Hidden in Paris

Chapter 26


At the door, Mark wasn’t exactly smiling, but he did not look angry. He was closely shaven and dressed with extreme care. Did he just bring his small Hermès bag neatly stored in the overhead compartment of his first-class direct flight? Did he already have their flight booked for the way back? Was he planning on taking the children only and leaving her in Paris? She instinctively searched his jaw for tension, his eyes for the cold light of controlled anger, but instead found in his expression a weariness she wasn’t familiar with and assumed must be jet lag. Strangely, he looked glad to see her rather than victorious. Her heart was in her throat.

“Aren’t you going to let me in?” Mark said. This wasn’t a question. Lola moved slowly away from the door to let him in. The absurdity of her situation was so apparent to her now. She had imagined in minute details how Mark would be searching for her, yet had not for an instant prepared herself for the moment he would find her.

She followed him into the house, her mind blank. He stood in the hallway, looked at the collection of small antique mirrors of all sorts and shapes and at the yellow walls stenciled with naïve suns. He waited until it occurred to her to guide him into the living room. She instantaneously began seeing the house through his eyes. The living room was too dark, too heavy with antique furniture and velvet curtains, too provincial French. “Can I give you something to drink?” she asked. Whether he asked for a drink, and the type of drink, the tone of his voice, all were subtle signs she was desperately seeking to read. She searched the walls for traces of Annie’s strength and common sense. Hers had abandoned her.

Mark walked around the room taking his time, inspecting objects from a distance that appeared to be physical and emotional, like he was visiting a second rate museum. He did not touch anything and she was thankful for that, because she would have perceived it as an invasion of Annie’s home. She wished so much she had not let him in. And it was terrible how she already felt battered by his unspoken disapproval. He turned to her and stared at her, cocked his head with an amused expression. “You look different.” This sounded neither like a criticism nor a compliment. She instantly became terribly self-conscious. “I do hope this is a wig,” he said, pointing at her hair. She felt relief like cool water running though her body and smiled. This was his sense of humor. She fluffed her now blond hair. “I let it grow out. This is my real color actually.”

“Who lives here?” Mark said.

“Well, there’s Annie, my... good friend, and her three sons, Maxence, Paul, and--”

“Any guys living here?”

She was about to give him a convoluted answer when she remembered something Annie had said. “You don’t owe him an explanation. Just remind yourself that he is the bad guy, not you.” So Lola did something very out of character. She answered with a question and mirrored his tone.

“Is there a woman living in your house?”

She chose the word “your” on the spur of the moment, and it felt good. Mark ignored the question and returned to inspecting things. Her shoulders had turned as hard and heavy as stone, and her jaw felt sore from clenching it. She was able to gather enough distance from what was happening to understand that her body was awaiting the blow up. Mark had not blown up yet but he was about to, because that’s what he did. Something stirred in her, indignation, determination. This was no way to live, this walking on eggshells, terrified of a human ticking time bomb.

“What money have you been using?” Mark asked softly. “Nothing came out of our accounts.”

On the phone with Annie, she had wanted to shout out for her friend to come to the rescue, but with Mark right in front of her, it had been impossible. So she pictured Annie in her mind for strength.

“I’m using my own savings. From before us.”

“Clever girl,” he said. “You had a secret account all this time? I never knew you to be secretive.”

There was something different about him that she could not put her finger on. He seemed...not humble, no, not quite, but less self-assured and also less edgy. She wondered if maybe he was sick. “I guess I thought I knew you, but the joke’s on me,” he added.

“Do you want to sit down?” She asked and she was surprised to see him sit on the couch immediately, as though he had been waiting for permission. He crossed his legs with one foot over the knee, and spread his arms on either side of the couch. She knew his body language, had learned to read its minutest fluctuations. Mark was trying to appear relaxed in a way that screamed that he wasn’t. “Okay,” he said, trying to smile, “so what’s the plan now that I’m here?”

