“I will update you soon. Now, go have a croissant, sit by the river, and enjoy your morning.”
L’Artisan has been treating me like a rock star. I suppose an advanced degree in organic chemistry will do that for you, as well as eight years’ experience as second-in-command at the fragrance chemistry lab at a major US cosmetics firm. That’s why L’Artisan convinced its parent company to relocate me to Paris. To introduce our efficient style to their niche products. But I need this position just as much as the company needs me. Back home, I’d stalled out in my job. I was second, not first, and there was no room for advancement. The head of the lab was going exactly nowhere. That made it even easier to say yes to the new job.
I end the call, tuck the phone into the small purse slung over my chest, and cross the street. I repeat the address that Marisol gave me out loud, but I’m not entirely sure where I am, other than heading closer to Notre Dame. I plug the address into my GPS and realize the bakery is a block away. Easy as pie.
Or eclair, I should say.
As I cross the street, I spot an older woman tugging a small, wheeled shopping basket behind her. A baguette pokes out the top of the basket, and I want to take a photo of it. So I do, raising my cell phone and clicking. Then I notice something at the corner of the street—a man locking up his bike. He wears a helmet. From my vantage point, perhaps fifty feet away, I can tell he’s handsome. Tall and trim, he wears dark, fitted slacks, and a light blue button-down shirt. The combination is somehow both casual and sharply dressed. He has that European look about him. Well, duh. I’m in freaking Europe. But what I really mean is—he looks like he belongs here. He has a certain ease about him. A comfort in his body and in his surroundings, in his style as a man who rides a bicycle in France. He owns this city, he knows it, and yet he doesn’t flaunt it. That’s what his easy stride and casual smile tell me, even from a distance.
When he takes off his helmet, I catch a glimpse of a chiseled jaw, and as he puts the helmet on the handlebars, I check out a rear end that would make angels weep.
I sigh happily, enjoying the Parisian view. Thank you very much, Europe, for sculpting some fine asses on your men. I’m just going to let myself savor the sight as he turns toward the door of the bakery.
Okay, savoring done. Time to savor some carbs.
I reach the bakery and open the door. The scent of fresh bread calls out to me, warm, doughy, and delicious.
I enter and inhale the lovely aromas, then take my spot in line and ogle the display case. There are apricot tarts, raspberry cakes, caramel eclairs, and bread, bread, bread. My mouth waters.
I stare at all the luscious food that’s so darn enticing I barely realize the man with the cute butt and fine jaw is standing in front of me.
When it’s his turn, he says hello to the woman at the register.
An involuntary shiver runs down my spine.
He said that in English.
And not just any English.
But British.
4
Griffin
I’d have kicked a rubbish bin in frustration if I were that type of guy. Instead, I gave myself fifteen minutes of drown-my-sorrows time. For the first seven, I leaned against the barricade at the river, sighed heavily, and stared glumly into the water. Then for three minutes, I opened my wallet, unfolded the piece of paper I keep in it, and reread the words imprinted on my memory.
3. Visit Indonesia. Run a marathon there. Travel across the country, then everywhere.
So, yeah. That’s been tabled. It wasn’t even my dream, but I annexed it when I had to. Adopted it, if you will, when the dream’s owner died.
Then, for the final five minutes, I wandered. Contemplating.
Travel everywhere. Love the idea, but I haven’t saved quite enough yet to pull it off. I need to scrape together a little more, and with the bonus gone, I need more work.
Only I don’t have more work yet.
But here’s the thing. Bread can solve nearly every crummy situation. Nearly. That’s why I’m here at the bakery. Marie is behind the counter, wearing an orange apron that’s covered in flour. Her thick black hair is held in a hairnet.
I say hello to her in English, and she answers me back the same. It’s a running joke. The first time I came here, I was talking on the phone with a friend from home, and she greeted me in English, assuming I didn’t know her language.
She was surprised when I switched to her native tongue, which I do again right now. I order a baguette, and we chat briefly. Am I having a good day? she asks. I don’t need to unload on her, so I tell her my day is fine.
“Did you find the rugelach in Le Marais that I told you about?” she asks as she bends to the case to grab the bread.
“It was amazing. And if I keep eating that I will balloon up,” I say, patting my belly and puffing my cheeks.
She laughs and waves a hand dismissively. “Don’t even go there, young man. You’re too skinny. You haven’t an ounce of fat on you.”
That might not be precisely true, but she’s correct that I’m trim. Running and biking has that effect on the physique.
“And you are too good to me,” I tell her, then hand her two euros for the bread.
I grab the bread and say good-bye as well.
“Bonjour.” The greeting comes from the woman behind me.
I turn in the direction of the voice. The American voice. The confident, strong American voice.
“Je voudrais un croissant chocolat.”
But she’s all wrong, so I jump in. “It’s
