I Heart Paris

  ‘I remember when he wrote that song.’

  I didn’t need to look to know who it was, but I couldn’t help myself. Solène was kneeling beside me on the sofa, her arms resting on the metal barrier and her chin in her hands. She stared out at the stage, smiling softly.

  ‘We had not been living together long. I was so homesick for Paris and he tried so hard to make me happy.’ She rested her head on her arms and turned to look at me with the same smile. ‘It is even prettier when he sings it in French.’

  I pressed my lips together and held on to the railings. I didn’t have a clever comeback, just a very strong desire to club her around the head, call her a bitch and tell her to fuck off. Which would have been very satisfying, but not very grown-up.

  ‘Sometimes we would sing it together, even lovelier.’ She pulled her long blonde hair over her shoulder and combed it through with her fingers.

  ‘Oh, just fuck off, you bitch!’ I stared straight ahead. So I wasn’t very grown-up. But at least I didn’t hit her. ‘I thought you said you had a boyfriend?’

  ‘I did?’ Like any really good backstabbing harpy, Solène didn’t react to my ridiculously childish insult. She just carried on smiling at me. ‘Angela, I thought we were friends.’

  ‘No, you didn’t,’ I said. ‘You thought you were going to steal my boyfriend.’

  ‘Oh please, we are not children.’ She laughed sweetly. ‘I am not going to steal your boyfriend.’

  ‘Really?’ I didn’t like the air quotes she put around ‘steal your boyfriend’. And I liked the implication that I was the one being childish even less. Even if I was.

  She sighed lightly. ‘Alex is mine. I cannot steal what already belongs to me.’

  Starting to shake slightly, my mouth already dry from drinking too much. I turned to face her.

  ‘Are you serious? Did you really just say that?’ I asked, incredulous. ‘No one really says that you know. And also, he’s not yours. Hasn’t been for a really long time actually.’

  ‘What did you do to your face?’ she asked, putting her hand over her mouth in mock horror and laughing. ‘I hope that does not hurt too much.’

  I ignored her and concentrated on not crying. But it didn’t matter to Solène that I wasn’t committing fully to the conversation, she seemed happy to talk for both of us.

  ‘It is sad that Alex and I had to spend some time apart, but now, we are ready to be together again,’ she reasoned. ‘He is ready.’

  ‘And he’s over the fact that you cheated on him like a big dirty slag, is he?’ I asked, trying to remain calm. Not an easy task.

  ‘I did a terrible thing, but there was a reason, of course. We have talked about this before.’

  ‘And that’s how I know you’re a nasty cheating slag.’

  ‘That is such an ugly word.’ Solène shook her sparkly blonde head. ‘You are a writer, non? You have no better words for me?’

  The worst part was, I didn’t. I didn’t have any words. Just a great big lump in my throat and a growing urge to vomit.

  ‘I only did what I did because he was too much for me.’ Solène placed her hand over mine. ‘I loved Alex so much, but I was so young and he was rushing into everything. After he proposed, I panicked, I got drunk, his friend came over and I was upset. Before I realize, we are in bed together and of course, this is when Alex comes home.’

  I snatched my hand away as though it had been burned. How dare she touch me? ‘Hang on a minute, go back. What did you say?’

  ‘I do not understand, go back to where?’ she asked, wide-eyed and innocent.

  ‘Fuck off, you know what I’m talking about.’ I was starting to veer back towards clubbing her around the head. ‘He proposed? Alex proposed?’

  ‘Yes, he did. Several times.’ She smiled sadly and flipped herself around, her head resting against the back of the sofa. ‘And I wish every day I had said yes.’

  Still up on my knees, I looked out at my boyfriend on the stage. He had swapped his acoustic guitar for an electric and was fiddling intently with the tuning pegs, staring at the monitor by his foot. His hair shone blue under the stage lights and his knackered old Nirvana T-shirt, the T-shirt I had slept in the second time I’d ever stayed over at his place (I was a girl, I remembered things like that) was covered up by a slouchy black cardigan. His washed-out, black skinny jeans revealed just a little bit too much of his jersey boxers when he bent down to mess with the monitor. Graham saw me first and waved, mouthing a wordless hi and then calling to Alex. He looked up from the stage and gave me such a shining smile, I couldn’t help, but return it. But mine just couldn’t compare.

