Bastille Day, page 19
“You did a beautiful broadcast just now,” Brigid offered. “You should watch it on the web,” she told Allison.
“Well, I had a come-to-Jesus talk with Father Cam after I blasted Nadia,” I told the room. Allison looked at me with some confusion. I’d guess Anglicans—or cultural Anglicans—do not come to Jesus. “He asked me to name what I was feeling. I couldn’t. But he could tell that my anger and my hatred were poisonous. Why else would I say such things to Nadia? Who never did anything to hurt me except wrestle with a decision that should never have been given her?” I put my head in my hands. I did not know if you could ruin an apéro, but I felt that this might be the way to proceed.
There was a hand on my shoulder. Rob, I thought, but it was too light. It was Allison’s voice that followed that touch. “Since we were at dinner the other night,” she said, “there is something I have wanted to say to this group. Perhaps this will be of some help. I hope so.”
She waited for me to look up at her, which, at last, I did.
“You told us a story the other night,” she said, taking a big gulp of her gin and tonic. “And I saw myself in it.”
“Really?” I asked.
“Oh yes,” she said. “Your best friend in college. Daniel? David. He was me.”
“Really?” I asked. “David was you?” I looked confused, I’m sure.
“He was,” she said. “I fell in love with one of my dormmates at Oxford.” She turned to Brigid and Rob, her eyes wide, and said, “Because I am drawn to women, you see.”
Now their eyes were wide.
Then she reached out a hand to me, touched my forearm. “I was in that place of confessing my love to the person who had been my best friend. And discovering that she did not feel what I did.”
“I am so sorry,” I said. “That must have been awful.”
“It was,” she said. “I was hurt. And I was angry. I had gone so far out there with my feelings. I had told the absolute truth, and I thought there should be some reward for that.” She shook her head. “But there was not.”
She turned away to the window, looked out at the tower. Just as I thought she was finished talking, she went on, speaking out into the night.
“So I thought maybe I could hate her instead of loving her. That is a natural reaction when someone has hurt you. I lashed out at her. I told terrible stories about her. But it did not help.”
“No,” I said, coming up behind her. “I can see now that it wouldn’t.”
“She did not ask me to love her,” Allison said, and tears were glistening in her eyes. “But I could not forgive her for not loving me.”
Brigid reached out to her, her own eyes glistening.
“For years. Years!” She shook her head sadly, disbelieving. “I was filled with rage. I could not forgive her. Even though that was what was most needed.”
“I think it’s about forgiveness,” I murmured. Don Henley, again, “The Heart of the Matter.”
Rob nodded. He knew the song. And that was also his greatest hope at this present moment, I supposed.
“Forgiveness,” Brigid repeated into the night, and now she was openly weeping.
“Wow,” I said. Did I start all this? But no. This is the human condition. We are hurt, we are broken, and we have to decide how we are going to proceed from there.
Speaking of which, I checked my phone surreptitiously.
Nothing.
“I could use a drink,” Rob said, moving over to the bar. Allison and Brigid were embracing. I walked over to the window, looked out and up at the Tour Eiffel. Here I was, in France, with a group of sobbing Parisians. This was now my reality, strange as it seemed.
Allison stepped over to me now. “Cal? How are you?”
“It seems that perhaps I should be asking you that question.”
She smiled. “You are sweet.”
I laughed. “I can be,” I said. “But, sadly, often I am not.”
“I hope that things can be mended with Nadia,” she said. “She is lovely.”
“Yes,” I said, a catch in my voice. “She is indeed.”
Brigid had gone over to help Rob make his drink, and now they were locked in an embrace, and she was still weeping. And despite that, I felt hope for them.
“I would like to be your friend,” I said to Allison.
She looked at me for a moment, blinked once, nodded.
“I would like that as well,” she said. We got out our phones and traded numbers right there, tried not to look across the room at Rob and Brigid, who were having a moment not necessarily meant to be shared by us. “Call me if you need me.”
“And you,” I said. “I was—” No. Not yet. “Thank you for your story.”
Rob and Brigid walked over to us, both of them wiping their eyes. “I’m sorry,” Brigid said, and Allison and I raised our hands. No need. This is a hard life. Do what you have to.
I think it’s about forgiveness.
We finished our apéro, then Brigid asked if we’d like to stay for dinner. I looked at Allison, who gave me a slight but clear “no” with her head. And she was right—they needed to be together. Needed to be alone, together.
So we walked out, Allison and I, her leaning in to me as though we were close friends, which I thought we might actually someday be. In the tiny elevator, she turned her head—all she could turn—and asked, “Would you like to have dinner?”
“I’m not sure I’d be such good company,” I said. “I am a trifle preoccupied.” I’ve noticed that when I’m with British people, I start speaking more British. Precise. Formal.
“Check your mobile,” she said. “And if you haven’t yet heard anything, come with me. It is better to have somebody than nobody.”
I squeezed her shoulder—all I could reach—because that was God’s truth.
When we got out, I checked—a voicemail from Jack, probably asking how I was doing—and that was it.
“I am yours,” I said.
She took my arm. “Let’s go to Philippe Excoffier,” she said. “I’ve actually got a reservation for two. I just didn’t know who the other would be.”