She had seen him do this a hundred times—let the other person talk too much, get confused, emotional. He’d reveal nothing of himself or his desires until he was completely in control. “Information is power,” he always said. She didn’t have to fall into the trap. All she had to do was the opposite of what she usually did. No excuses, no glib explanations, no pitiable display of emotion. So rather than sit down, she crossed her arms and said relatively firmly and with as little feeling as possible, “You tell me what the plan is.”

Mark examined Lola from head to toe with amusement. “What’s wrong with the way your hair was before? Is that part of the incognito thing? Are you trying to change identity?” he laughed a bit too loudly. She wanted to tell him that this was the real her, and that the identity she had assumed with him was the false one. She saw him follow her gaze toward the clock. The children needed to be picked up from school in just a few hours. As on cue, Mark asked: “Where are the kids? Are they here?”

He would take the kids away! He would have every right to. She had been found out but she could still hide them from him. Panic set in and she was slowly falling apart starting with the knot of tears that was irrepressibly forming in her throat.

“I want to see them,” Mark said.

She was about to burst into tears like a five-year-old when came the unmistakable pushing and yanking sound of someone opening the front door, followed by the loud thump of the wooden door closing again. Mark, from his sitting position on the couch, looked at her interrogatively. What followed was almost comical. Annie barged into the room. Her hair was electric and she seemed to have been sprinting.

“Cheerio!” she said, panting. She walked right to Mark without the slightest pretense of surprise. “I’m Annie. This is my house,” she huffed, holding her hand out to shake his. Mark slowly unfolded from the couch and got up to face her. Standing, Mark was a good foot taller than she was but to Lola, Annie was the Rock of Gibraltar. For what seemed like an eternity, Mark did not take the hand Annie continued to keep firmly outstretched toward him. When he finally shook, it felt to Lola as though Annie had scored a touchdown. She had made Mark do something he did not want to do! But Lola’s elation did not last. Instead of looking at her and speaking to her, Mark looked at Lola and said, “Where are the kids?”

“You haven’t introduced yourself,” Annie said aggressively as she stood in front of him, hands on her hips.

“Annie, this is my husband, Mark...”

Annie looked at Lola with an expression that said, “Duh!”

“Lola, I need to see Lia and Simon,” Mark said. He was beginning to look agitated.

“You’re out of luck,” Annie said. “The children are out of town.” Lola knew it was a bluff, but she felt a nonsensical sense of relief. “As I said,” Annie added, “this is my house. As far as I know, there is no reason why you shouldn’t be welcome. But things can change very quickly.”

“Lola,” Mark said between his teeth, “I need to talk to you in private.”

Annie turned to Lola, who was petrified. “Lola, do you wish to speak to this man privately?”

“Not really,” Lola said, and she meant it.

“All right,” Annie continued. “In that case, I will be present during your conversation, as a mediator.”

“You’re dreaming,” Mark chuckled.

Annie walked toward Mark. Was it Lola’s imagination or did Mark back off ever so slightly. “Then you can leave,” she said. “Should I be calling the police?”

Mark let out a big friendly laugh, and put both of his hands up in surrender. “All right, ladies. Let’s be friends here.”

Lola’s face lit up with relief. Annie’s expression was unflinching, and she was certainly not laughing. “Are you saying that you’re agreeing to me serving as mediator?”

Mark was still smiling widely, “All right, all right...whatever. Lola, where did you find your friend here? You gals crack me up.” Lola detected tension in his jaw, but he could have fooled anyone else. Thankfully, Annie didn’t appear the least bit fooled either. She had heard enough accounts to know what Mark was capable of. Lola caught herself wanting Mark to go crazy and demonstrate one of his trademark temper tantrums so she could be vindicated. Annie would see how terrifying Mark was, and it would excuse her lies, all of them.

