Chapter 28
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT
While Luc and Fedir took down the stage and lights, Marlow and Lali stayed up until three AM to count the proceeds.
They were exhausted but also on the adrenaline high of an evening where everything had worked out, and everyone had had an extraordinary time.
They regaled each other with the highlights.
“And I saw you dance with Guillaume, but not with Luc,” said Lali, digging for gossip.
“It didn’t mean anything—Luc was busy.”
“Yes,” said Lali, “busy watching you and Guillaume dance.”
“Stop talking,” Marlow said, making her final tally, “or I’ll forget my count.”
So Lali was quiet for a time, but then couldn’t help herself. “Have you chosen one over the other?” she asked. “I know you’re busy, but I have to know.”
“I don’t have an answer to that question, but I’ll tell you when I do. Now, I have our tally. I don’t have all the expenses yet from Noah and Madame Klein for the food, but I can tell already that the final amount is going to be more than enough to cover back taxes for everyone in Mirabelle.”
Lali’s mouth dropped to the floor. “What?”
“We’re all home-free,” said Marlow. “What’s even better, we still have more left over after that. What should we do with the rest?”
“What about donating to Sylvain’s medical clinic?” asked Lali.
“Perfect. And what about paying for your French medical license? The clinic will need a doctor, and Mirabelle has one.”
Lali had a good cry after that. Marlow comforted her and felt almost high with happiness.
Marlow, bleary-eyed, awoke with a jolt. She had the appeal at the mairie, after which Luc would drive her and the others to the airport.
She pulled on the first clothes she could find and looked at Luc, across the bedroom windows, sprawled on his bed, shirtless but with his pants still on from last night, dead to the world. This might be the last time she’d see him like that. Hot even in yesterday’s clothing.
Marlow found Sabine and Aubin, who had slept over on the couch, eating breakfast and cleaning the fridge.
“All that’s left is a piece of cheese, a stale baguette, and three pickles,” said Sabine. “Want one?”
“No thanks,” said Marlow. “I’m off to the appeal—you two keep cleaning.”
“No way—I’m coming,” said Sabine. “It’s the final showdown between you and Rémy, and I need to see who wins.”
On their way, Marlow saw the magpie from before—only this time, with its mate.
She pulled out her phone and shot a video of them, their blue-black, jewel-like wings shining.
One nodded in her direction, as if it approved of what she was doing.
Exactly what was she doing? Could someone, some thing, give her a hint? But they flew off before she could ask.
Party remnants still littered the square: garbage that needed to be taken to the bins, Fedir’s lights, paper lanterns. But the stores were locked up, and the keys were in her pocket.
They stepped into the mairie. Rémy stood there in a tailored suit and heels. Oh God. Marlow was wearing shorts splattered with periwinkle blue shutter paint, a T-shirt with a rip in it, and flip-flops. Sabine was only slightly better put together. Rémy eyed them both.
“We have been waiting,” she said. “It is a Sunday morning, and yet we are here on time, and in a … professional … manner.”
Marlow chose to ignore this and handed over the keys. “Sorry. And … as promised.”
Rémy pulled open a heavy wooden door at the end of the hall. “Après vous.”
Marlow and Sabine stepped forward, flip-flops thwacking the stone floors and echoing off the high ceiling. They were led into a paneled conference room with a heavy chandelier. Four people sat around a large wooden table with claw feet.
“Allow me to introduce you to the intercommunauté council,” said Rémy. “Je vous présente Madame Georgette Lafleur, Monsieur Bertrand Eugéne, Mademoiselle Noémie Dupuis, et Monsieur Théo Leblanc.”
“Bonjour,” said Marlow, “et merci d’être là le dimanche matin.” Thank you for being here on a Sunday morning. La dimanche? Le dimanche? Was Sunday feminine or masculine? Marlow wasn’t sure. She really needed to take French classes when they got back to Toronto.
People smiled politely. Marlow and Sabine sat in the two empty chairs.
“We will speak in English, as we know it is easier for you,” said Rémy.
“You requested a refund; I said that was not our policy. You insisted on an appeal. I have asked my staff back to work a day early to consider your request. We do not want to keep anyone here who does not want to be here. Our communauté is too important to us. Too special. We care about life here.”
