The next day was mayhem in the lab. Emotions were high. Stress, and grim and gritty determination, shone on my competitors’ faces. We were being judged purely on our mettle and how we coped working in a new environment on a strict timeframe.
As the day wore on, nerves turned from taut to frazzled and the noise level increased. Someone would push past someone else and foreign curses would ring out. It was interesting that I could always translate a profanity even if I didn’t speak the language.
For some reason, Anastacia kept coming in and yammering on that the prize of working alone in Vincent’s studio bored her. I’d have given anything to take her place! Working amid this chaos took a toll, I couldn’t think straight with all the noise. Clementine played some bawdy burlesque music, and warbled away operatically and it was all I could do not to scream.
Anastacia goaded Clementine but I got the feeling Clem relished the drama, going by the back and forth between them. After the third argument in as many minutes, I grabbed Clementine’s phone and shut off her music. ‘Are you purposely riling her up?’
The Parisian giggled behind her hand. ‘Oui! Isn’t it great? Look at her, you can almost see fire coming out of her nose!’
I risked a quick glance at Anastacia, who gave me a death stare so fierce my legs wobbled. ‘You are playing with fire,’ I admonished Clementine, and concentrated at glancing anywhere but in Anastacia’s direction.
‘Pah!’ she said. ‘If she’s concerned about me, then she’s not concentrating! She should be in Vincent’s studio working!’
‘But you’re not concentrating either!’
She did that thing, a sort of head loll and tongue cluck that implied I was obtuse. ‘I obviously don’t need as much time as everyone else, Del. I am French!’ she said as if that explained it all.
‘So?’ I failed to see her reasoning.
‘So we invented perfume!’
That wasn’t actually the way history remembered it but for the sake of saving everyone from another thirty-minute monologue I let her have the point. ‘Right-e-o, Clem. I have to concentrate but just be careful.’ I left the two women to battle it out.
Katherine with her lovely sleek red locks just shook her head and mouthed, ‘She’s a nightmare.’ I wasn’t sure if she meant Clementine or Anastacia, but I had a feeling it was her Parisian friend.
Sebastien wandered in, and all talk ceased. I watched him from the corner of my eye as I continued to work. With each contestant he hurried to answer their questions, as though he was in a rush to leave. When he came to Clementine’s bench he deflected her flirtatious banter easily so her pride wasn’t hurt. Golly, I could hear her overt attempts from where I stood, and internally rolled my eyes. Nothing was off limits to her. Would it be her downfall, not taking anything seriously and relying on other methods to get ahead?
The fragrance in the room swirled and shimmied, heightening as he continued to visit each contestant. I wasn’t sure if it was his magnetism that they were attracted to or the fact he was a Leclére, either way it was interesting to watch them flirt, bumble, or mumble alongside him. When he got close to my bench the room was abuzz.
Sebastien stepped towards me, a question in his eyes. I averted my gaze, and moved around him, brushing his hand as I did, feeling that same sizzle race through me.
‘Sorry,’ I said, snatching my hand back as if it had been burned. Do not act like a fool, Del! ‘Have you come to save me?’ The words spilled out before I could stop them. Save me?
‘Do you need saving?’ A smile played at his lips. Gosh, they were lovely lips, if you were into lips.
‘No, not really.’ I squirmed. ‘But I will definitely be having your larger than average glass of vin blanc tonight.’
He tilted his head. ‘Why?’
The room fell silent, I could almost hear them breathing, and they were hanging on to every word we spoke. Best not to rile them up by complaining about them! ‘I’m sure you know, since I poured my heart out to you in the bar that night, not realizing you in fact knew exactly who I was.’ No need to act the ingénue either, better he understood I was still annoyed at his double cross.
‘I’m so sorry, Del. I was grappling with so many things that day, and I didn’t actually recognize you until you jumped on my back and attached yourself to me.’
I gave him a hard stare. ‘I tripped over a baguette.’
‘If you say so.’
I scoffed. ‘You know so.’
He gave an airy shrug, but I could tell he was just playing with me.
‘If you’re free later, I thought we could have coffee?’
‘Maybe. I’m fairly busy so I couldn’t possibly confirm.’
‘I’ll meet you at the café with the red shutters at six.’
I pursed my lips and he smiled and left the room.