“That’s faith,” I said.
“Maybe so,” she said.
We walked, talking, down the Rue Saint-Dominique, past Nicolas and Café Constant, crowded with diners, and turned onto the Rue de L’Exposition at La Fontaine de Mars. It was an alley, really, just a residential street, and I was surprised when we arrived at this tiny restaurant on the right side of the street, hidden behind scooters and garbage bins.
“This is it?” I asked.
She took my arm and ushered me in. “Don’t judge, American boy.”
Why does everyone call me that?
She greeted the hostess and waiter, and they embraced her. Two kisses, one for each cheek. They ushered us to a table for two. I let her have the booth side and I took the chair. No sooner were we seated than Philippe himself came out of the kitchen to speak with her.
“Mademoiselle,” he said, taking her hand and kissing it. Then he looked to me with some curiosity. Like, who is this dude?
“Philippe,” she said. “May I introduce my friend, Calvin Jones. He is an American journalist. He works with Rob.”
Ah, that got me some love. “Monsieur,” he said, with a bow. “Bienvenue.”
“Merci,” I said. “C’est un bel endroit.” This is a beautiful place.
He bowed to me, beamed. “Merci. J’en suis fier.” I am proud of it.
“For you,” he told Allison, “I have your favorite. The ravioli foie gras.” That lit up her face as well.
“Merci, Philippe,” she said. The waiter, who we realized had been standing patiently by, asked for our drink orders. Allison wanted a French 75. I concurred. That sounded just precisely right.
Phillipe went back to the kitchen. Our drinks came. Allison and I toasted each other. She offered familiar words: “May the saddest day of your future,” she said, “be no worse than the happiest day of your past.”
“Thank you,” I said. We drank. Good French 75. Cognac, not gin, for its base. I approved.
We ordered. I got the poached oysters as a starter, duck breast for my main, and we ordered a soufflé with Grand Marnier to share for dessert.
And then things got a bit quiet. Because, let’s face it, we didn’t really know each other much, and some big bad doors had been banged open this evening, some big hurts exposed to the open air.
Well. I guess there are some things that must be said in any case.
“So,” I began. “I think that Brigid and Rob thought we were going to be a couple. You and me, I mean.”
“Of course they did,” she said. “Two such good-looking people as ourselves. Why wouldn’t we mate?”
I started laughing. I couldn’t help myself. “Brigid got mad at me for meeting Nadia. She had everything planned out. She thought.”
“They want us to be happy,” she said. “Even if they don’t know anything about us.” She could not help but joining me in laughter.
I raised a hand. Just to clarify that I wasn’t laughing because the idea was ridiculous. “You are a lovely person,” I said. “If I hadn’t fallen for Nadia—”
“And if I were not a lesbian,” she interjected.
“And that,” I admitted. “I’d be all over you.”
“Thank you,” she said, then made a face. “I think.” She took a drink, looked across the table at me, reached her hand across the table and put it on mine for a moment. The subject changed. The evening shifted. She removed her hand, looked down, looked back up. “What has happened between them? Brigid and Rob? Just in the past few days, something between them has shifted. For the worse, I think. That scene tonight—”
I shook my head. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you,” I said.
“Oh,” she said. “That bad.” She pursed her lips, formed her next sentence. “Will they be all right?”
I sat with that for a moment. I thought of the Rob I knew, the lifesaver, the man of integrity, the man who loved his wife so much he was willing to risk losing her rather than lie to her.
I thought of Brigid, who took care of people.
“Yes,” I said. “Yes, I think they will.”
She let out a long-held breath. “Thanks be to God.” She looked across at me, and then up at the cosmos. “And will we, perhaps, someday be all right? Will we know love? Will we forgive and be forgiven?”
“Jesus,” I said. I was a little surprised when nobody said “Don’t blaspheme.” “On down the road, do you mean?”
She shrugged. “I suppose.”
I looked across the table at her, at her avid attention to my answer, and at last, I nodded. “Maybe,” I said. “I don’t know where we’re going or what we’re doing. I don’t know what Vladimir Putin has in store for the West. What Islamic militants will do to Paris next time they attack. But maybe we will be.”
She ran her finger around the lip of her glass. “I wonder, what would that look like?”
The waiter poured us more sparkling water, the bubbles climbing up the glass, and I nodded my thanks and held it up. “This, maybe. Happiness? Contentment? Joy?”
She raised her French 75, drank, looked at the amber effervescence inside. “I’d like joy, I believe. I am content now. Maybe even happy. I love my work. I have friends. But I have no one to share my life with.” She flushed red. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I did not mean to be so personal.”
“It’s okay,” I said. “I think we can talk to each other. Tell each other the truth.”
“Very well,” she said. “Then I can say that I want you to be happy. To know joy. With Nadia, God willing.”
“Inshallah,” I agreed. “But I am starting to realize that so much is not up to me. That maybe it never was.”
I checked my phone. Nothing.
Nothing.
Our starters arrived, and they looked glorious.
“Let’s eat,” Allison Evans said to me, a light in the darkness.
