You Deserve Nothing - Alexander Maksik [14]
We’d stand in front of her mirror together trying on outfits, taking things off, putting things on, drinking our vodka and Cokes. It was her drink by the way. I only drank it because she’d decided that’s what we’d do. She’d tell me how pretty I was, how she envied my body. I’d tell her she was crazy, that I wished I had hers. The whole thing was such bullshit. But that’s your life then. Really that’s the most terrible thing about it.
Anyway, I know how attractive I am. I mean to what degree I’m attractive. I knew then too. I’m not spectacular and then in high school I was pretty much the same. I had a body that other people liked but it wasn’t the one I wanted. It wasn’t the one I thought was most appealing. I had nice breasts. That’s true. But they embarrassed me and I didn’t really want them then. I thought they weren’t subtle. They weren’t elegant. They weren’t Parisian enough. Even if my mother is French, and they’re basically just her breasts, they still didn’t look right to me.
Then there was Ariel in her long thin body telling me about how she wished she had my body. And what’s worse she was American. Both my parents are French and even if we spent all that time in New York, I was still French. I thought I should have looked it. And my mother thought the same thing. If you’ve never had a French mother you can’t understand what she expected of me when it came to my appearance, to style. To be fair, I should say a Parisian mother. A Parisian mother with money. And I’m not talking about my father’s money. I mean money. I mean that my mother was born and raised in Paris with money. In the seventh. She still wears the fucking chevalière.
She thought New York ruined me, made me American. Made me clunky, round, big. American. In all senses. The way I spoke English with an American accent, the way I spoke French with an American accent. She thought I did everything with an American accent.
Anyway, if Ariel wanted my big breasts it was true only because boys looked at me the way boys look at you when you have breasts like mine. She insisted that I wear tight low-cut tops when we went out. She said I was crazy to waste my body hiding it. I felt like an idiot at first but it wouldn’t be true to say that I didn’t like the attention. Still, without her I’d never have worn those clothes.
We’d go to Cab or VIP or a bar in the Latin quarter. Ariel preferred the clubs so we went there more often. The guys were older, better dressed, wealthier, more attractive, more European, there were fewer expats. They’d buy us drinks. Whatever we wanted. They wouldn’t leave us alone. Ariel loved it. I don’t know how many times I went back to her apartment by myself.
No one had any idea how old we were. There were men there as old as our fathers. But most of them were twenty-five, thirty. All she had to do was smile from our table. She was fearless. I’ll give her that. You’ve never seen someone so happy. To tell the truth she was dazzling those nights. Men were just drawn to her. Not that they didn’t talk to me. Of course. We were two young girls in a nightclub. But God they loved her and she would just light up. And the more they looked the more she’d glow. She wouldn’t talk to the boys our age. She just wasn’t interested. She said the weekends were for men. School was for boys.
Sometimes she came home when it was still dark. But just as often it was eight or nine the next morning. If her parents were around she’d call me to make sure they were asleep. Sometimes I’d distract her dad in the kitchen, ask for his help with something, so that she could get in without being noticed. I don’t think they’d have cared anyway. They were those kind of parents. Ariel liked to pretend they were watching over her, but we both knew that was bullshit.
The closest I ever felt to her was those mornings. We lay in bed and I listened to her stories. She told me about the guy’s apartment, his car, how