Read Online Solea by Jean-Claude Izzo, Howard Curtis - Free Book Online Page B

love.
    I knew I should have told her I felt that way. I also knew I should have told her I wanted to marry her, really wanted her to be my wife. She might have said no. But everything would have been clear between us. Whether the answer was yes or no, at least we would have talked about it, simply, like two people happy to be together. But I’d kept silent. And so had she, of course. Until the silence had torn us apart.
    Instead of answering Sonia, I finished my drink.
    â€œHis father dumped me,” she continued. “Five years ago. We’ve never heard from him since.”
    â€œThat’s tough,” I heard myself saying.
    She shrugged. “When a guy abandons his own son, never makes any attempt to contact him . . . Five years, you know, and not even at Christmas, not even on his birthday . . . Well, I guess it’s better this way. He wouldn’t have been a good father.”
    â€œBut a child needs a father!”
    Sonia had looked at me in silence. We were sweating through every pore. Me more than her. Her thigh was still up against mine, lighting a fire I thought I’d never feel again. A raging inferno.
    â€œI brought him up on my own. Well, my father helped, of course. Maybe one day I’ll meet a guy I’ll be happy to introduce to Enzo. He could never be his father, I know that, but I think he could give him what a child needs as it’s growing up. Authority, and love. And trust. Dreams too. A man’s dreams . . .”
    Sonia.
    At that moment, I had the impulse to put my arms around her and hold her. Gently, she freed herself, laughing. “Fabio.”
    â€œAll right, all right.” I raised my hands above my head, to show her I wouldn’t touch her.
    â€œWe’ll have a last drink, and then we’ll go for a swim. O.K.?”
    I’d thought to take her out in my boat. We’d go swimming in the sea. In deep water. In the very place I was right now. Thinking back on it, I was amazed I’d even suggested it. I’d only just met her. My boat was my desert island. My place to be alone. I’d only ever taken Lole out in it. The night she came to live with me. And Fonfon and Honorine, just recently. No other woman had ever been judged worthy to get in my boat. Not even Babette.
    I’d signaled to Hassan to pour us another round. “Sure,” he’d said.
    Coltrane was playing. I was completely drunk, but I recognized “Out of This World.” Fourteen minutes that could devour a whole night. Hassan would soon be closing, I realized. Coltrane was always to send his customers on their way. To their lovers. Or their lonely nights. Coltrane was for the road.
    I was quite incapable of getting up from my chair.
    â€œYou’re beautiful, Sonia.”
    â€œAnd you’re plastered, Fabio.”
    We both roared with laughter.
    Happiness. It was still possible.
    Happiness.
    Â 
    The phone was ringing when I got in. Ten past two. Jerk, I said to whoever was daring to phone me at such an hour.
I let it ring until they gave up.
    Silence. I didn’t feel tired. But I did feel hungry. Honorine had left a note for me in the kitchen. Propped up against the clay casserole she used for stews. “It’s
soupe au pistou
. You can eat it cold if you like. Have some. Lots of love. Fonfon says hi.” Next to it, in a little saucer, she’d put some grated cheese, just in case.
    Soupe au pistou
was vegetable soup with garlic and basil, and I suppose there were a thousand ways to make it. Everyone in Marseilles said, “My mother used to make it this way,” and so that was how they made it. It always tasted different. It depended on the vegetables you put in. It depended especially on getting the garlic and the basil in the right proportions, and how you mixed both of them with tomato pulp heated in the same water you’d cooked the vegetables in.
    Honorine made the best
soupe au pistou
. Haricot beans, kidney beans, French