Anouk was standing before her, unbuttoning her denim shorts. Her legs, long, slender, well-defined. Cecilia concluded that she must have been a dancer or an athlete of some sort back in the seventeenth arrondissement. Over the past few days, she’d had ample time to observe the model’s features. The planes of her face, the tautness of her body. But this close, ogling her—without the express purpose of figuring out her light—felt brazen, dangerous. Cecilia turned her attention to the sea, the guys swimming out in the middle distance.
“I hope it wasn’t something you ate,” Anouk said. “Or the water?”
“No, I think just… too much tequila.”
“I’m sorry. Maybe go over to the rocks and make yourself vomit, and then come in. Even if for a minute. You and Marc and the PAs work harder than the rest of us, you deserve a little fun, no?”
Cecilia laughed, looking back toward Anouk. She had stripped down to her underwear. Midnight-blue hipster briefs and a moss-green mesh bralette, the outline of her areola just discernible beneath the material. Her underwear did not match. And yet they… she… was perfect.
“You’re beautiful,” Cecilia said. Although she hadn’t planned to.
“Thank you.”
“I realize you probably hear that all the time, and that maybe it doesn’t even have meaning to you anymore, but—”
“No,” Anouk interrupted her. “It does. Thank you.”
For a moment both women remained still, each taking in the other. The space filled with the slow lapping of the waves, the laughter of the others far out in the distance, a balmy breeze.
“Go throw up and then come in the water with me,” Anouk said.
And then she turned and walked toward the shoreline.
Cecilia noted her smooth back, her firm ass, the length of her thighs. Something about her was both feminine and boyish and Cecilia found the combination surprisingly alluring.
“Fuck it,” she said under her breath. And then she stood, peeledoff her shorts and tee, and joined the others in the surf. She wasn’t that sick after all.
Later, after they’d frolicked in the water for a good thirty minutes and the group had somewhat dispersed—the Italians smoking over on the rocks; Rafaella, Katrine, Bas, and Elliot in a cluster a little way down the coast; Marc, Kip, Stu, James, and Hugh lying flat on the sand—Cecilia and Anouk reclined near the shore, gazing up at the star-filled sky. The light show was extraordinary that night. The full Milky Way on exhibit. Almost close enough to touch.
“Have you ever seen a sky like this?”
“In Jamaica, in the countryside.”
“Ah.” Anouk smiled. “Yes, in Martinique it’s the same. But the best for me was in France, in the Hautes-Pyrénées. It was…incroyable. Like magic. Like this.”
“It puts everything into perspective, doesn’t it? How tiny we are. How inconsequential. How insignificant my shrimp tacos.” Cecilia laughed, mostly to herself. Anouk did not seem to get the joke.
“For me, it’s comforting. Especially when I’m far from home. Knowing that wherever I am on the planet, I can see the same stars as my parents. That we share the same sky.”
Cecilia looked over to her then. Anouk’s hair was still wet, clinging to her shoulders. Her bra diaphanous. Gooseflesh on her taut belly. Cecilia marveled at how unselfconscious she was—whether it was from being a model or being French, she wasn’t certain. Cecilia just knew she was the opposite. She’d spent years trying to de-emphasize her curves. To make herself as small and unassuming as possible. Anouk’s insouciance was enviable.
“It’s a gift to have this job. To travel the world to these amazing places, and call it work,” Anouk continued. “I have this way of holding on to the memories. Because I don’t want to ever get so busy I forget to appreciate the beauty around me. I make little still lifes of every place.”
“Still lifes?”
“Like a collage. A sprinkling of things I want to remember. The view, the feel, the atmosphere, the food, the people I’m with…”
“Like a scrapbook?”
“Mmm, maybe. But more abstract. I can’t describe… I’ll have to show you.”
“You have it with you?”
“Back in my room.”
“I’d like to see that.”
Cecilia was quiet then. She wasn’t sure if that had sounded forward. A proposition of sorts. But she had the idea that Anouk wouldn’t mind.
