A Wedding in Provence (11 page)

Ulysse moved to her side as if she had given the right command.

“Good,” Brody said, smiling. “That’s not a word but let’s do it.”

“Promise you’ll be my partner. I don’t want anyone else to know about my weak arms.”

“I’m your partner,” Brody said.

“You’re my partner,” Olivia said, testing the words in her mouth.

Olivia walked out of the inn, Ulysse at her heels, and saw the group gathered in the garden. Brody, Nell, Jake, Fanny, Sébastien.

“Where’s Emily?” she called.

“At the
marché
,” Sébastien said. Ulysse immediately bounded off to sit at Sébastien’s side. “She has too much to do. She will meet us back here for a late lunch.”

Olivia had too much to do. She had to console her best friend, help her prepare lunch, swim a few hundred laps in the pool until her mind cleared and her heart settled. But she saw Nell’s sad face and Brody’s hopeful look and so she clapped her hands and called out, “What are you all waiting for?”

She headed down the hill toward the parking lot and heard the murmurs and mumbling from the group as they fell in behind her.

“We’ll take our car and Sébastien’s,” Brody said while they walked. “Fanny, you’ll come with us. Jake and Nell ride with Sébastien.”

“I’ve only got the motorcycle,” Sébastien said. “Emily’s got our car.”

“Nell,” Brody said. “Do you mind driving?”

“I didn’t bring my keys,” Nell said. “Hang on—I’ll run back.”

“I’ve got mine,” Jake said. “I can drive.”

They turned into the parking lot and headed toward the two cars.

“My car is gone!” Nell shouted. She stood in front of an empty parking spot.

“Gavin?” Olivia asked.

Nell’s chin quivered. “He fucking stole my rental car!”

Olivia walked over and put her arm around her. “Are you sure?”

“Where else is it? He disappeared and the damn car disappeared.”

Olivia felt a gut punch of fury. She knew Gavin was bad but hadn’t thought that he was criminal bad. She pulled away from her daughter. How could Nell have been such an idiot?

“Great date,” Olivia said, the words out of her mouth before she could stop herself.

“God damn you,” Nell growled. She turned and stormed off, heading up the hill toward the inn.

“Come back,” Olivia called, her voice shaky. “Nell. It’s just a car. Your insurance will cover it. No one got hurt.”

She looked at Brody, who stepped away from the group. The others pretended to ignore the family drama—they gathered
around each other, kicking stones, gazing up at the cypress trees, checking their cellphones.

“We should call the police,” Brody said to her quietly.

The police. Nell and her damn troublemaking life.

“I’ll go get her,” Olivia said. “Ask Sébastien to call the police.”

“And then we go calanquing?” Brody asked.

“It’s not a word,” Olivia said as she started up the hill.

“You’re coming back?” he called after her.

“Of course I’m coming back,” she said. “How could you possibly manage a kayak without me?”

She found Nell by the pool, sitting on the edge, her bare feet dangling in the water. Olivia felt as if all of the drama of Nell’s childhood unfolded this way: The girl would fight, then flee. Twenty-eight years old and nothing had changed.

Olivia slipped off her flip-flops and sat beside her. “I’m sorry,” she said.

Nell fluttered her feet in the water.

“I shouldn’t have said that,” Olivia said.

“I’m not mad at you,” Nell said, her feet suddenly still. “I’m mad at myself.”

“So you won’t pick up guys on airplanes anymore,” Olivia said. “Lesson learned. Now we go kayaking and enjoy a pretty glorious day.”

For the first time, Olivia noticed the day: The sky, clear of clouds, was a brilliant shade of blue. Around them the field of wildflowers rustled in the breeze. The sun had already baked the sandstone patio and Olivia guessed that the day would be very warm.

“Really?” Nell said.

“What?”

“That’s it? I fucked up, he stole my car, and we move on?”

“Yes,” Olivia said, her voice strong. “It doesn’t do any of us any good to be miserable about this. It’s over. He’s over. Now let’s celebrate my wedding weekend.”

Nell slid into the pool. She was wearing yoga shorts and a tank top. She pulled off the tank top and threw it onto the deck of the pool. She kept her back—now clothed in a bikini top—to her mother.

Olivia waited. She thought about Brody, waiting for her. All the others, waiting for her. Come on, Nell. I don’t have time for this.

