She roared away, her heart thumping – partly because of her recent proximity to the barrel of a gun; partly because she was beginning to realise that two years of evening classes may have made her on point when it came to writing things down, but speaking and pronouncing things correctly, remembering words in the moment, was going to be more of a challenge than she’d thought.
Half a kilometre on, she saw a small sign bearing the name ‘Faux la Montagne’. Sighing with relief, she rounded the corner and drove slowly past small stone houses that increased in number as she moved towards what must be the centre. About a hundred metres along, the road opened into a tiny square with a fountain at its heart, and the smallest church she’d ever seen on the right-hand side. Just ahead, a sign pointed to ‘Chambre d’Hotes’, and then suddenly she was there, parked in front of La Petite Maison.
Back in comparative civilisation, she began to relax. The village was charming, each house with its individual shutters – some wooden, some coloured pink, white or blue. There was a tiny boulangerie close to the fountain, and slightly down the road she could see the purple signage of a café. In the distance, she spotted a couple walking a dog on a long lead. ‘Maybe there is life on this planet after all,’ she whispered to the Nissan before climbing out and walking to the front door of the B. & B.
She’d chosen this particular accommodation because of its French rural charm – or at least what had appeared charming from the photograph on hotels.com – and its proximity to Broussas, which was just five kilometres away. And she wasn’t disappointed. The building was narrow, but three storeys high, with windows in the attic flung open to let in fresh air. The door was adorned with hanging baskets and each window had its own little row of flowerpots. It was, in short, exactly the sort of accommodation she wanted to create herself – welcoming, charming, beautiful, well cared for and unapologetically French. She put her journey out of her mind, banished thoughts of rushing home to Ben and Ty, and resolved that she’d really make a go of things. ‘C’est un nouveau départ’ – a new beginning.
Lifting her hand, she rang the doorbell, and almost immediately heard the clip of heels against tiles. A tall, slender woman dressed in mustard-coloured linen trousers and a black halter-neck T-shirt answered the door. Her hair was black and tucked neatly behind her ears, her eyes were carefully made up. A cigarette dangled from the corner of her mouth. On Lily, a fag end stuck to the top lip would have looked slovenly. But somehow, on this woman it looked impossibly chic. Perhaps, Lily thought for a fleeting moment, she ought to take up smoking too.
‘Bonjour,’ the woman said, after taking the cigarette out and blowing the smoke upwards, politely keeping it away from her guest.
‘Bonjour, je m’appelle Lily,’ she began. ‘J’ai une chambre ici?’
‘You can speak English if you want,’ the woman interrupted, her eyes twinkling with amusement.
‘Oh, thank you. I am learning French,’ she said, apologetically.
‘It’s fine. I am afraid I don’t speak English very well,’ the woman said. ‘You will have to excuse me.’
‘It’s great. I mean, you’re speaking perfectly.’
An amused shrug. ‘You are Madame Butterworth?’
‘Yes – but call me Lily, please.’
‘OK, Lily. Enchanté. I am Chloé.’
‘Nice to meet you.’
‘Do you want any ’elp with your bags?’
‘No, I’m fine,’ Lily said. ‘I’ll just bring in one for now.’ She walked to the back of the car, popped the boot and extracted the wheeled case, lifting it by the handle, and climbed up the four stone steps to the front door. Chloé moved back slightly, gesturing her inside. As Lily walked past, Chloé dropped her half-smoked cigarette and ground it under her kitten heel on the stone step.
‘Sorry,’ she said. ‘I should quit thees shit.’ She smiled and gave yet another shrug, indicating that she actually had no intention of doing so. Lily had never realised shoulders could be so expressive.
‘It’s fine,’ Lily replied.
‘I will give you le tour,’ Chloé said, moving past her with a waft of perfume and cigarette smoke, her linen trousers and fitted top perfectly accentuating her tall, elegant frame. Lily, feeling tatty in comparison in her skinny jeans and hoodie, trotted after her, already planning the type of outfit she might change into as soon as she’d had a shower and settled in.
