‘Yes, are you living here?’
‘Oh, I see.’ I bite my top lip. ‘My needs.’
‘Yes. Your knees. Was it wrong? My English is …’ He puts out a hand and tilts it from side to side.
‘No. It’s fine. My needs. It’s complicated. I was supposed to be living here and now, well … I’m staying, just for a bit.’ I have no idea what my plans are. ‘Until I know where I’m moving on to.’
‘So you are here to invade us!’ He smiles widely, and I’m wrong-footed.
‘What? To invade?’ I repeat and he nods. ‘No, I was here to live, but now, I’m just staying for a bit, then going back. Definitely not invading!’
He looks confused. ‘Sorry, my English, it’s not quite …’ He tips his head from side to side and the smile returns to his face, as it does to mine. ‘I mean you are here to live with us.’
‘Well, I’m just staying … for a bit,’ I repeat. I wonder how the locals must feel about so many British people moving here. Do they feel we’re invading their towns and villages? Do they resent us coming?
Fabien doesn’t seem to resent my being here. But then I remember Ollie and me drinking gin and tonic with the other expats in the ‘pub’, barely speaking French. I wouldn’t blame him, or anyone else in the town, if he did.
He claps his hands together. ‘You are staying here so we need to make you as comfortable as possible,’ he says, with that killer smile. ‘Enough to make you content.’
Comfortable and content would be perfect right now. I can’t help but think the people of the town must be laughing at the likes of me and Ollie. Another British couple moving here for the good life, wanting to make a Little Britain beyond the Channel, then packing up and moving back when it all goes wrong. I sigh. I barely speak French. I’d had no idea how I was going to work or where. I can see why people like Fabien might laugh at us. Although, thankfully, he doesn’t seem to be. In fact, he’s being charming, welcoming and nothing but helpful.
I follow him into the cool warehouse. For the next hour or so, we walk, keeping our conversation to what I’ll need for a few days’ stay. He grabs suitable pieces and arranges them by the back door to deliver to Le Petit Mas de la Lavande later that afternoon. I think a mattress will do me for a few days, but he insists I need a bed and finds me a big wooden one, with carved acorns on the posts, tells me it’s been here for ages and he can offer me a very good price. He sorts out a mattress, and I wonder what on earth I’m going to do with them when I leave the following weekend. But, right now, the thought of sleeping on a proper bed, with a thick mattress, is worth every euro. And it’s still cheaper than a hotel. I take the chair because I like the idea of having a little project to do while I work out where to go next. Fabien insists on four plates and beautiful cutlery, ‘because eating correctly is important for the stomach and well-being’. I take some pans from a random box of cooking utensils, which he adds to the pile, with my bundle of bedding. He doesn’t ask any more questions about why I’m here on my own, needing ‘everything’, or why I’m staying just for a bit.
We pass a clothes rail. He picks out a wrap-around dress in a cherry print and holds it against me.
‘Oh, I’m not sure I should,’ I say, as, with his other hand, he pulls out a kimono top, unlike anything I’ve ever worn before.
Suddenly a wave of guilt washes over me. I’m not in this warehouse to enjoy myself, just to buy practical necessities. Enough to make you content … I hear Fabien’s words as I look at the dress and the top. I have barely any clothes with me, and the ones I have are for rainy British weather …
Next weekend I plan to give the key to the estate agent. I have until then to work out who I am and where I’m going. I can be whoever I want to be. Go where I like. I look at the dress and smile at Fabien so he adds it to the pile with a nod of agreement; it’s a good choice.
‘Parfait,’ he says, and holds up another dress, then a silk dressing-gown – ‘For the mornings,’ he says. I’m blushing a little but I take the gorgeous dressing-gown and he smiles.
Hastily, I tell him I’m done. I have everything I need. I slip the leather-bound recipe book on to the pile. I stare at the bed, the chair – and the small round table, with folding chairs, that Fabien insisted I’d need. I’ll leave them in the house when I go so it’s dressed for any buyers wanting to view it. It may help to get a sale. He adds up the prices of the items, then deducts some because I’m such a good customer. All of it costs less than the settee Ollie ordered when we moved in.
Quickly, I pull out my purse and my bank card in case he changes his mind about the discount. For someone who feels we’re here to invade, he’s been very generous.
‘Oh.’ He looks at the card. ‘I’m sorry. My machine … en panne. Broken. Can you pay cash? I can knock a bit more off if that helps.’
‘No, it’s fine!’ I say. At this rate he’ll be paying me to take it away. ‘I’ll just go to the cashpoint.’ I point to the bank. ‘I’ll be back.’ I hurry out into the brilliant sunlight.
I think about Ollie and me as I go, realizing how we stood out in the town. We didn’t try to integrate, just arrived and hoped life would be as it was in the UK. I think about Fabien holding the dress against me and wonder if it’s obvious that I’m single now. Am I going to be wary of every man I meet, now I’m no longer somebody’s other half? I feel as if I have a sign over my head: ‘Newly Single Female’. The last thing I want is another partner. I just want to be me. Not a wife, a woman who couldn’t have children or who’s just lost her mother. I’m just not sure who me is.
I cross the road to the cashpoint and stand in the bank’s shade, enjoying the cool and letting the reality of my situation sink in once more. I have somewhere to sleep tonight, and eat. As horrid as it was splitting from Ollie, it’s over. We can both get on with our lives now. We need to find new paths away from each other. I have everything I need for the time being. Enough to be content.
I put my card into the machine and type in my PIN. The machine whirs and whirs and then the card slowly disappears inside it. I fumble for it but it’s gone. I try to read the screen but the message vanishes before I can. The bank has shut for lunch, and I hear Ollie’s voice in my head: ‘What kind of country stops for lunch?’ But my card is gone.
FIVE
I feel like I’ve been left alone on an island: the last ferry has just sailed. I now have nothing. I rummage in my bag for my phone to call the bank in the UK. But even if they send me a new card, it’ll be days before it arrives. Then I see it: the envelope of cash from the sale of the sit-on lawnmower, which I was supposed to pay into the bank. It had been brand new when we moved here. I got a dog and Ollie got the lawnmower. Once we’d decided to leave, he’d pushed it down to the end of the drive and stuck an ‘À vendre’ sign on it. We sold it for half what we paid for it, a quick sale to a couple with a holiday home in a neighbouring village.
I breathe a sigh of relief. But this is all I have until I can get a new bank card. I need to make it last. I return to the brocante, this time with only half a smile. I put back the silk dressing-gown and the leather-bound book. And the beautiful vase I had planned to fill with flowers, and tell Fabien a white lie to hide my embarrassment at my new financial situation. I say I’ll come back for them when I can get out more cash.