But for the moment, Annie didn’t seem terrified at all. She guided Mark to the kitchen and had him and Lola sit on opposite sides of the kitchen table. Mark was even more of an incongruous apparition in Annie’s kitchen, which had so recently overflowed with kids, cereal boxes, and cups of hot cocoa. Mark had to love the kitchen, she thought. Everyone loved Annie’s kitchen. It was so French, so quaint. But moving from the living room to the kitchen did not change the fact that time was ticking. The kitchen clock was just as mercilessly accurate as the living room clock. She breathed with increasing difficulty. She stopped looking at the clock, which she decided was going to give things away, and, resting all hope on Annie, she waited for someone’s next move. While she and Mark fell silent, Annie flattened her crazed hair with the palm of her hand, brushed some crumbs leftover from breakfast off the table with dignity, and turned on the coffeemaker. She opened the kitchen glass door wide. The chirps of birds and summer heat found their way into the kitchen. In the distance, someone was playing the piano, a lighthearted piece that sounded like something by Vivaldi.

“Let me grab something to write with,” Annie said. She walked out of the kitchen while Mark and Lola sat in silence. Lola scrutinized her hands and considered how docile Mark was at the moment as he looked around the kitchen and rocked on the back legs of his chair. A minute later, Annie was back and she was holding a pad and a pen. She sat down on the chair across from Mark, and sat at Lola’s side. Annie was in her element, in her kitchen, in her house. The sun and the smell of coffee flooded the kitchen like a promise of better days.

“Let’s get started, shall we?” Annie said. “Oh, and Mark, please, could you stop doing that to the chair. It’s an antique, and you might end up on your ass.”

Mark stopped. Lola looked in despair at the clock. It was three forty-five. The children! She glanced in panic at Annie who discretely mouthed, “Lu-cas.”



A violent ray of sunshine darted through an opening in the curtains of Althea’s hospital room. That light attacked her in her sleep, and she awakened with difficulty. She lifted an arm, wiggled her toes, and was surprised when they responded. She dropped her arm, exhausted by the effort. Her head hurt terribly, her brain felt too large for her skull, and it was nearly impossible to open her eyes. The scary nurse who had made Annie cry barged into the room, her voice boomed.

“I see Sleeping Beauty’s up!”

Althea felt compelled to apologize. “I’m ready to go now. I’m sorry.”

“Sorry?”

“I’m fine really. I just need to pee.”

The nurse moved about the room. “You don’t need to pee. You’re connected to a catheter. It’s just uncomfortable.”

Althea, horrified, imagined what that meant.

“Anyway,” the nurse added without looking at her, “no one’s going anywhere.”

“You don’t understand.”

The nurse shrugged and looked at her with cold eyes. “If someone doesn’t understand, it’s you.” And she left.

The throbbing pain in her head erased all thoughts for a while, but Althea didn’t have the strength or courage to face the nurse and ask for a pain reliever.

Soon, the doctor, a tall black man in a white lab coat, walked in. In his footsteps walked an elegantly dressed round woman in her sixties. The woman was as short as the doctor was tall, as pale as he was dark. She wore an expensively cut gray suit that didn’t belong in a hospital room. Both the doctor and the lady had matching expressions of unhurried kindness. The doctor took her pulse and spoke with a hint of an African accent. “How are you feeling?”

“I have a very bad headache,” Althea whimpered, and saying those words she nearly burst into tears. The doctor called the nurse on the intercom and asked her to add something to Althea’s IV. The nurse entered, syringe in hand, and her face lit up when she saw the older woman. The two spoke in French about grandchildren while the doctor continued to examine Althea, pausing every so often to take notes. Althea’s head throbbed. The nurse emptied the content of the syringe into the IV bag and left the room. The doctor scribbled in a file and the round little woman dragged a chair next to Althea. “Hello, my child. My name is Madame Defloret.” She added the obvious, “I speak English.”

“Good,” Althea whispered. She was glad it was her turn to get this stranger’s attention. The nasty nurse had seemed delighted to speak to her.