Nell spun around as if she could hear her mother’s thoughts. “That’s what I don’t get,” she said, her voice sharp.

“What?” Olivia asked, suddenly weary.

“How you do that. Move on. Chaney dies and you think I should be over it already.”

“I never said that.”

“You said it the day you left L.A. Get over it, Nell. Move on. Move on. It’s your fucking mantra.”

“It’s not my mantra. I don’t have a fucking mantra.” Olivia felt anger rising from somewhere deep inside her. Don’t let her do this to you, she thought.

“You have some superpower that the rest of us mere mortals are lacking,” Nell spat from the center of the pool. “You fail as an actress, you become head of the damn theater company. You lose the lease on your theater, you get offered space in fancier digs at the same cheap rate. You divorce my dad, you find a hotter guy. You’re the queen of moving on and I can’t
get out of bed most days. I can’t stop thinking about what I did wrong and what I might have said to change things. I see Chaney lying in our bed every time I close my eyes. Did you know that he was naked? Why? Why didn’t I throw away my old sleeping pills? Why didn’t he tell me how much he wanted that goddamn role? Why didn’t he tell me he was bipolar? Six months later and I can’t fucking move on.”

Olivia slid into the pool. Her long beach tunic wrapped around her. She tried walking toward Nell but the cloth tangled between her legs. She dropped underwater and pulled the dress over her head. It floated like a ghost beside her.

In her bathing suit Olivia felt lighter and freer. She walked toward Nell.

“Don’t touch me,” Nell said.

“I can’t stand your pain,” Olivia said.

“Don’t,” Nell said. “Don’t tell me what I should do and how I should be.”

Olivia felt clearer than she had all weekend. “When I tell you to move on, it’s because I can’t stand how much you hurt and I want it to go away. I’m your mother. I adore you.” She stopped walking and faced her daughter. “I’m wrong. I can’t make it go away.”

She saw tears sliding down Nell’s face.

“I can listen to you,” Olivia said. “That’s what I can do.”

She reached out and took Nell into her arms.

“My girl,” Olivia said, her head pressed against Nell’s. “My sad, wonderful girl.”

The dreadlocked young man at the kayak center looked stoned and bored. He tossed life vests into the boats as if they were a
nuisance, something only tourists would wear. Olivia grabbed hers, now wet and cold from the dirty water on the bottom of the boat, and slipped her arms through it. Suddenly the dude was interested. He stepped forward and strapped the vest across her chest, breathing cannabis breath on her face.

He mumbled something in rapid-fire French. Olivia stepped away. “I don’t speak French,” she said, though she usually managed well enough. But this guy was rattling on way too quickly. Besides, she was angry at all the young men who could cause her daughter pain.

“And the paddles?” she asked in English. “Where are they?”

He had moved on to help Nell with her vest and Olivia felt the urge to punch him. But Nell stepped away and adjusted her own straps. Good for her, Olivia thought.

Brody emerged from a cabin with an armful of paddles. He began distributing them to everyone.

“Jake, you’re with Nell,” he said and immediately Olivia thought: No, not Jake. But Nell happily climbed into the kayak. At least she’s smiling, Olivia told herself.

“Sébastien, my mother will do all the work, so you have nothing to worry about,” Brody said.

“Alors,”
Sébastien said. “Fanny, you are in the rear.”

“I am not,” Fanny said.

Olivia saw Fanny’s frailty for the first time. She looked old in her bathing suit, her skin sagging, her body trembling. She imagined what Fanny might be thinking: Sam’s my partner. I need Sam.

“Bon,”
Sébastien said. “I’ll have to manage in the back.”

He climbed in, his athletic body at ease in the kayak.

“And you, my love,” Brody said, turning toward Olivia, “may sit here.”

He gestured to the bow of the kayak beside him. Olivia blew him a kiss and climbed into her seat.

“Follow me, gang,” Brody called. “We’re going to head west and turn in at the fourth calanque. We’ll explore there and then head back, turning in at the third and the first. Apparently the best swimming is in the one called d’En-vau. But we’ll see how it goes. If anyone’s too tired—and I know that would be Jake, poor guy—just let me know and we’ll change our plans.”

“We’re leaving you in the dust,” Jake said.

He hopped into the kayak and pushed off. Nell grabbed the sides of the boat and then settled in, already laughing. She needs a good time, Olivia thought.

