The Yellow Eyes of Crocodiles (5 page)

Originally from Scotland, Shirley said she’d come to France to attend hotel school and never left. She made her living giving voice lessons at the Courbevoie conservatory, tutoring English, and baking cakes that she sold for 15 euros apiece to a restaurant in Neuilly. She was raising Gary on her own, and never spoke about his father. When the subject came up, she merely grunted, which said what she thought of men in general, and of that man in particular.

“Do you know what your son is playing with, Shirley?”

“No, what?”

“Tampax!”

“He’s not putting them in his mouth, I hope?”

“No.”

“Well, at least he won’t freak out the first time he sees a girl with one.”

“Shirley!”

“Joséphine, how come that shocks you? He’s fifteen years old; he’s not a child. So what’s up with you?”

“I’ve been on a roller coaster all morning. Antoine left. I kicked him out, I mean. I told my sister and I told the girls. Oh, God, Shirley, I think I’ve made a terrible mistake!”

“You’re not the first woman to lose her husband. And I’m going to tell you a secret: we do just fine. It’s hard being alone at first, but after a while we wouldn’t have it any other way. You’ll see. Life alone is sheer bliss! When I’m in the mood, I sometimes cook candlelit dinners, just for me.”

“I’m not quite at that point.”

“I can tell. But this has been coming for so long. Everyone knew except you. It was obscene.”

“That’s what Hortense said. Can you believe it? My fourteen-year-old daughter knew more than I did! Not only was I being cheated on, but people must think I’m a moron. But none of that matters now, anyway.”

“Do you wish I hadn’t told you?”

Joséphine looked at her friend’s sweet face, her short and slightly upturned nose covered in tiny freckles, her honey-green eyes. She shook her head.

“You’re the nicest person I know, Shirley. And it’s not really that woman Mylène’s fault. If Antoine had been working, he’d never have gotten involved with her. Being put out to pasture at forty, it’s just not right!”

“Stop it! You’re giving him too much credit, and you’re not seeing straight. It happened now because it was bound to happen sometime. Come on, pull yourself together. Chin up!”

Joséphine shook her head, unable to speak.

“Will you look at this amazing woman? She’s about to die of fear because a man left her! Let’s have a cup of coffee and some chocolate. You’ll see, things will start to look up.”

“I don’t think so, Shirley. I’m so scared! What’s going to become of us? I’ve never lived alone—ever! I can’t do it.”

Shirley went over and took her by the shoulders.

“Tell me exactly what it is that frightens you. When you’re scared, you have to face your fear. Otherwise it’ll eat you alive.”

“No, leave me alone. I don’t want to think.”

“Tell me what scares you.”

“How about that coffee and chocolate?”

“Okay, but you’re not off the hook,” Shirley said with a smile. “Arabica or Mozambique?”

“Whichever. I don’t care.”

Shirley took out a bag of coffee beans and an old wooden coffee grinder. She sat on a stool, wedged the grinder between her thighs, and began to steadily turn the handle, without taking her eyes off her friend. “It’s like my brain. It grinds slowly, but exceedingly fine.”

“You look so pretty sitting there in your apron like that. I feel so ugly.”

“Don’t tell me
that’s
what’s scaring you!”

“Who taught you to be so direct? Your mother?”

“Life did. It saves time. But you’re cheating again; you keep trying to change the subject.”

Joséphine looked up at Shirley, squeezed her fists between her knees, and started talking. She began in a rush, then slowed down, stopping and repeating herself.

“I’m afraid. I’m afraid of everything. I’m a great big ball of fear. I want to die right here, right now, and not have any more worries. I’m afraid I’ll never find love again. I’m afraid of losing my job. I’m afraid of talking to people I don’t know. I’m afraid of losing my mind. I’m afraid of breast cancer. I’m afraid of dying alone.”

“Tell me your worst fear, the one that paralyzes you and keeps you from being the brilliant Jo who can speak so wonderfully about the Middle Ages that I sometimes want to go back there. What is it that makes you shrivel up into a ball?”

“I feel ugly. I keep telling myself no man will ever fall in love with me again. I’m fat. I don’t know how to dress or fix my hair. And I’m just going to get older.”

“That’s true of everyone. What is it that you can’t face?”

Joséphine looked bewildered.

“You really don’t know?” asked Shirley.

Joséphine shook her head. Shirley stared at her for a long time and then sighed.

“That’s the fear you have to identify, Jo, the one that’s behind all the others. Once you do that, nothing will frighten you ever again, you’ll see.”

“You sound like a fortune-teller, Shirley.”

“Or a witch. In the Middle Ages they would have burned me at the stake!”

“What are you doing tonight?” asked Bérengère, pushing the piece of bread away from her plate. “If you’re free we could go to Marc’s opening together.”

“I have a family dinner,” said Iris. “Is the opening tonight? I thought it was next week.”

Bérengère Clavert and Iris Dupin met at the same restaurant every week. It was a trendy place where you could see politicians whispering; a starlet trying to impress a director; a few titless models with bony hips. At a table for one, a regular waited for a tasty piece of gossip like an old crocodile lurking in a swamp.

Bérengère picked up the bread again, and impatiently flicked it with her index finger. “I feel like I’m surrounded by vultures watching an animal die. They won’t say anything, they’re way too polite. But it’s in their eyes. ‘How’s the Clavert woman doing, now that she’s been dumped again? Thinking of slitting her wrists?’ It’s humiliating. Marc will be showing off his new girlfriend, and I’ll be sick with rage, love, and jealousy.”

