‘I beg you to understand, ma petite. I made up the story because I didn’t want to hurt you. Didn’t want you to carry the stigma of being the illegitimate daughter of a prostitute upon your shoulders.’ She stands and holds my hands in hers, hands with aging, wrinkled skin, veins popping, but the deep sadness in her grey eyes behind the wire rim spectacles doesn’t move me.
‘I can’t believe you lied to me about my mother, Sister Vincent. How you concocted a tale that would make a young girl’s heart swell with such romantic notions she’d cling to them like they were sacred prayers.’ I make it clear how angry I am with her, this dutiful creature who was the only good thing about my childhood and now I find that was a lie, too. She didn’t trust me enough to let me handle the truth. I could have, couldn’t I?
You’re not doing such a good a job now, are you?
‘I made a fool out of myself with that phony story all these years,’ I continue, raising my voice and not caring if God disapproves. He knows what I’ve done and I’m living my punishment. What more can He do to me? ‘Emil knows the truth and I’m more under his control than ever. I have no choice but to do his bidding if I don’t want to end up in the gutter because I will never return here. I’m done… done with you… done with your pious teachings. Lies, all lies. I’ll never believe in you or hold anything you say sacred again.’
‘Please, mon enfant, I beg you to forgive me—’
‘Forgive you? I don’t know if I ever can.’
Bitter words that prick my brain to rethink what I’ve said, but I’ve gone too far. I’ve set myself up for a painful isolation from the one person in my life always there for me. Yes, I’m not thinking straight… I do that a lot these days. But I don’t need Sister Vincent’s preaching to me about my ‘habits’. It’s better this way.
Then, without turning back even when I hear a loud sob behind me and the swish of holy skirts slumping to the stone floor, I race back to Paris, anger and frustration pumping through me. Adrenaline surges through my veins and primes my juices like a glass of Pernod. I need to be with someone, someone to hold me, tell me what I want to hear. That I’m wanted… loved. My sensual urges are on fire, burning like an eternal flame.
There’s no turning back and no one to stop me.
I head up the cobbled Rue Norvins toward a familiar apartment with red velvet walls and a big, soft four poster bed at the top of Montmartre, a place where I can forget how lonely I am. No lies… no promises. Just sex with a beautiful man who doesn’t care who my mother was.
Montmartre
The heady warmth of smooth brandy quiets my fears and calms me.
I lie nude on the rich, cherry-red velvet coverlet, listening to the sound of my own breathing, the minutes ticking by on the grandfather clock in the study. Like droplets of water falling on my forehead.
Tick… tock.
Drip… drop.
Then a cool breeze tickles me between the legs as the rugged artist tantalizes my bare skin with his long paintbrush.
‘Bastien, again… please, mon amour.’
‘You’re drunk, Sylvie… sloppy drunk, but you’re beautiful.’
I wiggle my hips. ‘Hand me my pills. And the brandy.’
I need it, crave it… I can’t turn off the painful thirst for the alcohol circulating in my brain. My mouth is dry. I’m heaving up gulps of air. My eyelids are heavy as a profound weariness descends upon me. Weighing me down as if I’m bound by restraints, my feelings and emotions wrapped up in a realm of fantasy, knowing what comes next. Pure ecstasy.
‘Where did you get these pills?’ he asks. ‘They’re a powerful sedative.’ He rattles the glass bottle of sleeping pills I sweet talked the studio doctor into giving me.
‘I have my ways… give me the pills.’
‘What if Hélène shows up and finds you here?’
‘Who the hell is she?’
‘My patroness…’
‘You mean your posh whore.’ I see him grin wide, his bare chest shiny with sweat.
‘She’s doesn’t trust me.’
‘Neither do I.’ I smirk, then wiggle my hips again to get what I want. Him. And the pills.
‘Zut alors, Sylvie, I can never resist you,’ he says, handing me the pills and then the brandy. ‘You’re the most beautiful woman I’ve ever made love to.’
‘Until the next one comes along.’ I have no illusions about Bastien and his loyalty, or lack thereof, but the struggling artist is good for my ego… and my needs.
His fingers are cold, colder than I would have imagined when he touches me. I don’t care. I’m all in a fever, wrapped up in darkness and secrecy and—
Desire.
Sending me to a place I both need and fear.
I hear the crisp snap of a matchstick hitting the iron bedframe and the scent of that fear mixes with the pungent odor of a familiar smell filling the outrageously red bedroom. A cool, damp musky smell that reminds me of rich earth.
Bastien inhales deeply and blows out the smoke before offering me the bud. I shake my head, preferring the lovely dream my pills promise. I down the rest of the pills with the brandy, then gasp when I feel his soft kisses teasing me, and then his curious mouth moving up and down my body, his lips dancing over my skin with a wicked playfulness both intimate and frightening.
My heart beats faster, my breaths frantic.
The room begins spinning around me. A nauseating dizziness takes hold of me. I shouldn’t have taken so many pills. I’m powerless to resist their effect. I refuse to acknowledge I’m on a drunken, drug-induced binge, drowning my sorrows with a man I don’t love but enjoy, except tonight he seems nervous. I assume that’s because I dropped in unexpectedly, enticing him to soothe my lonely soul with his gorgeous body.
A pity, I remember little of what happens afterward except I’m never disappointed. All I recall is waking up with a raging headache and a lovely soreness between my legs and a woman shouting… then Bastien shouting back.
‘She’s a drunk and an addict,’ the woman yells. ‘Get her out of here.’
‘Do you know who she is?’
‘No, and I don’t care. She’s nothing to me. Get rid of her or we’re through.’
‘You don’t mean that, ma chérie.’
‘I’m not paying for this rattrap so you can bring your tart here. We have an agreement. I own you and you service only me. Toss her out now or you can sell your ass to another rich pigeon.’
Then a door banging… the grandfather clock striking three… someone picking me up and carrying me out into the chilly night.
And I pass out. Again.
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