Read Online The Coming of Bright by Sadie King - Free Book Online Page B
Authors: Sadie King
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umpteenth time in the short time she had known him. She could have sworn his glance radiated downward from the slight cleft in her chin, went just slightly south of the crescent-shaped birthmark in the hollow of her neck. She straightened her back, trying to assume a more professional bearing, but only made his pupils dilate. A straightened back, a fuller chest: not the best response to his wayward eyes.
“No, actually I’m more into buttresses.”
A wink. She slapped his shoulder. Hard. He mock winced.
“Just take me to it, OK? Stop playing around, Mr. French-at-Harvard.”
She said Harvard with her best faux French accent.
She hoped that whatever he did, he didn’t stray into the territory of wordplay involving France and tongues. That might make her blush. Important to keep her body language straight, not allow her desire to become as wayward as his eyes, allow the freshness and fragility of her passion to overflow and be terribly misconstrued.
“Fine, Ms. Elle Hache O O Ku .”
She’d picked up some French language tapes prior to a summer trip to Paris with six of her Zeta Rho sisters at Vanderbilt. All she remembered of “The Joys of Conversational French,” unfortunately, was l’alphabet and some oft-used lines from her trip like “ Parlez-vous anglais? ” and “ Où sont les toilettes, s’il vous plaît? ”
“What the hell does that mean?”
He apparently wasn’t done playing the cunning linguist, wanted to lead her further down the Champs-Élysées of confusion.
“ Vous semblez aimer les hommes célèbres français, alors pourquoi ne pas Duchamp et son Mona Lisa avec une moustache. ”
“Did you just call me Mona Lisa with a mustache?”
His double-edged compliments were starting to earn him more rancor than humor. Zora was on the sensitive side about her facial hair—she’d had a facial waxing at Bella Spa on Pearl Street, next to the Cantonese take-out place, less than a week before. The slate should have been wiped clean. Her hand shot up to her face to check. Nothing, not a hint of fuzziness, simply a blank slate of glowing skin.
“No, no, not even close—but here, let me get a closer look.”
As they walked, wove through the aisles, he maneuvered right next to her. If she’d moved any further right to avoid him she’d have bruised herself on treatises of torts. Peered intently at her lower face as though he were a doctor with a dermatoscope, looking at skin lesions. She shoved him away with enough firmness to send a message. Next time she’d leave a mark.
“Better not try that again or I’ll slap the hair right off your face.”
“Nope, no mustache. A few freckles though. Cute. Taches de douceur .”
Her revenge sprang upon her tongue, her lips, a ruse for his wayward eyes, another expression she remembered from those tapes, one meant for the careless pedestrian in the wake of a dog-walker, or a traveler on a dusty country road.
“ Tu viens de marcher dans la merde! ”
The ruse worked. He stopped cold, looked down, back, lifted up one shoe, then the other. And then his shock gave way to laughter as he grabbed her arm and continued on, faster.
“Good one, Miss Bullshit, you already have sterling legal credentials.”
“Takes one to know one Jack, and I don’t have to remind you of your surname de merde , now do I?”
He stopped cold again.
There it was, finally, the bust and engraved plate.
François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694-1778, Who Freed the Human Spirit from its Chains.
From his sarcophagus in the crypt of the Pantheon. Chains or no chains, Voltaire could have done a passable impression of the Mona Lisa. The bust-makers had chosen a younger likeness as their model, had accentuated in bronze the natural softness of his features, their sensitive and mysterious androgyny. Like most of the philosophes, he was a pretty boy.
To the immediate left of the alcove that bore the head of Voltaire was a door, oak, locked, that said in stenciled silver letters,
“No, actually I’m more into buttresses.”
A wink. She slapped his shoulder. Hard. He mock winced.
“Just take me to it, OK? Stop playing around, Mr. French-at-Harvard.”
She said Harvard with her best faux French accent.
She hoped that whatever he did, he didn’t stray into the territory of wordplay involving France and tongues. That might make her blush. Important to keep her body language straight, not allow her desire to become as wayward as his eyes, allow the freshness and fragility of her passion to overflow and be terribly misconstrued.
“Fine, Ms. Elle Hache O O Ku .”
She’d picked up some French language tapes prior to a summer trip to Paris with six of her Zeta Rho sisters at Vanderbilt. All she remembered of “The Joys of Conversational French,” unfortunately, was l’alphabet and some oft-used lines from her trip like “ Parlez-vous anglais? ” and “ Où sont les toilettes, s’il vous plaît? ”
“What the hell does that mean?”
He apparently wasn’t done playing the cunning linguist, wanted to lead her further down the Champs-Élysées of confusion.
“ Vous semblez aimer les hommes célèbres français, alors pourquoi ne pas Duchamp et son Mona Lisa avec une moustache. ”
“Did you just call me Mona Lisa with a mustache?”
His double-edged compliments were starting to earn him more rancor than humor. Zora was on the sensitive side about her facial hair—she’d had a facial waxing at Bella Spa on Pearl Street, next to the Cantonese take-out place, less than a week before. The slate should have been wiped clean. Her hand shot up to her face to check. Nothing, not a hint of fuzziness, simply a blank slate of glowing skin.
“No, no, not even close—but here, let me get a closer look.”
As they walked, wove through the aisles, he maneuvered right next to her. If she’d moved any further right to avoid him she’d have bruised herself on treatises of torts. Peered intently at her lower face as though he were a doctor with a dermatoscope, looking at skin lesions. She shoved him away with enough firmness to send a message. Next time she’d leave a mark.
“Better not try that again or I’ll slap the hair right off your face.”
“Nope, no mustache. A few freckles though. Cute. Taches de douceur .”
Her revenge sprang upon her tongue, her lips, a ruse for his wayward eyes, another expression she remembered from those tapes, one meant for the careless pedestrian in the wake of a dog-walker, or a traveler on a dusty country road.
“ Tu viens de marcher dans la merde! ”
The ruse worked. He stopped cold, looked down, back, lifted up one shoe, then the other. And then his shock gave way to laughter as he grabbed her arm and continued on, faster.
“Good one, Miss Bullshit, you already have sterling legal credentials.”
“Takes one to know one Jack, and I don’t have to remind you of your surname de merde , now do I?”
He stopped cold again.
There it was, finally, the bust and engraved plate.
François-Marie Arouet (Voltaire), 1694-1778, Who Freed the Human Spirit from its Chains.
From his sarcophagus in the crypt of the Pantheon. Chains or no chains, Voltaire could have done a passable impression of the Mona Lisa. The bust-makers had chosen a younger likeness as their model, had accentuated in bronze the natural softness of his features, their sensitive and mysterious androgyny. Like most of the philosophes, he was a pretty boy.
To the immediate left of the alcove that bore the head of Voltaire was a door, oak, locked, that said in stenciled silver letters,
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