She followed Chloé up polished mahogany stairs to the second floor, where her host opened a door with ‘La Chambre Bleue’ painted on it in delicate script. ‘This is yours,’ she said, nodding towards the interior.
Inside, the room was indeed extremely blue. The bedding was embroidered with blue silk flowers, the rug on the floor was faded – possibly antique – and patterned with violets and bluebells. The shutters were open and the window half cracked, so a small breeze entered – enough to move the shimmering voiles at the window. Above the four-poster bed was a small decorative chandelier, its glass sprinkling jewelled, rainbow lights across the bed and onto a little dressing table.
‘Oh wow,’ said Lily. ‘This is beautiful.’
A shrug. ‘It eez OK.’
‘I love the whole shabby chic look!’
‘I am sorry, the… what?’
‘The shabby chic, you know – faded grandeur, upcycled antiques. You must have worked hard on this,’ she said, hoping that Chloé might be able to point her in the direction of a decent chalk-paint stockist.
‘Non, this was my grandmother’s,’ said Chloé shaking her head. ‘The furniture has been here since one hundred years. I have done nothing.’
‘Oh.’ Lily nodded, chastened. ‘Sorry.’
‘De rien,’ Chloé said, ‘It does not matter.’
‘Well, thank you. It’s gorgeous.’
‘Oui, I think so too,’ Chloé said with a smile. ‘The whole house is – as you say – beautiful. I am lucky. My grandmother passed it to me from ten years.’
Lily nodded, wishing she had the confidence to accept a compliment like Chloé, whether about her house or her taste or her shoes, without arguing against it, or saying something like: What? This old thing?
‘You would like a coffee?’
‘Oh, yes please.’
‘I will make. Come down since five minutes.’
‘I will, thank you.’
The minute Chloé closed the door and Lily heard her footsteps clip down the wooden stairs, she flung herself on the bed and sank into its feathered eiderdown. She gazed at the window, through which, from her vantage point, she could see a light blue sky, sprinkled with small, unthreatening clouds and just the very tops of buildings and trees.
If someone as beautiful and glamorous as Chloé could run a business here and make it work and be – or at least appear to be – happy and confident, then so could she. She imagined herself wearing crisp linen and elegantly cut clothes, changing up her trainers for heels. Perhaps getting her slightly messy hair cut into more of a chic bob. And lipstick – she should be ditching the dusky pinks she favoured for something vibrant, confident and red.
She stood up and looked in the mirror. Her black hoodie hung off her, shapelessly. Her jeans clung to her thighs in all the wrong places. She rummaged through her suitcase and pulled out a clean top, which brought with it several other items. Some knickers that had seen better days, a diary and a little photo album she’d grabbed at the last minute from her bedside drawer.
She picked the album up, tempted to open it, but knew it wasn’t the right time. Seeing pictures of Ty and Ben, of the three of them as a family, might tip her over the edge. She’d wait until she was feeling stronger.
Plus, she told herself, it wasn’t as if she wouldn’t see them again. Ty was definitely going to come over, and she still had to believe that Ben might come around.
She slipped into the top then dumped here hoodie on the bed before thinking better of it and hanging it neatly over the back of the dressing table chair.
She found a brush and ran it through her hair, tucking it a little behind her ears. Then, reaching into her washbag she pulled out her duty-free purchase – amused to remember that the perfume she’d chosen was presciently a ‘Chloé’ one. Her mascara was smudged, so she wet a finger and ran it under each eye. It would have to do for now. ‘This,’ she said to her reflection in the mirror, ‘is the start of a whole new chapter.’
Then, smiling, she turned and tucked her case under the bed, pulled the eiderdown back into its original position and left the room, trotting down towards the dining room and the smell of freshly ground coffee.
8
‘So, what’s the house like?’ Emily asked.
Lily pressed the phone to her ear, turned slightly, her head comfortably cradled by the feather pillow, and looked around the charming room again.
‘Oh, Em, the B. & B. is lovely – and you should see Chloé, the owner. She’s about our age, but she’s so glamorous, so… so French.’
‘Are you saying I’m not glamorous?’