Chapter 30: Au revoir, Salope

Maggie treated Olney to a last supper at Chez Vrolet a small bar-restaurant on the Rue St. Charles. They had eaten there often. Indeed, it was next to the very same deli from which they had purchased and then smuggled many hot chickens into their room at the Hotel Deuil. The reasonable fixed-price menu included all the wine the client could drink and a decent selection of cheeses to finish off with. Olney thought the little bistro must be among the best bargains in Paris. The owner, Monsieur Vrolet, looked like a working class version of the French singer/actor, Eddy Mitchell, who, in turn, looked like an actor playing a working class version of Monsieur Vrolet. Open weekdays only, the bistro specialized in lunch and early dinner, closing its doors every night at huit heures sharp. Olney had always liked the place for its swift service and competent fare. He also liked the blue wallpaper and its repeating pattern of pale yellow orchids.

Maggie did not share his opinion about the decor. "It's just wallpaper," she said, "depressing, even."

"No, no, the blue is special, like a lagoon in the south seas, and the orchids are so delicate; they add a touch of art deco to the place, and then, they'll always remind me of you."

"If I'm not mistaken, that's another one of your backhanded compliments." Maggie thought the orchids were too stylized. In fact, she hated the wallpaper. "Besides, it doesn't match the clientele."

The evening clientele did indeed resemble the inmates of a TV ward at dinner.

"No, no," he waxed on with edge-over enthusiasm, "they're beautiful people and they deserve beautiful surroundings."

The conversation had been fitful. Olney was having trouble facing facts. He felt a fragmenting urge to twist the lens of reality and view their silences and tears as breathless talk and laughter.

"Hey, it's Spring, Poot. Dear old le Printemps is just getting started and you're going to miss the best part of it, silly girl."

"You're the silly one. Spring doesn't start for a couple of weeks."

"Not according to my theory. See, the precession of the equinoxes during all these thousands of years has moved the starting point of the seasons back about a month; well, actually more come to think of it." His attention was snagged by a brown blotch nestled on a petal of an orchid. He wondered how long it had been there and under what circumstances ... some sort of sauce accidentally catapulted from a plate to register forever in finite space. Had it happened in merriment or anger or just simply happened, an accident in the midst of a conversation long forgotten, even the incident itself. O the grand googols of forgotten moments, bouncing around in the universe like heedless quanta.

"No, I'm serious, just ask any dog. In this hemisphere, spring no longer starts in March, but in February. You can feel it in the air. In the same way, Autumn begins in August and Summer gets started in May. And everyone knows the planet shuts down for winter by mid November. Thus, the most glorious season of the year in the most beautiful city in the world has already begun, and you're going to miss the best part of it." His tear ducts, put off for awhile by the babbling, started to mourn. "Me too, I s'pose. Aye, Pootita-mia...."

"Don't talk, Olney. Eat." Her lips began to quiver; they wanted to cry--

"You know," he went on--off actually, on a tangent--"it's that name of yours. With a moniker like 'Pootie,' how can you hope to avoid unsavory characters like me?"

--but threw up their hands, instead. "You always spoil everything." She could have wrung his neck. "You start out by saying something nice and romantic and then finish it with one of your ... your off-putter's. I mean, the combination is absurd. Take some lessons, polish up your smooth talk. I'd hate to hear what you'd say if I was going to die in ten seconds."

"'Hey, it's been a slice. Next squishy, please!'"

"Don't you ever feel shame?"

Olney fidgeted in his seat, anxiety cattle-prodding his heart. He wanted to gasp for air. "Sweetheart, it's just my way of denying. I'm devastated. I want to die."

"That's better." Tears welled in her eyes this time, lips clutching at one another as they were meant to do.

The waitress put a fresh litre of pop-top red on the table as Maggie dried her eyes. The supping folk looked at her unabashedly. As the rare foreign couple they so obviously were, she and Olney were often studied at Chez Vrolet. The spotlight didn't bother them; their audience watched passively, as if the two were stars in a soap opera.

"I'd better not drink this," Maggie said. "The train leaves in a couple of hours and I don't want to be sick crossing the channel."

"I intend to drink as much of it as I can," Olney stated firmly. His face was grim, with just enough ham in it to keep him steady. "Wish I could take what's left in a bow-wow bottle. But that's ok, I've got a full four litre bonbonne--you know the one I mean, heh-heh--to help me through the night."

"You'll probably try to weaken Rhonda."

"So who's seen Rhonda?" he asked Jewishly. "I doubt she'll show up tonight. Would you?"

"Not if I'd caught me with you the way I did the other night."

"Eh?"

"You know what I mean." Maggie was starting to get nervous. "Olney, what are you going to do?"

