We sat side by side at a small round table on the sidewalk of a café, facing those sand-colored buildings with their shallow wrought-iron balconies. We could see the gates of the park at the end of the street, their golden spikes, and the overflowing greenery behind. It was late afternoon, the hottest hour of the day, and the pale façades of the buildings reflected onto the pavement, trapping heat into a furnace beneath our feet. Anouk bathed in the sun, sleeveless, a straw hat on her head. I told her to cover her shoulders; they were turning pink.
She was an energetic talker, and I rarely had to prod her along in conversation. She was telling me about a play she was codirecting with a friend, who had less experience than she did. She knew the ins and outs of putting together a show, from writing the script to setting up the décor. Although she wasn’t all that organized in her private life, she was a skilled director onstage. These actors, however, were novices. Anouk swung her neck to the side, cracking it gently. I shuddered at the sound of her body—the machinery made visible for a moment. She explained how it was important for her to know their lines. She’d garner more respect if she could correct them, finish their sentences.
How old are the actors? I asked.
Not much older than you, she said. They’ve just finished school. As soon as it’s time to break for lunch they disappear for an hour. Imagine, a whole hour to eat a sandwich. Not one of them stays to rehearse. They lack your discipline.
I smiled at the compliment.
A few families walked by us on their way to the park. The street was otherwise quiet. I unwrapped the speculoos cookie that came with my coffee, and then thought better of eating it, not wanting to gain weight before the summer. Anouk hadn’t finished her citron pressé. The lemon pulp settled on its surface in a thick layer. She drank it with no sugar.
Midsentence, Anouk paused. She had suddenly turned pale.
What’s wrong? I asked.
Her gaze was fixed on a woman across the street who walked back and forth along the opposite sidewalk. She held a phone to her ear. Nothing about her was familiar; I couldn’t remember ever seeing her before. She was around my mother’s age, dressed in a beige jacket and matching skirt, pale stockings and black heels, but didn’t look like anyone Anouk would know. Her hair was short and elegantly coiffed, a dark brown color. She wore a delicate scarf with a floral pattern that moved in the air as she walked by. We could hear her melodious voice punctuated by small bursts of laughter, her heels clicking against the pavement.
Do you know her? I asked. Anouk shushed me and looked down at the table, as if bowing to hide her face. She then brusquely took a ten-euro bill from her wallet and threw it on the table. Did she want us to leave? She seemed to hesitate, staying put on the edge of her chair.
But you haven’t even finished your drink! I said, gesturing at her citron pressé, where condensation marked the table around the glass.
Anouk’s face usually expressed her emotional state in all its movements, her eyebrows sharpening like arrows, her mouth widening into oval shapes, her voice rising in volume. She derived energy from charging into a fire. She rarely stepped aside. And yet now she was immobile, her lips drawn shut, as though this action alone might contain her emotions. But what were they? Why had her body shut down so violently? She glanced up at the woman and seemed to flinch. My own skin prickled in response and I, too, recoiled from her.
Let’s go, she said, standing up. She looked at the woman one last time and swept up her bag. As I got up, I saw the woman turn the corner and vanish from sight.
We took a shortcut through the park. We walked quickly and in silence, circling the fountain and the few tourists who sat on its edge. My sandals and feet were soon covered in a thin layer of dust from the gravel. We paused only once we’d arrived at Place Edmond Rostand to wait for the light. I tried to recall the woman’s face. But all I could remember was her outfit, the jacket and square heels as she waved her hand in the air, and the electric effect she’d had on Anouk. Were it not for this, I would have found her banal, forgettable even, but now that I thought about it, she’d acted like an important person, taking up the width of the sidewalk with her phone conversation. A woman lifted from another world.
At home, Anouk told me that the woman we’d seen walking down the street by the café was Madame Lapierre, Father’s wife.
I’d known about Madame Lapierre for as long as I could remember, though I’d never seen her in the flesh. I hadn’t even seen an image of her. I knew she had two sons who were older than me, and I supposed I could call them my half brothers. I stayed away from the newspaper articles about Father. While his political career flourished, I pretended to have little interest in current events beyond the culture section. Anouk read the paper front to back when I wasn’t watching.
I immediately knew it was her, Anouk said, pacing around the living room in circles. Her voice grew thin, saying how she’d always thought their paths would coincide once we moved to this neighborhood; in some ways it was bound to happen and she had steeled herself for the possibility of an encounter, but wasn’t it strange how she’d instantly detected her presence, like a radar sensing a disturbance in the field? She knew my father’s favorite park was the Jardin du Luxembourg. It made sense that he shared the same tastes as his wife, who exhibited her Roger Vivier shoes for all to see.
She was wearing the same shoes that Catherine Deneuve wore in Belle de Jour.
I winced when I remembered that Anouk had just bought a pair of similar heels for a fraction of the price.
Do you think she recognized us? I asked.
She’d have no idea who we are.
I looked away. In that moment, I saw it clearly, as if I’d been jerked from a stupor. Unlike Madame Lapierre and her sons, who enjoyed a public life with him and could claim him, we were nobodies, invisibles. I felt a layer scraped from me, a part of me gone. The exposure was sudden, and I shivered even though it was warm in the apartment. There were no public images to connect us to Father. If Madame Lapierre walked by me in the street, she wouldn’t know who I was. I imagined her brushing past, wrapped in silk.
I had such a distinct image of him then in our home, seated on the leather couch with Anouk, standing by the sink drying dishes, turning the page of a newspaper at the dining room table. Just thinking about him triggered an intense familiarity. I was his only daughter and the youngest of his children. He was my father. But Madame Lapierre had shaken that image of him, like seeing a stranger in your home take possession of your belongings. We were, I realized, on the wrong side of Father’s double life. I glanced over at Anouk, who had at last stopped pacing.
Is she what you expected? I asked.
I didn’t have any expectations, she answered sharply and then disappeared into her room.
I stood in the kitchen alone, listening to our neighbors as they prepared dinner. So Father’s other life had penetrated ours, in the same way that the sounds of families in the building swept through our apartment. But ours had been reconfigured, the elements settling into different corners, and I felt disoriented as I walked to my bedroom and shut the door.