There was no message from Ben, although she could see from the blue tick next to her photo that he’d seen the picture she’d sent.
Dropping her phone on the mattress, she pulled on her jeans and a T-shirt, socks and shoes and walked down to the dusty kitchen. The box with some of her provisions was on the counter – packing it away into cupboards peppered with ancient mouse droppings had not seemed like a good idea – and she poured some cornflakes and milk into the cereal bowl she’d bought, which still had a stubborn label on the underside. Leaning against the counter and looking out at the ragged mess of the back garden – still somehow beautiful in the morning sunlight – she resolved that while today she’d crunch down this British breakfast on the go, by tomorrow she’d have located the boulangerie and would go all out on crusty pain, croissants and bitter black café.
Suddenly, some movement in the long grass caught her eye, perhaps a cat was stalking through the garden, or a large bird was flapping its wings amongst the stray branches? She put down her bowl and stood on tiptoe at the window, looking out, but could see nothing except the endless green overgrowth stretching away.
When the back door creaked, she let out an involuntary cry. Had she left it off the catch last night? She watched, frozen to the spot, as it continued to groan, praying it was a stray cat rather than a feral Frenchman intent on robbery. Not that there was anything to rob, she thought, desperately. Unless he had a particular penchant for cornflakes.
To her relief, in what seemed like minutes but was probably only seconds, the door opened enough for her to see the reason for the creaking. A small woman was standing there, holding what appeared to be a plastic bag.
‘Bonjour!’ said the woman, stepping past her as if walking into a stranger’s kitchen was completely normal.
‘Bonjour,’ Lily replied, desperately trying to find the words, Who the feck are you and what are you doing in my house? in French, but finding she was unable to locate them in her brain. Instead she went for an unsatisfying: ‘Comment vous appelez-vous?’ What are you called?
‘Bonjour,’ the woman said again, ‘je suis votre voisin, ’ermione.’
Her neighbour. Lily knew there was a woman living next door, but hadn’t glimpsed her so far. She tried desperately to think of something to say. ‘Ah! Une belle nom. Comme Harry Potter!’ she said, at last.
The woman looked confused. ‘C’est ’er-mion-e,’ she said slowly.
‘Oui, Hermione, you know – like from le Harry Potter?’ Lily said. ‘Oh, for heaven’s sake!’ she continued, doing her best Hermione impression. ‘Um… expellimarus! Um… J.K. Rowling…’ She trailed off.
The woman regarded her with a confused stare. ‘Je ne comprends pas, Madame,’ she said, sadly. Her hair was short and tousled and a big, army-green wax jacket enveloped a body that could have been any size under its enormous folds.
‘Désolé,’ said Lily, feeling like a complete idiot. ‘Je m’appelle Lily.’
The woman nodded; her face serious.
‘Je suis anglaise,’ Lily felt the need to add, with an apologetic grimace. I am English; sorry about that.
‘Oui, oui,’ the woman replied without smiling, stepping unceremoniously across her kitchen in wellies that were almost certainly covered with chicken poo. ‘J’ai un petit cadeau pour vous!’ She finally smiled, revealing a set of coffee-stained teeth. She held the plastic bag, bulging with something, up as proof.
‘A present?’ Lily said. ‘Oh, thank you!’
She watched as the woman rummaged in the bag, finally pulling out what appeared to be a glass bottle filled with cloudy urine. ‘Jus de pomme,’ the woman said, grinning and nodding enthusiastically.
‘Oh, lovely. Did you… is that yours?’ Lily said, holding up the too-brown liquid.
The woman looked at her in confusion and Lily felt embarrassed to have fallen into the all-too-British trap of assuming that everyone could understand your language if you spoke loudly and slowly enough. ‘Vous l’avez fait?’ she said. You made this?
The woman nodded, then returned to the plastic bag, this time producing something that looked at first glance like an old white rag, but actually – to Lily’s horror – turned out to be a chicken, fully feathered, muddy footed and completely and utterly lifeless. Its head hung limply to one side, eye open, regarding Lily with a fixed stare.
