Page 138 - And the Mountains Echoed (novel)

sexuelle. She wanted to own me.” He was looking at her when he said this and

smiling a subversive little smile, cautiously gauging her reaction. Pari lit a
cigarette and played it cool, like Bardot, like this was the sort of thing men told
her all the time. But, inside, she was trembling. She knew that a small act of
betrayal had been committed at the table. Something a little illicit, not entirely
harmless but undeniably thrilling. When Maman returned, with her hair brushed
anew and a fresh coat of lipstick, their stealthy moment broke, and Pari briefly
resented Maman for intruding, for which she was immediately overcome with
remorse.
She saw him again a week or so later. It was morning, and she was going to
Maman’s room with a bowl of coffee. She found him sitting on the side of
Maman’s bed, winding his wristwatch. She hadn’t known he had spent the night.
She spotted him from the hallway, through a crack in the door. She stood there,
rooted to the ground, bowl in hand, her mouth feeling like she had sucked on a
dry clump of mud, and she watched him, the spotless skin of his back, the small

paunch of his belly, the darkness between his legs partly shrouded by the
rumpled sheets. He clasped on his watch, reached for a cigarette off the
nightstand, lit it, and then casually swung his gaze to her as if he had known she
was there all along. He gave her a closemouthed smile. Then Maman said
something from the shower, and Pari wheeled around. It was a marvel she didn’t
scald herself with the coffee.
Maman and Julien were lovers for about six months. They went to the cinema
a lot, and to museums, and small art galleries featuring the works of struggling
obscure painters with foreign names. One weekend they drove to the beach in
Arcachon, near Bordeaux, and returned with tanned faces and a case of red wine.

Julien took her to faculty events at the university, and Maman invited him to
author readings at the bookstore. Pari tagged along at first—Julien asked her to,
which seemed to please Maman—but soon she started making excuses to stay
home. She wouldn’t go, couldn’t. It was unbearable. She was too tired, she said,
or else she didn’t feel well. She was going to her friend Collette’s house to
study, she said. Her friend since second grade, Collette was a wiry, brittle-
looking girl with long limp hair and a nose like a crow’s beak. She liked to
shock people and say outrageous, scandalous things.
“I’ll bet he’s disappointed,” Collette said. “That you don’t go out with them.”
“Well, if he is, he’s not letting on.”

“He wouldn’t let on, would he? What would your mother think?”
“About what?” Pari said, though she knew, of course. She knew, and what
she wanted was to hear it said.