Mélodie
My mother said we were going to stay in Cluny
I didn’t think about it at the time, but I suppose we were going to keep Grandpa company, since Grandma had just died. To be entirely honest, I was not greatly sensitive to that kind of thing as a child. It seemed normal for old people to die. Of course I was sorry Grandma was dead, but I’d seen her so infrequently that I had no real concept of her. She’d been nice though, I could remember that much. And she’d had a smashing set of very straight, very white teeth and hordes of sophisticated Parisian jewellery and crimson lipsticks that smelt expensive.
The one good thing to come out of it was that I inherited the lipsticks. Grandma had left them to my mother, but she said she didn’t need them and gave them to me. But before I even got a chance to do much with my new acquisition, that little horror, my younger brother Cedric, had used them to draw ridiculous sketches on his new art pad. The lipsticks were utterly ruined. I had flown into a mad rage. It wasn’t just the lipsticks – it was living day in, day out with the little imp. His young life basically consisted of finding ingenious ways to torment me.
He’d been impossible in the car on the journey down, constantly clicking his tongue, shifting around in the back and kicking me. In the end my mother had to get a bag from the trunk to put between us. Of course she took Cedric’s side, not mine. It was easy to be fooled by his seraphic features, and for some reason best known to God and grasshoppers, she never turned around or walked in when he was up to no good. Naturally, it was he who initiated nearly all our fights, but mother was oblivious to this familial fact.
The journey became even more tedious once Cedric and I were separated by the luggage. It was hot, and the car had no air conditioner[2]. Lionel, my older teenage brother, was being taciturn and unsociable in the front passenger seat, plugged into his Walkman and listening to a tape of Jean-Jacques Goldman[3]. Mother didn’t say much either, other than the occasional ‘merde’[4] at our poor car[5] every time she stalled it and the impatient Parisian drivers honked ruthlessly from behind us, much to my embarrassment. The motorways were hell, as this was the first day of the summer holidays and Parisians were deserting the narrow confines of the city en masse like lemmings having caught sight of a particularly sheer cliff.
I was horribly grateful by the time we arrived. The Bourgogne Cluny
Grandpa came out of the house whilst we were unloading our voluminous luggage from the trunk of the car.
“There you are,” he barked. “I thought you’d never get here.”
My mother’s jaw tensed and her pale blue eyes turned hard. I knew Grandpa was a mean old codger, but honestly, his cantankerous bile didn’t bother me half as much as my mother’s reaction to it.
After a second, she seemed to remember something and her face relaxed. Grandpa stood on the steps with his cane in hand, looking down expectantly at his daughter.
“Yes, here we are,” my mother replied. Her voice was pleasant, but it was a tad too high and strained and I knew it was not natural. She walked to the steps and rose to give him a kiss on each cheek. He returned the kisses, of course, but I knew that amongst adults ‘la bise’[7] didn’t necessarily denote any real affection. Children do not do ‘la bise’ with each other – perhaps because it’s easier to dissemble if you’re an adult. Of course that’s just a theory.
We all went inside, which was swelteringly hot, but in a nice, summer-holiday kind of way. It was very dark inside, with old-fashion furniture and brown wallpaper. The first thing I noticed was that the place was buzzing with flies. I’d never seen anything like it. Grandpa laughed when he saw me frown at the pests.
“Here,” he said, handing me a green swatter. “You use this.” He sniggered at my perplexed expression, then demonstrated the effectiveness of the cheap plastic utensil, which looked to me like a spatula with lots of holes in the end of it. I’d never seen one before. Grandpa proceeded to swat four or five flies on the trot, much to Cedric’s amusement. Lionel barely smiled. He walked through the living room, still plugged into his Walkman like the clichéd sulking teenager, and went upstairs with his backpack.