Once he’d gone, Clementine dashed over. ‘Aren’t you the flavor of the month?’
‘Don’t start,’ I said, glaring at her. Could she even make perfume? All she seemed to care about was having the upper hand and intimidating everyone. Well, I wouldn’t put up with that! ‘He’s my mentor, remember?’ That’s all it was, a mentoring session so he could say he’d done his job and walk off into the sunset…
She shook her head and flounced off. Next, she’d be sabotaging me. When I calmed down, I thought of the green-eyed Frenchman. He’d actually seemed pained having to stand around and answer questions. I’d have pegged him as the opposite, like his father, a dreamer who loved talking about fragrance, the type who got lost in conversation, their passion radiating from every pore, but he wasn’t like that at all. Why?
Out of the window I caught a glimpse of Sebastien striding down the Champs-Élysées, hands in pockets, wind in his hair, head down as though he had the weight of the world on his shoulders. There was a real sense of desolation about him at times when he thought no one was watching. As though he was lost, his moods shifting like the tides.
I spent a moment watching him, just for the sheer loveliness of the fine figure he cut walking against the wind and felt a pull in that direction. A sense of understanding.
***
At the café with the red shutters, I took a seat out the front, the fresh air like a balm after all day inside with so many aromas. The summer breeze blew away the tension I’d been holding and I flopped back in my chair, and waited for Sebastien. He was late, dammit.
A few minutes later, he arrived with a mouthful of apologies. A waiter fussed over him, and then pointed to me. I blushed, feeling caught out, staring so openly. I made a show of checking my cell phone as if I had something wildly important that needed doing, while Sebastien answered his phone too.
How’s Pop? I miss him. I sent the text to Jen as he ended his call and sat down.
‘Have you ordered?’
‘Not yet, I didn’t get quite the welcome you did,’ I said with a smile.
He gave a half shrug. ‘Let’s remedy that.’
The waiter fell over himself to serve Sebastien, returning with two small black coffees and a plate of icing dusted Madeleines.
‘So,’ he said, taking a sip. ‘I noticed the mood was fraught in the lab today. How did you cope?’
I took a deep breath, and debated with what to say. ‘It’s certainly different to what I’m used to. But isn’t that what this is for? To push out of our comfort zones and apply pressure?’
He sighed. ‘Yes, a commercially viable perfumer would naturally work in a lab, like you’re all doing. So it was thought by the management team that you’d be tested under the same conditions. More for your benefit, than for ours. If any of you do go on to work for a large perfume house, you’ll have experience. You’ll know what is expected of you in a professional capacity.’
‘I get the feeling you don’t agree?’
The green of his eyes flashed. ‘Not really. This was supposed to be about helping perfumers find their voice, their style, not some apprenticeship… My papa never worked in a lab, he always worked alone. I work alone.’
‘But you’re in charge, aren’t you? Why don’t you say no?’
He waited a beat. ‘It’s complicated. But I made a promise and I’m sticking to it, even if it’s not what I agree with for the most part.’
‘You made a promise to your father?’
When no answer was forthcoming I continued. ‘It surprised me, that Leclére would open the doors to us so soon after…’ I left the sentence hanging.
‘He asked me to.’ His voice grew thick. ‘Just before he died, he made me promise him that I’d do this one thing.’
‘Why? Why did he suddenly want you to help a group of strangers?’
He exhaled. ‘I don’t know, but he was adamant about it. And I figured it was the least I could do, listen to a dying man’s wishes.’
I shivered at the sadness in his voice, and pictured a frail, old Vincent beseeching his son to do this one thing. The question remained though, why did he want to escape when he had the world at his feet?
‘But…’
He cut me off, the subject clearly closed. ‘How are you finding Paris?’
‘I love it,’ I said. ‘I’ve always wanted to live in a big city. Now I’ve had a taste of it, I know it’s in my future.’
He gave a tiny nod and I continued, ‘It’s the noise, the early morning trucks unloading their wares, the traffic, the beeping of horns, a signal it’s a new day, the busy boulangeries, patisseries, fromageries, the clatter of cutlery and conversation…’
This time he just shook his head and laughed. ‘It’s everything I dislike,’ he said. ‘Paris can swallow a person whole.’
How could he not love Paris?