The lady took Althea’s hand. “I’ll tell you what is going on, and what we suggest you do about it, and you decide if you agree to it.” Madame Defloret’s voice seemed to turn liquid. Althea felt a release of every muscle in her body. “I’m ready to go. I’m feeling just fine. I’m so sorry I...”

“You’ve been diagnosed with an acute case of Anorexia Nervosa. Are you familiar at all with what this illness signifies?”

Althea felt the distant alarm in her brain. She was in dangerous territory, but her headache was melting away, and she could only notice the wellbeing. She did not answer.

“It is a very real illness that requires treatment,” Madame Defloret continued without letting go of Althea’s hand. “For too many it is a deadly illness. Only it is considered by many as a mental illness. Have you been diagnosed or treated in the past? Are you receiving treatment now?”

Althea turned her face away. Mental illness? What the woman said did not matter, but the kindness of her tone made Althea’s throat tighten.

“Have you, my child?” Madame Defloret insisted. “Have you been diagnosed or treated, ever? In America maybe?”

“No...no, never. I’m all right, really. I think I can go home.”

“As far as this hospital is concerned, it would be assuming too much of a risk to let you go until you are better.”

“I feel better,” Althea answered, and she did feel wonderfully relaxed at the moment.

Madame Defloret looked straight at her. “You need to listen to this, Althea. This is a serious matter. You might not be able to assess things accurately. Your body is completely run down by this, and most likely there was a grave toll on your emotional welfare as well. In my experience, even with the best of intentions and family support, you won’t be able to overcome this on your own.”

Althea blinked, her eyes wanted to close. “On my own,” she echoed.

“I work for the eating disorder department at Sainte-Anne Hospital. We have a wonderful service that deals specifically with your kind of problem. We don’t always have spaces available, but I have a spot for you.”

Althea looked incredulously at Madame Defloret. She couldn’t think of anything to say.

“Do you have any questions, dear?”

Althea’s words and thoughts struggled to come out “How...do you know...for sure I have a mental...anorexia?”

“Honey, you weigh ninety pounds and measure five-foot-seven. The ratio alone is a real indication of malnutrition. When was the last time you had your period?”

“I don’t remember.”

“I’m here to help. Do you want to be helped?”

Tears swelled up in Althea from way down in her throat. “I don’t think you can help me.”

“Oh,” Madame Defloret said with a smile, “I’ve helped young women such as yourself time and time again, even some whose lives were only hanging by a thread. I absolutely can help you. But you have to want to be helped. It will be hard work, but, dear, there is a light at the end of the tunnel.”

Althea could no longer think or speak. She only found the strength to say, “Please, yes.”

“Here is the paper you need to sign.” She placed a pen in Althea’s hand and Althea watched her hand sign on the line. In the far distance, she heard a voice. “She’s in. Let’s have her transported to Saint-Anne right away. Lucky girl.” And a moment later, Althea surrendered to sleep.



Leaning against the school gate, Lucas rubbed his chin, surprised to find it rough with beard. He had not showered, brushed his teeth or shaved since the morning before and was still wearing the same clothes. Why, he practically looked like a transient. Now that Jared’s life was no longer in danger, Lucas had returned to worrying about Annie, or Annie as she pertained to him. The last playful words exchanged as she was running out of the hospital and back home to assist Lola had only reassured him briefly. He replayed the evening and the night in his mind, going from smiling to himself to feeling despondent. And now, why was he at the children’s school taking part in the charade between Lola and her husband? Maybe he should be at the house instead to make sure things were safe. Even if Lola’s husband wasn’t violent, Annie was just as likely to escalate a confrontation.

The children came out, cutely dressed in school clothes and wearing backpacks. But the warm welcome he had expected did not happen. The children weren’t delighted to find him standing outside the school gate. Maxence looked at him accusatorily. “Why are you here?”

“Your mothers,” Lucas started and then cleared his throat, “are visiting Jared and Althea at the hospital.”

Maxence looked dubious. “I thought it was just Jared.”