***
It turned out I was right about the bugs. They were everywhere. But it wasn’t what I had expected. The charm of The Country (La Campagne) was tangible. I watched through the window that evening as my mother pointed out a praying mantis on the window sill. Cedric was fascinated and insisted we go outside to take a closer look. The air was warm and smelled of the hot summer sun gone down and dusky dew and dried grass and flowers and green things. The sound of the crickets – so loud and constant – had me transfixed. It was as if they were there to keep the time. It was soothing and reminded me of the metronome mother had at home for the piano. When we got to the praying mantis, which scared me a little because it looked like a cross between a plastic toy and an alien, I saw three little lumps of light on the ground.
I pointed them out. “Mum, mum, look!”
“They’re glow-worms,” she explained.
I had no idea that the world even held such wonders. How could something biological make light? I wasn’t sure if she was joking or winding me up. I took a closer look: I couldn’t believe my eyes! It looked like a caterpillar with its bum alight! Well, after that, any sulking thought at being out in The Sticks departed from my mind.
We ate dinner late, as was the custom in France
He turned to me at one point and said, out of nowhere: “You’re a good girl. Look at that...” He turned to address my mother whilst pointing his fork in my direction: “She’s eating properly. No elbows on the table, unlike the boys. Bloody disgraceful. Youngsters have no table manners these days,” he muttered, going back to his pâté en croûte[9].
My mother scowled and I beamed at the compliment.
***
The next morning, I amused myself by counting all the snails I could see. There had been a light, brief shower that had left the ground glistening wet. Almost as soon as the rain had stopped, the snails had started coming out in droves. There were tonnes of them, and Cedric and I were delighted. We plucked them off the concrete steps at the front of the house and I relished the sucking sensation each time. Some of them were tougher to unglue than others, which meant the suckage was all the more enhanced.
It’s true I squished a few, but it was mostly by accident and I apologised every time. But then, Cedric had the ‘brilliant’ idea of getting washing powder from the outbuilding (which was a cross between a garden shed and a garage), mixing it in the puddles with a stick and putting the mixture into a snail’s eyes. I saw the antennae retreat painfully into the snail’s head, and was aggrieved to see the eyes turn a sick fluorescent yellow. Cedric cackled evilly. I felt ill and disturbed, and decided he was not such a nice boy sometimes. I left him to it and went upstairs to see what Lionel was up to in his bedroom. He hadn’t come down even for breakfast. Grandpa was in the living room watching tennis and sporadically shouting things like ‘no, no! Go to the net you idiot!’ and ‘he serves like a girl!’ at the television, which I thought was particularly daft.
I opened the door of Lionel’s room and saw him sprawled on the bed, sucking on a lollipop (where did he get it from?) and reading The Three Musketeers.
“Come out and play, Lionel,” I said, but I knew by his expression that he was going to tell me to sod off.
“Sod off,” he said, not even bothering to look up from his book.
“Where did you get the lollipop?” I asked.
“Had it from back home.”
“Got any more?” I tried not to get my hopes up.
“No.”
“Want to come out for a walk? We could go to the farm.”
“No.” Lionel picked absently at one of his teenage spots.
“Fine then,” I spat, “stay here picking your disgusting, greasy spots.”
My heart hammering, I turned on my heels, slammed the door shut and fled the scene of the insult before Lionel had the chance to retaliate physically. As I raced down, I heard the muffled words ‘spoiled little shit’ from behind his door, which meant he was not going to give chase and thump me one.
I walked back down and into the kitchen and found mother cooking with Cedric.
“I’m going for a walk,” I announced.
My mother looked up from a pile of green beans picked fresh from the garden that she was preparing for lunch. “Fine,” she said. “But lunch will be ready in an hour, and don’t go any further than the farm.”
I nodded. My mother didn’t have to worry. I was a granny in a child’s body: boring, pompous and fearful of dangers. I rarely took any unnecessary risks.
I strolled up the lane, kicking loose pebbles and thinking about how I could possibly get hold of some sweets. The air was warm, damp and fragrant, and a rainbow was taking shape ahead. I watched the blue-grey clouds recede completely and the brilliant sunshine hit the stones of the old houses on both sides of the lane, and then the wheat fields ahead, making them glow orange.
