“You did last night.”
Marlow tried to metabolize all of this. She teetered a bit and grabbed the dining room table for support. Her hair dripped and made a little pool on the floor.
“There’s one last thing,” said Sabine.
“What, did I also buy the Eiffel Tower? The Gare du Nord? Maybe I threw in theMona Lisafor good measure. Wonder if my credit card covers all that, too!”
“If you want a refund, you can’t get it online. You have to go in person.”
“Well that’s impossible,” said Marlow. “It’s end of June—the festival is in October. Basically tomorrow. Thirty-thousand euros? I’m so screwed.”
Every once in a while, these things happened with Marlow. And Sabine had to get really calm—calm enough for both of them—so they could manage whatever disaster had occurred.
“The house is calledMaison Perdue,” said Sabine. “I mean, ‘Lost House?’ That’s kinda cool.”
But Marlow didn’t have time for any of that. “Hack into my mail, impersonate me, and write back saying all the things I just said but in French. Didn’t mean to, can’t afford it, highway robbery—anything. But be polite—the French are big into polite. Make all of this go away.”
“How come I have to do it?”
“Because you have the best French. And also you have nothing on your plate. And because I have to go to work and not get fired so we don’t end up living in someone’s garage, never mind a rundown ramshackle house in France.”
“We already liveoversomeone’s garage, Mum, and rundown and ramshackle are kind of the same.”
“This is no time to correct my English. It’s almost nine, which means it’s three in France. Their workday is almost over.”
“For the record, I had very important things to do today.”
“Like what?” Marlow shoved her laptop into her bag.
Sabine gazed at the tree out the window. Its leaves rustled in the morning breeze.Today’s the first day of the rest of my life,she thought. What do you do on that day? Clean your closets? Lie on your bed weeping? Save your mother from her impulse buy so she doesn’t wreck your lives? Maybe all of the above.
CHAPTER FOUR
Marlow rode her bike along Bloor and went over what she’d say to Oscar about the PowerPoint. Telling the truth would go something like: Sabine finished high school yesterday, so I had to celebrate her, then I got into a fight with my brother, drank too much, and was way beyond being able to do anything coherent thereafter.
Lying would be in the vein of: We ordered in sushi, I ate a shrimp that didn’t taste right and ended up barfing, which kept me far too busy to work on the budget.
Or she could go with the internet connectivity thing.
By the time Marlow got to work, Sabine had already texted that she’d sent the refund request email and had gotten an out-of-office autoreply. It said that all questions about the one-euro program had to be dealt with in person. No exceptions.
Marlow was distracted in the Latvian programming meeting, swinging wildly from hating the here-and-now to worrying about a thirty-thousand-euro penalty that might jeopardize her entire life not to mention paying for Sabine’s undergrad—yes, she’d been offered full scholarships, but there’d be residence,food, transportation if she went to school outside of Toronto … Marlow dug a deep and wide worry hole and jumped inside, which made her miss important bits about how the Latvian translator was double-booked, the filmmakers didn’t speak English, the director’s wife had visa problems, and one of the films wasn’t even finished yet.
Marlow kept thinking,Maison Perdue, Maison Perdue—and how fitting a name that was, given she’d just been discussing how lost she was with Noah, and her daughter—even though she was a hundred percent on track—also seemed lost, and everything felt, well, lost.
Oscar blew into the office late. He’d no doubt say he had a breakfast meeting.
“I was just at a breakfast meeting, but did you send it? I didn’t get it!”
“No, I—”
“Can’t hear you!” he called across the floor, beckoning her over.
Marlow wanted to be anywhere else but here. France, say. She joined Oscar in his office.
“I’m meeting Victor in five, but I never got the new pitch deck,” he said. “You send it?”
“I didn’t, I’m sorry.” Her legs felt weird. Numb and tingly.