  ‘And so I came back to Paris. Without him, I had no reason to stay in the city. New York was dead and cold to me,’ Solène carried on with her sob story while I stared down at the stage, my breathing becoming more uneven and heavy. ‘I begged him to take me back, I sent letters, wrote him songs, I even sent plane tickets, but he was heartbroken. And then I am hearing many stories about him with many different girls, and I am heartbroken.’

  ‘I heard that too.’ I broke away from staring at Alex and swung my legs around to sit on the sofa. This wasn’t happening. It couldn’t be. ‘But then he met a really nice girl and started going out with her and he was really, really, really happy.’

  ‘He did not seem so happy when we went for drinks earlier,’ she countered. ‘I would say he was very unhappy. And confused.’

  ‘I’m not going to sit here and argue with you,’ I said, finally finding the strength in my legs to stand up. ‘You and Alex are over. He said so. He told me so. I don’t care why you were in that bar earlier and I don’t care what you think is going to happen. It’s not. It’s over.’

  ‘No, it is not. I am sorry Angela, you are–’ she actually paused to look me up and down ‘–nice? But I love Alex and he will always love me. I know him, I know what he wants.’

  ‘And what if he doesn’t want you?’ I asked, not feeling quite so confident as Solène stretched up off the sofa and stood in front of me, blocking the stairway. Her tight jeans clung to her curves without even a hint of muffin top and I was fairly certain that she wasn’t wearing a bra under her black vest. With her long blonde hair spilling over one shoulder and perfectly worn-in ballet pumps, it was like looking into the world’s most flattering funhouse mirror.

  ‘But he does.’ She narrowed her eyes and stepped closer to me. ‘He wants me completely. So why would he even be thinking about you?’

  I didn’t have anything. Pushing her out of the way, I ran down the steps, trying not to fall, but not especially caring whether or not I did. My handbag bashed rhythmically against my hip as I stumbled out of the main room, desperate to get out of there without seeing Alex. It was one thing to hear all of that from her, it would be another thing to see it confirmed in him. To see them together.

  ‘Angela?’

  I didn’t know who it was and I didn’t care. I just wanted to go back to the hotel and after that, God knows what, but I just couldn’t be there at that exact second.

  ‘Angela, wait!’

  I’d got as far as the narrow entrance to the club before I was faced with a stampede of Stills fans pushing through the doors as they opened. I froze in front of them for a moment before I felt a hand yank me roughly out of the way and through another dark doorway. I felt around the walls for a light switch until I heard a click. A couple of blinks later, I saw Graham standing in front of me. And lots of mops. Apparently we were in a broom cupboard.

  ‘Where are you running?’ he asked. ‘Didn’t you hear me?’

  ‘Yeah, no, I mean, I’m sorry,’ I said, looking at my feet. ‘I just wanted to get outside.’

  ‘I’d give it a while until the crowd clears up,’ he said, resting a hand on my shoulder. ‘Uh, Angela, I thought I saw Solène up on the balcony with you.’

  For the second time in two minutes, I froze. I really didn’t like hearing her name, it felt like seeing a really big spider in the bath.

>   ‘So she was there, huh?’ Graham asked. ‘Alex is going to lose his shit if he sees her here.’

  ‘Or not,’ I said quietly, forcing the tears back. I was not going to cry for her. Not while I was with people anyway. Possibly later, in my bed, on my own. For hours and hours and hours and hours. Yes, that sounded suitably dramatic.

  ‘Alex will freak out if finds out she’s here, believe me,’ Graham looked as if he meant it. ‘I’m gonna have to find her and kick her ass out of here before—’

  ‘Before he proposes to her again?’ I interrupted.

  His jaw dropped for a moment before he tried to cover it up with a cough.

  ‘And maybe instead of finding her, you could go and ask Alex why he was in a bar with her earlier on?’ I kicked a stray floor sponge out from under my foot, hitting Graham in the shin. ‘And why it is that she’s so certain, so incredibly certain, that he is still in love with her.’

  ‘Angela, he isn’t,’ Graham insisted, kicking the sponge back at me. ‘You gotta trust me on this one. I’ve known that guy for more than ten years and there’s no way.’

