Without Reservations_ The Travels of an Independent Woman - Alice Steinbach [9]
A waiter appeared with my omelette and salad. “Bon appétit,” he said, placing my meal on the small round table. He reminded me of someone. Belmondo? No. Louis Jourdan? No. I studied his face, a very Gallic one; a little gaunt but handsome in a bony way. It crossed my mind to flirt with him. This was Paris, after all, where women of a certain age were thought quite desirable. But before I could act on my thoughts, the waiter moved to the next table.
After polishing off the salad, omelette, and a bowl of vanilla ice cream, I ordered a café noir. Then I settled into one of the great pleasures of café-sitting: surveying the scene. At the next table, a young, shy-looking couple spoke softly in Japanese, trying not to call attention to themselves. Across the way, a darkly handsome man dressed in black sat sketching in a large notebook.
Outside on the terrace, catching the last bit of sun, were the deeply tanned Italians: beautiful women wearing gold jewelry, and sculpted, model-perfect men in Armani suits. And then, of course, there were the Americans—either overdressed or underdressed but always friendly—and the French, who ruled the Flore, rightfully so, and were elegant no matter their attire.
I sat sipping my second café, imagining the time when Sartre and Simone de Beauvoir practically lived at the Flore: writing, eating, and even seeing people by appointment there. It was not difficult to imagine. I could imagine doing it myself. Of course, at that moment, I could see myself doing just about anything, including ringing up friends to set up appointments: “Bonjour, mon ami, it’s Alice. Look, I’ll be at the Flore most of the afternoon and I’ve decided to have some friends over. Why don’t you come by sometime after one? Dress casual. See you then.”
At about eight I noticed a subtle change in the light. As the sun moved lower in the western skies, it washed the ancient Paris buildings with pale-pink patterns. The faces of those gathered at the Flore were tinted rosy by the softening light; everyone looked years younger. By now my eyes were growing heavy from jet lag. It was bedtime for me.
As I strolled back to the hotel, I stopped to watch a young couple near the tiny, romantic place Furstemberg. From a radio they’d set on the ground, the voice of Frank Sinatra rose like smoke, filling the air with words about a small hotel and the longing of lovers to be there together. I watched as they began to dance slowly to the music, arms wrapped around each other. The square was deserted except for the young dancers beneath the fragrant paulownia trees. Of course, even had the square been bursting with tourists, the dancers would not have noticed; they existed only for one another.
I knew that feeling. As I stood in the shadows, it all came back: the feel of Dick Reavey’s arms around me at the high school prom, swaying to the last slow dance of the night, the swish of my silk dress, the sharp edge of his white collar against my face. Swaying back and forth to the music, our cheeks touching, inhaling the scent of his aftershave, nothing else existed. Time stopped, and we hung there, dancing, not looking back, not looking forward. After the music ended, we’d walk off the dance floor hand in hand, dazed with longing. Some part of me still felt I would never feel that alive again.
Does anyone ever forget such moments? I wondered, watching the two dancers in the place Furstemberg. What if more of life could be like that? Like the last slow dance, where, to echo T. S. Eliot, a lifetime burns in every moment.
By 8:30 I was back at the hotel. The bed had been turned down and there were fresh flowers in the room, a bouquet sent by a friend living in Paris. The food had revived me, so I decided to try one of Françoise’s miracle beauty products. But which one? The mask, I thought, the one that Françoise promised would “tighten the skin and circulate the blood.”
With the bathroom window open,