Lovely War(52)

“What happened?”

Colette’s skin prickled. “Oh, you know,” she said. “The war’s awful. Life’s unfair.”

Aubrey could write a book about unfair, but there was something she wasn’t telling him.

Get close to him, Colette, and you will lose him, she warned herself. If your bleeding soul doesn’t drive him away, the war will snatch him from you.

Colette took a deep breath. She was better now. Herself again. Music was what they had in common. Music. They could be musical friends.

“What are you working on lately?” she asked. “Any new compositions? Jazz arrangements?” She paused. “That march you transformed into blues last time? Fantastique!”

He knew she was steering him away. Changing the subject. But it gave him an opening.

“The way you sing, Colette. It’s like nothing I know.”

“Oh?”

“I don’t just mean your voice.”

It drove him wild, the cool amusement with which she took everything he said.

“I am afraid to ask,” she said, “what else besides my voice affects the way I sing.”

He turned as much toward her as he could without actually putting his feet on her lap.

How had he drifted here? When what he really wanted to do was tell her how he thought of her all day, every day, with every swing of the pick and every crash of his hammer; how he’d filled notebook pages with ideas for songs that would be perfect for her voice, ideal for her register? Sultry, smoky, dark. Emotional.

That was what she was. Colette was emotion.

“You’ve changed how I think about music,” he said. “I’ve got some new songs in the works. I don’t know what the words would be, yet, but I’ve got the tunes, and maybe . . .”

“I’ve changed how you think about music?” She shook her head in wonder. “I’m just a girl who sings French songs. You’re the one whose music is electric.”

“That’s just it,” he said. “Man, I wish I could show you what I mean at the piano. Up till now, I was all about speed. Tricky harmonies. A show-off, you know? I was aiming for glitz.”

“Glitz” was not a word Colette had ever learned, but she was too polite to say so.

Aubrey knew he was boring her. “You’ve got me thinking more,” he said, “about how to pull the feeling out of a melody. Make it something you can sing with your whole life. Not just the body. That’s how you do it, every time.”

I could see you there, Apollo. Waving in the window like a nosy neighbor. Go away.

Aubrey Edwards, I told him, you’re not here to talk music theory or vocal technique.

“You’re a mystery, Colette Fournier,” he told her. “That deep, dark place you sing from.”

Colette didn’t know what to say. She didn’t think her singing sprang from some inner truth, some prior pain. Of course she was angry about Dinant. Anger didn’t even begin to describe it. She’d carry the rage to her grave. But every Belgian was angry. Aubrey, she feared, was swirling some fantasy around her in his mind because he liked her voice.

“What did happen to you?” he said softly.

Why must he persist? Run, Aubrey, run. I am too broken to be loved. All I love, I lose.

And yet, here he was, this American with electric fingers and dancing limbs, sitting in a small cloud of orange lamplight. Speaking low, asking her about her life, her actual life, and waiting to hear the answer.

They were all alone in the dark. There was no one to hear them. There were dozens of ways a young man could try to take advantage of this situation. But he didn’t.

So she told her story, about growing up in Dinant. About the magical village reflected like glass on the smooth waters of the Meuse River, about her happy childhood there, in the lilacs by the citadel, about her mama and papa and Alexandre; her oncles Paul and Charles; and her cousin, Gabriel. About the Rape of Belgium, and the annihilation of Dinant, about the convent, and about Stéphane.

And when she sobbed until her eyes were bloodshot and her nose ran, he gave her a handkerchief and took advantage of nothing. Nothing but the chance to say, wordlessly, Here; you’ve been carrying that alone for a long time. Let me carry it with you awhile.



* * *





Colette’s story broke Aubrey’s heart. Without one ounce of push from me, he opened his arms to her, and she enfolded herself in his embrace. His tears fell into her hair.

He ached to comfort her, but what could he say? “I’m here,” he told her. “I’ve got you.”

He did have her. For the first time in years, Colette did not feel alone.

Aubrey held her close. Who could hurt this girl? What devils would destroy the precious life of this lovely person—dash the happiness of this vibrant, kind, strong, funny girl?

Now he understood, as he hadn’t, as deeply, before, why they needed to stop the Germans and win this war. Now he also understood that when his time came to leave Saint-Nazaire and face the trenches, it would be impossible to tell Colette goodbye, and go.

It was hard enough to say goodbye that night. The brief kiss she gave him at the door was filled with neither passion nor desire, but sweetness, affection, gratitude.

Aubrey returned a kiss to match and quietly slipped out the door.