I thought I should go and see the farm: I’d never seen one before. At the end of the lane there was a large wooden gate that gave onto a wide drive. There were four or five metal canisters its base. I guessed they must be milk pails, but this was the first time that I’d ever actually seen any. I was about to go through the gate when a noise caught my attention. It sounded like someone sniffling. Where was it coming from? Here it was again. This time it was clearer: more like a sob. It could only come from the lane around the corner, which was obscured by tight hedgerows.
I tiptoed gingerly around the hedges and craned my neck to have a look. Sure enough, there was someone there, a girl in a flowery dress sat down with her back to the hedge. There was one of those same silver milk pails at her feet. She had clearly just come to pick up some milk from the farm. Her face was in her hands, so I couldn’t see it, and at first I could not tell the colour of her hair because her head was covered with a lavender-blue handkerchief. Her dress was old-fashioned too: classic cut to the knees, with a delicate blue floral pattern. On her feet, she wore old leather sandals. My eyes widened in delight: it was just like someone from Little House on the Prairie, or La Petite Fadette[10], or Manon des Sources[11].
I didn’t think she had noticed me, because she started to cry in earnest. I could see she was older, a teenager, and the sound of someone no longer a child crying made my skin crawl.
“Are you ok?” I asked, careful to keep my voice low so as not to startle her, but I startled her all the same.
She looked up from her hands suddenly and tensed up. “Oh!” she said, her eyes wide. It made me think of one of those cartoon animals caught in a car’s headlights.
When she realised it was just me, her manner relaxed. She took out a handkerchief[12] from the folds of her skirt (I could not see a pocket), and wiped her nose.
“Are you OK?” I asked again.
“Oh yes – fine, fine,” she said quickly. Now she was stood up and facing me, I could see her hair peeking out from under her headscarf. It was very blonde. Her eyes were cornflower blue and her face like a pretty doll’s.
“But you’re crying!” I said. “Did you fall over?” I glanced down at her knees to see if she had any scrapes.
She looked at me as if I’d said something amusing. “No – I didn’t. Just having a bad day.”
“Oh I see,” I said, but I didn’t really see. We both stood looking at each other awkwardly, neither quite sure what to say next.
Then I realised we’d not even been introduced.
“My name’s Cécile,” I said.
“I’m Mélodie,” she replied.
I’d never heard of anyone called ‘Mélodie[13]’, like the music. It seemed a very clever name, much prettier than Cécile, which meant nothing at all and which was one of the more common names in France
“Are you here on holiday?” Mélodie asked. She seemed to be brightening up. I tried to decide how old she must be; probably fifteen or so.
“No – well, yes, I suppose,” I answered. “I’m here to see my grandfather. He has a house just down the road.” I pointed in the direction of Grandpa’s house.
“And are you having fun?” she asked politely.
“No, not really. I mean, I like the snails and the glow-worms and the crickets and the pâté en croûte. But my older brother’s sulking because he wanted to go to Marseille[14] to see his friend instead, and my little brother Cedric’s a troll. My mother’s miserable because she fights with my Granddad, and no one plays with me.”
Mélodie laughed. I didn’t know what I’d said that was so funny but I was glad I was cheering her up.
“Well, I’d better go,” she said, nodding her head down the lane.
I didn’t want her to go. I had no one to play with in this silly goat turd of a village. The idea that I might make a friend as lovely and as old as her – five or six years is practically a whole generational gap at that age – enthralled me.
She smiled and gave me a little wave, then turned to leave.
Luckily, inspiration struck: “Are you hungry?” I said.
She stopped in her tracks and turned around. I immediately knew I’d struck gold.
“Yes,” she admitted, “I am a bit…” She glanced over her shoulder at the lane stretching behind her, as if debating whether to go or stay.
“Good.” I walked over to her and took her hand. “You can come home and eat: mum’s cooking lunch right now.”
She looked down at me, uncertain, but I tugged at her hand and she followed.
***
I took her back in tow, like a prize galleon I’d captured on the high seas. When we got to the front yard of the house, she pulled back on my hand.
