But being alone is better than the company of my stepsons. I see how they look at me, Antoine and Nicolas.
I reach for the bottle and pour the remainder into a glass. The liquid reaches to the very rim. I drink it down. It’s a very fine burgundy but it doesn’t taste good like this. The acid stings the back of my throat and nostrils like vomit.
I open a new bottle and start drinking that too. I drink it straight from the neck this time, tipping the bottle vertical. The wine rushes out too fast for me to gulp it down; I cough. My throat is burning, raw. The wine pours over my chin, down my neck. The cool of it is strangely refreshing. I feel it sinking into the silk of my shirt.
I saw him in the courtyard the morning after our drinks, talking to Mimi’s flatmate, Camille, in a puddle of sunlight. Jacques once told me he approved of that girl living with our daughter. A good influence. Nothing to do with that little pink pout, the delicate upturned nose, the small high breasts, I am sure.
She was leaning toward Benjamin Daniels as a sunflower in a Proven?al field tilts toward the sun, Vichy-check top slipping off brown shoulders, white shorts so brief that half a bronzed buttock was visible beneath each hem. The two of them together were beautiful, just as he and Dominique had been beautiful; impossible not to see it.
“Bonjour Madame Meunier,” Camille trilled. A little wave as she shifted her weight from one leg to the other. The “Madame” calculated, no doubt, to make me feel all the cruel power of her youth. Her phone trilled. She read whatever had arrived, a smile forming as though she were reading some secret message from a lover. Her fingers went to her lips. The whole thing was a display for him, perhaps: meant to entice, intrigue. “I have to go,” she said. “Salut Ben!” She turned and blew him a kiss.
And then it was just me and Benjamin Daniels in the courtyard. And the concierge, of course. I was certain she would be watching all of this from her cabin.
“You’ve made it beautiful out here,” he said.
How did he know it was all my work? “It’s not looking its best,” I told him. “This time of year—everything is almost over.”
“But I love the rich colors,” he said. “Tell me, what are those—over there?”
“Dahlias. Agapanthus.”
He asked me about several of the borders. He seemed genuinely interested, though I knew he was just humoring me. But I didn’t stop. I was enjoying telling him—telling somebody—about the oasis I had created. For a moment I almost forgot my suspicion of him.
And then he turned to face me. “I’ve been meaning to ask you. Your accent intrigues me. Are you originally from France?”
“Excuse me?” I fought not to lose control of my expression, felt the mask slipping.
“I noticed that you don’t always use the definite article,” he said. “And your consonants: they’re a little harder than a native speaker’s.” He made a pinch with his thumb and forefinger. “Just a little. Where are you from originally?”
“I—” For a moment, I couldn’t speak. No one had ever commented on my accent, not even the French—not even the Parisians, who are the worst snobs of all. I had begun to flatter myself that I had perfected it. That my disguise was complete, foolproof. But now I realized that if he had guessed, and he wasn’t even French, it meant others would have done too, of course they would. It was a chink, an opening in the shell through which my former self might be glimpsed. Everything I had carefully put in place, all I had worked so hard at. With that one question he was saying: you don’t fool me.
“I don’t like him,” I told Jacques, later. “I don’t trust him.”
“What on earth do you mean? I was impressed by him last night. You can feel the ambition coming off him. Perhaps he’ll be a good influence on my wastrel sons.”
What could I tell him? He made a comment about my accent? I don’t like the way he seems to watch all of us? I don’t like his smile? It sounded so weak.
“I don’t want him here,” I said. It was all I could think to say. “I think you should ask him to leave.”
“Oh really?” Jacques said, quite pleasantly. Too pleasantly. “You’re going to tell me, now, are you, who I may and may not have in my own house?”
And that was that. I knew not to say anything more on the matter. Not for the time being. I would just have to think of another way to rid this place of Benjamin Daniels.
The next morning a new note arrived.
I know you, Sophie Meunier. I know the shameful secrets hiding beneath that bourgeois exterior. We can keep this between us, or the rest of the world can learn them too. I ask just a small fee for my service of silence.
The amount my blackmailer was asking for had doubled.
I suppose a few thousand euros should sound like small fry to someone living in an apartment worth several million. But the apartment is in Jacques’ name. The money tied up in Jacques’ accounts, his investments, his business. Ours has always been an old-fashioned arrangement; at any given time I have only had what has been handed out to me for housekeeping, for my wardrobe. I did not realize before I became a part of this world how invisible the grease—the money—that moves its wheels really is. It is all squirreled away, invested, liquid or fixed, so little of it available in ready cash.
Still, I did not tell Jacques. I knew how badly he would react, which would only make things worse. I knew that by telling him I would make this thing real, would dredge up the past. And it would only further underscore the imbalance of power that existed between my husband and me. No, instead I would find a way to pay. I still felt able to handle it on my own. Just. I chose a diamond bracelet, this time: an anniversary gift.
The next morning, I dutifully left another wedge of grubby notes in a cream-colored envelope beneath the loose step.
Now, I look at myself in the mirror across the room. The spreading crimson stain of the wine. I’m transfixed by the sight of it. The red sinking into the pale silk of the shirt. Like spilled blood.
I rip the shirt from me. It tears so easily. The mother of pearl buttons explode from the fabric, skitter to the corners of the room. Next, the trousers. The fine soft wool is tight, clinging. A moment later I am on the ground, kicking them from me. I am sweating. I am panting like an animal.
I look at myself in my lingerie, bought at great expense by my husband but so seldom seen by him. Look at this body, denied so much pleasure, still so well-honed from the years of dieting. The xylophone of my décolletage, the wishbone of my pelvis. Once my body was all curves and ripeness. A thing to provoke lust or contempt. To be touched. With a great effort I changed it into something to be concealed, upon which to hang the garments made for a woman of my standing.
My lips are stained by the wine. My teeth, too. I open my mouth wide.
Holding my own gaze in the mirror I let out a silent scream.
Jess