Chapter 24
24
My back gradually improved over the next few days, but the weather deteriorated into days of rain and biting winds. Resting in my little hut, I occasionally felt it rock with a particularly high gust, but I felt quite snug and safe, and I realised it was the first time I had enjoyed my own company for quite some time.
Instead of distracting myself with housework and mundane tasks in the garden, I had the chance to think properly about what I was going to do next. I had been in France for weeks now, and I knew I couldn’t stay forever, the ninety-day rule being what it was. Isabel, my children and my grandchildren had their own lives, and their own paths to follow. I needed to do the same.
I pulled out one of the notebooks I had brought with me – the one with the picture of Wonder Woman on the front. My word, Lynda Carter really did have a spectacular figure. It was one that Bunny and Jasmine had bought for me, and I opened it, smoothing out the first page with my hand.
I remembered the conversation we’d had with Felix about women and their notebooks, how we liked to keep them until the right moment arrived. Well, this felt like the right moment.
I found a pen and wrote:
Next
at the top of the page, and then I underlined it twice, because this was important.
1. Do things I like to do. Particularly when it comes to going to concerts and films I think I would enjoy.
2. Don’t do things I don’t want to do. Especially cleaning the windows. All my neighbours seem to use the same firm, which turns up with a van and a long brush on a stick and they seem perfectly happy with it.
3. Travel to places I want to see, not places other people think I should see. I do want to go to Italy, I’ve always wanted to see the Sistine Chapel, but Stephen said the wait to get in was hours. So, I will splash out and buy a Fast Track ticket and hang the expense.
4. Learn a new language. Spanish? Italian? Both? There are daytime courses at the local community centre. As well as pottery, yoga and lots of other things. Investigate?
5. Throw out every black garment I own. Especially that dress Stephen made me buy for our thirtieth wedding anniversary. The one with the yellow and white stripe. It makes me look like a Liquorice Allsort.
6. Buy more colourful things.
7. Change my car.
I thought about this one for a long time. I’d never bought a car on my own before, Stephen had always been in charge of that, although the only thing he knew how to do was put petrol in it. The last time we went to several showrooms, where all the cars looked the same to me and most were grey or silver and the only preference I had voiced was that I would like a red car, so I was easier to see and presumably easier for other people to avoid.
I ended up with a grey car with a grey interior, so effectively, I was the same colour as the road.
When I had asked if the car had conformed to the proposed Euro emission regulations, Stephen and the car salesman who was a spotty oik called Jazza, looked at me in astonishment, the way one would a dancing dog, and they had both laughed. Although I don’t think Stephen would have known a Euro emission if one had whacked him on the back of the head with a shovel. Therefore…
8. Go to a garage where they don’t sneer, chuckle to themselves, patronise or make me feel like a fool and will actually speak to me without looking over my shoulder for my husband. And buy a red car. A big one. One that I choose.
Luc drove a red truck, and I wondered if I could buy something like that. A car that stood out a bit, that showed some spirit. A car with a rugged name like Thug or Juggernaut . I’d always had a bit of a thing about them. Perhaps I could have one now?
9. Buy some new bed linen with flowers on and chuck out all the old stuff. I don’t like polyester sheets, particularly cream ones, and if I get a new duvet, I want one that makes that satisfying crackly noise when I turn over.
10. New pillows. The old ones have been used and washed so many times they are like Weetabix.
11. Find my white trainers at the back of the wardrobe and wear them as a fashion statement. I think they look cool, Stephen said I wasn’t going to play at Wimbledon any time soon, so why pretend I was.
12. Go to Wimbledon.
13. Throw out the plastic washing-up bowl. Isabel’s right. It’s disgusting.
14. Visit John in New York, and stay at a hotel, not with them. Go to a Broadway show. Leave halfway through if I don’t like it.
15. Get a decent haircut. I look like my mother. And go every eight weeks, not every eight years.
‘I’ve brought you a flask of coffee. What are you doing?’ Isabel said from the doorway. It was still raining, and she was peering out from under the hood of her raincoat.
Behind her, Marcel and Antoine stood, tails wagging, doggy smiles on their faces, completely unbothered by the weather, just glad to be included in the way dogs often are.
‘Making a bucket list,’ I said, looking up and being mildly surprised to find I wasn’t already out doing new and exciting things, but was still only thinking and planning to do so. I went back to my list before I could forget this feeling.
16. Do the things on this list, don’t just think/talk about them.
‘Oh, have you developed some terrible disease since last night?’
‘No, but I do think I need to have some direction in future. I’ve been paddling around in the shallows for long enough. I’m sixty-three, how much longer do I have?’
‘Oh, stop it, you’re beginning to sound like Eugénie,’ Isabel said. ‘I’ve brought you a bit of cake, too, in a sandwich bag. And some more painkillers in case you’ve run out.’
‘Thank you, cake would be lovely, what sort?’
‘I made sponge cake and flapjacks, but I left the flapjacks in the oven too long and they are a bit dangerous. I didn’t know if your teeth would cope with them.’
