Fromage a Trois Page 3

  When I didn’t reply, she continued, filling the silence. “Don’t you think? You were too good for him. You must be relieved.”

  “I haven’t even really processed what happened. It was all so out of the blue. I mean, what am I going to do? I don’t know how to be single. Where will I live?”

  “You don’t need to worry about any of that now,” she said. “You have at least three weeks until Paul gets back.”

  “I guess I could go stay with Mum, but God, the shame of it all. After eight years with the same guy, moving home with my mother . . . I just feel like I’ve wasted so much time. What about my ovaries?” I couldn’t hold back the tears any longer.

  “Ella, seriously. Nobody expects you to figure all this out immediately.” She paused briefly before saying, “I’m coming over. I’ll bring supplies.”

  “No, I’m a mess.”

  “I don’t care. You need me,” she said, and hung up abruptly.

  I heard the doorbell as I was applying a second layer of mascara to cover the mess I’d made of the first coat. I knew it was probably a bad idea to even bother putting on makeup but I considered it a preventative measure, an incentive not to cry. I opened the door to Billie’s warm embrace and felt immediately relieved. I needed a hug more than I’d realized.

  She unpacked the “supplies” she deemed appropriate for post-breakup consolation: a tub of salted-caramel ice cream, chocolate chip cookies—and cookie dough, in case the mood struck—a baguette, a wheel of Camembert, and a thick slice of Comté, which she knew was my favorite cheese, but had perhaps forgotten how I’d come to love it. She filled the table with food and then pulled out a bottle of red wine from her bag. It was only 2:00 p.m. but desperate times called for desperate measures, she told me.

  I told Billie that I felt that Paul’s retreat was an excuse, that maybe he wanted to leave me but didn’t have the guts to actually say it out loud. I figured that I’d been fine as his girlfriend while he’d been working his way through pay grades, but when it came to a future with me, the idea of commitment sent him into a self-reflective spiral. Or perhaps in his efforts to emulate his boss and the CrossFit girl, I’d just gotten caught in the crossfire. Was I being self-important, trying to figure out why Paul didn’t consider including me on his journey, I wondered. But, as Billie said, perhaps it was all for the best. Did I really want to marry a guy who took advice from a girl named Jessyka?

  Billie let me talk. She sat sipping wine, perfectly composed while I rattled on with theory after theory, trying to justify Paul’s behavior and questioning my own. But then she shushed me, as if she knew I needed to get it all out but now was the time to stop. The concerned look disappeared from her face as she told me, in a tone that made me feel like I was the naughty kid at the back of classroom, to stop with the self-doubt, that she’d worked it all out in her head. “Right. Ella. Let’s get serious: Paul and you weren’t meant to be. That much, at least, must be clear to you now.”

  I was about to counter, about to make another excuse for Paul but she stopped me before I could.

  “Honestly, you’re better off alone. Paul has always been a bit of an odd one and you guys are so different now. During university, you both lived to travel and loved gallivanting around the world, but since he graduated, he’s been obsessed with his career and how much money he earns. It’s always been Paul’s ambition and desires in front of yours, you must see that. I know you’re chilled out about these things, but—correct me if I’m wrong—you don’t really love your current job and it doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. Right?”

  “You’re not wrong.”

  “And has Paul ever asked you what you really want to do, or put your goals first?” she asked.

  I shook my head.

  “No, he encouraged you to settle down in Melbourne, and then when he decided he needed a change of scenery in order to ‘find himself,’ he didn’t think twice about picking up and leaving you. Sorry to be harsh, but that’s a dick move!”

  Still fighting the need to defend my now-ex-boyfriend out of habit, I thought back over the past eight years. Paul hadn’t always been so awful. There were even times when we’d been seriously happy: those days as students, basking in the sun and drinking coffee between classes. We’d go on holidays during semester breaks and when classes started up again, he’d take me for expensive lunches on his dad’s credit card; I remember how good it felt to escape student life for a couple of hours. We’d talk about our lives post-graduation and make wine-fueled plans to travel back to Paris and find jobs there.

