Losing Julia (53 page)

Oh Lord, I’m crying now and I don’t have my handkerchief. But I’m not sad. No, not at all. I’m wildly happy like a boy in the rain, face up to the clouds, arms aloft, fists clenched. Alive!

WHEN I SAW
Julia again she was standing in front of her hotel, leaning against the wall with her hands in the pockets of her raincoat. Her hair was wet from the rain and she didn’t smile when she saw me. I had only a few minutes before I had to meet Charlotte and Margaret.

“What is it?” I said, running my hands along her cheeks.

She turned her face away.

“Tell me. Please.”

She turned back and looked at me. Her eyes were swollen.

“I saw you and your wife and son. I watched you come out of your hotel.”

“You watched us?”

“And I followed you to the park. I watched you playing with Sean and I saw how you and Charlotte held hands as you walked.” She swallowed hard. “You looked so lovely together. All three of you.”

“But why—”

“I had to know what it would feel like. I had to see that you were married.”

I remembered carrying Sean on my shoulders in the park and galloping like a horse and then hiding a coin in my hand and pretending to pluck it from behind his ears, a trick that never ceased to delight him, causing him to search behind his ears several times a day.

I nervously reached for my cigarettes. Julia began crying.

“It felt awful, Patrick.”

“I’m sorry.”

“I couldn’t bear it.”

“You shouldn’t—”

“It’s my fault.”

“Don’t say that.”

“There is no place for me in your life. I don’t belong here.” She turned sideways as if to leave.

“There has to be a place.” I was whispering.

“There isn’t. I can’t do this.”

I felt my fists tighten until my whole arms were quaking. The pressure in my head caused a piercing pain just behind my eyes. “You can’t leave me, Julia. You’re the only person who’s given me any hope. You’ve changed everything for me, don’t you see?”

She looked up at me and began to say something but stopped, her hands held limply aloft in grief, as if in midsentence. I could hardly look at her.

“Just give me some time,” I said. “Please.” I thought again of Sean and how we had played in the bath for an hour that morning and how he had laughed hysterically when he abruptly peed all over me.

She didn’t say anything.

I grabbed her by the shoulders. “You’ll wait a little longer? Say that you will.”

She looked up at me. “Yes, I’ll wait,” she said softly.

I spent the rest of the day following Charlotte and Margaret around Paris, stopping to look inside every shoe store—Margaret’s idea—and trying my best to remember to smile as we sat for dinner at an expensive restaurant near the Pantheon.

I couldn’t sleep that night. Early the next morning I took Sean out for a walk, stopping in a park so that he could chase pigeons. Then we sat together on a bench and watched the sun come up, casting an orange and then yellow hue on the streets and buildings. Sean was on my lap and it was cold so I unbuttoned my jacket and wrapped it around him. He tilted his head straight back to look up at me, then reached for my nose. After he crawled out of my jacket he began searching my pockets with his small, dimpled hands. “Bon bon?” he inquired, smiling sweetly.

I stroked his cheek. “No bon bon. Can you say,
‘Bonjour? Bonjour Papa?’”

“No, bon
bon
Papa,” he said sternly, tossing his head forward as he spoke.

I reached into the inside pocket of my jacket and pulled out a small red candy, handing it to him. Then I took his hand and began walking back to the hotel. After I dropped him off at the room I ran over to Julia’s hotel, but she wasn’t there.

“Why do you keep disappearing on us?” asked Charlotte, when I returned. She was sitting before the mirror applying her makeup.

“What do you mean?”

“You know what I mean. You’re always heading off somewhere.”

“I just went out to get some cigarettes.”

“But you spend hours out by yourself.”

“I don’t want to bore you with the military museums. And you know I can’t stand shopping—especially for shoes.”

“It’s Margaret, isn’t it? You’re avoiding her. I’ve always known you didn’t like her. And don’t think she doesn’t know.”

I started to deny it but thought: no, let her think that.

“The sitter will be here in fifteen minutes. Margaret and I are going out. You’re welcome to join us.”

“Shopping?”

“You don’t have to go
in
the stores.”

“I’ll meet you later. We’ll have a nice dinner.”

Charlotte looked at me through the mirror. “Margaret was right. You are acting strange.” Then she stood and rummaged through her purse for her lipstick, which she carefully applied to her lips. After she was done she zipped up her dress, put on her shoes and went to the door. “You can’t dwell on the war forever, Patrick.”

“No, I can’t.”

“You could have some fun while we’re here.”

“Yes. Maybe I’ll even buy that suit.”

“Just try?”

“I’ll try.” I walked over and kissed her briefly. “See you for dinner.”

“Dinner.”

“Bye.”

When I returned to Julia’s hotel she was sitting in the lobby reading a newspaper. She jumped up when she saw me and her eyes were full of happiness. “I’m sorry about yesterday,” she said. “I shouldn’t get so upset.”

“That’s all right,” I said, hugging her.

“I was terrified that you wouldn’t come back.”

“It’s getting harder to get away.”

I saw the muscles in her face tighten. “How much time do we have?”

“I’m meeting them for dinner,” I said. “Maybe I can get away for a few hours tomorrow too.”

“Let’s go to the Louvre. No, let’s go up to my room and then to the Louvre.”

Once inside her room we made love silently and quickly. Too quickly. But everything was too quickly now, so that our time together felt increasingly compressed.

As we dressed I looked around her small room; at her suitcase on the floor in the corner and her things laid out neatly on the dresser and at the bed and the cracked blue paint on the ceiling and as I looked around I wondered how many more times I would make it back here, but I decided not to guess.