And so we ate. My oysters were, indeed, glorious. “Oh my,” I think I said after the first bite.
“I know,” she said. “Philippe.” As though that said it all. She offered me a scallop, which I gladly took. Buttery, tender.
“Oh my,” I said again.
Something she had said stuck with me. Because it seemed to be the heart of the matter. Our starters were cleared away. We ordered another round of drinks. And I looked down at the table, too afraid even to meet Allison’s gaze. “Forgive and be forgiven,” I said.
“Yes,” she said gently.
“What does that look like?” I asked. “Feel like? I think I might be able to forgive. But I don’t know how to be forgiven.” I took a deep breath. Let it out. “I have so much red in my ledger.” Black Widow is always a reliable go-to.
“Avengers Assemble,” she said. “Yes, I know the movie.” In the UK, the film was renamed to distinguish it from the old Avengers TV show. “How is this possible, that you need to be forgiven? You were a journalist. You didn’t torture prisoners. You didn’t kill people.”
“Did I not?”
“Tell me,” she said. “You are carrying something too big for one person alone.”
“So people have said.” I took a deep breath, shrugged. “Okay.”
And I told her about Khalid. I told her about the times he saved my life, about the stories he had opened for me, about the days he was my rock, about how after my father was killed, Khalid’s sunny steady presence helped preserve my sanity.
“He was my friend,” I said. “My best friend. And I got him killed.”
I told her about how he died, about the blast, about going home to his wife Elena to tell her face to face. The least I owed her surely.
All those times I sat in their kitchen enjoying tea and sweets, all the laughter, all of that was gone. We sat at an empty table as Elena wept, wept as though she herself would die, as the weeping children pressed into her lap, a succession of downy ducklings wondering where their father was.
At last, the tears stopped for a moment, and she looked across the table at me, as she had many times. But this time, her look was pure hatred, and I thought her gaze would reduce me to ashes.
“You have killed him, Calvin,” she said.
“No,” I said. It was though the oxygen had been sucked out of the room. I gasped for air.
“Yes,” she said. “He did not have to die.”
“Please,” I said. I was begging.
She got up from the table. She turned away from me without another word, swept up the stairs and out of sight.
I sat there, watching Khalid running toward that little girl.
Watching him disappear in the white light.
“So you cannot forgive yourself,” Allison said, back in Paris, many years and many miles later. “Even though you know he chose this.”
“I cannot,” I said. “If we had not come to Iraq. If I had not come—”
Our entrees arrived just then, and even the wonder of them could not rescue me.
Allison regarded her foie gras ravioli, then regarded me. “Nothing I can say will fix this,” she said, and she shook her head sadly. “Fix you.”
“No,” I said, and this was actually kind of funny. “Why is that?”
“We are two of a kind, I think,” she said. “My head is full of such rubbish about myself. Everyone who looks at me sees a better me than I do.” She looked at me. “When I look at you, Calvin, I see someone who is gentle, and generous, and broken. Who wants to do better. To be better. But there is so much to escape. To transcend. However you wish to put it.” She raised her hands, palms up. “This is what I see.”
“You’re not wrong,” I said. “I take responsibility for things I don’t even know about.”
She indicated my duck. “Still it would be—in my theological understanding of the word—a sin not to eat that.”
I smiled. “You’re not wrong,” I said again.
I lifted my fork.
I took a bite.
And it was very good.
14.
Paris
July 15, 2016
Friday
I walked Allison back to her apartment in the 15th, a long heart-pounding jaunt up the Trocadero steps and past. We had a nightcap at her place, port, and as I strode back across the river to my apartment on the rue Edmond Valentin, I was in some ways in a better place. Yet in some ways, still in the worst place of my life.
As I walked, the streets were packed with Parisians avoiding their apartments for a few more minutes. It was a rainbow of people bearing the heat of summer. Models and menials. Men, women, children. Arab women in headscarves pushing their babies. Young lovers stopping to check the menus of cafés open late. One last drink, perhaps, before they climbed the stairs to their apartments.
I turned over my phone every few minutes as I walked. Nothing. I had resisted sending Nadia another text, reaching out again.
But then I did.
I stopped on the Avenue Woodrow Wilson, thought for a moment, and started to text.
“I am so in the wrong,” I wrote. “I would do anything to fix things. Please talk to me.”
I pressed Send, and as soon as I did, I hated myself for my weakness.
“You are an idiot,” I said to myself. Out loud. And I walked on, across the bridge, down side streets to my apartment.
Behind me, I heard footsteps, which was not exactly normal for this late at night, not typical in this place off the beaten tourist track.
I stopped on the first step of the stoop to tie my shoe, and I took a surreptitious glance back.
Fifty feet behind me, a big man with salt and pepper hair—a man I recognized instantly—was nonchalantly looking off into the distance as though he had nothing at all to do with me.
As though he had nothing to do with the wreckage of my life.
I stood up. I could go through my front door and leave him behind.
But this, of course, is not what I did, because that would have been prudent, and clearly I do not know how to do the prudent thing.
I turned, and with the speed of a thousand thousand sprints, of all the runs through Baghdad and London and Paris and Killeen, Texas, I bore down upon him.