“Wait – I really can’t stay,” she said, her eyes darting about uncertainly. “It’s very kind of you to invite me, but I’d rather not go in on second thought. I don’t want to intrude,” she added.
“Don’t be silly,” I said. “We have lots of food!”
“Really,” she insisted, “I’d rather stay here.”
“Oh, well that’s no problem!” I was relieved that she didn’t actually want to leave, but just wanted to stay outside. “I’ll get you something from the kitchen, won’t be a minute!” I flew inside and went straight to the fridge. I grabbed a yogurt and opened the drawer for a spoon.
My mother was making a gratin with Cedric, who seemed to be mostly engaged in consuming a large bowl of grated cheese.
“No!” my mother snapped at me, “no yogurt, we’re about to eat!”
“It’s not for me,” I explained whilst I peeled the top off the yogurt, “I found a girl and she’s hungry.” I heaped a couple of generous teaspoons of sugar into it. I popped the spoon inside the yogurt ‘just so’ for my guest.
My mother’s expression turned serious. “What do you mean?”
“She’s called Mélodie. I invited her to lunch but she’s in a hurry so she can’t come in.”
“What?” my mother said. “She’s out there right now? Who is she?” She looked as though she wasn’t sure whether or not to believe me. Wiping her hands on her apron, she marched towards the front door. I trailed behind her with my yogurt ‘offering’, careful not to let the spoon fall out.
Mélodie sat on the bench and looked terrified when my mother appeared at the door, but my mother put her at ease quickly: she was rather friendly that way, and I’m sure she could see at once how lovely Mélodie was. My chest puffed out proudly as I saw the look of approval (I had been telling the truth) and interest in my mother’s eye.
My mother sat next to Mélodie on the bench, and I waited patiently for their conversation to conclude. A lot of inane questions from my mother: Was Mélodie local? Who was her family? How old was she?
I listened in mild interest at Mélodie’s answers. Yes, she lived just up the road beyond the farm; she was one of the LaCourt family. She was fifteen (I’d been right). I shifted my weight from one foot to the next impatiently now. I wanted to see Mélodie’s delight at the yogurt (my favourite[15]) that I’d come bearing.
My mother started launching into the topic of Lionel and how he was only a year younger than Mélodie, and maybe would be a good playmate for her (how rude, couldn’t she see Mélodie was mine!). I squeezed in between them and handed Mélodie the yogurt triumphantly.
“There you go!” I said. “I gave you two spoons of sugar.”
Mélodie smiled and took the yogurt from me. “Thank you.”
“I can mix it for you,” I offered.
She chuckled. “No, it’s OK, I can do it.”
My mother made some kind of chortling sound behind me. I could practically feel her eyes rolling into her head. I suppose it was silly, my treating Mélodie like a baby when she was six years my senior. And yet I felt instinctively protective of her, as if she was helpless, a fragile damsel in distress.
“But you can’t just have a yogurt,” my mother objected. “You must stay for lunch!”
Mélodie stirred her yogurt and shook her head slowly. “That’s very kind of you, but I really can’t stay.” I noticed her eyes flicker down to her shoes.
“Why not? Do you have an important meeting to go to?” my mother teased.
“No, I have chores,” Mélodie replied.
“Well I’m sure they can wait. It’s lunchtime. You were going to eat, weren’t you?” my mother asked, as if the thought of not eating lunch was comical. And, indeed, the idea of skipping any meal in France
Mélodie’s smooth, milky cheeks coloured slightly. “Actually,” she mumbled, “I don’t usually eat lunch.”
It all came out after that, with my mother pulling the string until the fish was fully out of the water. Mélodie explained how she lived with her step-father and step-sister, on whom she had to wait day and night. They didn’t feed her properly; she lived more or less on scraps. Sometimes, she said, she had nothing to eat for dinner but ketchup[16]. She did all the chores around the house and slept in the attic. She made her own clothes from old curtains and tablecloths.
