Free The French Girl by Felicia Donovan

said, ‘But surely you’re not thinking…’ You’re not thinking of what?”
    “We will not worry about anything that woman says,” Giselle answered as she quickly picked up a Family Circle and flipped haphazardly through the pages.
    Giselle flipped so quickly through the pages that I knew she could not possibly be reading them. Finally, she reached over and took me by the chin and held it for just a second and smiled.  She dropped her hand and went back to the magazine and began to read it again from the beginning.
    As I sat in the waiting room with Giselle, my eyes fixed on a poster showing two children getting on a school bus. It said, “Immunizations Save Lives.”
    “Giselle!”
    “What?”
    “I will not have to get a shot, will I?”
    Giselle lowered the magazine.  “Of course not. This is just a checkup.”
    Carol came over to us and said, “Room Two, your favorite.”
    Giselle smiled, but I could not imagine why she would have a favorite room at a doctor’s office. As we stood up, Carol called Giselle’s name.
    “Are we still on for Saturday night?”
    Giselle opened her mouth, and then glanced down at me.  “Oh mon Dieu , I completely forgot,” she said.  “It was this Saturday, wasn’t it?  I will have to talk to Jean. I am not sure if we…”
    “It’s no problem at all,” Carol said.  “Everyone would certainly understand if you want to cancel.”
    The room we waited in was painted in a light green shade and had a mobile of smiling fish with rainbows painted on them dangling over the examining table.  The fish swam around happily under their own power.  Above the table on the wall was a very large, colorful painting of two bears walking along a wooded path, holding hands.  One was looking up and reaching for a falling leaf descending from the sky.  The other wore glasses and was holding a copy of Little Women very close up to its face.  The bear that was reading seemed oblivious to the large green turtle that was crossing the road directly in front of it. There was something about the painting that made me smile.  I was still looking at it when the door suddenly opened up and a young woman dressed in a long gray skirt and white coat with a stethoscope draped around her neck, stepped in.  She had long, blonde hair pulled back in a twist and very light blue eyes. She was very pretty.
    She stepped forward and kissed Giselle on the cheek.
    “Hi Sweetie,” she said.  “I hope I didn’t keep you waiting too long.  I had an unexpected emergency.”
    “So I saw,” Giselle said with a bitter tone.
    The woman shrugged. “And the sick will be treated without prejudice, or so the oath says.” Holding out her hand to me she said, “And who is this beautiful young lady?”
    “Eppy, this is my cousin, Etoile Toussaint. Etoile, this is Dr. Gloria Epstein, but you may call her Eppy because she is a good friend.”
    I froze.  Epstein.  This was most definitely a Jew’s name, but surely this woman could not be a Jew?  She was much too pretty. Her eyes, though pale in color, crinkled up along the edges when she smiled, just like Giselle’s.  Her lips were quite full and red and covered with clear gloss. Her hair was silky and wisps of it hung down from where she had it pulled back. Surely Maman had never worked for a Jew like this.
    “Etoile?” Giselle asked giving me a small nudge on the back and I realized the woman was still holding out her hand to me.  I shook it and she laughed.
    “You even look like Giselle. How lucky are you?”
    Giselle patted my shoulder.
    Giselle stayed in the room with me while Eppy weighed and measured me, looked at my eyes and down my throat and in my ears.  While she listened to my chest and back, Eppy asked me many questions about when I had last been to a doctor, which had been years; whether I had been to a dentist recently, which I hadn’t; and what I liked about school. The only thing I could think of was reading.
    “She has already read