answered questions. When she arrived at the hostel, early in the evening, it was not the nicest place. Peeling walls, worn linoleum, dim corridors that reeked of age and abuse. Worse, the hostel had been overbooked and there wasn’t a room for her. There wasn’t even an extra bed in the dormitory. The staff wasn’t entirely helpful, and to top it off, the phones weren’t working.
She was near tears. Had the trains been running, she might have turned around, retraced her route to Paris, then to New York, then home to California. Who could blame a frightened teenager for wanting to go home?
She sat in the lobby and tried to evaluate what to do. Several minutes later, a young man came over to her and sat down next to her. He was very slight of build, with a mocha complexion. In French he started a conversation and asked what nationality she was.
“I’m American,” she said in French. “From California.”
“My name is Rene,” he said. “I’m French, but of Tunisian origin.”
He smiled and tried to speak English with her, but his was limited, so their conversation ensued in French. He was eighteen and had technical training in computer engineering, he said, mostly self-acquired. He had enlisted in the French Air Force, he said, l’armee de l’air, he proclaimed proudly. This was his final evening at liberty. The next day he would take a train in a different direction and travel onward to Nantes in west central France for six weeks of basic training. It was his hope to eventually see the world, to be posted in someplace exotic like Polynesia or Martinique where the French maintained bases. He added that it had always been his dream to visit America, as well.
Alex joined him for dinner. They had soup and bread and cheese in the hostel cafeteria. She waited to see whether the hostel keepers would find a place for her. But while her conversation with Rene played out in the forefront of her mind, in the back of her mind her worries accelerated.
What would she do? Despite the kindness of the old lady on the train and the gentle amity of Rene this evening, she had never felt so homesick in her life, so cut off from everything she knew. In her stomach was a knot that wouldn’t untie.
After dinner, there was a change at the concierge’s desk. The new man told Alex that the phones were up and running again and they had called everywhere, including local homes that might take in an overnight border. But it was early summer and there were no beds to be had anywhere within a hundred miles. Nor was there any way for a single girl traveling alone to get to anywhere else. And it was against regulations for anyone to stay in the hostel’s lobby or office area.
There was still some daylight remaining. In midsummer in the south of France daylight remained until almost ten o’clock. Alex walked outside the hostel, stood in the street and tried to decide what to do. She noticed that across the street there was a small Catholic church. It was white stucco with peeling green paint on its front door.
Alex walked to it. She tried the door but it was locked. When she turned around, however, she was surprised to find Rene standing very close to her.
“I heard what’s happening,” he said. “You can have my room for the night.”
She was shocked. “That’s kind of you,” she said. They spoke in French, and at this time in her life, hers was halting. “But you’re about to go into the military. I couldn’t possibly take your room for the final night.”
“I wish you would,” he said.
“Where would you go?”
“I have a backpack. I can sleep in the park. Among the hobos,” he said with a smile, “among les clochards. It will be an adventure. I’ll be gone before dawn as long as the police don’t catch me.”
“No, no,” she said. “You mustn’t take such a risk for me.”
“Then let me sneak you into my room and we will share it,” he said.
Her expression must have conveyed her confusion, appreciation mingled with anxiety and suspicion. He sought to defuse it. “I warn you, there is only one bed. It is very narrow and there is no space on the floor. But I will be honorable.”
She searched his eyes. Sometimes, she thought, angels take strange forms.
“All right,” she said.
They returned to the hostel. A friend created a distraction for the concierge and Alex darted down the corridor to Rene’s room. The concierge either didn’t see her or chose not to.
The door to Rene’s room was unlocked and the room empty. He followed a minute later, closed the door and locked it. The room was tiny, maybe eight by ten, with a nightstand and a bed, just as Rene had described. Barely enough room for two people to stand up together, much less lie down together.
The shower and bathroom facilities on the corridor were communal. They took turns so that Alex could have privacy to change and so that he could too. Awkwardly, at 11:00 p.m., they turned off the single room light and lay down together, Alex between the wall and Rene’s body. Around her neck, Alex wore the small gold cross that her dad had given her years earlier, the one she had eventually lost in Kiev. She knew Rene had noted it, but he said nothing about it.
