He bends down to shout back. “But not the real one. That glamorous, fake one you see in films. I always spend the real one watching television alone in my bedroom.”
“Yes! Exactly!”
Josh hands me a glass and nods towards one of the restaurant’s giant decorative-aluminium shells. We duck underneath it. The noise becomes somewhat muffled, and I raise my glass. “To the new year? Our new school year?”
He places a dramatic hand across his heart. “I’m sorry. But I can’t toast that place.”
I laugh. “Okay, how about…comics? Or Joann Sfar?”
“I propose a toast” – Josh raises his glass with mock gravitas – “to new beginnings.”
“To new beginnings.”
“And Joann Sfar.”
I laugh again. “And Joann Sfar.” Our glasses clink, and his eyes stay carefully fixed upon mine in the French tradition. My smile widens into a grin. “Ha! I knew it.”
“Knew what?”
“You held eye contact with me. I’ve seen you pretend like you don’t know how things go around here, but you do know. I knew you knew. You’re too good of an observer.” I take a triumphant sip of champagne. The pristine fizz tickles the tip of my tongue, and my smile grows so enormous that he breaks into laughter.
Thank you, France, for allowing alcohol to be legal for teenagers.
Well, eighteen year olds. And we’re close enough.
Josh is amused. “How do you know I wasn’t looking at you simply because I want to look at you?”
“I’ll bet you speak French better than you let on, too. You never use it at school, but I bet you’re fluent. People can play dumb all they want, but they always give themselves away in actions. In the small moments, like that.”
The bubbles seem to go down the wrong hole. He coughs and sputters. “Play dumb?”
“I’m right, right? You’re fluent.”
Josh shakes his head. “Not all of us grew up in a half-French household.”
“But I’ll bet you’re still good.”
“Maybe. Maybe not.” Thankfully, he’s amused again.
“So why do you pretend not to know things?” My fingers play with the stem of my glass. “Or not to care?”
“I don’t care. About most things,” he adds.
“But why play dumb?”
He takes another sizable gulp of champagne. “You know, you ask really tough questions for a first date.”
A painful blush erupts across my face and neck. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s okay. I like girls who challenge me.”
“I didn’t mean to be challen—”
“You aren’t.”
I raise an eyebrow, and he laughs.
“Really,” he says. “I like smart girls.”
My blush deepens. I wonder if he knows that I’m the top student in our class. I never talk about it, because I don’t want people to judge me. But it’s true that his ex-girlfriend was smart, too. Rashmi was last year’s salutatorian.
Josh says something else, but the noise level in the restaurant has been increasing, and it’s finally reached its maximum volume. I shake my head. He tries again, but I still can’t hear him so he takes my hand. We down the rest of our drinks as we squeeze through the revellery. He plunks the empty glasses on a passing tray, leads me past a final throng of partygoers, and we emerge gasping and laughing into the hall.
“Well,” Josh says. “Now that that’s done.”
I gesture towards the galleries. We stroll through them hand in hand. But the air here is cold, almost reminiscent of mortuaries, and the sparsely furnished rooms grow stranger and stranger. Miniature sculptures of mundane objects that you have to get on your knees to see. A short film of a fast-food joint being purposefully flooded with water. A collection of puppets with crayons shoved up their asses.
“That looks…”
“Uncomfortable?” Josh finishes.
“I was going to say like a very colourful suppository.”
He bursts into laughter, and an elderly woman with a dead fox around her shoulders glares at us. The fox has been dyed an alarming shade of purple. Josh whispers into my ear, “That’s how it became such a vibrant colour. Crayons. Up its butt.”
I cover my giggling, but it’s no use. She glares again, and we scurry into the next room. “Ohmygod. This whole thing is…not what I’d hoped.”
“Don’t say that.” But he’s still laughing.
I shake my head. “I wanted weird, but maybe it’s too weird?”
“It doesn’t matter. I’m with you. I’m happy to be anywhere with you.”
My heart puddles. “Me too.”
