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Elodie looked at her doubtfully but did as instructed. This time, as her feet lifted up and she leaned backwards, she felt Grand-mère’s hands on her back, supporting her.
‘Just lean back, relax. Just float.’
Elodie felt her strong arms beneath her and she felt her body relaxing. It was quiet with her ears beneath the water. Above her head the summer sun dappled through the willows, they waved their long fingers along the banks, and as she stared at the blue sky above, her hands skated the water and she felt again that sense of peace.
Afterwards, when they had gathered their things, Elodie wrapped up in a large fluffy towel that had been washed and rewashed often, she found herself feeling hungry, ravenously so.
‘Works up an appetite, right?’ said Grand-mère, laughing as she heard the audible noises coming from Elodie’s belly. ‘Come on. Let’s go make an omelette.’
Elodie’s eyes widened and she nodded, offering a small grin, like a peep of blue sky.
‘You like them?’ said Grand-mère.
Elodie nodded.
‘Good, let’s do that, then. Then after breakfast we are going to tackle this,’ she said, laying a hand on Elodie’s hair.
Elodie pulled a face.
‘Don’t worry, I have a trick to get out the tangles,’ said Grand-mère, as they entered the farmhouse kitchen and she began to gather the ingredients together.
‘Crack the eggs into the bowl for me,’ said Grand-mère and Elodie began, gently cracking the shell against the side, and then opening it in two like she’d been shown the day before. A tiny piece of shell fell into the mixture, and Grand-mère showed her how to remove it with the shell, by scooping it out. ‘It acts almost like a magnet, it’s odd,’ she said. ‘Tomorrow when I open the restaurant you will get to see a real kitchen.’
Elodie looked confused. She opened her palms as if to say, Isn’t this real?
‘Oh, of course, but this is much smaller.’ She took the whisk and pointed. Elodie’s eyes followed where she indicated out of the window, where she could see in the distance a barn-shaped building made out of stone.
‘That’s my restaurant,’ said Grand-mère. ‘It’s a simple place, really, serving the locals around here. I only open for lunch in the week. When the old owner passed away, I decided to take over. I am not a trained cook, but I figured, well, I am not dead yet, my husband is gone, so I don’t exactly have to ask anyone’s permission, the vineyards are managed by Monsieur Blanchet, and so what must I do with my time… knit?’
Elodie grinned.
After their breakfast, Grand-mère combed out all the tangles in Elodie’s hair by the warmth of the range in the kitchen. There was something soothing about her hands on her head. It reminded Elodie of Maman, she even smelled similar.
In the evening, Grand-mère cut up some old material and began to create a swimming costume for her, in shades of dark navy and red. The sewing machine whirred as the summer rain beat a tattoo against the glass, and when Elodie went to bed, she dreamed of the river, where she floated, the gentle current carrying her beneath the willow trees where she could see the sun and the sky and the birds. She stayed that way for ages, until her fingers began to grow soft and webs began to grow and slowly ever so slowly she began to turn into a fish and swim all the way to the sea, where her mother was waiting for her and pointing to what looked like oysters but were in fact small cakes.
Early the next morning, Grand-mère took her to the village. It was called Lamarin, perched on a hilltop, where honey-coloured stone houses spooled around it with shutters in shades of pale blue and cherry red. It was surrounded by a lavender ocean, with fields as far as the eye could see of purple flowers. It was breathtaking. She was shocked that she hadn’t seen it the day she’d arrived. She’d been so focused on not looking out the car window.
They were there to visit the local market, a bustling place in the village full of stalls, from cheesemongers to people selling rag rugs and even chickens. Grand-mère was only interested in the fresh food. Fresh tomatoes, melons so ripe they made your mouth water, crisp salad speckled with water, and just-caught mackerel from Marseille. She ordered several things, which she asked to be delivered to the restaurant.
‘The first lesson in good cooking,’ she said, ‘is to use what is in season. It is the base layer. Use only what is of the best quality – you cannot fix bad quality with a sauce. It is like a woman trying to disguise who she is with make-up, instead of using it to enhance what she already has.’
Elodie’s eyes widened.
Later, Grand-mère took her to her restaurant.
It was small; a converted brick building that once held pigs, so Grand-mère said when they walked back, their hands laden with string bags full of produce.
‘It’s not fancy. But I like it.’
Elodie liked it too. As the morning wore on, she helped by staying out of the way, watching with fascination as her grandmother’s hands danced as they chopped and whisked and created mouth-watering dishes.
By mid-morning the customers had started to queue outside and Elodie watched as her grandmother wrote down the specials on a chalkboard outside. She explained that because she was only one person and didn’t have staff, she only served one option for lunch, which she wrote outside on a board – that way if somebody didn’t want it they could go somewhere else.
She raised an eyebrow. ‘But, of course, no one dares.’
It was true, Elodie saw, as most people walked straight past the sign, not bothering to check what was on offer. She realised then that here in rural France, food was taken just as seriously as within Paris. What’s more, they liked to be surprised. And over the course of that first week she witnessed as her grandmother fed many of the local farmers, shop-keepers and wives from the village and its surrounds. There were a lot of people who seemed curious about the little girl who had come to live with Marguerite Renaux. Some remembered her mother, Brigitte, some, especially the older ones, came forward to squeeze her cheeks and to tell her how much she looked like her.
Elodie learned fast when to disappear when one of them started towards her with a look in their eye, their fingers like a set of lobster pincers. When Marguerite asked her what she was doing one day, watching as she began slowly to back away, Elodie pinched her thumb and forefinger together and then subtly indicated an older woman advancing towards them, fingers snapping.
In realisation, Marguerite had to stop herself from breaking out into giggles.
Soon life in Lamarin took on a rhythm; they got up early, and went swimming in the river before they headed out for the day. By the end of that first week, Elodie was able to do a pretty decent doggy-paddle, and they would lie on their backs, treading water, watching the light filter from the vast willow trees.
Afterwards they often ate their breakfast as a picnic, while they warmed themselves on the riverbank, lying on towels on top of a large green blanket. The food was simple but delicious. The pastries weren’t as fancy as the ones from Paris, or as delicate, but they tasted just as good and it was amazing how wonderful a hardboiled egg could taste after a vigorous swim. Or how good a simple fresh baguette was on their way home from the bakery. Elodie found it was customary to break off the tip and eat it on the way home.
She found, too, that life in Provence was very different to Paris. It was slower here, and things were savoured more. Here everyone greeted you with a smile.
As the weeks passed, Elodie learned how to cut an onion, how to boil potatoes, how to cook an omelette herself. And soon, being in a kitchen with her grand-mère, with the wireless on, swaying along as the older woman sang, she realised that at some point she’d stopped reprimanding herself for enjoying herself, and the pain of losing Maman, while still hard, was no longer quite as raw.