  ‘Well it’s difficult to know who to trust when the only person telling me what’s going on is the ex-girlfriend who has decided she wants him back and is going to marry him,’ I blurted out, losing control to hysterics at the end. ‘And you didn’t know he met her this evening did you? Maybe he just isn’t telling you because he knows you don’t like her.’

  ‘Listen to me. Alex does not love her, he can’t stand her,’ Graham repeated, although to me, he sounded slightly less sure of himself. ‘And you know he’s crazy about you.’

  ‘I don’t know what I know,’ I said quietly, trying to calm myself down. Throwing a fit at Graham wasn’t going to help in any way. Well, it might make me feel better for a bit, but it wasn’t really a viable long-term solution.

  ‘You want to go talk to him?’ Graham asked, slipping an arm around my shoulders and giving me what was supposed to be a reassuring big brother hug. ‘He’s all done with the sound check. I can get him to come out here or something?’

  ‘I think I just want to go and get some sleep,’ I squeezed him back. ‘Really. We’ve got a big day tomorrow and everything.’

  ‘We do.’ Graham nodded, releasing me from the hug. ‘I, uh, but what do you want me to tell Alex?’

  ‘Don’t tell him anything,’ I said, stretching and yawning for effect. ‘I suppose I don’t want to stress him out before the show, we can talk after.’

  It was such a lie. If any part of what Solène had said was true, stressing him out was the nicest thing I would want to do to him. It wasn’t as if he didn’t know that I’d broken men before. Idiot.

  ‘I really don’t want to lie to him.’ Graham looked uncomfortable. ‘If he asks, I’ll just tell him you went back to the hotel and he can call you, OK?’

  ‘Whatever,’ I said, giving him another quick hug. I felt like I’d actually talked myself into feeling very tired all of a sudden. And he didn’t need to know that I didn’t actually have a phone.

  ‘Are you sure you don’t want to go talk to him?’ Graham asked once more. ‘I really hate the idea of you heading back to the hotel thinking whatever crap she told you was true. She’s fucking crazy, Ange. You shouldn’t believe shit that comes out of her mouth.’

  ‘Yeah, I know.’ He was right about the crazy at least, but crazy didn’t always mean liar. ‘I promise I’ll talk to him after the gig, don’t stress. Go. Play.’

  Satisfied that I wasn’t going to throw myself in the river, Graham opened the door slowly, checking that we weren’t about to be trampled by the entire indie population of Paris. After another short hug, I squeezed out of the doorway, breathing out as I hit the cool air of the dark street. I was so confused, so completely overloaded, I made it halfway down the street before I remembered that I had totally abandoned Virginie at the bar. Making a variety of grumpy sounds, I turned around to go back inside to tell her I was leaving. It would be really shitty just to leave her there on her own, and while I felt as though I deserved a free pass on shitty behaviour, it really wasn’t fair on Virginie.

  It seemed as if every single person who had been in such a rush to get into the gig just minutes earlier, had been inside, knocked back a drink and then come back outside to smoke. I tried to push through the crowd politely, heading back towards the bright light with all the noise coming out of it, which I assumed was the door, but the fresh air made my fuzzy head swim. And it was hard to tell through all the skinny jeans, vintage T-shirts and elaborately messy haircuts. On the upside, aside from my hair being genuinely messy and my weighing a stone more than any other woman on the street, I fitted in perfectly. It wouldn’t help Jenny at all, but for the first time, I was relieved that I wasn’t wearing Giuseppe Zanotti booties and a sequined Balenciaga mini dress. The black eye helped me stand out from the crowd quite enough.

  ‘Hi, I need to get back inside, I just left for a moment,’ I explained to the girl on the door. She looked back at me blankly while a very large man stood in my way.

  ‘I’m on the list?’ I said, looking at the girl and then back at the man. Equally unimpressed.

  ‘I’m on the list for Stills, uh, je m’appelle Angela Clark?’ I pointed at the list for emphasis.

  ‘Je ne parle l’anglais,’ the girl said with a smirk, her eyes fixed firmly on the piece of paper in front of her where my name had been thoroughly crossed out. Brilliant.

