Young and Revolting: The Continental Journals of Nick Twisp (9 page)

I sipped my coffee and turned scarlet as compliment after compliment was showered upon me—all translated by Mr. Hamilton.

The lobby had never been so clean. Such neatness in arranging the trash cans. My wife was quite the beauty. And so young! I was so helpful to poor Mademoiselle Vesely. Not to mention little Maurice. My shoes looked very comfortable. And doubtless were well made. My struggles with French were so endearing. And on and on and on. Quite the boost to a guy’s flagging self-esteem, even if the source of my popularity remained obscure.

Then it occurred to me that sitting around this dim room month after month, year after year, sewing their fingers to the bone, these ladies must run short of conversational topics. So lately a new subject has diverted them: the young American janitor. Jesus, they probably know all about my date with Reina. And have already debated whether in fact I have the hots for Babette. Apparently, to the wig- makers of this quarter my life was an open book.

Giggling, the matronly coffee server made a remark, which everyone boisterously seconded. Mr. Hamilton translated: “Rick, before you go back to work, they want a kiss.”

No time to bolt for the door. I was grabbed, pressed enthusiastically to corseted bosoms, and showered with kisses. In his nearly 15 years on the planet Nick Twisp had never been so popular. And who says the French are reserved?

1:30 p.m. I was opening a tuna can for lunch when My Love stormed in with a newspaper. She thrust the copy of
Libèration
in my face and pointed to a small box at the bottom of page one.

“
Read that!” she demanded.

“
Sorry, darling. I have not spontaneously acquired the ability to read French.”

Sheeni was obliged to translate. The headline read: “A ghost in Montparnasse?” It seems that visitors to the Cimetière du Montparnasse in recent days have reported witnessing a young man who resembles Jean-Paul Belmondo lurking in the vicinity of the grave of Jean Seberg.

“
Who the hell is Jean Seberg?” I asked.

“
Don’t play dumb, Nickie. You know Jean Seberg was

Belmondo’s romantic co-star in A bout de souffle.”

“
Sorry. Never heard of the chick. Or seen the movie. She’s buried there, I take it?”

“
Yes, of course. Hounded to an early grave by the FBI for her association with the Black Panthers. Nickie, we’re supposed to be keeping a low profile here!”

“
Well, pardon me for living. I assumed the graveyard was a safe place to hang out. Any mention of Maurice?”

“
Yes. Witnesses have reported the man is accompanied by a small dog in a trench coat, which may symbolize the detectives who pursued Belmondo throughout the film.”

Leave it to the French to over-intellectualize impish Maurice. I mixed the tuna salad and explained to my suspicious wife why I again reeked of someone else’s perfume.

4:12 p.m. As I was helping Reina carry down her birds, we encountered my lovely wife on the stairs. I made the mumbled introductions. Why is it when guys are introduced, they shake hands, say “hi,” and that’s that? But bring two attractive women together, and even a guy can sense that only about one percent of the subsequent human discourse is at the verbal level.

“
It’s so nice to meet you,” said Reina, “Your husband is such a dear to assist me.”

“
Yes,” replied Sheeni, smiling just as affably. “Rick . . . does have his uses at times.”

“
He’s very popular with everyone in the building,” added Reina. “But you particularly, I think. I like your perfume, Ms. Vesely.”

“
Call me Reina. You must give me the name of your coiffeuse. That cut is so flattering.”

“
Of course. Rick tells me you’ve trained your pets to do extraordinary things.”

“
Parrots are quite intelligent. They respond to love and patient guidance.”

“
A useful strategy in many endeavors, I should think,” smiled My Love. “We must come and see you perform.”

“
I’d love that,” agreed Reina.

“
Well, I won’t hold you two up,” said Sheeni. “I’m sure you have a busy agenda. Au revoir, Reina.”

“
Au revoir, Sheeni.”

Not bad. Call me a cockeyed optimist, but I think those two hit it off rather well.