"Might go to Amsterdam, look for a job. Maybe I can flog poffertjes in the Jordaan. Worked there for six months once, not in the Jordaan, but elsewhere, over on the Vrolikstraat as a day laborer. Problem is finding a place to live. Can't make enough money working black to pay for lodging is the trouble. Then again maybe I'll go to the Riviera and stare at tits. Done that before too. Of course, I could always come back to Right Sock." Pause. "Should I?"

"No."

"Will if I want to."

"Don't look me up, then."

"So what are you going to do?"

"Well," she began, breathing in a lungful of air to dispel that old fear of the future--only a few hours away now. "I'll stay with mum for a week or two and then go back to Crusty and Belle's and look for a job. That's about it. I owe my mother a lot of money from this disaster. And you owe me half of everything."

"Wait just a minute." Perhaps a fight would take their minds off things. "Remember, you agreed to sell all your possessions with no strings attached. I suppose, out of the goodness of my heart, I might owe you a few hundred, but that's all."

"Cheapskate." But Maggie didn't want the fight. "Don't, Olney. We can talk about it some other time." Did she want to see him again? "I wonder when that will be."

"The Good Lloyd only knows."

Silence. They put out their cigarettes at the same time. Olney called for the bill while Maggie fished in her handbag for the money. She was agitated, flushed. "I can't take it here any more," she whispered, standing up abruptly. Her face suddenly went pale. Olney leapt to his feet, catching her as she started to topple.

"Maggie!" Her eyes fluttered, she mumbled something he couldn't hear. "Pootie, my sad little darling." The waitress brought a glass of water. Olney thanked the woman as Maggie drank; color slowly returned to her face.

"I'm all right," she said, "just need some fresh air." As she put on her coat and made for the door, Olney realized they hadn't left a tip. He reached in his pocket for what was left of the 500 francs stash. Not bad, actually. Two tens, four hundreds and a few coins. But nothing for a tip. Oh, well, he thought, visions of the old heldenleben returning. He threw down a ten and caught up with Maggie. They left to the silent applause of the carapaced mangeurs.

§§§

"I guess we're not the 'romance of the century' after all," Maggie said as they left the apartment, she for the last time. "I suppose lovers always think theirs is the purest, the most eternal. For awhile, anyway."

"It's a stupid notion," said Olney with a snort. Even so, he was ready to be cast in the role at a moment's notice. They walked along the Rue de Lourmel, each carrying a suitcase. The night was damp; mist hung low in the reflecting sky. "Companionship is what it all comes down to," he resumed. "Why bother about romantic love? No one knows what to do with it, anyway. The human race is not ready for love. We may be wired for it, but self-interest usually wins the day. About all we can handle is sex. The desire to possess sexually is as close as we come to love."

"Speak for yourself, bozo. Better yet, don't speak at all." She wanted him to be quiet. Or at least to say nice things.

"What do you mean? You admit you're incapable of really loving. You prove my case. It's ridiculous. Under the conditions of our hapless evolution, every precaution should be taken to avoid falling into the illusion of love. Disaster is the only result. Relationships? Forget it. Disaster. Having once fallen, however, we keep setting ourselves up for the opposite of our declarations. We should begin by saying 'I hate you', so we could eventually migrate--according to the law of enantiodromia--toward love. In the meantime, one should only declare 'I love you' at specified times, such as anniversaries, birthdays, or the moment before expiring. Ritual lip service is all we're capable of."

"I'd like to have a nickel for every time you've told me you loved me. I always suspected they were just words."

"I meant it every time. I was a fool, of course. Any man caught saying 'I love you' to a woman should first be ridiculed and then shot." Wait. He'd better take that back. Earnestly giving the suitcase to his other hand, he jabbered away as they walked to the métro. "I didn't mean you're not worth loving. I simply meant that love, as we beasts express it, always threatens to annihilate us unless we feed it increasingly outlandish praise alluding to its grand utterness. It makes us weak and vulnerable because it interferes with reality. Who can relate to life's nuts and bolts when they're head over heels? If you ask me, love is for adolescents. They are the only ones who can afford the luxury of being in love. They don't have bills to pay or political decisions to make. They go to school and play and that's what love is all about, playing. It should be encouraged. Dad should snarl: 'What? Straight A's and still not in love?' Because once turned out on the slave market you'd do better to forget all about love and devote your energy to making ends meet, or whatever the fuck it is you've decided--unclearly, at that--to do with your godforsaken life."

"Me! How did I get into this? How dare you--"

"No, not you. I meant 'one.'"

"Olney, I'm leaving in an hour and maybe we'll never see each other again." She stopped, putting the suitcase down to rest her arm. "You've been awful to me. Can't you please stop ranting and raving just this once?"