17. Make a dental appointment for a check-up – not been for five years.
‘But I don’t think I need the painkillers,’ I said, ‘I think I’m okay.’
‘You’ll never guess what just happened in the barn,’ Isabel said excitedly, ‘I would have come straight over to tell you but then a couple called in and they bought all the little milk bottles, for something they are organising. I think it was a play. But the big thing is I sold one of those old enamel signs for a hundred and ten euros. And Felix took that cameo over to Gaston’s wife. Mathilde knows a lot about jewellery, not just how to turn brake blocks into earrings. She might have an opinion.’
‘That’s excellent,’ I said, pulling myself to my feet and checking to see how uncomfortable I was. No, everything felt fine.
‘I’d like to go out somewhere,’ I said, ‘I’ve been stuck in here for days. Do you need any help with the g?tes? Or the barn?’
‘No, I don’t! I’m under strict instructions to make you rest.’
‘Who from?’
‘Luc. He rang me up a few minutes ago asking how you were, and he asked if you would be up for going out for dinner on Saturday.’
‘Why didn’t he just ring me, he has my number?’
Isabel shrugged. ‘I dunno, ask him. Perhaps he thought you might be asleep.’
18. Ring people up. Don’t just text or send emails.
‘I’ll ring him,’ I said.
And I did.
And he answered and he sounded genuinely happy to hear from me. We talked to each other and made arrangements and exchanged ideas. And when I ended the call, I felt unreasonably pleased. And independent.
The following day the weather had improved and although it was still quite chilly, at least the rain had stopped.
Against all advice, I spent the day helping Isabel clean up the g?tes ready for the next people, and I also sold the auricular theatre to a new local ex-pat who also took one of Felix’s leaflets about his language classes.
‘I never thought I’d sell that,’ Isabel said, ‘and she took some tea towels too. I wish we could get more people in though. Perhaps we should do that video you mentioned. By the way, what are you going to wear on Saturday?’
I looked down at my smart trousers and fairly new Breton sweater, which I had bought in a shop back home, not realising I could have bought an authentic one for less in France.
‘Something like this?’ I said.
‘Absolutely not!’ Isabel said, ‘you need something new. My guess is you’ll be going to Le Poulet Argenté, which means the Silver Chicken. I’ve been there once, it was lovely, but very posh. You need a smart outfit and some proper shoes. Or they won’t let you in.’
‘Won’t let who in where?’ Eugénie said from the doorway.
‘Joy has a date on Saturday with Luc, and she needs something chic.’
Eugénie’s eyes lit up.
‘I don’t own a chic dress,’ I said, ‘I don’t own chic anything.’
‘But I know someone who does,’ Eugénie said, ‘she has cupboards full of clothes, a lot of them never worn. Most of them will be too small for you, everyone is so much bigger these days, but perhaps some of them might fit. If you suck your stomach in and don’t eat too much. You must come with me, and we will find something.’
Perhaps unfairly, the possibility of this did not inspire me. Eugénie was always well turned out, and she never seemed to wear the same outfit twice, but I didn’t want to wear the clothes of an eighty-four-year-old woman.
‘I really don’t think that’s a good idea,’ I said.
Eugénie’s nostrils flared. ‘You think because I am an old woman now that I might not know about anything other than my aches and pains? The many disappointments and setbacks? The years of struggle and suffering? The problems with ungrateful family and friends? How my life has been beset with danger and difficulty? And ill health that no one will take seriously. And Paulette the same. To you she is a woman who makes food, the best onion soup in Brittany, possibly in France. But she had a life before that. Oh yes, don’t look so surprised.’
‘Isabel said she was a model when she was younger.’
‘That is not the half of it. Where do you think I get all my things from? Certainly not the shop in the town. I spent much of my life in rags, pitiful clothes. No longer. I will show you.’
‘ Mamie , you were never in rags,’ Isabel protested.
‘No, but I might have been,’ Eugénie said, ‘ alors , we are wasting time. Isabel can drive us to the town. Seeing as you still do not have your car. Perhaps Luc has sold it and pocketed the money.’
‘He would never do that. But I can’t leave the brocante , someone might come looking for something,’ Isabel protested.
Eugénie flared her nostrils in disdain. ‘Of course they won’t, leave a notice, closed due to illness. This is much more important.’
We reached the Sports Bar just before three o’clock, when – as Eugénie had predicted – the lunch time trade was easing off.
Paulette was waiting behind the bar, alerted by Eugénie’s earlier phone call, and her face lit up when she saw us.
‘ Je suis vraimant enthousiaste – I’m so excited,’ she said, ‘Come, come with me.’
Louis who had been polishing some wine glasses, rolled his eyes.
‘ Je ne comprendrai jamais les femmes ,’ he said.
‘No, you don’t understand women, that’s half the problem,’ Eugénie fired back.
We went into the back of the building and up a flight of stairs. Eugénie seemed surprisingly nimble for someone who seemed to have so many unnamed illnesses and weaknesses.
