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‘He is sweet,’ said Clarice, twirling a stud in her ear. ‘Otherwise I would leave him, non?’
I was in awe of this girl, who seemed to have it all together.
‘And how is it with Léo?’ asked Clarice. ‘Where did you meet each other?’
‘Hannah, try some of this,’ said Léo, passing me a plate of cold meats and pâté and olives. ‘Une assiette de charcuterie.’
I picked up a delicate, thinly sliced piece of prosciutto and dropped it into my mouth.
‘Mmmn,’ I said to him in between chews. ‘Good.’
I passed the plate to Clarice.
‘We met this morning,’ I said, grabbing a napkin to wipe my hands. ‘At Gare du Nord.’
She looked confused and I laughed. ‘I managed to trip over his bag and twist my ankle, and then we both missed the train to Amsterdam. He blamed me and I blamed him, but we’ve had to agree to disagree on that one. He’s been showing me around Paris, persuading me that it’s not the awful place I thought it was.’
‘You do not like Paris?’ said Clarice, visibly shocked at the idea that someone was less than enamoured by it.
‘I had a bad experience here before,’ I said. ‘Nothing to do with the city itself.’ Although perhaps it had taken me until today to realise that.
‘You and Léo seem like you have known each other for longer than a day.’
I glanced over at him. He was getting something out of his bag, a record, handing it across the table to Clarice’s boyfriend.
I took a sip of the wine somebody had poured me. ‘Do we?’
Léo shouted something to one of the guys across the table and then turned to me.
‘I want to show you one more place,’ he whispered into my ear. ‘Before we leave for the station.’
‘What is it?’
‘Montmartre,’ he said, beaming. ‘You cannot come to Paris and not see Montmartre, and it is very close. You will get a tiny glimpse of how it was in Paris a hundred years ago. Parts of it are like taking a step back in time.’
I smoothed out imaginary creases on Sylvie’s skirt.
‘This has to be the absolutely last thing you show me,’ I said. I’d seen pictures of Montmartre: the Moulin Rouge, the Sacré-Coeur; it would be a shame not to see it if it was as close as he said. ‘And then I’m going straight to the station.’
He nodded, standing up. ‘Of course. It will be worth it, you will see.’
‘Give me a second, ok?’ I said, making my way through the bar, hugging the wall to avoid the bar staff with their white shirts and their black aprons who were twirling about with huge trays of drinks. I used the loo and then stood by the sink, turning on the tap and letting ice-cold water cascade through my fingers. I barely registered the door opening, or Sylvie coming in.
‘There you are, Hannah,’ she said. ‘I wanted to see you before you go.’
‘Me too. I was going to come and thank you for everything,’ I said, turning to face her. ‘If you let me have your address, I’ll have your clothes dry-cleaned and posted back to you.’
‘There is no need. You can keep them if you like.’
I shook my head. ‘I couldn’t do that.’
She shrugged. ‘Léo has my details, he can give them to you. You are getting the train to Amsterdam together, yes?’ She leaned her hip against the sink next to mine.
‘Probably.’
‘You know, he is usually very guarded around people. He does not let them get too close, not at first,’ she said, turning on a tap, splashing her face with water.
‘Yep, I can see that,’ I said, thinking about his mood when we’d first met, how I’d passed him off as yet another arrogant Parisian. It was only now I was beginning to see a sweeter, softer side.