Outside as we walked down the sidewalk I struggled to keep up with her. “I can’t wait to show you what I found at the Louvre,” she said, looking as excited as I’d ever seen her.

“What is it?” I asked.

“You’ll see,” she said, smiling.

I noticed a change in her as soon as we entered the museum. She moved differently and spoke in hushed tones as though she were in a church or a mausoleum. We strolled down the vast hallways for three hours without talking, pausing for minutes at a time to stare at various statues and busts and paintings and ancient artifacts. I looked into the eyes of kings and queens and emperors and princes and peasants and slaves and old men and young children and I saw the blood dripping from a hundred Jesuses withering on the cross. I saw Mantegna’s
Saint Sebastian
bound and run through with arrows and Titian’s alluring
Woman in the Mirror
and Delacroix’s
Liberty Leading the People,
her chest bared as she crosses the barricades, the dead at her feet. Before Velázquez’s portrait of
The Infante Marguerite
I thought of Robin and then I saw Murillo’s
Young Beggar
and I thought of all the orphans of war and I suddenly had a sense of losing time completely, as though the world had come to a screeching halt and I was privileged to walk about it unlocking its mysteries, both glorious and wretched, with Julia as my guide.

As we walked slowly down a statue-lined hallway toward the
Venus de Milo,
Julia turned to me and asked, “Do you feel it?”

“You mean the sense of history, of what these artists were trying to say?”

She nodded.

“Yes, yes I do. It’s quite overwhelming. And haunting too, all those faces staring at you from the past.”

“It is, isn’t it?” She began walking again.

“It’s so enormous, like a huge tribute to humanity.”

“Did they get it right?” she asked.

“What do you mean?”

“Did the artists get it right? The things you and Daniel went through, what you felt and saw and did. Not just the bad things but the good things too. Did they get it right?”

I looked up into the face of a solemn statue. “Yes, they got it right.”

“That’s good.” I could see she was biting her lip.

“Shall we go outside, have a cigarette and maybe some coffee?” I asked.

She nodded. We turned down the hallway.

“Oh, Jesus.”

“What is it?”

“Charlotte’s here. With her sister.” I stepped back behind a cluster of tourists and watched as Charlotte and Margaret slowly worked their way down the hall toward us.

“I had no idea they’d be here.” I looked at Julia. Her face was stricken.

“Did they see us?” she asked.

“I don’t know.”

Julia began backing away from me. Charlotte and Margaret were coming closer. I looked around for an exit. When I looked back at Julia she was farther down the hall, standing next to a large statue and staring at Charlotte. I hid behind a pillar, then edged my way toward Julia. She turned toward me and shook her head no, then backed away more.

“Where will I meet you?” I said, whispering loudly.

But Julia kept shaking her head.

I pushed through a group of tourists, heading toward her, but she kept backing away.

“Patrick? Is that you?”

I froze.

“Patrick?”

I slowly turned.

“Charlotte?”

“What on earth are you doing here?”

Margaret was next to her, scowling.

“I thought… I thought I might find you here.” I turned and looked back at Julia. She was watching, her face constricted.

“That was sweet of you,” said Charlotte, leaning forward and kissing me. “I can’t
believe
you found us.”

I looked again at Julia. She was crying.

“Patrick, are you listening to me?” Charlotte turned to follow my gaze. I started toward Julia but she shook her head no and began backing farther away, her fist pressed against her mouth.

I turned back to Charlotte. “I… I thought I saw an old friend, from the war. Just a resemblance.”

Don’t go, Julia.

“You’re sweating,” said Charlotte, tracing her finger along my temple.

Julia.

“Yes, it’s hot in here, isn’t it?”

“Not really,” said Margaret, who was wearing a sweater.

Charlotte joined her arm in mine. “I was just wishing you were here. There’s a painting I want to show you. I’m just crazy about it.”

More tourists streamed down the hallway. I strained for a glimpse of Julia. She was still there, but farther away now, still watching me, shaking her head. My legs begged to run.
Go after her.

Margaret was staring at me. I stared back at her. Charlotte tugged at my sleeve. “Come on.”

I thought of Sean back at the hotel. Of his hazel green eyes and his giggle and the way he smiled when I walked into the room and how he was always trying to grab my nose and pull it off. I thought of Charlotte and our wedding and our comforting routine at home and how happy we were to finally own a house and how the neighborhood children were so good with Sean. I thought of the war and how lucky I was just to be alive and how I’d never let Sean face such a thing. I thought of Lawton and Giles and Tometti and Daniel and all that they would miss in life. And I thought of the look in Daniel’s eyes on the day he died; how he tried to give me strength.

Give me strength.

“Isn’t this place incredible?” said Charlotte. “Have you seen the Egyptian collection? And the jewelry. Did you see the jewelry on display?”

Julia was harder to see now.
Go to her.

Charlotte tugged again at my sleeve. I slowly followed alongside of her. Margaret kept staring at me.

Don’t leave her alone. Not again.

“Isn’t this one beautiful?” said Charlotte, pointing to a marble.

I turned again to look for Julia.

“Yes, it’s very beautiful,” I said.

Daniel, what should I do?

“You’re trembling,” said Charlotte, turning toward me. “Are you feeling all right?”

I shook my head.

I don’t know what to do, Daniel.

“You poor thing.” She put her arm around me and kissed me again, then felt my forehead. “God, you’re burning up.”

Are you listening, Daniel?

I turned and looked for Julia again, but she was gone.