  Just as I was about to give up and send Virginie a groveling email apology from the hotel, I spotted her shoving people out of her way as she stormed out of the club, her iPhone clamped to her ear. She looked pissed. I followed her down the street, trying to catch up without interrupting her call, but she was really bloody fast for someone so tiny. No wonder she never wore her Louboutins, she’d break her neck moving at that speed in four-inch heels.

  ‘But I cannot do any more,’ I heard her yell down the phone. ‘I did not help with the article, it will not be good, what else is there?’

  I carried on following, but held back slightly, pressing up against the wall. She turned the corner and sighed loudly. ‘What else can I do, Cici? Please, I hate this.’

  Really, I’d had the wind knocked out of me more times in one evening than was healthy. Cici? She was on the phone to Cici?

  ‘Perhaps,’ she said slowly. ‘Alors, her boyfriend, he has someone else here in Paris, an ex-girlfriend. She is very unhappy about this.’

  I closed my eyes and tried to remember to breathe. This couldn’t be good. They were talking about me? They were talking about Alex?

  ‘She is very beautiful, yes, but I do not know if it is true.’ She laughed lightly. ‘No, I suppose that does not matter. And she is very sexy, I would guess that he is. He has not been very attentive to Angela.’

  Well, that much was true, I admitted to myself. But seriously, what was going on? Virginie was quiet for a few moments, making little agreeing noises while Cici rattled on. I could actually hear her crowing down the phone from around the corner, but I couldn’t make out exactly what she was saying.

  ‘Yes, perhaps. She met with a friend from London today and was very sad,’ Virginie carried on slowly. ‘And I believe she is not talking to her American friend, her name is Jenny, I think? If her boyfriend was cheating also then perhaps. Also, if the article is very bad, then I think she might.’

  She might what? She might what?

  ‘I do not think you will be able to convince her to leave easily and I have told you, Cici, she emailed your Mary to say that you sent her to all the wrong places. Will this not be a problem?’

  Of course not, I thought bitterly, nothing was a problem for Cici. She was a Spencer. So sending me that list of crappy places wasn’t just her idea of a joke, she was actually trying to get rid of me. God, what was wrong with that girl?

  ‘Cici, you know I do not like this,’ Virginie whined down the phone. ‘I know what we said, but I like her. Distracting her from the article was not
so hard, but this is not fair. It is her life, not just one job.’

  I ran my ring fingers under each eye to wipe away a couple of stray tears. She was seriously trying to ruin me? And Virginie was in on it? She really was a Belle girl after all. I was so stupid. Of course she wasn’t that nice! No one was that nice! And thinking about it, I’d made so many excuses for things that didn’t add up just because I liked her. When would I learn my lesson? People just couldn’t be trusted.

  ‘Maybe she will decide on her own,’ she said. ‘There is nothing really for her to stay in New York for. She might be happier back in London?’

  I peered around the corner as Cici squealed loudly down the phone, causing Virginie to pull it away from her ear sharply.

  ‘I know you do not care if she is happy, but I am not happy either,’ she sighed. ‘I have done everything you asked. Have you spoken to Donna?’

  She was biting her short nails, nodding into the phone. ‘Cici, this was our deal, you will definitely be able to get me the visa, yes?’

  The nodding shifted into a shake and her pretty pout turned into a hard, thin line. ‘Non, I can get the interview myself, it is the visa I need.’

  I hadn’t actually seen Virginie look genuinely angry before, but weirdly, it was far more reassuring than her super perky super fan act. I recognized this, it was human. Even if it was a human who had shat on me completely.

  ‘You cannot do that!’ she shouted at the phone. ‘I did what you asked, I cannot make someone to move to another country. Cici, you made a promise—’

  I walked around the corner, clutching the strap of my bag for strength.

  ‘Angela!’ Virginie snapped back into smily mode, although really not fast enough. ‘I came outside to find you.’

  For a moment I just stood and stared. Then, all at once, everything just exploded in my mind. My suitcase getting blown up, Jenny not talking to me, tripping over Alex’s stupid shoes and bashing my face in, screwing up the Belle article, Alex deciding he didn’t want me to move in any more, Solène announcing that she was taking Alex back, how much I missed Louisa, her having a baby, and now this. There really weren’t words for how incredibly pissed off I was. So I didn’t bother with words. I slapped her right around the face.