Olney put down his burden too. "It's just that I can't believe any of this is happening. Life-shattering situations are hard to confront without coming completely unglued. And here we are, calmly taking you to the train and out of each other's lives. This is serious self-destruction going on here and I'm only trying to act civilized. As far as I'm concerned it's a bloody awful mistake. A normal night is what should be taking place, even an awful normal night. I mean, dammit, as lovers we're too young to split up so soon. We were so comfortable together."

"I suppose you'll try raving at Rhonda." Maggie wanted him to please, shut up.

Olney kicked the suitcase. "Look, for the last time, Rhonda was just ... just ... aw, skip it."

"You made love to her. Under my nose!"

"And you should have sat on her nose. What a difference that would have made." Olney nearly wept from the disappointment and frustration of it all. "You could have pleased the gods. They would have cheered. An ultimately appropriate act, the only positive assessment of the situation, the evolved solution. Nothing might ever have happened again and we would all have remained friends and tonight would have been normal." He rubbed his hands vigorously, trying to soften the calluses growing above his frozen, meandering lifeline. "She would have given you the licking of your life, she was so hot."

"Stop describing everything so graphically. I didn't and I wouldn't and I hate you for having suggested it."

"I know," he said ruefully. "Under prevailing conditions--i.-bloody-e., the state of the art of human development--if you were the type who got off on that sort of thing, God knows, I'd probably have to rob banks to keep you happy. Or worse, get a job. To tell the truth, I suspect Rhonda would have turned into Woody Allen's second lobster lady if I'd gotten to know her better." He was lying; erotopathic fiends is what they would have become.

"Let's go," Maggie said wearily. "It's getting later and later."

Olney shut up for awhile. Maggie took advantage of the silence to think some of her last thoughts in Paris. Gonna step on every crack, she thought. But the cracks were too far apart. Cracks're bad luck, anyway, she continued. I don't need any more bad luck. She glanced at Olney; his spiky face seemed to be slashing the air in front of it. He does it so easily, she mused. Damned demagogue has turned his treachery into my letting down the whole human race. He commits what amounts to adultery and I'm the one they're supposed to throw stones at. Well, you'll get yours, Hopalong! Always making pronouncements. No rebuttal allowed, we're all wrong but him, like it or lump it. Well, lump it, chumplet, she frowned. He would be better off with Rhonda. I could always feel the enjoyment he got when they talked about things. I like talking with him too, but he's so intimidating. Doesn't intimidate Rhonda. She's kind of intimidating, herself. Prettier than me. My legs are ok. Hers are really something, though. But he likes my 'gina 'cause it's almost bare. I like it too. Better'n anything. I'll miss his cock in there. His not-so-big cock, that is. That stopped him. But he can go on forever. Gives a girl plenty of time. He buggered me! Ivadene likes it a lot there, the bold girl. Told me in the Pruneville pub she could never find a man who wanted to do it that way. Should've come to Paris. Met Olney. God he makes me wet. Dry spell ahead. Oh, Olney you big jerk. Big fatal-flawed jerk. I could kill him. Now that I've been to gay Paree all the men on the farm are gonna be a bore. Never felt so flummoxed in all my life. His anger. I just curl up inside when he raves. Awful temper tantrums over the stupidest things. Couldn't get the lettuce out of the cellophane bag once. Heard him growling in the kitchen like a mad dog. By the time I got there the bag was in shreds and so was the lettuce. What would he do if something really awful happened? Me, I'll never find out. I don't want him you can have him he's too bats for me. Am I giving up? Never catch up to him is the problem, I guess. Him and his GO. Get to Go and then we'll GO. And if he hollers make him pay ... but how? Owes everybody. Just a gigolo, he is. Or should be. Something missing in Olney. Hung up on his organ, and everyone else's too. Still looking up girls' dresses. What's going to become of him? I worry. Maybe it's that grand trine he's always talking about. Have to study astrology some more. Gandhi had one, didn't stop him. But Olney, for all his being 'the busiest man of leisure in Paris,' never really does anything. He'd probably relax if he had money. Though he told me poverty had saved his soul. Could be. He's got a dark side. Pervert. Made me do things I never would've. Scary stuff. Habitating. No telling what a person might do if they got hot enough. Likes it under the public nose. Well, bubbo, you picked the wrong girl. What if he finds the right girl? A young girl. Wouldn't he be in seventh heaven then. Make that hell. They'd crucify him. He's the one confusing sex with love. And love ... I don't know what it is. What happens when you're in love? Is the other person more important then? I like sex, though. Could do it all day sometimes. 'Specially around my period. God I wish we could now. Don't dare mention it, he'd push me into a shadow. Wish I could be that way but I can't. So hot I could cry. Need a rest by myself for awhile. Away from driven, neurotic, Olney Garkle. But I do love him!

