“Hey, have you heard old Claude finally found a tenant for his place?”
I spray down my tattoo station with antiseptic and shrug. “Good for him,” I say. Claude owns the apartment directly across the alley from mine; it should probably concern me more than it does that he’s found someone to rent it, seeing as how it’s so fucking close to my place, but after the day I’ve had, I don’t have it in me to give a shit.
“Apparently, it’s some American girl,” Christophe continues. “Some artist.”
“Good for her, then,” I say, wiping down the table and spraying it again for good measure, thinking back to that last client of mine who looked entirely too sketchy. At least he was in and out of here in no time, just getting a small, dumb-ass tattoo of a cartoon character right above his ankle.
We’re about to close for the evening, and Christophe never seems to be able to focus on cleaning up his station at the end of the night, which makes it take twice as long. Usually, all I want to do is get to the bar, have some beers and see what fine piece of ass I can take home with me, but tonight, I’m headed straight home; I’m beat after finishing the 6-hour back piece I worked on earlier today.
“You’re not even a little bit curious?”
I shrug off Christophe’s question. “Fuck that,” I tell him. “After all the shit that went down with Amandine, I promised myself that I wouldn’t tie myself down to anyone for a while. I’m just looking to have fun and get as much ass as possible, man.”
I start to check my inventory of inks, gauze, nitrile gloves, antibiotic ointment—the whole mess.
“American girls are pretty easy from what I hear, dude,” Christophe points out as he finally starts to disinfect his station for real. “And you can talk them into doing some really freaky things.”
“Pfft,” I say. I notice I need more yellow, and I’m almost out of gloves. “I have more than enough options right here in Rouen already.”
“Hey, look at it this way,” Christophe counters. “You can get in there and tap that ass, and by the time you’re tired of her, she’ll be on her way back to the US.”
I roll my eyes. “If it’s so important to you, why don’t you take a shot at getting in her pants, man,” I say. “I just want to keep working on coming up with some new designs, practice with the Four Pistols and let the pussy come to me.”
I grab some inventory from the supply closet and check over my station one more time before heading out of the shop for the night.
By the time I get home, I’m bone-tired. I start to pull my shirt off before the door is even shut behind me and let it fall to the floor on my way to the bathroom. I strip off my jeans and kick them into the corner. My boxers come next, then I’m standing on the bath rug in nothing more than my socks.
I turn on the shower and wait for the water to heat up as I pull off my socks. I step under the shower head, turning around so the jets pulsate over my back and neck, relieving the tension that’s built up after leaning over clients all day. For a second, my mind wanders to what Christophe brought up this afternoon: an American girl’s moving into old Claude’s place, right across the alley. I wonder if it might be worth picking her brain about life in America, if the opportunity came up.
I start scrubbing myself down, trying to imagine what would bring a young American to Rouen for any length of time. It’s not a big city like Paris, but it’s not a tiny village, either. There’s the university—maybe she’s a student?—but it’s still hard to imagine why she’d pick this town to come to.
Whatever, I decide. Unless she wants a tattoo or is interested in checking out the music scene, there’s no real point in talking to her.
I finish my shower and dry off, wrapping a towel around my waist before heading into the kitchen to grab some Thai leftovers and a beer from the fridge. I head into the living room, snatching the remote off the coffee table as I flick on the TV and triumphantly collapse onto the couch. Flipping through Netflix, I’m drawn to a new American series they’ve just released and start watching the pilot.
Tomorrow, I’m meeting with Pascal, Yann, and Sam for practice, if Pascal can get his ass out of bed before five. My phone rings and I head into the bathroom to grab it; sure enough, It’s Yann.
“Yo, Jacques,” Yann says as soon as I pick up. “Pascal’s working late so we’re going to meet at three, is that okay with you?”
“Yeah, works for me. I can get my groceries before then and be ready to load up the car.” Pascal lives outside of town, on a farm he inherited from his parents; it’s where we practice, since there aren’t any neighbors to piss off out there.
“Christophe told me there’s some new chick moving in across the alley from you. You seen her?” Yann is weird when it comes to girls. He loves them, he’s protective of them, but he’ll go after every last one who’ll give him the time of day. He’s one of the favorites with our fans for that very reason.
“Nah, dude,” I say. “If Claude’s just talking about it now, she probably doesn’t even have her papers to be in the country yet, you know? She probably won’t be moving in for a while.”
“Well, let me know when you see her,” Yann says. “I’ve never been with an American chick.”
I laugh at his stupidity. “Yeah, whatever, man. She’s going to have half the guys in Rouen after her because everyone around here thinks American girls are easy,” I point out.
“Well, if American girls are easy, then it shouldn’t be a problem,” Yann points out. “Maybe she’ll need someone to protect her.”
I laugh again and use this as an opportunity to change the subject. “So, you’re bringing the beer to practice tomorrow, right?”
“Right,” Yann says. “Remember: three o’clock!”
“Got it. See you then.” Throwing my phone onto the cushion next to me, I get back to eating my dinner and drinking my beer, grabbing the remote to unpause the episode I’d started to check out.
An hour later, just as I’m about to turn in for the night, I notice a light from my living room window and decide to peer across the alley to see what’s going on. Claude is there, apparently cleaning the place up, getting it ready for his new tenant. I crank open my window and lean out; Claude has the windows open, probably to keep the fumes down.
“Hey! I heard you’re getting a new tenant!” I call across.
Claude looks up, startled, and then walks over to the window to say hello.
“Yeah, I posted it on one of those websites, and she called and said it would be just the thing,” he tells me. “Seems like a nice girl. Just finished her degree in art.”
“Pretentious, right?”
Claude shrugs. “She seems nice,” he says. “She paid me the deposit with no problem and even helped me set up something called PayPal to do it. She should be here tomorrow afternoon.”
I raise my eyebrows. “Wow, tomorrow? That was fast.”
“Her flight comes in sometime in the morning, but she won’t get here until later that evening,” Claude says. “Something about wanting to take a quick detour on her way from Paris.”
“She’ll have plenty of time to check out Paris,” I point out, and Claude nods. “She must be traveling light if she’s going to be here after tromping around Paris all day.”
“She’s having some of her stuff shipped, and she’s only coming with what she needs for the next week or so. She’s probably using the short-term storage lockers at the train station or something,” Claude points out, and I nod.
“Christophe and Yann are both pretty excited,” I tell him. “Can you pass along anything about her that I can share with them?”
“Not much. She’s twenty-one, here for a year, then going into a graduate program for art. Seems nice, but who knows?” Claude shrugs. “She’s cute, though.”
“How do you know?”
Claude gives me a little grin. “I had her send me a picture, so I’d know it’s her when she picks up the keys tomorrow,” he says.
I laugh at that. Christophe and Yann, at least, will be pleased to hear it. “Does she speak French?”
“Eh, not very well, but she’s able to get her point across,” he says. “Good thing, too. I haven’t spoken English to anyone since I was working full-time.”
I haven’t spoken English to anyone since I was in school, so he’s at least got one up on me. I wrap up the conversation and close the window, wondering if it might be worth it just to see if all the hype about this American girl amounts to anything.
She’s probably just like every other girl, I remind myself as I turn down the blankets and get into bed. I have to wonder though: why would someone choose to come to Rouen? Why would she come all on her own, at that? Nothing Claude told me makes me think she’s got a boyfriend moving in with her, but of course, she might not have mentioned that to Claude.
I fall asleep, wondering just how easy American girls actually are. I’m willing to bet that Christophe and Yann will both be disappointed.