“What’s wrong with them?” Paul said.

“It’s a complicated question and--”

“Did he shoot her?” said Laurent.

The children asked and asked, he noticed, but seldom waited for an answer. “Nothing of such a dramatic nature, I’m afraid.”

“Are they dead, though?” Paul wanted to know.

Laurent pushed him. “If they were dead, they’d be at the cemetery, not the hospital you turd-head.”

“Are they bleeding at least?” Paul asked.

Lia trailed behind. “Where are we going?”

“We’re picking up your baby brother and then to the...”

“When’s Mom coming back?”

“...park,” Lucas continued, wondering about his blood pressure.

Maxence raised an eyebrow, “Oh yeah? Why not the house?”

Lucas had figured out a long time ago that the boy was exceptionally sharp. “That would be because...”

Paul interrupted. “Which park?”

Laurent made an awful face and held his throat. “I’m thirsty.”

Lucas strained to continue, “...they forgot to give me the key.”

“Whatever happened to your own key?” Maxence said.

“I...misplaced it.”

“Well, that sure is bad luck!” Maxence exclaimed, not buying it for an instant. Before he asked another one of those disagreeably inquisitive questions, Lucas took Maxence aside. This was the best thing to do, the only thing to do.

“Lia’s father has come, quite unexpectedly I’m afraid, and there needs to be some grown-up discussion before...”

Maxence nodded knowingly. “We’re in hiding then?”

“Well... we... but... In a way...”

Maxence patted Lucas on the arm. “Don’t worry, man. I’ll cover for you.”

The group walked gingerly to Simon’s daycare and Lucas decided that his fear had been just plain silly. At the daycare, Simon was busy at work with Legos and did not want to leave. Finally he got up from the rug and followed them. But as soon as they were outside, Simon stalled.

“What is it now, small one?” Lucas asked him.

Lia shrugged. “He hates to walk.”

“You could just carry him,” Laurent instructed. Lucas lifted Simon up onto his shoulders. The child was light but strangled him with his powerful little arms.

There were too many of them, so a taxi was out of the question. Strong from his morning experience, Lucas decided he would take the children on the métro. He was a bit miffed when the kids casually took passes from their pockets and entered the station as easily as he would have entered Fauchon. Lucas studied the map and came up with an itinerary. They would have to change trains three times, but to get to Buttes Chaumont would present the advantage of being near the park and steps away from his apartment. They rode the métro from La Muette to Buttes Chaumont. At each métro change, Lucas lifted Simon onto his shoulders and huffed and puffed to the next train, the children complaining of thirst, heat and hunger the entire time.

When they finally got out of the métro, Laurent said, “How come we didn’t take the métro at Passy? We would have had to change only once.” Lucas planted his gaze on the child and wondered if he should put his own understanding of the world into question. As they climbed up the steps out of the subway and toward the street, he nudged Simon. “Come on, little one. You can walk. I’ve seen you do it plenty of times.”

“Mamma,” Simon began wailing.

“How does your mother do this?” he asked Lia. “This gigantic baby must weigh over fifteen kilos!”

“Mom?” Lia said. “She doesn’t carry him like that.”

“She takes the stroller,” Paul added.

“What stroller?” Lucas heard himself wail. “Where is it?”

“At the daycare,” Laurent answered.

Lucas wailed, “Should you not have told me about the stroller?”

Lia just shrugged as if to say, “What is the problem with you?”

At the park, Lucas was desperate to rest on a bench, but the children saw the ice cream vendor. From there on, things worsened. Lucas purchased five ice creams, but by the time the last child was served, the other four were a mess. The ice cream melted faster than they could eat it, and already their clothes and faces were smeared in horrible ways. Lucas made a silent prayer that Annie would call him and that he would not have to bring them up to his apartment. The playground was shaded and Lucas moaned with relief when he finally sat on the bench.

“All right now. You can play,” he said and waved in the direction of the jungle gym.