My heart hammered when I heard this. An actual, real-life Cinderella! I could tell from my mother’s reactions and facial expressions that although concerned, she was not entirely convinced that Mélodie wasn’t telling her pork pies.
I took in Mélodie’s dress and attire again, and it made sense to me: it didn’t look like something you could buy in the shops. Still, just because she made her own clothes didn’t mean that she was necessarily being starved either. It was impossible to tell, really, but her demeanour was so earnest and her embarrassment seemed genuine. I decided to believe her.
Mélodie left quickly after that, taking her milk pail with her. My mother had no intention of letting anyone go without food, and had invited Mélodie for lunch tomorrow.
***
When Mélodie turned up at one o’clock on the dot the next day, I ran out the door to greet her. She was wearing the same dress as yesterday, but she had a pink ribbon round her head this time. It was lovely, just like the ones you see on those pretty dolls. I dragged her inside by her hand. She sat and had a proper lunch with us. We ate pâté en croûte again (because I liked it and so did Grandpa), cucumber and yogurt salad with parsley and rabbit stew (which was delicious, and I decided that rabbit was now officially my favourite meat). Then we had cheese and bread, and then some mille-feuille[17] because Grandpa was cuckoo about mille-feuille. I was in heaven because I’d finally managed to get a decent sugar hit.
Grandpa didn’t seem to mind us having Mélodie over for lunch. In fact, I’m not sure he noticed. I mostly saw him knock back a lot of red wine, lost in a world of his own, although every once in a while he would come out and regale the table with excellent war stories or silly jokes. But I was sad to see that he still never missed an opportunity to criticise my mother.
As for Lionel’s reaction to Mélodie, it was one that was deeply satisfying to me. He was properly besotted.
Everyday that week she came to lunch, and we got to know here little by little. She was pretty shy still, and avoided talking too much about her step-dad and step-sister, despite my mother’s concerned enquiries.
Lionel spent most of the time running his fingers through his shiny chestnut-brown hair and putting on a show of being extremely nice to everyone, passing round the dishes and being generally helpful.
At first Mélodie seemed impervious to his quiet attentions, but on the third day, I saw her blush when Lionel complimented her on her dress. It was a new one she had just made: yellow background with purple and pink flowers. Her headscarf matched.
***
On the Saturday, my mother had to take Grandpa to the doctor for a test thingy, so we had to stay with Madame Bagnard across the road for the afternoon. So we wouldn’t be seeing Mélodie today. This depressed me somewhat, because her visits were the highlight of otherwise dull, slow days spent cooking, playing cards and trying to keep Cedric entertained. And now we had to spend three hours at some stranger’s house.
Cedric, Lionel and I crossed the road and waved goodbye to our mother as if we were being sent off to the gallows. Madame Bagnard was waiting eagerly at her door, waving us in with a wide smile. She was extremely fat, but fat in the way that people are supposed to be, and which seems natural for them. She looked absolutely delighted to have us.
“Come in you little dears,” she said, pinching each of our cheeks. “Why, you look starving!” she exclaimed, an indignant expression on her ruddy features.
I shook my head and started to protest that we’d just had an early lunch, but she cut me off.
“Come, come,” she said, “I have a small snack set up for you.”
She gathered us up and sort of ferried us into the dimly lit living room, where an enormous spread was laid out on a long dining table. There was absolutely everything on there that I could think of – well, nearly everything. I noted there were no ‘conneries’[18]. I longed for something like Nutella, but there was nothing like that in sight. The table was covered with dishes of olives, melon, fruit of every description, bread, meats, eggs, saucisson[19], potatoes, salad and other dishes that I couldn’t even name. I spied some Grenadine[20] in the corner, which mollified me somewhat.
My brothers and I sat down at the table with long faces and apprehensive eyes. I had absolutely no appetite and by the look of it, neither did Lionel and Cedric.
Mrs Bagnard kept us at the table the whole time, and we slowly, painfully tried to consume the foods she would pile onto our plates. It was hard to say no: she looked so pleased with every forkful we swallowed.