“I didn’t know you had such deep feelings,” Iris said.

“How can you say that?”

“Because you’re mixing up pride and love, and I’m not buying it. You’re irritated, but you’re not hurt.”

Bérengère wasn’t sure whether to cry or counterattack. She’d initially planned not to tell Iris anything, to protect her friend from the rumor going around Paris. But she also loved gossip and backbiting, and she wasn’t about to let her own ox be gored without retaliating. She put her elbows on the table and her chin in her hands, and smiled.

“Not everyone can have a smart, rich husband like yours, Iris! If mine were more like Philippe, I’d be faithful and content.”

“Contentment doesn’t take away desire. You can be content with your husband and wildly passionate with your lover.”

“And you know this because you have a lover?”

The question surprised Iris. Bérengère was usually a lot more subtle.

“Why wouldn’t I?” she asked without thinking.

Bérengère sat up and leaned close. Iris noticed that the left corner of her friend’s mouth went up a little.

“Have you had your lips plumped up?”

“No, I haven’t! Tell me about this lover!”

Rather than answer, Iris tapped on the slight bulge at the corner of Bérengère’s mouth.

“I swear, something looks weird there, on the left side. Your lip is sticking out. Or maybe curiosity is distorting your mouth. Are you so bored that you have to snap up the smallest bit of gossip and make a big deal of it?”

“You’re so nasty!”

“Oh, in that department, I’m not even in your league.”

Bérengère sat back in her chair and glanced casually toward the door. There were a lot of people in the restaurant, but no one she knew. She leaned close to Iris again.

“I’d understand perfectly if you needed . . . more. You’ve been married to Philippe for so long. Desire doesn’t weather all that cheek-by-jowl toothbrushing.”

“Well, I’m pleased to report that our cheeks and jowls get it on pretty often.”

“Oh, come on! Not after all these years.”
And not after what I’ve been hearing!
Bérengère thought.

She hesitated for a moment, and then, in a hoarse voice that caught Iris’s attention, she added: “You know what they’re saying about Philippe?”

“Yes, and I don’t believe a word of it.”

“Neither do I. It’s absurd!”

Bérengère seemed about to burst with joy.

It must be serious
, thought Iris.
Bérengère wouldn’t get this worked up over just any old rumor. And to think she calls herself my friend! Whose bed is she going to stick Philippe into this time?

They’d known one another for a long time, and shared the cruel intimacy of two women in constant competition with each other.

“Do you really want to know?”

“Hurry up, or I’ll forget what we were talking about. Then it’ll be much less interesting.”

“They say Philippe is in a serious relationship, ‘something special.’ That’s what Agnes told me this morning.”

“That bitch! Do you still see her?”

“She calls me from time to time.” Actually, they spoke every morning.

“And may I know who Philippe is supposed to be fooling around with?”

“Ah, that’s where the shoe pinches. Better you should hear it from me than someone else.”

Iris folded her arms against her chest. “Check, please,” she told a passing waiter.

She would pay the bill, imperial and magnanimous. She felt like the poet André Chénier, coolly marking the page in the book he was reading as he climbed the steps to the guillotine.

By now, Bérengère realized she had said too much, and was squirming with embarrassment. “Oh, Iris, I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have.”

“A little late for that, don’t you think?” said Iris icily, glancing at her watch. “I’m sorry, but if you’re going to beat around the bush much longer, I won’t be able to wait.”

“All right! They say he’s going out with a . . . a . . .”

“Oh, for God’s sake, Bérengère, stop stammering! A what?”

“A young guy. A lawyer who works with him.”

There was a moment of silence as Iris looked her over.

“Well, that’s original,” she said, struggling to keep her voice neutral. “I didn’t expect that. Thanks for letting me know.”

She got up, took her purse, and put on her elegant pink leather gloves, pushing each finger in carefully, as if each one corresponded to a thought. Then she walked out.

Despite her turmoil, Iris remembered the row and number of her parking space in the garage, and slipped into her car. She sat tall and straight, the way she’d been taught, pride making her rigid. After a moment, she felt her nose quiver, her mouth tremble, and two enormous tears form at the corners of her eyes. She brushed them away, sniffled, and started the car.

Marcel Grobz reached across the bed to pull Josiane Lambert closer. But she had slipped out of reach and was ostentatiously turning her back to him.

“Don’t pout, sweetie-pie. You know I can’t stand that.”

“I’m telling you something super important and you’re not listening.”

“Okay, okay, I’m listening. I promise.”

Josiane relaxed and rolled back over till her purple and pink lace negligee was touching Marcel’s ample body. His fat stomach hung over his hips, and red hair covered his chest and formed a fuzzy halo around his bald head. Marcel was no prize, but he did have mischievous blue eyes that made him look far younger. “You have the eyes of a twenty-year-old,” Josiane would murmur to him after making love.

“Move over, you’re taking up all the space,” she said now. “You’ve gotten fatter, Marcel. There’s fat everywhere.” She pinched his waist.

“Too many business lunches. Go on. I’m listening.”

“So here’s the thing . . .”

She pulled the sheet up below her large breasts, and Marcel tried not to stare at the two mounds he’d been eagerly sucking minutes before.

“You should promote Chaval. Give him responsibility and a sense of importance.”

“Bruno Chaval?”

“Yes.”

“Why should I? You have the hots for him?”

Josiane let out that deep, raucous laugh he found so sexy. He joined in the laughter, then tried to grab her again.