6:45 p.m. Dynamic Mr. Bonnet just called. We are scheduled tomorrow for health exams at a hospital in Ménilmontant, wherever that is. Can it be that the French also require prenatal checkups for expectant fathers? Perhaps they’ll demand a post-conception sperm sample to probe for genetic anomalies. I think I prefer the old days when you just went at it like rabbits and took potluck on whatever came out.

JUNE

TUESDAY, June 1 — Sometime before dawn. My Love just poked me in the ribs.

“
Nickie, are you awake? I hear music.”

“
When you think of me?”

“
What?”

“
Sorry. Still asleep.” I listened. A nearby accordion was conjuring from the ether of memory the evanescent notes of “Time after Time.”

“
It’s an accordion, darling.”

“
I can tell that, Nickie. Who do you suppose it is?”

“
My guess is Señor Nunez. He often plays in the lonely hours of the night.”

“
You’ve heard him before?”

“
Many times.”

“
Why didn’t you waken me?”

“
You had not indicated a prior interest in late-night accordion recitals.”

“
It’s so sad . . . so beautiful.”

“
So romantic?”

It was. We went at it like rabbits. Then lay entwined, still joined in our own secretions, as the birds of Paris got it together to greet another dawn. My Love was contemplating perhaps the solitary accordionist; I was brooding over the rent that was due today.

2:15 p.m. I now have an official certificate, signed by a French- licensed physician, attesting to the soundness of my health. Unlike many of my papers, it is an entirely genuine document. Oddly, the curt Ménilmontant doctor seemed not to care one whit that we were expecting a new citizen of the Republique. He only inquired if I had been in an accident to have undergone such extensive facial reconstruction. I mentioned a mishap with a skateboard as he was thrusting a gloved finger where few except Dwayne Crampton had dared to venture. Not pleasant. If intercourse for women feels that intrusive, it’s no wonder they take such a jaundiced view of men. If I were a chick, I’m sure I’d be committed to thoroughly inhibited lesbianism.

4:30 p.m. No cemeteries and their controversial inhabitants for us today. Maurice and I took a long stroll to the Parc Montsouris, a pleasant hilly park with a lake, artificial waterfall, and winding paths leading to quaint grottos. Lots of apartment-sized dogs like Maurice attached to attractive females. One elegantly dressed woman who stopped to chat as heinies were sniffed was perhaps only slightly more beautiful than Fanny Ardant. I stood there suddenly incredulous that I could not respond in her own tongue. I feel I have a natural affinity for French. It’s just the vocabulary that is giving me trouble.

We got back in time to share a pre-bird-lugging lemon water with lovely Reina. She has been offered a position with a small but highly regarded circus touring the provinces this summer. I might not see her for months!

“
I love the life of the road,” she admitted. “And it would be a good test for my babies.”

“
I don’t know,” I said, skeptically. “Parrots are very territorial. They may not like being dragged around from town to town.”

“
But, Rick, many birds fly thousands of miles. They enjoy new places.”

As we were conversing in her odoriferous abode, I took a quick survey of my feelings—always well buried in Twisps. It was true: I longed to take her in my arms and kiss her delicious lips. Such censurable desires I could not even lay at the door of lusty François. They appeared to be coming straight from the heart.

5:52 p.m. Every one is abandoning me. When I returned from vigorous bird-hauling, I found a note from my absent wife. She has gone to the Musée d’Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris with Señor Nunez. I should not expect her home for dinner. Damn, I wish that woman would cultivate some female friends. Now I have to feel jealous of a dwarf.

10:10 p.m. No sign of my wayward spouse. I took the rent money down to Madame Ruzicka, who invited me in to watch TV with her and Henri. Tonight’s entertainment was an old movie starring Catherine Deneuve—with my hostess providing sporadic translations and commentary. Since bored newlywed Catherine couldn’t get it on with her handsome and respectable husband, she took a day job as a prostitute specializing in grotesquely repulsive clients. The worst was a degenerate with a mouthful of metal teeth. Maidenly Catherine really seemed to dig that dude. Very creepy and disturbing. Not a film designed to calm the anxieties of a fellow whose wife was out on the town with another man. Especially since the long-suffering husband wound up in a wheelchair—paralyzed for life!