We would tell her, every once in a while, that we were full, patting our bellies and trying to plaster satiated smiles on our ashen faces, but she would simply say: “tut, tut, nonsense, nonsense. You’re just being polite. Adorable little creatures…”, and then she would go round and pinch us hard on the cheek again. “I can’t stand the thought of little children going hungry,” she would say over and over.
I thought she was mental.
My mother came to rescue us at about four in the afternoon. I was never more grateful to leave a place in my life, nor more nauseous. But I felt guilty that I could not muster up more affection for Mrs Bagnard as we departed; the torture she had inflicted on us had clearly been unintentional.
I was a little cheered, however, by the summer shower that drenched us in the little time it took to cross the country lane back to Grandpa’s. It was fat, wet rain that was literally hot. I’d never felt hot rain before, we didn’t have that in Paris
Come Sunday, I waited for Mélodie to show up, but lunch came and went without any sign of her. My mother told me not to worry, and that Mélodie wouldd come when she felt like it, but Lionel started to fret and kept pestering me with questions all afternoon. Did I think she was OK? What had she said to me on Friday – that she’d come back Sunday, or was it Monday? I said I didn’t know, and although it was tedious not to have my new best friend with me on such a dull day, I knew she’d come Monday. Besides, there was a double bill of my favourite cartoon, Cobra, to keep me busy[21].
Monday rolled by, and still no Mélodie. My mother told us to be patient, and that Mélodie was probably busy, but Lionel and I were not satisfied. We knew where Mélodie’s house was; although secretive about her home life, she’d told us that much.
We hatched a plan: we’d go after dinner, when mum and Grandpa were planning to watch a re-run of the most boring film on earth, Gone with the Wind, which they’d been waiting all week to see (two figurative fingers down one’s throat). As soon as we finished eating, Lionel and I said we were going outside to play for a while then would go to his room to read for the rest of the evening. It was only eight-thirty; the sun wouldn’t be going down for a while yet. Cedric nestled himself on the couch next to my mother, and Lionel and I took off, strangely excited.
We stepped outside to a glorious summer evening. The setting sun was enormous, a glowing orange half-circle peaking out from the horizon. It reminded me of those fizzy orange vitamin Cs that mother would give me when I was ill.
The smell of summer was intense. The evening was still warm from the hot day, but a cool breeze was blowing. Lionel and I half-walked, half-ran up the road to the farm, then turned into the lane around the corner. I could see, on the left-hand side, the place where I had found Mélodie crying only a week ago (seemed like longer).
Soon the lane turned into a tarmac road. To the left, there was a massive wheat field, just as Mélodie had described. It was like a sea of gold, rippling in the breeze.
We climbed over the white iron fence of the field (Mélodie had said that it was a short-cut to the back of the house), and sure enough, we could see a large white house on the horizon. We started running through the wheat towards it, laughing and chatting, with me making as many cracks as I could about Lionel’s crush on Mélodie and getting a slap on the head for every one of them. I was pleased. I had not managed to get much attention from Lionel in recent months.
When we got to the house, we hunched down amongst the wheat and staked out our target. The back of the house was an open yard with light-grey gravel and some large bins against the wall next to the back door. One of the lights inside the house was on, but we could see nothing through the glazed window. We had omitted the problem of how to get Mélodie out of the house in our plan.
Lionel frowned, then turned to me. “You should go ring the doorbell.”
“No way – why me?” I said.
“Because you’re a little girl, idiot. The step-dad’s not likely to get mad at you, is he?”
“How do you know that? Maybe he hates little girls!” I said, alarmed. “No, I’m not going there. It looks scary…”
“Honestly–” Lionel began, but the noise of a door opening stopped him short.
We hunched down further and watched. Mélodie walked into view with a heavy black rubbish bag and headed towards the bins. We breathed a sigh of relief, and stepped into the yard.
“Mélodie! Psst!” Lionel hissed.
When Mélodie saw us she dropped the rubbish bag in shock. She glanced over her shoulder and, satisfied that we were alone, sidled over to us.
“What are you doing here?” she whispered, her eyes wide with horror.