As if Marlow didn’t. Rémy’s superciliousness could really get under your skin.
“Therefore,” said Rémy, “we agree to your request for a refund, and your request to refuse ownership of Maison Perdue.” Rémy slid a one-euro coin across the table. “I have already released the thirty-thousand-euro security deposit from your credit card. You are free to go.”
There had been so much on Marlow’s plate, she’d only focused on waiting for the appeal, rather than what to do when she got there.
It would’ve been a simple thought process: either she got the refund and made one choice, or she didn’t, and made a different choice.
But getting her mind in gear had utterly escaped her.
Marlow looked out at the mairie’s overgrown courtyard. The weeds had taken over. Vines with thick trunks grew up the old, crumbling stone walls. I know how to fix them, thought Marlow.
“Et?” said Rémy. Everyone was waiting, Sabine included.
Marlow unzipped her purse and pulled out a thick envelope of cash. She slid it across the table right by the euro coin. “First, here are the back taxes for my house, as well as Madame Belleville’s, Lali and Fedir’s, and Luc’s. Everyone is paid up in full.”
The council members, Rémy especially, were stunned.
“Next, as far as the house goes,” said Marlow. Everyone was on tenterhooks, Marlow included. She had no idea what she might say next. “I’ll let you know. Have a wonderful fall.” Marlow stood up abruptly. “Sabine?”
“Mais, pardon?” asked Rémy, baffled.
Marlow headed for the exit, followed by Sabine. Rémy scrambled after her. “You cannot leave like that with no answer.”
“We have a plane to catch, and I want to make a thoughtful decision, because, as you said, the communauté is too important for anything less.”
Sabine and Marlow found Madame Belleville waiting on the bench with a bag. “How was it, the request?”
“Très bien. Tous les arriérés d’imp?ts sont payés,” said Marlow, switching into French out of respect. Sabine was impressed that her mother knew the French for “the back taxes have all been paid.” Their French had improved over the summer.
“We will speak the English, as it is your langue,” said Madame Belleville, “and you may tutois me and call me Marguerite, because we are friends. You are included, Sabine.”
Sabine could have been knocked over by a feather. Madame Belleville did not offer to be called by her first name. It was just not the right order of things.
“Thank you, with all my heart, for the pay of taxes,” said Madame Belleville. “Lali had said to me. This is the most wonderful.”
“We didn’t do it,” said Marlow. “Everyone at the fundraiser did.”
“Still,” said Madame Belleville, stern, shutting down further objections.
She passed Sabine the bag. “I have made the lunch for the airplane, if this is not given. And the little bites between the lunch and the dinner.”
“Thank you so much,” said Sabine.
“Pierre picks us up in an hour,” said Marlow.
“Then I will walk with you,” said Madame Belleville. “Because I have a thinking.”
The day was getting more interesting by the moment.
“I do not know how much long I can stay in Mirabelle. I am old. Maybe until my last days, and they find me in the bed, dead. Maybe I move to the maison de retraite in Neufchateau. And if I go, I asked myself, does Marlow wish my house?”
Marlow and Sabine stopped dead in their tracks.
“I have no parenté, uh, how do you say?” asked Madame Belleville.
“Relatives?” offered Sabine.
“Correct. But I feel you are these people.”
“What would we do with your house?” asked Marlow.
“I do not know, but when I call you the maire of Mirabelle, I was not making a blague—a funny saying. My house has always been La Maison du Magistrat. You are closest to our magistrate. So it should be yours.”
Marlow got so emotional she couldn’t talk.
“My mum thanks you,” said Sabine. “She’s just a bit overwhelmed at the moment.”
Madame Belleville, teary, pulled a hanky from her sleeve and blew her nose like a truck driver. It looked like she was overwhelmed, too.
Sabine was trying to figure out how to fit everything into her luggage as Aubin closed her bedroom window and shutters.
“You have to keep some of this,” she said, eyeing everything she’d bought in Paris, ten tiny books she’d made while she was here, and the rusted Eiffel tower keychain, exercise book of alphabet practice, old city maps and rabbit figurine from the courtyard. “I can’t take it all back.”