Josh squeezes my hand. “Come on.” He pulls me closer as we walk, and our bodies bump against each other. It’s amazing how solid he is. How real. Muscle and skin and bone. “We still haven’t seen your Finnish artist. Maybe he’s over here?”
We find the exhibit hidden away in a back corner of the museum. The walls are collaged with hundreds, maybe thousands, of grainy, unframed photographs. We peer closer at one of a crumpled single-serving potato-chip bag. The artist had laid a scribbled note beside the object as some kind of label before snapping the picture. It’s written in Finnish, but it’s also been marked with a date.
“Huh.” We say it together.
Josh points to another photograph. It’s an empty bus seat, also labelled. “So he’s cataloguing his day-to-day life? I guess?”
I look around for a sign in French and find it beside the door. I walk over to read it. “These aren’t his things. They’re some woman’s.”
Josh gives a low whistle. “No wonder this looks like a stalker’s bedroom.” He bends over. “Oh, shit! Look at this one. Yeah, I think that’s actually shit.”
I race back to his side. “How did he get her shit?!”
“Maybe he went into a public restroom after her? He was probably gonna take a picture of the seat and got lucky. Maybe it wouldn’t flush.”
I snort loudly.
“I mean, I’ve been waiting for you to leave something behind for ages, but you keep picking all of these working toilets.”
I fake-gasp and shove him. He laughs and shoves me back, and I squeal as the purple-fox lady enters the room. She shoots us daggers. We straighten up, but our sniggering is barely contained as we attempt to focus our attention on a picture of a discarded Coke can. “This guy’s lady love is kind of a slob, don’t you think?” he whispers.
I cover my mouth with my hands again.
“A reaaaaaaaal litterbug.”
“Stop it,” I hiss. My eyes are watering. “Ohmygod, look at this one! How did he get her toenail clippings?”
“If you were my girl,” he whispers, “I’d take creepy pictures of your trash when I knew you weren’t looking.”
“If you were my girl,” I whisper back, “I’d put the creepy pictures in a foreign museum so you wouldn’t know that I take creepy pictures.”
A single belly laugh escapes from Josh, and the woman spins around and actually stomps her foot. Like a cartoon character. It’s the last straw. We lose control, cracking up hysterically, as we run from the room and towards the escalators.
“If you were my girl,” I say, barely able to catch my breath, “I’d remove your skin, dye it purple, and wear you like a scarf at fancy gatherings!”
He stops and bends at the waist, he’s laughing so hard. “Oh, fuck.” He wipes a tear from his eye. Two museum guards whip around the corner. “Go, go, go, go, go!”
We tear down the hall, and the guards take off after us. We hit the escalators, and – for some reason – they give up. After, like, ten whole yards. They cluck their tongues as we disappear from view. “So much for security.” Josh is cheerfully dismayed. “Maybe we should steal a painting?”
I laugh, and he watches me from the step below. Beaming. The current between us is so intense that it’s almost visible. He takes my hand and turns it over, examining it. It’s so much tinier than his. “If you were m
y girl?” he says. “I’d steal you away from the fancy gathering and take you somewhere less pretentious.”
I rest my thumb against an ink stain on his index finger. “And if you were mine, I’d tell you that I know a good place just up the street.”
He lifts his head. His eyebrows rise.
I smile.
“If you were my girl,” he says, but there’s an explosion outside in the courtyard, and I miss the punchline. Fireworks crackle in showers of pink, green, blue, white, green, pink, orange. The museum-goers on the escalators heading upwards erupt in a frenzy of applause as we continue heading down. “If you were my girl,” Josh says, pressing his nose against my ear. I turn my head, and the lights and the noise and the people disappear. The distance between us disappears.
Our kiss is anything but shy.
His lips press deeply against mine, and mine press deeply back. Our mouths open. Our tongues meet. We’re hungry, deliriously so. Even with my eyes closed, the shape of his body flashes before me, lit by the spectacle outside. Light, dark, light, dark. He tastes like champagne. He tastes like desire. He tastes like my deepest craving fulfilled.