“Where have you been?” Lionel asked.
“Nowhere,” she replied, “here.” She glared at him. “Go away before my step-father sees you. I’ll never hear the end of it if he does.”
“No.” Lionel said.
I watched the interchange with interest.
“You’re coming with us,” Lionel told her firmly.
Mélodie stopped glaring at him. “I can’t, my step-father will kill me,” she explained.
“Only for a little while,” he pleaded.
Mélodie hesitated, then said, “Fine, but let me go tell him I’m going for a walk.”
She went back inside the house and Lionel and I retreated into the protection of the wheat field. Mélodie came back out a couple of minutes later. We ran as fast as we could at first, away from the house, but I had difficulty keeping up and was getting a stitch.
“Wait for me!” I yelled up ahead. Lionel and Mélodie slowed down, but they were still a hundred meters ahead. I walked towards them, but stopped short when I saw Lionel take her hand and interlace his fingers with hers.
I might have been just a nine-year-old kid, but I knew what that kind of hand-holding meant. I walked on, but kept a respectful distance. Lionel and Mélodie were talking softly, and I could not pick up their words clearly.
Eventually we came to a copse of trees and a small brook. Lionel and Mélodie sat together by the tree, and I went to the brook, deciding to leave them in peace and throw a few pebbles instead. I tried to amuse myself for a few minutes, but it was boring as well as awkward. I turned around to see what they were doing, and that’s when I saw it: the kissing. It was quite a shock, I can tell you that. It was totally gross of course, and yet for some peculiar reason that I couldn’t account for, I sort of envied them.
***
We stayed out till nearly ten o’clock. I was dead bored of hanging around Mélodie and Lionel like a gooseberry, so I kept bugging them to go back. Mélodie fretted that she’d stayed out far too late. On the way home, I gave Lionel a piece of my mind about monopolising my friend and slobbering all over her, but mostly because I didn’t know what to say to him. He had an odd expression on his face. I’d never seen him happier. We snuck back into the house without anyone noticing at all – Gone with the Wind was still going.
Mélodie had told Lionel that she hadn’t been able to get away for lunch because her father had changed his schedule at work, but that she was going to try to make it tomorrow.
Tomorrow came and went, and the day after that, and the day after that, and the rest of the week without a sign of Mélodie. Mother, for once, was a little worried. She was debating whether or not to call on her, but then decided that if her step-father really was that nasty, it would probably make things worse.
I was tempted to ‘come clean’ and tell mother that we’d gone to see her at the house, but Lionel told me to shut up and that it had nothing to do with it. That night we all sat and watched Angélique Marquise des Anges[22] on TV, but my mind was elsewhere, and I could see that Lionel was not paying attention either.
The next morning, Lionel and I agreed that we’d go out to the house again and see if we could find Mélodie. We left dinner early and spent ages trying to convince Cedric that he didn’t want to come with us, and then we ran again through the field and to the white house. We crouched in the wheat, observing the house, but no light was on and there seemed to be no one in at all. Eventually, the back door opened, making my heart skip a beat. I nearly stood up, but Lionel held me back by the arm.
“Wait,” he said.
And it was a good thing too, because it wasn’t Mélodie that had walked out, but a brown-haired girl in jeans and a bright pink T-shirt. She walked past us and disappeared round the side of the house.
Lionel and I decided that this probably meant that Mélodie was alone in the house. We plucked up all our courage to make a mad dash across the courtyard, and then we hunkered down behind the bins. We looked up at the house, desperately trying to catch some movement behind the windows. Eventually, I saw a blonde head bob past in one of the windows.
“There!” I said, and Lionel picked up some pebbles and started throwing them at the window, just like they did on TV, which I thought was cool.
The blonde head disappeared from the window. Lionel and I held our breath. After a minute or so, the back door of the house opened again and Mélodie stepped out, to my complete elation. But it was short-lived. Her pretty features were marred by a purple black-eye and a swollen lip.
“Go away!” she hissed frantically. “Leave, now – he’s still here!”