‘Pour le pot!’ Hermione said, brandishing it towards Lily’s face. The chicken dangled, silently, just inches from Lily’s nose. Hermione mimed putting it into a saucepan, then did a chef’s kiss on her fingers. ‘C’est délicieux.’
‘Oh, thank you… but I’m not sure…’ said Lily, resisting the urge to back away. ‘I mean, merci beaucoup, mais…’ She paused. What was she going to say? That she didn’t eat meat? Because that was absolutely not true. She could chow down a Sunday roast with the best of them, and never said no to a chicken korma.
What she objected to, it seemed, was having a dead, unplucked bird wobbling in her face. But why? Because it made her feel squeamish? Because she couldn’t bear to eat it because it actually looked like a living creature? She was so divorced from what she ate, all packed neatly into supermarket plastic, that when confronted with reality she felt complete revulsion. This chicken, God rest its tiny soul, had probably had a better life than half the shrink-wrapped organic chicken breasts she picked up from the chilled aisle. She looked deep into its eye, and couldn’t help but feel judged.
With few neighbours nearby, it was important to get off to a good start with this one. Her heart thundering, she gingerly took hold of the chicken’s soft, feathered neck. Hermione released her grip and the full weight of the bird swung in Lily’s hold. Trying not to gag, Lily laid it quickly on the kitchen counter. Almost unbearably it was still warm – her neighbour must have snapped its neck on the way over. ‘Merci, Madame.’ She smiled. ‘Vous êtes tres gentille.’ You’re very kind.
‘C’est vraiment frais!’ the woman said.
‘You can say that again.’
The woman stood and smiled at her for a moment.
‘Um, voulez-vous un café?’ Lily asked.
‘Non, merci,’ said her neighbour, still standing there.
‘Un thé peut-être?’ Maybe you want a tea?
‘Non.’ The woman abruptly turned to go. ‘? plus tard!’ See you later. She lifted her hand in a wave without looking round and disappeared back into the foliage.
‘OK, a… oui, à plus tard,’ Lily replied, feeling slightly sick. Hopefully the woman wasn’t going to come over for dinner and help her polish off the poor chicken. She was quite willing to accept that when it came to meat eating she was a hypocrite, but admitting you had a problem and actually plucking a chicken were two very different things.
Just as she was wondering whether she could get away with sweeping the bird into a bin bag and depositing it in the street-side bin without being spotted and causing terrible offence, there was a knock at the front door.
Tentatively, hoping it wouldn’t be yet another neighbour waving a dead animal or a jar of pee in her face, she moved forward to open it.
Outside, she was greeted by the smiling face of Chloé, who stood – miraculously immaculate in a white trouser suit and red scarf, despite having somehow negotiated the weed-infested path – with a gift bag.
‘Bonjour,’ said her former host, holding the bag. ‘Félicitations!’
‘Merci beaucoup,’ Lily said, her face breaking into a genuine smile at seeing someone familiar. ‘Come in.’
‘Thank you,’ Chloé said, stepping into the hallway, her eyes scanning the dusty floor, faded wallpaper and hanging wires. ‘I cannot stay, but I want to bring you thees gift, for your moving in – ’ow you say, ’ouse ’eating, yes?’
Lily didn’t correct her, partly because she would have felt like a hypocrite – Chloé’s English put her French to shame – but also because she quite enjoyed the little nuances and mispronunciations Chloé came out with. Plus, she loved the idea of calling it a house heating rather than housewarming. Especially as this particular house didn’t seem to have any decent heating at all.
Chloé held out the gift bag that contained the unmistakable weight of a bottle of wine. Now this was more like it. ‘Merci!’ Lily said, accepting the bag and walking through to the kitchen to put it on the dresser.
‘C’est votre poulet?’ asked Chloé, noticing the dead bird on the side and looking completely unfazed. ‘It’s yours?’
‘My voisin, my neighbour gave it to me. Un cadeau,’ Lily replied, unable to disguise the slight turn up of her lip.
Chloé laughed. ‘Quel est le problème? You are not végétarienne?’