"Say something, Poot?"

"No."

Descending the stairs at Charles Michels. Setting the suitcases down to search, Olney, for two yellow tickets. One each into the turnstiles, triple-armed barriers giving way reluctantly to pressing thighs, suitcases held aloft with snorts and grimaces. The low-ceilinged corridor with green tiled walls all too familiar ... their station, so many treasure hunts begun here. It seemed like years.

"My God," Olney said, "we only lasted three months."

"It's like a movie." Maggie cried quietly. Who could tell, any more? Life imitating cinema.

They inched into a full second-class car. "Of course it's packed," Olney fumed, bent in three directions to protect her suitcase and stay out of the way of the other sardines. "It's infernal the way a traveler can never get an empty car. You arrive in Paris? The whole city drops what it's doing and heads for the subway. You want to leave? They're packed in there waiting for you. God damn--"

"Ça suffit," she hissed.

"Hey," he dropped his voice to normal, remembering his grand tour of Montmartre, "remember the ride back from Père Lachaise?" Maggie gave him what was to be a last elbow in the ribs.

§§§

Gare du Nord.

"This is where we came in, Poot."

"GO, at last."

§§§

Ten o'clock and the Paris-Londres was already there. It backed along the same track to the end of the same quai every night of the year. It waited patiently until the same time, then pulled out slowly, loaded with passengers leaving hell on their way to heaven, or heaven on their way to hell, or simply going home. These same people now clipped swiftly past our two sad porters, who hobbled along slowly, carrying their heavy loads as if one leg were shorter than the other. Olney's stomach was turning like a raffle barrel. He looked at Maggie, ready to burst into tears or make a quip--he didn't know which--but the strain on her face stopped him cold.

All back, she's thinking, I want to take it all back. And Olney can take his back, too, and Rhonda hers. And everybody can take back every bad thing they ever did, every last all of it!

Humans alike in the sentient night clipping by faster and faster. And there is the car. And there is the seat. And now is the baggage above it, so neat. "O Christ, but I love riding trains," said Olney, a needle of dread in his hysterical heart.

On the quai again, Maggie found a vendor. She bought a limp sandwich and a small bottle of Evian. Olney found his quip at last. "Hey, that cost the same as four litres of St. Chinian." She dropped the items into her handbag. "You got the chicken in there?" he quipped again. "C'mon, let's eat." Olney jerking in front of the duffle-coated girl, his cold, skinny body wrapped in many clothes, alternately sweating and freezing from the raw order of things, and all around them an existanz of people hurrying to make their stand against time. "Aw, Pootie, say it isn't so. Let's get your bags and go home. Pain ... who needs it?"

For a moment she said with her eyes, she said ... mais non. Feet together, ankle bone to ankle bone, one small hand holding a cigarette, the other deep in a pocket, toque on now, shaking her head slowly.

"Look," Olney kept on, "we'll ask Rhonda to leave. She'll be more than happy. It's only because I'm leaving too that she agreed to stay as much as one day longer. She'll want to leave. Sweetheart, I'm gonna die without you." Maggie reached for the wide lapels of his peacoat and gently pulled them to and fro. The smoke from her cigarette drifted between their eyes. Smarting and crying, his eyes pleaded. She dropped her hands slowly. It was ten twenty-five. Time, that serial bully....

"I'd better get on the train." The convocation of humanity had already boarded. Only the case histories remained. And now she stood on the steps of her car, and only the case history remained. He took her hand.

"Pootita-mia, this awful three months has been the best time of my life."

Her free hand leapt to shield the look on her face as it changed from a sob to laughter. "You did it again!"

"Let me do it forever, then. We're not ready for this."

"We must be, Olney. The train is moving." And then, for one stunning moment, their gaze comprehended what had passed between them earlier, while packing. Their bodies reeled from what their minds now knew: they didn't matter; they weren't yet enough of themselves to matter. She squeezed her eyes shut, hoping to get out of this terrible dream, to awaken in their comfortable bed to another morning in Paris, to yawn and stretch and try again. "It's only stupid life," she said, half to herself. The train began to pick up speed.

"Maggie, don't go!" he shouted, moving with it. "God damnit!" He held on to her hand, trotting now. "I love you," he called. "I'm so sorry!"

He let go of her hand at the edge of the quai. "It's just like a movie," she called back, blowing him one last kiss as the train began to snake out of the station, out of Paris, and into the dark.

§§§

Chapter 31: "Floating"

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