My breath caught in my throat. I glanced at Lionel’s face, and he looked horrified. In that split second, just as we were processing the reality of the situation and preparing ourselves to get the hell out of there, a man appeared behind Mélodie. He was tall with brown hair, in blue dungarees and smoking a cigarette. He looked furious and is mouth was distorted into a mean sneer. We saw him but Mélodie didn’t, because she had her back to him. He grabbed her by the arm very roughly and she screamed.
“What the hell are you up to?” he roared at her. “And you, who are you?” he shouted in our direction. I thought I would pass out from fright, but try as I might, I couldn’t make my legs move. “What are you doing on this property?” he continued. “Get out of here right now or I’ll come and sort you out!”
Lionel took my hand and we started to make a run for it. I could feel my pulse pounding in my ears, and neither of us stopped for breath until we got back to Grandpa’s.
***
We never did see Mélodie again. When we got back to Grandpa’s that night, quite besides ourselves, we told mother everything. She was appalled, and swore that she’d contact Social Services.
The rest of the holiday elapsed peacefully. Grandpa, oddly enough, seemed to perk up a little, and even took us fishing. I liked the fishing, but I did not like the large dragonflies that were all over the place. They were vicious. Lionel and I hung around together nearly the whole time. We talked of Mélodie a lot, and our thoughts never strayed very far from her. I don’t know why, but I couldn’t get the picture of her living off ketchup out of my mind.
When we got back to Paris
[1] Which my mother explained was in southern Bourgogne
[2] I don’t even know if they had air-conditioned cars in those days, but if they did, we would never have been able to afford one anyway.
[3] French singer/songwriter who was, and still is, incredibly popular in France
[4] Which means ‘shit’ and it is not quite as rude in French as it is in English.
[5] A lemon-yellow Opel.
[6] If you could call it that.
[7] Literally, ‘the kiss’, the customary French greeting, even for mere acquaintances (hugging is not a French ‘thing’ at all). It’s two kisses (one on each cheek) in most parts of France , except Paris
[8] A French aniseed-flavoured liqueur which is stupendously yummy. Mother would let me have a sip of hers every once in a while. It is vastly popular in France
[9] This is a dish consisting of pâté baked in a crust. I suppose it’s the equivalent of a pork pie, except this is delicious and delicate, not coarse and fatty.
[10] One of my favourite books at the time: written by George Sand in 1849 and set in the French countryside.
[11] One of a two-part 1963 novel by Marcel Pagnol about a beautiful shepherdess, set in Provence France
[12] A proper one too, not a Kleenex (which they had in France
[13] ‘Mélodie’ in French means exactly the same as ‘melody’ in English.
[14] Large port-town in the South of France, and second largest city in France
[15] Danone, vanilla. The French take their dairy products very seriously, as is well known. They have a gigantic selection of yogurts in the most fantastic flavours.
[16] I did not believe that bit though – I think she must have been exaggerating. Nobody eats ketchup for dinner.
[17] Literally, ‘A thousand sheets’, which is a standard French pastry consisting of alternating layers of puff pastry and custard, topped off with icing.
[18] Which can be loosely translated as ‘crap’, although it’s somewhat ruder in French than in English.
[19] The French version of salami, but infinitely nicer.
[20] Sweet pomegranate syrup used as squash. Very popular with kids all over France
[21] Manga-style cartoon about a space adventurer who gets a face lift and goes from long-haired brunette to curly blond and gets his arm converted to a ray gun after being chased down by the space mafia. Smokes cigars and is frequently surrounded by lots of naked ladies with fine figures, large breasts and very little more to cover their dignity than a thong and the odd tattoo. I suppose a little risqué for children, but this was France
[22] Literally, ‘Angelica, Marquise of the Angels’. Dead good 1960s show set in mid-17th Century France, about the child of an impoverished nobleman who marries a rich Count that is scarred and much older than her. She hates him at first but then it turns out he’s a cool guy. Unfortunately he gets killed by the powers that be and she sets off for revenge and has fantastic adventures.
