least—wasn’t I tired of American boys?—and he was there. Not in New York, where David and Leo were, but in Paris, where I was alone.
Two days after the party, Monique knocked at the door of my maid’s room. She had deep circles around her eyes and looked exhausted. “Alain and I have decided to be together,” she said quickly, as if to get it over with. Ensemble . That word. Not a passing fancy, the real thing.
I wasn’t completely surprised—I had seen them disappear into the bedroom together the night of the boum —but I was almost speechless with disappointment. Because of her parents, Monique had to maintain the fiction of the room she rented, but Alain was coming over that afternoon to help her move her things into the apartment.
“Aren’t you even happy for me?” she asked, hurt by my silence.
“Of course, I’m happy for you,” I said. “I just didn’t expect it to happen so soon.”
“You know, the night of the boum,” Monique began, looking down. I knew what she was trying to tell me. She trailed off, weary from the effort to say without saying. We had been talking about sexual passion for a year, and now it had happened to her.
“It was just like the books,” she said. “You know.” Monique smiled mysteriously. Neither of us was ever specific, though we both knew what was supposed to happen, where and how, but that still never had for me. I envied Monique’s new attachment, so I began to spend time with Bernard, who was feeling abandoned too.
Table conversation between Bernard and me tended to flounder, except when he talked to me about growing up Jewish in North Africa and about his family, which seemed oddly like mine minus the exotic location. I thought I might like his mother, Sophie, who sounded sensitive and intelligent.
Bernard was addicted to Baby-Foot, the popular table soccer game many big cafés had set up toward the back of the room. He claimed that the game was his way of unwinding after classes. Although I had neverseen much evidence of heavy study activity, Bernard swore that he did nothing but study when we weren’t together.
“I don’t know about Bernard,” I said to Monique, who was promoting the relationship so we could be two couples together.
She insisted that he was perfectly intelligent, just not a littéraire like us. As far as I could tell, Bernard read nothing but crime novels by San Antonio, the French version of Mickey Spillane. I couldn’t help comparing him to my old boyfriends.
Monique accused me of succumbing to nostalgia. I was remembering only the good times.
“That’s what nostalgia is,” she said. “Selective memory.”
With Alain and Bernard, I had entered another movie, Les Cousins , the first new wave film I had seen with David in New York. An earnest country cousin (Gérard Blain) comes to live with his cynical city cousin (Jean-Claude Brialy) in Paris. Both are law students. The country cousin studies all the time and writes letters home. The city cousin has affairs and never cracks a book. The country cousin falls in love with the city cousin’s girlfriend. This piques the city cousin, who decides to prove to the country cousin that the girl can’t be trusted, that she will always come back to him. To make his case, the city cousin takes the girl’s hand—pulling her away from the country cousin—and he places her hand inside his shirt, open at the collar. Once the girl puts her hand on Jean-Claude Brialy’s chest, it’s all over. She melts into his caress. Love, Brialy smugly explains to a crestfallen Blain, is just a matter of skin.
Even David was impressed enough to grow his hair long and get a jacket like the one the sexy cousin wore. I started wondering about skin.
Virtue is rarely rewarded in nouvelle vague movies. The city cousin passes his exams; the country cousin fails his. I feared that Bernard was going to fail his exams, given his city cousin study habits. It worried me that he assumed he would be lucky
Two days after the party, Monique knocked at the door of my maid’s room. She had deep circles around her eyes and looked exhausted. “Alain and I have decided to be together,” she said quickly, as if to get it over with. Ensemble . That word. Not a passing fancy, the real thing.
I wasn’t completely surprised—I had seen them disappear into the bedroom together the night of the boum —but I was almost speechless with disappointment. Because of her parents, Monique had to maintain the fiction of the room she rented, but Alain was coming over that afternoon to help her move her things into the apartment.
“Aren’t you even happy for me?” she asked, hurt by my silence.
“Of course, I’m happy for you,” I said. “I just didn’t expect it to happen so soon.”
“You know, the night of the boum,” Monique began, looking down. I knew what she was trying to tell me. She trailed off, weary from the effort to say without saying. We had been talking about sexual passion for a year, and now it had happened to her.
“It was just like the books,” she said. “You know.” Monique smiled mysteriously. Neither of us was ever specific, though we both knew what was supposed to happen, where and how, but that still never had for me. I envied Monique’s new attachment, so I began to spend time with Bernard, who was feeling abandoned too.
Table conversation between Bernard and me tended to flounder, except when he talked to me about growing up Jewish in North Africa and about his family, which seemed oddly like mine minus the exotic location. I thought I might like his mother, Sophie, who sounded sensitive and intelligent.
Bernard was addicted to Baby-Foot, the popular table soccer game many big cafés had set up toward the back of the room. He claimed that the game was his way of unwinding after classes. Although I had neverseen much evidence of heavy study activity, Bernard swore that he did nothing but study when we weren’t together.
“I don’t know about Bernard,” I said to Monique, who was promoting the relationship so we could be two couples together.
She insisted that he was perfectly intelligent, just not a littéraire like us. As far as I could tell, Bernard read nothing but crime novels by San Antonio, the French version of Mickey Spillane. I couldn’t help comparing him to my old boyfriends.
Monique accused me of succumbing to nostalgia. I was remembering only the good times.
“That’s what nostalgia is,” she said. “Selective memory.”
With Alain and Bernard, I had entered another movie, Les Cousins , the first new wave film I had seen with David in New York. An earnest country cousin (Gérard Blain) comes to live with his cynical city cousin (Jean-Claude Brialy) in Paris. Both are law students. The country cousin studies all the time and writes letters home. The city cousin has affairs and never cracks a book. The country cousin falls in love with the city cousin’s girlfriend. This piques the city cousin, who decides to prove to the country cousin that the girl can’t be trusted, that she will always come back to him. To make his case, the city cousin takes the girl’s hand—pulling her away from the country cousin—and he places her hand inside his shirt, open at the collar. Once the girl puts her hand on Jean-Claude Brialy’s chest, it’s all over. She melts into his caress. Love, Brialy smugly explains to a crestfallen Blain, is just a matter of skin.
Even David was impressed enough to grow his hair long and get a jacket like the one the sexy cousin wore. I started wondering about skin.
Virtue is rarely rewarded in nouvelle vague movies. The city cousin passes his exams; the country cousin fails his. I feared that Bernard was going to fail his exams, given his city cousin study habits. It worried me that he assumed he would be lucky
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