Just One Day

He looks perplexed. “Which is correct?”

“I’m beginning to think they both are.”

He shrugs a little, takes my hand, kisses my cheeks twice, and then he bids me adieu.

_ _ _

It’s only lunchtime when I leave Modou, and with no idea when I will see Celine, I feel oddly relieved, like I’ve been given a reprieve. I hadn’t really planned on being a tourist in Paris, but I decide to do it. I brave the Metro and get off in the Marais quarter and go to one of the cafes along the beautiful Place des Vosges, where I order a salad and a citron presse, adding plenty of sugar this time. I sit there for hours, waiting for the waiter to kick me out, but he leaves me alone until I ask for my check. At a patisserie, I get a ridiculously expensive macaron—this one a pale tangerine, like the last whispers of a sunset. I eat it and walk, in and out of the narrow streets, through a lively Jewish section, full of Orthodox men with black hats and stylish skinny suits. I snap a few pictures for my mom and text them to her and tell her to forward them to Grandma, who’ll get a kick out of it. Then I wander around looking at the boutiques, gazing at clothing I can barely afford to touch. When the salesladies ask me in French if I need help, I answer in French that I am just browsing.

I buy some postcards and go back to Place des Vosges and sit down in the park inside the square. Amid the mothers playing with their babies and the old men reading their newspapers, puffing away on cigarettes, I write them out. I have a lot to send. One to my parents, one to my grandmother, one to Dee, one to Kali, one to Jenn, one to Cafe Finlay, one to Carol. And then, at the last minute, I decide to write one to Melanie too.

It’s kind of a perfect day. I feel totally relaxed, and though I’m undoubtedly a tourist, I also feel like a Parisian. I’m almost relieved that I haven’t heard from Modou. Kelly sends me a text about meeting up for dinner, and I’m getting ready to make my way back to the hostel when my phone chirps. It’s from Modou. Celine will be at the club after ten o’clock.

I feel like the mellow relaxing vibe of the afternoon disappears behind a storm cloud. It’s only seven. I have several hours to kill, and I could go meet the Oz gang for dinner, but I’m too nervous. So, I walk the city in my nervousness. I get to the club at nine thirty and stand outside, the heavy bass thump of live music making my heart pound. She’s probably already there, but it feels like being early is some kind of faux pas. So I linger outside, watching the stylishly edgy Parisians with razored haircuts and angular clothes filter into the club. I look down at myself: khaki skirt, black T-shirt, leather flip-flops. Why didn’t I dress for battle?

At ten fifteen, I pay my (ten-euro) entry and go in. The club is packed, and there’s a band on the stage, all heavy guitars and a violin screeching feedback, and the tiniest Asian girl singing in this high, squeaky voice. All alone, surrounded by these hipsters, I don’t think I’ve ever felt so out of place, and every part of me is telling me to leave before I make a fool of myself. But I don’t. I haven’t come this far to chicken out. I fight my way to the bar, and when I see Modou, I greet him like a long-lost brother. He smiles at me and pours me a glass of wine. When I try to pay, he waves the bill away, and immediately, I feel better.

“Ahh, Celine is there,” he says, pointing to a table up front. She sits, alone, watching the band with a strange intensity, the smoke from her cigarette curling witchily around her.

I walk over to her table. She doesn’t acknowledge me, though I can’t tell if it’s because she’s snubbing me or concentrating on the band. I stand next to the open chair waiting for her to invite me to sit down, but then I just give up. I pull the chair out and sit. She gives me the slightest of nods, takes a puff of the cigarette, and blows smoke all over me, which I suppose counts as a greeting. Then she turns back to the band.

We sit there, listening. We are sitting right up close to the speakers, so the sound is extra deafening; my ears are already beginning to ring. It’s hard to tell if she’s enjoying the music. She doesn’t tap her toes or sway or anything. She just stares and smokes.

Finally, when the band takes a break, she looks at me. “Your name is Allyson.” She pronounces it Aleeseesyoohn, which makes it sound ridiculous somehow, an SUV of an American name with too many syllables.

I nod.

“So, not French at all?”

I shake my head. I never claimed it was.

We stare at each other, and I realize she won’t give me a thing. I have to take it. “I’m looking for Willem. Do you know where I can find him?” I’d meant to come in guns blazing, French spouting, but my nerves have sent me scurrying back to the comforts of my mother tongue.

She lights a new cigarette and blows more smoke on me. “No.”

“But, but he said you were good friends.”

“He said that? No. I am just like you.”

I cannot imagine in what way she would think she is even remotely like me, aside from us both possessing two X chromosomes. “How, how are we anything alike?”

“I am just one of the girls. There are many of us.”

It’s not like I didn’t know this about him. Not like he hid it. But hearing it out loud, from her, I feel exhausted, jet lag dropping me like a plummeting elevator.

“So you don’t know where he is?”

She shakes her head.

“And you don’t know where I can find him?”

“No.”

“And would you even tell me if you did?”

Her eyebrow goes up into that perfect arch as smoke curls out of her mouth.

“Can you even tell me his last name? Can you tell me that much?”

And here she smiles. Because in this little game we are playing, have been playing since last summer, I just showed my hand. And what a rotten hand it is. She takes a pen and a scrap of paper and writes something down. She slides the paper over to me. His name is on there. His full name! But I won’t give her the satisfaction of my eagerness, so I casually tuck it in my pocket without even glancing at it.

“Do you need anything else?” Her tone, haughty and gloating, manages to carry over the sounds of the band, who have started playing again. I can already hear her laughing about me with all her hipster pals.

“No, you’ve done quite enough.”

She eyes me for a long second. Her eyes aren’t so much blue as violet. “What will you do now?”

I force a bitchy smile, which I expect doesn’t look bitchy so much as constipated. “Oh, you know, see the sights.”

She blows more smoke on me. “Yes, you can be a touriste,” she says, as though tourist were an epithet. Then she begins ticking off all the places lowly people like us go. The Eiffel Tower. Sacre-Coeur. The Louvre.

I search her face for hidden meaning. Did he tell her about our day? I can just picture them laughing about me throwing the book at the skinheads, telling Willem I’d take care of him.

Celine is still talking about all the things I can do in Paris. “You can go shopping,” she is saying. Buy a new handbag. Some jewelry. Another watch. Some shoes. I can’t quite fathom how someone spouting off Ms. Foley– like advice can be so condescending.

“Thank you for your time,” I say. In French. Annoyance has made me bilingual.

Thirty-one

Willem de Ruiter.

His name is Willem de Ruiter. I rush to an Internet cafe and start Googling him. But Willem de Ruiter turns out to be a popular name in Holland. There’s a Dutch cinematographer with that name. There’s some famous diplomat with that name. And hundreds of other nonfamous people who nevertheless have some reason to be on the Internet. I go through hundreds of pages, in English, in Dutch, and I find not one link to him, not one piece of evidence that he actually he exists. I Google his parents’ names Bram de Ruiter. Yael de Ruiter. Naturopath. Actor. Anything I can think of. All these combinations. I get vaguely excited when some weird theater thing comes up, but when I click through, the website is down.