“Keep the book about your father,” he said. “The patron rabbit saint of Maison Perdue should remain in the courtyard to keep watch. And you can always wear two layers of clothing.”
“Good idea.”
“I don’t want you to go back to Canada.”
“I don’t want to go back either,” she said, tracing the line of his face, jaw, neck, Adam’s apple, to commit it all to memory. She kissed him on the lips. “But I’ll be back.”
“Could you hurry?”
Luc packed luggage into the back of the tour bus in the Nenier parking lot.
Bill was furious with Iris, because they’d forgotten to check into the flight, and she should have reminded him to do it.
Iris claimed she’d been distracted by the fundraiser.
Noah took the blame but didn’t care because he was planning in whispers with Pierre when they’d next see each other.
Pierre, a travel agent, had a few flight deals up his sleeve that interested Noah deeply.
“Noah,” snapped Iris. “Focus, please. Get us checked into this flight.”
Marlow turned to Guillaume, who had come to say goodbye. “So once I’m in the United States,” he said, “I’ll reach out about coming to Toronto. I can be your date to Yves’s opening.”
“That is a terrible idea.”
“I can kiss you on the red carpet and make him envious. Then I can fight him in front of everyone—I know how you like that public display of testosterone.”
“That would also help immensely with my job at Renegade, so definitely plan for it.”
“I know you haven’t made up your mind about me or Luc, but I’m in this. I want you.”
It made Marlow shiver, but Luc was only two feet away in the bus. So was her kid. And her parents. “When I know what I’m doing, I promise to let you know.”
“You haven’t heard from Cannes yet, so I will hope for that. And if not Cannes, come work with me at the winery.”
Marlow looked into his eyes. “I’m probably going to regret this, but I’m not really looking for a business partnership—aside from raising Sabine, my whole life has been about work.
And that’s one of the things that this summer in France offered that was different from what I’d been doing for years, on automatic pilot.
And, as it turns out, I’m not really interested in a situationship either. But thank you. Sorry.”
“Nothing to apologize for. I’m sad, but there you are.”
“For God’s sake, Marlow,” said Iris. “We’re going to miss our flight.”
Marlow kissed Guillaume on each cheek and stepped onto the minibus.
There was terrible traffic into Paris. By the time they reached Charles de Gaulle, there was a half-hour until their gate closed. Noah thought it might be a sign to stay in France.
Marlow sent Noah and Sabine inside to help Bill and Iris check in. She pulled her carry-on out of the bus while an irate driver honked and hurled obscenities at Luc’s bad parking.
“It’s just like the first time I met you,” she said, laughing.
“Only this time, I am wearing socks and shoes,” said Luc.
“I have to go, or I won’t make the flight—”
“Maybe that is my master plan.”
“My parents’ll love that. I’m going to talk fast—I can’t thank you enough for everything. The fundraiser, the work on the house—oh my God, I never paid you for your work!”
“It is my pleasure.”
“No, no, I am going to pay you, I’m such an idiot.”
“I always meant to do this work for free.”
“That is a very bad idea for you, and a giant gift for me,” she said, looking at him, all of him: his lithe body, how comfortable he was in his own skin, the lines at the corner of his eyes that crinkled his tanned, leathery skin as he smiled.
“Tonight, I will lie in my bed and look to your room and see closed shutters.”
“Yes, but they’ll be newly painted shutters.” The minutes were ticking down.
“I will wish you were there.”
“I am going to miss this plane,” she said, her resolve melting, wanting to be with him.
“I did not finish painting you. Back in Canada, shoot a story on Instagram every day. Borrow festival equipment and shoot your feature film, even if you are certain you’re a terrible artist. Fill your soul, not to get rich and become an internationally known filmmaker like Yves, but just for you.
You can make art, even if it is not for sale. Do you promise?”
“Promise.” Her eyes welled with tears. She did not want to go.
“You are not your job. Yes, you have financial responsibilities, but life in Mirabelle doesn’t cost much, and it is good. Come back. We can find work of some kind to pay for food.”
“I am very good at mixing mortar.”
“And finding chanterelles. See? Two jobs already.”
The airport doors slid open. It was Noah. “Marlie, get your ass in here.”
Marlow kissed Luc long on the lips. It sent tingles through her entire body. And then she was gone.