The Butler(16)

    “I’m grateful that you want to be here. But you’ll get bored hanging around while I’m at work, and I’m working on a big project right now.” He knew that she sometimes stayed at the office even later than her co-workers and brought work home on weekends.

“I’ve been thinking that a temporary job in Paris might be fun, just for a few months. I’ve never worked in France, only in England.” He had legal residence in England and the necessary work papers, and his French passport allowed him to work anywhere in the European Union, so he had many options.

“They don’t have big houses that are fully staffed in France anymore, not like they do in England,” she said. They were rapidly disappearing in England too, but he knew that she was right, and grand homes and large formal staffs had been gone in France for a long time, and with socialist governments and punitive taxes for the rich, no one liked to show wealth in France. A butler was a flashing red light to the tax authorities and shone a spotlight on a way of life that indicated big money.

“I thought I’d leave my name with an agency here, for qualified domestics, and see what turns up. It would only be temporary, until you get tired of me.”

“You know I never will,” she said gently, and patted his hand. He was a good son, and always had been. She had been lucky with him. Javier was her heartbreak.

    After dinner that night, they talked about what he’d seen in Argentina. It brought back memories for her, both good and bad, and she thought about them late into the night as she lay in bed, and then drifted off to sleep peacefully. She didn’t want to be a burden on her son, but she was glad that Joachim would be staying for a while. He was tucked away in her guest room sound asleep.



* * *



—

When Olivia got to Paris, she moved into the apartment she had rented for four weeks. It was on the top floor of a well-kept building on the quai Voltaire and was as modern and well decorated as the photographs had indicated. She had paid in advance. The guardian had the keys for her and showed her around. It had a big, spacious living room, sliding glass windows, a terrace, a single bedroom, bath, and modern kitchen. It was obviously owned as an investment to rent, so it lacked a warm personal touch. But it was wonderfully located, with a beautiful view of the river, with the barges and tourist boats drifting by, and a good view of the buildings on the Right Bank. It was perfectly adequate for a short-term rental, but she had a hunger to stay longer. The idea had been gnawing at her. She could even study French, not having the language might turn out to be a handicap, and she loved the idea of staying for six months or a year. She had no anchor anywhere now, no job, no family, no man in her life. Her relationships had never been long-term ones, or very successful. She had an aversion to getting too attached to anyone. For all of her adult life, and especially the last ten years, all her energy and passion had gone into her work, which hadn’t saved her magazine in the end. For the first time in her life, she had no obligations and no reason to be anywhere, and thanks to what her mother had left her, she could afford to take a year off. Sooner or later, she would need another job, for her head as well as her bank account, but she was in no hurry, and had no acute need at the moment, as long as she was reasonable and somewhat careful about what she spent.

    Once she was in Paris, Olivia knew she wanted to stay. She had no friends here but hoped to meet people. She was in touch with Claire Smith, her assistant from her defunct magazine, who had just taken a job in L.A., and encouraged her to try a change of scene too. They were unattached women who had put everything into their careers and were free to go anywhere they wanted now. It was both the upside and downside of having invested everything in their jobs and being unmarried and unattached at their ages. Claire had just turned forty, and had taken a job with Architectural Digest as their rep in L.A. Olivia was forty-three. It shocked her sometimes to realize that she was probably halfway through her life and still trying to figure things out, where she wanted to live, and what she wanted to do when she grew up. She was supposed to be grown up now, but didn’t always feel that way, especially lately. She was starting over, and now she wanted to take a year off and sidetrack herself while she rethought her life and what her goals were. She didn’t want to start another magazine, nor go to work for someone else, after having been her own boss for ten years, but she realized she’d probably have to. At least for now, there was no pressure on her to make any decisions. She could just enjoy Paris and adjust to all the recent changes in her life. She had no man she was involved with at the moment but had never wanted to base her life on any man, or to depend on one. She had seen what that had done to her mother, and the high price she had paid for it emotionally.

    After Olivia unpacked, she flipped through a magazine, and saw an ad for Sotheby’s real estate agency in Paris. She assumed they’d speak English and decided to call and see what kind of rentals they might have for six months or a year. She felt brave and adventuresome when she called them and spoke to a woman agent with a British accent. She promised to get back to Olivia after she checked her listings. She recommended the seventh, eighth, and sixteenth arrondissements when she heard where Olivia was staying. They were the three most elegant and desirable areas of Paris, as well as the first arrondissement, around the Place Vend?me. She asked if Olivia wanted a furnished or unfurnished apartment, and if a house would be acceptable. Olivia said she thought a house might be too big, and perhaps not as safe and protected as an apartment. She didn’t care whether it was furnished or not. She thought it might be fun to furnish a place sparsely with special things she found and could ship back to New York when she left. Her apartment in New York was tired and dreary anyway, and some new pieces from Paris might improve it when she went back. It all sounded like fun to her now and was part of the adventure. What mattered to her was that she live her life fully, meet new people, do new things, breathe the air of Paris, and be completely alive, not buried in a job going nowhere, tied to a man who never came through for her, with her life on hold, waiting for a miracle that would never happen. Seeing how empty her mother’s life had been right to the end had been a powerful wake-up call. It was everything she didn’t want and was determined she wouldn’t let happen to her. Her mother’s life had seemed like a living death. She had sacrificed her whole life to George and what suited him, and in the end, he had died with his wife at his side, not Olivia’s mother.