There is a sudden bang on the wall of glass in the hall behind me. I spin around to see a small dove cowering in the courtyard, reeling from its crash. It scrambles, skids. I am not certain it will make it.
“I can’t stay here,” I say then. “I can’t stay in this house.”
“What do you mean you can’t stay?”
“I mean, I’m taking the kids and I’m going back to Paris. You can finish editing your movies or whatever it is you have to do, but I’m not staying here. In this country, with the racism and the guns. And in this self-indulgent town, where ninth graders do cocaine. And where everyone looks and dresses and thinks the same and there’s no individuality. I gave it a chance, but it’s killing me. I don’t want to live in a bubble! I don’t want to be comfortable with the narcissistic bullshit. And the star-fucking. It’s stifling. I need diversity, I need variety. I need gray skies and rain sometimes. And I need to get away from a place where even the birds want to kill themselves.”
He bows his head then, overwhelmed, frustrated, lost. I can only imagine what he is thinking. This big fat house, this big fat life, and still I am not happy. This extent of privilege, for which we’d strived for so long, is not enough. It might make our lives easier, desirable on the surface, but no more meaningful. No more satisfying. No more true.
“What do you want me to tell you, Cile?” he asks, eventually. “You want me to tell you it’s okay, leave, take the kids—that it won’t affect me? Because of course it will. But if you’re that unhappy, then go. I can’t make you stay here if you don’t want to be here. Go.”
He rises then and crosses the room, past me, and into the hallway.
“What are you doing? Where are you going?”
“I’m going to try and save that bird,” he says. “I’m giving it a chance.”
That evening, when Fran is at a dinner with the head of Brad Pitt’s production company, I ask the kids how they feel about returning to France. For a moment, they both look at me in disbelief. Lucie, vaguely confused. And then, Julien baring the slightest hint of a smile.
“Vraiment?”
“Vraiment. Really. Papa will stay behind to finish editing the movies, but we can go.”
“Like when? Like this summer?”
“No, like now. Like this month. I may have to put you in a French school, until spots open up at EIB or EJM,” I say, referencing two of the more competitive bilingual private schools. “But if you think you can handle that, then I’m happy to make it happen.”
“Yes!” Julien fist-pumps the air.
Lucie remains sedate. “Is this because of the drug thing?”
“It’s because of a lot of things, Luce.”
“But what if…?” She trails off, her eyes suddenly watering. “But what if Leelou finds her way home and we’re not here?”
I put down my fork and knife then and reach for her hands across the table. “Oh, Lucie. Leelou’s not coming home, honey. Leelou’s not coming home.”
Julien scoots his chair over and wraps his arm around his sister’s shoulders. A gesture that absolutely melts me. “It’s okay, Lu. It’s going to be okay. And if Leelou does come back, Papa will be here.”
She looks to me then, big amber eyes framed with wet lashes. Her long, untamed curls. “If we go home, do I have to go back to ballet?”
“Do you want to go back to ballet?”
She shrugs, tiny shoulders in an oversized sweatshirt. “I’m still thinking about it.”
“Okay.” I smile. “You do that. It’s your choice.”
On Thursday afternoon, a curious envelope arrives for me in the mail. There is no stamp. No return address. Just my first and last name handwritten in green ink. I open it before I even get inside. And midway up the path, I freeze. There is no letter within, no note. But instead, a familiar black-and-white photograph. A man’s hand wedgedbetween a pair of female thighs. It takes a moment. And then it registers. I flip it over. And written on the back in a distinctive delicate cursive are the wordsHIKE UP YOUR SKIRT A LITTLE MORE.
I’m shaking by the time I get inside the house. My temples throbbing, my breaths quick and shallow. In my frenzied state, I locate Fran in the kitchen, where he is standing at the island, readingVarietyon his iPad and sipping an espresso.
“What is this??” I yell, waving the photo in his face. “What is this??? How did she get this???”
He stills my shaking hand long enough to scrutinize the image.
“She who? I don’t know what you’re talking about. What is this?” It takes a half second, the realization spreading across his face. “Where did you get this?”
“In the mail. Anouk. She left it in the fucking mailbox.”
