‘Yeah sure,’ I say to stop him saying anything else self-deprecating.
‘Yes that’s why it’s a bad idea, or…’
‘Just yeah, I mean maybe at some point. If we get some time.’ It is the most pitiful invitation.
‘Oh.’ His voice softens. ‘Cool,’ he adds.
‘Maybe I can call you again, like tomorrow? When you’re not at work,’ I offer, desperate to move off the topic of Archie flying all this way to stay in this attic with me and my ghosts.
‘Of course.’
‘Great.’ I take another long drag.
‘Ava, I have to go.’ He sighs.
‘I know, thanks Archie.’
‘For what?’
‘For answering. I— It means a lot.’
‘Anytime.’ And whilst it might be something that anyone says to finish a call, when he says it, I believe him.
Chapter 5
Isleep in untilnine. Enjoy the luxury of not living with retirees who seem to surface horrifically early and like to hoover.
The shower eventually starts to spit out warmish water after five minutes of running and I try to scrub yesterday off into the drain. When I feel slightly more human and the headache from the wine has been reduced to a dull fug, I reach for the towel and stand by the sink. I can hear my mother telling me to try to make an effort, that if I at least looked like I was coping, the rest would follow. I wasn’t quite sure about the psychology behind the sentiment, but still dig around in my make-up bag, searching for a face that might show the world I’m better than I am.
I never turned the radio off last night, so I’m welcomed into the kitchen to what clearly is the French version of Best of the Seventies, but it is nice to not be in silence. I make a black coffee and launch my laptop into life at the breakfast bar.
I go through the motions of my usual morning routine. First, I log on to the blog. There are forty more comments on my last post and twelve messages. I had told them I was off on a short, book-related break but would be back in a couple of weeks. It managed people’s expectations, stopped randomers messaging you asking if you had died.
I used to make sure I replied to everyone when it all started, but it was smaller then, a few dozen maybe here and there, and it took up a morning. About five months after the blog started, a post went viral. I had shared a picture of Ettie and me, the first time I had put our faces on the internet. It was a selfie, the first date, when phone cameras were still blurry and imperfect. We looked so young. I wrote something so unguarded I look back now and wonder where I got the confidence to ever publish it. It had travelled somehow into the feed of a TV presenter who had lost her husband a year before and she had shared it. The next day I had gained 17,000 followers, and my meandering passion project to stave off boredom had become something much more.
This morning though, I decide to read through the messages. They used to just be women but there’s men now too. All explaining to me how my ‘strength’ inspires them, how I am the only one who ‘gets it’. Now, as I sit in the empty apartment, terrified about the prospect of stepping outside, I know it’s all one big lie.
My mission today is to buy food. It is almost eleven; I can get my shopping, walk around the market for an hour and then meet The American for lunch. The thought of eating with a stranger would normally bring me out in hives, but there’s something about her that makes the prospect a little more appealing. I want to know her, to be invited into her confidence. I think if I was more like her then everything might be a little easier to handle.
I take a large canvas bag from the kitchen and make my way down the stairs onto the street. The road up to the square is as empty as it was yesterday. Familiarity seeps through me. This had been my town, the one I had discovered and built my identity around, the one that wasn’t heavy with shared family stories and awkward teenage moments.
When I round the corner towards the square, I see a queue of people snaking out of the boulangerie door. Ettie had told me once that it was a legal requirement for every village in France to have somewhere you could buy bread. Like a lot of things Etienne told me, I never felt the need to follow it up with a Google search. I had a sort of immovable trust in him.Later I realised that this is a trait that lots of young women who fall for older men often have in common. There’s nothing quite like finding out you’re a cliché.
I skirt around the edge of the square, until I can’t avoid it any longer. The stalls are huddled around a covered market built back when chainmail was a wardrobe staple. In the height of the summer the weekly Thursday market is the place to be, where hastily made shanty stalls sprawl down the side streets to the delight of the tourists, but now it’s just for locals offering a meagre splattering of the basics: namely vegetables and jars of paté. It means there aren’t enough distractions. It means that the moment I look up across the square I can see it.
The little red sign with the gold writing still reads ‘L’Avenir,’ the wicker tables, already laid out, the shutters and parasols sun-bleached and all a bit wonky. The café. Our café.
A waitress I don’t know looks at me, notices me staring. She points to the sign with the opening times, ‘Nous ouvrons en dix minutes, madame!’ she shouts across the void of all of the ten metres between us.
I turn and walk towards what I hope is the supermarket. My bearings have left me now. When I see the Spar sign I feel as if I have made it to a bunker of sorts. It is safety with its fluorescent lights and refrigeration – it’s hard to feel sentimental in a supermarket.
I take a basket and shuffle around the aisles, clutching at the torn-up little shopping list in my hand. I’m sure there are glaciers that would complete a shopping list faster, but I think I would stay all day in here if it meant I didn’t have to look at the café again.
Chapter 6
Thankfully L’Auberge is downa side street, and I go the long way round to try to make up the time. Even when I try not to be, I have always been frustratingly punctual.
I didn’t need to worry, The American is already here, sitting at a bistro table on the terrace, sunglasses shielding half of her face with her shoulders wrapped up in a grey scarf I fully expect to be cashmere.