Chapter ten
Our mouths are still attached when Josh hits the ground floor. A number of things follow in rapid succession: his chin smacks my nose on its upwards trajectory as he quickly reclaims his height over me; I lose my balance, stumble forward, and take both of us crashing to the museum’s polished concrete floor.
“Holy shit.” Josh looks up at me, and his eyes widen. “Holy shit!”
Blood is pouring from my nose.
“Is it broken? Did I break your nose?”
I touch it and wince, but I shake my head like it’s not a big deal. I shove my dress back down over my indecently exposed upper thighs. “I’m fine.” Imb fimb.
Josh pulls me up and out of the escalator’s path. He pats his coat frantically, searching for something, but he’s coming up empty. A concerned observer whisks out a stylish floral pocket square and hands it to me.
“Merci,” I tell the dapper man. Mbear-see. I hold it to my nose for a few seconds, and it comes down looking like a crime scene.
“No. No.” Josh can’t stop repeating himself. “I’m sorry. I am so sorry.”
“It’s okay!” I hope he can understand my voice. “It’s only a bloody nose.” I hold out the pocket square, unsure, and the man furiously waves his hand. Thatsokaykeepit. I nod another thanks as Josh leads me to the closest restroom. “Really, I’m fine,” I assure him. But he touches his forehead in horror as I disappear inside.
Damage inspection. My nose is still running, my chin is stained like a tomato, and tomorrow I’ll be sporting a vicious bruise. At least my dress is still clean? A woman with flawless ebony skin and to-die-for cheekbones emerges from a stall. She gasps. “What happened?” she asks in French. She’s already producing an entire pack of tissues from her bag. She pushes them into my hands.
“I get these all of the time,” I say. “It’s so embarrassing.”
Only the first half is a lie.
I hold up a tissue, carefully pinch the bridge of my nose, and wait for the bleeding to stop. And wait. And wait. I urge her to leave, because it’s weird to have a stranger, even a well-meaning one, stare at me for this long. She finally does. Immediately, I hear Josh ask her in manic – but word-perfect – French if I’m okay.
Aha! I knew it.
When the blood comes to a standstill, I reappear with a whopping smile. Josh wrings his hands. “Isla, I am so sorry. Are you sure it’s not broken?”
My smile turns into a full-blown grin. “Positive.”
His discomfort eases, but only momentarily. His brow refurrows in confusion.
“Un nouveau record,” I say. “Combien de temps ça t’a pris? Une heure?” A new record. How long did that take? An hour?
Josh’s eyes narrow. He realizes that I caught him speaking in fluent French, even though he implied upstairs that he can’t. “Au moins quatre-vingt-dix minutes,” he admits grudgingly. At least ninety minutes. It only took this long for me to learn the truth.
I stare at him. I stare harder.
Finally, he shakes his head and laughs. I smile – sweetly, this time – to let him know that his secret is safe. Josh rubs the back of his neck. “I don’t suppose you’d still want to show me that other place? That less pretentious, date-continuing place?”
“I don’t know,” I tease. “It’s a secret place. Can I trust you?”
“I’m great at keeping secrets.”
I nudge him gently. “I know you are.”
The air outside is gusty and crisp, and it adds to my feeling of recklessness. I don’t know if I’ll be able to tell Kurt what I’m about to do, if this is breaking some sort of friendship code. It might be. But I don’t care.
We’re radiant, the thrill of the evening having been returned, as we hurry up the next four blocks. I take a left on rue Chapon and lead him to a building with white peeling paint and red wooden shutters. I stop at the keypad. Josh look surprised, maybe even shocked. “Don’t tell me you have an apartment.”
I punch in the code, and the door buzzes. I give him a mischievous smile. “Come in.”
“I figured we were going to a bar or club or something. Colour me intrigued, Martin.”
I wrinkle my nose.
Josh cringes. “Yeah. That doesn’t work with a male surname, does it?”