Lia planted herself in front of him.

“I need to pee.”

The bathroom was within eye distance. He pointed to it.

“Mom takes me into public bathrooms,” Lia told him, making a face.

Indeed, the toilets of public parks had to be squalid, and what about the strange people that might be lurking around. But how could he take one child to the toilet and leave the other four unsupervised. The boys were busy amusing themselves with fighting other children on the playground. They called it play, but it was more like war. Youngsters could be remarkably aggressive, Lucas noticed, but he also noticed with contentment, and maybe a hint of pride, how his children formed a tight little clan against the others.

Lucas turned to a mother on a nearby bench who had heaven knew how many children of her own. “Would you mind keeping an eye on those boys there?” He pointed to Lia. “This little lady needs to use the restroom.”

He stood with great discomfort at the door of the girl’s bathroom. “The lock is broken,” he apologized to the mother and daughter waiting in line behind him.

Lia’s voice came out of the stall. “There is no paaa-per! Can you hand me a Kleenex?”

“Dear,” Lucas whispered, “I do not carry such things.”

The woman behind him laughed and produced Kleenexes from her purse as though she were some kind of genius. Lucas thanked her as graciously as he could, considering he felt like clubbing her over the head. But already, on the playground, the woman allegedly supervising his children was yelling at Paul for hitting one of her brats with a plastic shovel.

It was getting late. Annie had not called him and he knew better than to call her. How he was ready to bring the children back to their house. To hell with keeping them! But the thought of taking the métro again was more than he could bear. Of course his own apartment was five minutes away, but the thought of five children with shoes filled with sand and hands sticky with ice cream residue all over his Persian rugs made him shudder.

The children, sensing his weakness, began making demands.

“We’re hungry!”

“You just had ice cream.”

Laurent shrugged. “Ice cream doesn’t fill you up.”

“It’s just sugar. Empty calories,” Lia added.

“Empty?” Lucas echoed.

“I have an idea. You go get the food,” Maxence suggested. “We’ll stay here and play.”

“I regret, but this will not be possible.”

Laurent pointed an ice cream smeared finger toward a yellow arch Lucas had never noticed in the past. “McDonald’s is right there,” he said.

“Me want chicken nuggets,” Simon blurted out, followed by frantic orders from every kid:

“I want a Whooper.”

“They don’t do Whoppers dumbass.”

“Can I have a toy with my happy meal?”

Lucas stopped them by raising both palms. “Let me make something clear,” he said, “I refuse to set a foot in that horrible place.”

“You never had MacDo?” Maxence was flabbergasted.

“Never have, never will. Not only is it rubbish, but it is the symbol of American imperialism.”

“What?”

“France is the world’s capital of gastronomy, so why ingest the worst that the world has to offer?”

“How do you know you don’t like it if you’ve never had it?

“You’re like Sam I Am.”

The children explained that it was an American joke about eating green eggs.

“But it’s sooo good.”

“But we’re really, really hungry.”

Lucas discovered he was walking on the edge of the razorblade too late. “No McDonald’s! Never!” He yelled.

The playground turned silent. Birds stopped chirping, dogs quit barking, and mothers and children froze. Everyone was staring at him as though he were a child abuser. Lucas hurried the children out of the playground. He felt quite famished himself. With the circus at the hospital, he’d had neither the time nor the enthusiasm for breakfast or lunch. He, too, needed to go to the bathroom but he could no longer ask those hostile mothers for favors. He resigned himself to bringing everyone to his apartment. He would make some pasta; maybe he had enough for a salad. He hoisted Simon on his shoulders, and now was also carrying Lia and Paul’s backpacks. He was fuming. The children could see he meant business and cooperated. But they all came to a stop in front of McDonald’s, jumping up and down, begging and claiming starvation. The fact was, he was starving. Really starving. He had not eaten a thing in nearly twenty-four hours.

The double cheeseburger with bacon turned out to be surprisingly tasty.