‘ Et voilà !’ Paulette said, throwing open a door.
Inside, the room was small but filled with clothes racks. There were shelves with shoe boxes, handbags in linen bags, interesting looking suitcases with battered travel labels stuck on the outside.
‘I kept everything I could when I was modelling,’ Paulette said, ‘sometimes instead of my fee, I would ask for the clothes I wore, or for them to sell them to me at a reduced price, and as some of them were tailored to fit me, they agreed. They wouldn’t do that now, I am sure. But hardly ever the evening gowns, which were thousands. I saw some in a museum only recently, such tailoring, such stitches. And what is two hundred dollars compared with a Chanel original? Not that they would fit me now, but they are still beautiful. But there are some I acquired that might do; things I wore later.’
Eugénie parked herself on a chair and we looked through the racks of clothes in amazement. There were suits, dresses, sweaters, tailored slacks and even a couple of ball gowns done up in calico bags. No wonder Eugénie always looked so elegant if she had this treasure trove to choose from.
‘So you worked for Chanel? I thought it was Dior?’ Isabel said.
‘I worked for everyone,’ Paulette said, with huge laugh, ‘I have not always been sixty. I went all over the world. I was tiny, like a bird in those days. I had glossy black hair down to my waist. And what a tiny waist! I used to dance down the runways, I was called Martinet . There was even a spread in Vogue of me, they called it French Dressing . Big shoulder pads, crazy days.’
Eugénie shook her head sadly. ‘What happened, Paulette?’
‘Good things. I fell in love, I got old and happy,’ Paulette said, ‘and I learned to cook.’
‘Joy needs something to wear for dinner,’ Eugénie said, bringing us all back to why we were there in the first place. ‘Not much here will fit her, I feel sure, and clothes then were proper sizes, not what they are today.’
‘Thanks for the vote of confidence, Mamie ,’ Isabel muttered.
‘You can borrow anything you want to,’ Paulette said, ‘but they must be returned. C’est ma pension . My – what do you call it – my nest egg.’
She pulled a dark green dress off the rail. ‘What about this? I wore that at Ascot, with a big white hat. I was divine. And this?’ Next was a pink satin cocktail dress, lavishly covered in tape lace and sequins.
‘No sleeves,’ Eugénie said, shaking her head, ‘a woman her age needs sleeves. Unless she has been a professional tennis player.’
‘She’s absolutely right,’ I said.
‘Then perhaps this?’ Paulette said. She pulled out a royal blue silk velvet jacket and stroked it as lovingly as though it was a kitten. ‘It will enhance your eyes. It is Chanel. I never wore it. It was too big. They had to take it in at the back with clothes pegs. Now it is too small. I waited for the right day and then that day never came. I just loved the colour.’
I took it and looked in the label in the neckline:
Chanel
I didn’t think I’d ever touched a Chanel garment before, never mind worn one. I tried it on, over my T-shirt and jeans it fitted perfectly, looked sensational, and the silk lining was as soft as a cloud.
‘And these might fit you. I bought them back in the eighties,’ Paulette continued, handing me some slim, dark blue trousers.
I tried them on. They were a bit snug if I was honest. I stood up straighter and pulled in my stomach.
‘You are not as fat as I thought,’ Eugénie sniffed from her chair in the corner.
Phew, got away with it then.
‘And this,’ Paulette said handing over a white silk shirt with what looked like a pattern of tadpoles all over it.
After some hesitation, remembering the parlous state of my rather ancient bra, and looking around for somewhere to strip off, I gave up and hauled my T-shirt off.
An immediate barrage of tutting filled the room from both Paulette and Eugénie, who dramatically pretended to faint off the side of her chair and had to be caught by Isabel, who heaved her back upright.
‘No, I cannot believe what I am seeing,’ she croaked.
‘What?’ I said, looking down. Okay, it sort of fitted, and it was still what I thought of as my comfortable bra. It had once been beige, so perhaps they were overreacting?
‘I will tell you a secret that all French women know, that my mother told me,’ Paulette said, ‘ Si une femme porte quelque chose de beau sous se vêtements, elle s’envoie un message très puissant. ’
‘If a woman wears something beautiful under her clothes, she sends a powerful message to herself,’ Eugénie interrupted, pointing at my bra, ‘and that is not powerful, not formidable , that is not even slightly persuasive. There is no place in your wardrobe for… that!’
‘But I like it,’ I said, rather feebly, ‘it’s one of my favourites.’
They both laughed.
Paulette dabbed at her eyes with a handkerchief. ‘You English! It’s an old bra, not a beloved toy!’
‘But no one is going to see it,’ I said.
I cast a despairing look at Isabel, who just shrugged and pulled aside the neck of her shirt to show me the strap of a scarlet and very lacy bra. Her eyes sparkled with something like mischief.
‘You must go to Zaza in the next town,’ Paulette said very firmly, ‘ c’est impératif, and tell her I sent you. She will give you une réduction – a discount.’