Free Paris, He Said by Christine Sneed Page A

and three featherweight boar’s-hair brushes for detail work—that despite the painted fingernails and black leather jewelry, he looked a little like Colin. She had not yet told her ex-boyfriend she’d moved to Paris, in part because he had stopped calling at the end of February, when she’d admitted that she was seeing someone else and had been for a while. With no detectable malice or sincerity, Colin had said he was happy for her. He had also all but stopped e-mailing her by the time she packed her suitcases and left her roommate behind with her plants, a stained caramel-colored ottoman, a forest-green area rug, and the heavy-drinking MBAs upstairs.
    She had seen Colin twice after their breakup. They’d met once for coffee a week before Christmas, and he’d given her a poinsettia plant that she later brought to the office, where it still lived, and a Coach wallet that she had felt uncomfortable accepting. She had only brought him a card and a bar of his favorite dark chocolate, one studded with hazelnuts, not expecting him to arrive with expensive gifts. He was nervous and seemed happy to see her; he had dressed up for their meeting in new jeans that fit him well and the navy lamb’s-wool sweater she had given him for his birthday in late October. This was the first time they had seen each other since the breakup, and he looked good; he’d had a haircut and was clean-shaven, no missed whiskers below his eyes or near his ears. And yet her thoughts kept drifting to Laurent, to what he might want to do that evening, to the fact that he would be returning to Paris over Christmas while she flew to L.A. to see her parents and sister for five days. She wanted Colin to return the wallet but was afraid of hurting his feelings. She ended up keeping it and thanked him but felt resentful of herself and, unfairly, she knew, of him too. Later, when Laurent noticed the wallet and complimented her on this new acquisition, she did not say that Colin had given it to her.
    The last time she and Colin had gotten together, for breakfast on the Sunday after Valentine’s Day, when Laurent was in Paris again, this time on gallery business, it had not gone so well. Colin seemed hungover and spoke heatedly for most of the meal about his job and his older brother, who was cheating on his wife. When Jayne tried to pay the check, he looked offended and insisted on paying. When they parted ways a few blocks from her apartment, he had trouble meeting her eyes. “I know we weren’t seeing each other for that long,” he said softly. “But I thought, I thought you were—” He couldn’t finish the sentence, and the sight of his face, red from the cold and his warring feelings, made her throat close over.
    “I’m so sorry, Colin,” she said, reaching up to put her arms around him, her nose pressed to his warm neck. He smelled like honey and cold wind. He mumbled good-bye and didn’t look at her again before he turned and walked hastily away. She stayed where she was, watching his retreating back. When her phone began to ring, she knew from the tone that it was Laurent calling from Paris, as if he sensed the sad tension she was feeling on the other side of the ocean. With conflicting pangs of guilt and pleasure, she answered. She looked once more in Colin’s direction, but he had disappeared.

CHAPTER 7
Dans la Rue
    Jayne’s sister wanted to visit later in the summer or in the early fall, as soon as she had saved enough money to buy a plane ticket. Stephanie was desperate for a few days’ escape from L.A. and from her record executive boss, who was in the middle of a contentious divorce and had lately gotten into the habit of sharing with her every detail of this unhappy experience, no matter how personal. Laurent had told Jayne that of course Stephanie could stay with them, her parents too if they wanted to visit, but Jayne wasn’t ready to invite anyone in her family to France. She didn’t yet want them to know the extent to which