WEDNESDAY, June 2 — My wife arrived home at 1:42 a.m.

Rather late, I thought, for a 15-year-old. Señor Nunez took me aside and apologized man-to-man for the lateness of their arrival. Although he was too polite to say so, I gathered that it was his companion who wished to remain out so late. Apparently, they had dinner at a noted restaurant on the place Saint-Germain-des- Prés and then went to a club on a barge on the Seine that caters to dwarves and midgets. Paris truly is a town with something for everyone.

While Sheeni was flossing her teeth, she casually let it drop that she had kissed her companion on the stairs.

“
Well,” I replied, keeping my cool, “I suppose that is an appropriate venue for kissing a dwarf in comfort.”

“
He’s quite an extraordinary man, Nickie. He’s lived an incredible life. Did you know he’s a marvelous flamenco dancer?”

That was an image I did not care to ponder in the middle of the night. I turned out the lights and we went to bed. For the first time since our wedding, I did not kiss the lips that kissed you know who.

10:12 a.m. Truly miserable morning. My parents, of course, often had it this bad, but somehow I had supposed my own marriage would be different. We ate our breakfast in sullen silence. Lately, I’ve noticed, Sheeni hasn’t been throwing up quite as much. I suppose that’s good news for our struggling zygote. I’m beginning to understand the source of domestic violence. Usually when I look at her I experience a surge of affection, but today I just wanted to smack her a good one. Hard to believe this alteration in feelings. Can’t write any more. Too anguished.

9:35 p.m. Talked to Connie. My father is in L.A. She’s met him. Very discouraged that her hopes now pinned on Lacey warming up again to such a “total creepy loser.” Expressed hope that balding George Twisp not as bad as his negative first impression. I said “don’t count on it.” One piece of good news: L.A. County in major budget crisis. Contemplating early release for some nonviolent petty criminals. Paul to be sprung soon from jail?

Connie not distressed by Sheeni dwarf-kissing. Deemed it an obvious power ploy. Said I must have been succeeding in appearing unavailable. Dismissed my fears that Sheeni on some kind of sick amatory down slope: from tall Trent Preston, to me, to dwarf. What will she be kissing next, I asked, a hamster? Connie sanguine. Said I should keep my cool and resist all impulses to get whiney or clingy.

Not the sort of impulse I’m worried about. Wife and Alphonse off somewhere in his Twingo. Wish now I hadn’t bought that big German knife.

THURSDAY, June 3 — Another conference with Mr. Bonnet in Belleville. Apparently, I have passed muster. The contract is almost ready for me to sign. Riding home on the Métro, Sheeni at last clued me in. They want me to appear in a music video. With those giggling schoolgirls!

“
Hey, I thought we were keeping a low profile?”

“
We are, Nickie. Don’t worry. The whole thing is merely a vanity enterprise. No one’s going to see it.”

“
What do you mean?”

“
Those three girls are Dutch. They have an act called De Drie Magdas—you know The Three Magdas. It seems they’re all named Magda and they sing some sort of tiresome novelty songs. So their star-struck parents, having more money than sense, have hired Monsieur Bonnet to produce a music video, for which they require a young Belmondo look-alike.”

“
But I can’t sing.”

“
Not a problem. The girls will do the singing.”

“
I don’t know, Sheeni . . .”

“
Nickie, this is a wonderful opportunity. Monsieur Bonnet and his lawyers can help us get a Carte de Sejour.”

“
What the hell is that?”

“
It’s a residency permit that would let us remain here legally.”

“
Why?” I demanded. “So you can go out with Alphonse and that genius Señor Nunez? Not to mention the Boccata brothers!”

“
You shouldn’t get so jealous, Nickie. I don’t object when you go out with Ms. Vesely. At least I don’t lie about where I’ve been.”

Remarkably well informed, as usual. I wondered if the wig-makers had ratted on me.

“
I never kissed her,” I volunteered.

“
Glad to hear it,” she said, taking my hand and giving it a squeeze. “Will you do the video, darling?”