Jake pulled off his T-shirt and began paddling. Olivia noticed that even though he was shorter than Brody, his shoulders were broader, his muscles more defined. He was a sun-scorched guy with wheat-blond hair. Not my type, Olivia thought. Whatever that meant. In fact, for a year now, she had only had one type: Brody. That was a surprise to her after so many years of sexual curiosity. Even before her marriage ended, seven years ago, she started noticing all the good-looking men who inhabited her world. There were actors, directors, patrons, theatergoers. There were doctors and dentists and lawyers. The world was full of hot guys. She was so starved for sexual attention that she turned on the male world with laser eyes. You’re out there and I want you.

Oddly, once she was divorced, she didn’t go wild. She dated
a few men and found them attractive but self-absorbed. They were too damn cocky. They were hung up on young women. They were insecure. Desire turned out to be much more fun than the real deal. Until she met Brody.

And now she forgot about all the other hot guys out there. Watching Jake reminded her how foreign it was for her to admire another man’s body or to think about kissing that guy. No, she didn’t want to kiss Jake. She wanted to warn her daughter: Stay away.

She fell into an easy paddling rhythm, stroking on the left, then on the right. Brody did whatever he needed to do behind her to direct them and propel them forward at a surprisingly fast pace. They breezed by Jake and Nell’s kayak, ignoring their trash talk. And in moments they were out in the open sea, the dramatic limestone cliffs rising up on their right.

Olivia felt a breeze on her arms and she noticed whitecaps for the first time. Emily had told her about the storms in the south of France, the mistrals. These winds keep the clouds away. When the wind stops, the clouds gather and a storm batters the coast. Not on my wedding day, she thought.

“Hang on,” Brody called to her. “Let’s give Sébastien and my mother a chance to catch up.”

Olivia drew her paddle out of the water and laid it across the front of the kayak. Brody moved their boat around so they could watch the others paddle toward them.

“I love this,” Olivia said.

“So that means you’ll trust me from here on in?”

“Not a chance,” she told him.

“The color of the sea keeps changing with the light,” Brody said. “I’ve never seen so many shades of blue.”

“No wonder so many artists lived in the south of France,” Olivia said. “There’s something about the light that makes the world look brand new.”

“And the sea air,” he said. “I was landlocked for too many years.”

“Maybe it’s love that’s distorting our vision,” Olivia said, looking back at him.

“Damn right.” Brody beamed at her.

During the six years that she was single she did just fine in the world, running her business, meeting friends for dinner or a movie, taking a theater trip to London every year by herself. She wasn’t lonely, or at least she kept busy enough not to notice it very often. But after she met Brody, she felt the world shift somehow. She talked to him about everything, as if all of it—her daughters, her theater, her fears and passions—belonged to both of them. Now she wondered if loneliness had hidden somewhere for all those years, just out of sight.

Nell and Jake pulled up in their kayak. Nell’s face was flushed and her eyes shone.

“Man, is it gorgeous out here!” she said.

“And we haven’t even entered the calanques yet,” Brody told her.

“You are fools!” Sébastien called, edging closer with Fanny in the last kayak. He was working hard to make his way toward them. “You are doing this all wrong. You should take your time and look around. This is not a race. This is a way of living on the water.”

But he was smiling as Nell splashed him with her paddle. He splashed her back, soaking her with the chilly seawater, when suddenly a speedboat raced behind them, sending up an
enormous wake. Olivia saw her paddle slipping from the boat and lunged for it just in time, then gripped the sides of the kayak, trying to regain her balance. She heard shouts from Brody, and then suddenly their kayak lunged left and right again.

She heard a scream and turned back. With a new wave, Sébastien and Fanny’s kayak capsized, toppling them both into the water.

Brody dove from behind her into the sea.

Olivia looked around the boat, fear surging through her veins and turning her suddenly cold.

And then she saw Fanny’s head bobbing in the water. Sébastien was hanging on to the bottom of their upturned kayak. Was Fanny wearing her life vest? Could she swim?

“Reach my hand!” Sébastien shouted to Fanny.

“I can’t—” she yelled and then her head went under.

Brody appeared close to the spot where she went down.

“To your right!” Olivia screamed. “She’s right there!”

Brody dove down and then Jake dove into the water as well. Nell shouted as her own kayak almost toppled.