A moment passed. They both started to laugh at the preposterousness of the situation. Then they started to talk about their homes, their families. They discovered they were both only children raised by a single parent. Rene had been raised by his very strict father, who worked in a factory. His mother had deserted the family when he had been five. Rene had been raised as a Muslim but had fallen away from his faith, perhaps as a reaction to the strictness of his father’s Islam.
“What would your father say if he knew you were here, lying in bed, with an American girl?” Alex asked.
“Oooh!” Rene answered quickly. He laughed and pointed to his lower backside in the dim light. He furiously waved a finger to indicate that he didn’t even want to
After hushed conversation of nearly an hour, fatigue rolled in upon them. Alex taught Rene some words and phrases in English.
Rene reciprocated with some useful words in Arabic.
Marhabbah. Assalaam Alaikim. Maasalaamah.
Hello. Peace be unto you. Good-bye.
“If you greet most Arab people in their language, you break the ice,” he said. “They will trust you more and treat you with a genuine smile,” he said. “Assalamou Alaekom means ‘hello’ or ‘hi’ in Arabic. Another word is Ezzayak, said as a question. It means, ‘How are you?’ Learning a few Arabic words will always make a difference.”
“Assalamou Alaekom,” she tried, laughing, garbling it.
“Assalamou Alaekom,” he corrected. It quickly became a joke between them. They laughed until she felt herself drifting, trying to stay awake but no longer able. The last thing she remembered was Rene saying something to her that she didn’t understand. She was too tired.
The next morning she awoke with a start. It was 8:00 a.m., and she was alone on the bed. She looked everywhere in the small room. Rene was gone and had taken all his things. She waited for several minutes to see if perhaps he was in the shower or the bathroom. But no. He was gone.
She pulled on a T-shirt and some jeans. She snuck out of the hostel. The new concierge on the morning shift gave her a cursory glance but said nothing. She went outside into a warm summer morning. She was still unsure what to do, whether to go forward with her trip or go back to America. The knot had returned to the pit of her stomach, and she again felt alone, sad, and vulnerable. She had made one friend, or thought she had, and now he was gone too.
The door to the church was open across the street. She had time. She wandered in. There were a few older people sitting in various pews. There was stained glass at the front, a hundreds-of-years-old depiction of Jesus raising his hands to God.
Alex sat for a moment, then closed her eyes and said a prayer. She wanted wisdom. She wanted guidance. She wanted to know how to proceed. She opened her eyes.
Nothing much had changed. She stood, bowed slightly to the cross at the altar, turned, and walked back toward the front door.
She was near her decision. She would return home. The loneliness was too much.
Then something caught her eye.
In the back pew, among the old people she had walked past was the lady from the train. The old woman smiled at her and raised a hand. She signaled Alex to wait, as if she had something to say.
Outside, Alex waited. The old woman came out of the church a few seconds later.
“Today you will continue on to the Camargue?” she asked, recalling the previous day’s conversation.
Alex hesitated. “Yes. Yes, I think so,” she said. “Unless I change my mind and go back to Paris. I’m thinking about-”
“No, no, no!” the old woman said sharply. “
“Merci bien,” Alex said.
“If I had a gift, I would give you one,” the old lady said. “But I am old and not well off. So I don’t.”
“I think you just did give me a gift.”
“I don’t understand.”
“You remind me so much of my grandmother. It’s almost as if you’re her.”
The old lady laughed. “You flatter me,” she said.
“My train leaves in an hour,” Alex said. “To the Camargue. Thank you.”
“Good luck to you,” the old lady said. “May God always bless you.”
They embraced again. On her way to the train station, Alex stopped by a small grocery store. From a cheerful shop owner, she bought fresh bread, a packet of cheese, two apples, and some bottled water for the train ride. She had an eye out for Rene but did not see him.
On the train through the French countryside, in a compartment that seated six, she wondered what guideposts, what angels, had been on earth for her. Across from her sat a mother with a boy of about ten. They were French of Sudanese origin, Alex learned as a conversation developed.
Alex tried her next phrase of greeting in Arabic. They smiled and responded with kindness. Alex engaged the boy in a casual conversation and
