to me and introduced himself: Guillaume. He hoped my stay in Saint-Tropez would be enjoyable, and that I would come to eat many more times. I only realized that he must be the owner after he’d left the table.
He returned a few minutes later with a plate of oysters, a dozen, three for each of us. The freshest, he said, perfect, only just in and magnifique , exquisite. His treat, we must try. He waited.
I tried desperately to catch Pippa’s eye for help. She would know that I’d never had an oyster, just as I’d never had dates or figs before her suite at the Savoy. It had been one thing in front of her; I didn’t think Faye would be so kind about my ignorance. No doubt it would amuse her greatly. And I certainly didn’t want Callum to see it, or the restaurant owner, or anyone else in this elegant place.
But Pippa was focused on Faye, who was talking with Guillaume about their plans for the New Year’s party. Apparently he knew the caterer, or was the caterer, or had once been the caterer—I couldn’t follow it. And then the tray was being held out to me, and I had to take my oyster. I held it clumsily in my fingers, cheeks already reddening. I would look like a fool in front of all of them.
Under the table, I felt something cold against my other hand and turned to see Callum with a secretive smile. The metallic touch came again, and I closed my fingers around the tiny fork he held out for me. I hadn’t seen them on the tray.
While Faye and Pippa talked with the owner, Callum angled himself so I could watch his subtle, secret demonstration: squeezing a wedge of lemon over the shell, then gently prodding with the tiny fork to loosen the oyster, tipping the shell back, slipping the oyster whole into his open mouth. A moment to chew and savor, and then swallow. It was kind of him to do this for me, of course, but also surprisingly intimate—these movements performed just for me, for my eyes—and I wondered if he could feel my eyes on him, the way I could still feel his warm fingers putting the cold fork in my hand. He set the empty shell back in its cradle of ice on the tray, upside down, and nodded at me, the smallest encouragement.
I took a deep breath and had only just swallowed my first oyster—shocking, creamy, cold—when the owner turned to me, eager for my reaction. I saw Callum hide a smile, the corners of his lips rising up the tiniest fraction. “Perfect,” I said to Guillaume, “they’re perfect, just as you said.”