I head upstairs, smiling to myself, and he follows quietly. After we’ve passed several floors, he shoots me a curious look. “All the way up,” I say. We spiral and spiral until we reach the top landing. Josh glances at the purple door with the leopard-print mat, expectantly. Nervously. “Not that one.” I steer him around a hidden corner towards a second, smaller door. “This one.”
He tugs on the knob and discovers that it’s locked. I fish out the skeleton key from the bottom of my bag. It’s heavy and iron. “You know,” he says, “if you weren’t tiny, cute, and remarkably innocent looking, I’d be running away right now. This feels like the set-up to some torture porn.”
“Never trust a girl because she looks innocent.” I wag the key at him, but my heart pounds faster. He said I’m cute. I turn the key, the lock thunks, and the door creaks open.
Josh squints into the darkness. “Ah. More stairs. Of course.”
“Last set, I promise.”
He follows me inside, and I gesture for him to shut the door. We’re enveloped in pitch black. “Wait here,” I whisper.
“Are you getting your axe?”
“Handcuffs.”
“Kinky. But, okay, I’ll try it.”
I laugh as I climb the final set of stairs. They’re narrow, rough, and steep, so I ascend with caution. I raise an arm above my head until my fingers hit the trapdoor. One more turn of the key, a powerful shove with the heel of my hand, and it pops open. The stairwell illuminates. I look down. Josh looks up at me, bathed in starlight and wonder.
He steps onto the rooftop balcony with silent reverence. I close the trapdoor, and we’re surrounded by a sparkling, winking cityscape.
“You can see everything from here,” he says. It’s the first time I’ve heard him speak with awe. The serpentine river and crumbling cathedrals and sprawling palaces and everything, yes, everything is visible from here. The view is even better than the Pompidou’s. The City of Light pulses with life, Nuit Blanche celebrations in full swing.
“Welcome to the Treehouse.” I shine with a buoyant pride. “I’ve never had a real one, but it makes for a good substitute. The only part that requires an imagination is the tree itself.”
“I can’t believe it. This is yours?”
“My aunt’s. Tante Juliette lives in the apartment with the purple door. I used to play up here when I was a little girl, but then she gave me the key during my sophomore year. Kurt and I need somewhere…to escape.”
Josh is taking in the space, lingering on and processing each item. The balcony is square, snug, and crammed with a va
riety of worn objects: a wooden ladder, two mismatched cane chairs, a mossy terracotta pot holding a miniature rosebush, stacked piles of round stones, a cracked mirror with a gilt frame, a collection of pale green soda bottles, a steamer trunk with a broken lock, and the head of a white carousel horse. A low concrete wall holds everything in.
“They’re all found objects,” I explain. “We pick them up off the street. We have a rule that none of our décor” – I say this word somewhat jokingly, somewhat seriously – “can be purchased.”
Josh squats down and delicately touches the horse’s mane. “People leave things like this on the street?”
“In front of their houses. They set them out for the garbage-men to take away.”
“What about this?” He points to a chipped porcelain bowl that’s filled to the top with fresh water.
“That’s for Jacque. He’s the stray cat who sometimes hangs out with us.”
Josh shakes his head. “This…yeah. This is incredible. You must bring all of your paramours here.”
It’s a tease, but as he stands back up, I sense a real question underneath. “There’s only been one. And, no, he didn’t receive an invitation.” I bend over to remove a thick, plaid blanket from the steamer trunk. “Okay. I lied.”
“You did bring him here?”
I hold up the blanket and laugh. “No. I bought this. I didn’t find it on the street.”
Josh emits a barely discernible but clearly relieved breath of held air. It makes me smile. I lay the blanket down. We sit, facing each other with crossed legs. “So tell me about him,” he says. “Tell me who I should be jealous of.”
“Well. His name is Jacque, he’s about yea-high, and he has the most delightful little paws.”
“Come on.”
“The guy isn’t important. It’s not like I dated him for two years,” I add pointedly.
“Ugh, don’t remind me.” But after a few seconds, he nudges my knee. “Go on.”
I sigh. “His name was Sébastien. He’s French. He attends a school ten minutes away from ours. And my aunt set us up.”