  But while Paul’s student lifestyle was family-funded, I worked part-time in cafés and restaurants, and had been relieved and grateful to land a job in a small independent publishing house after graduating. I’d done an internship there and they’d kept me on, mostly to do photocopying and get coffee. It wasn’t a dream job, but I didn’t know what else to do, and in the back of my head I believed it had the potential to go somewhere. The problem was that nobody ever left the company, so for years I’d essentially remained an intern, all while taking home minimum wage.

  Meanwhile, before Paul had even finished his degree, he was offered a job at his father’s hedge fund—nepotism at its finest—and since then had been steadily working his way up within the company. His colleagues were the type of guys who would go out after work on Friday nights and wouldn’t return home until late Sunday morning, the type who bought new cars every time they got a bonus and upgraded their apartments every couple of years. But despite his frequent pay rises and the fact that we were in very different life stages, even despite an ego that seemed to grow with his salary, Paul had still been my Paul and our lives had remained solidly intertwined.

  “Seriously, El, what kind of person lets a girl like you go? He’s turned into one of those wanker bankers who thinks the world owes him something for existing.” Billie was getting worked up now but I was beginning to see where she was coming from. Paul had encouraged me to settle down and I’d accepted this as a sort of sacrifice for our relationship. Sure, I’d felt nostalgic for the traveling we’d done while still at university and often felt the urge to up-and-go when I looked at the photos I’d posted around my cubicle at work, but who wouldn’t rather escape to the beautiful white sands of Phuket, the hand-cut noodles of Lanzhou, or the colorful prayer flags of Lhasa, rather than stare at an ever-overflowing inbox? Of course I missed the adventures, but work and life were part of growing up, and I’d had Paul to fill the void.

  Billie unwrapped the cheeses and we moved onto our second glass of wine. My tears had stopped and I was starting to feel a little brighter. The booze and Billie’s good humor were helping.

  “So what’s the plan now?” she asked, which set my mind racing again.

  The reality was that I was a few months away from entering my thirties and had just accidentally dumped the man I was expecting would propose. Already, I’d spent the last eleven months worrying about not really having achieved anything noteworthy by the end of my twenties—not having become the strong female with her shit together that I’d always pictured in my head growing up—and now after trying to instigate marriage and start a family, I found myself single and soon-to-be homeless.

  “Well, first of all, I need to move out,” I said, taking a large sip of wine.

  “I can help with that. When are you thinking? Where will you go?”

  “That I’m not sure of.”

  “You can stay with me,” Billie offered.

  “No, no. You’re busy with work at the moment, and your place is far too tiny for the two of us.”

  “Ha, that’s true, but still, we could squeeze in. It’d be cozy.”

  I looked at my friend, grateful for her generosity and not wanting to put her out. But I had told Paul that I’d be out of “his apartment” by the following weekend. And there was no way that I could bring myself to ask him for any more time. I wasn’t even sure how to get in contact with him while he was on his
retreat.

  Billie’s phone buzzed. She looked at me apologetically, mouthing “sorry,” and rushed into the other room to take the call. She was a jewellery designer who had achieved sudden success with a range of beaded bracelets and, having grown in popularity much quicker than she could have planned for, she was constantly troubleshooting. I was used to her taking calls like these and it seemed that this time, something was causing a lot of grief. She spoke increasingly loudly and her tone felt foreign to me; she was all business and her comforting manner had turned professional.

  Hanging up, she apologized again and told me she needed to go, asking if I would be OK on my own. To which I, of course, said yes. As much as I loved the fact she’d come over, I’d be relieved to have some time alone to think things through and try and figure out what the hell I was going to do. She’d given me a small but timely emotional boost.

  After seeing her out, I topped my glass up to the rim—classy, Ella—and went back downstairs to bed. I grabbed a notepad and sat writing a list of things I needed to do: find apartment, pay rental deposit, get pay rise, buy car, move out, set up house. It was a short but seriously daunting accumulation of tasks, and breaking things down plunged me back into a state of dread. I didn’t bother including finding a new boyfriend and having babies, but they were there, ever-present in the back of my mind, and the thought alone was enough to make me drain the rest of my glass and throw my notepad across the room. It hit the wall with a thud and fell on the floor near a pile of Paul’s things.

  I let a few more tears go on their merry way and willed myself to sleep.

  Chapter

  5

  I DIDN’T LEAVE THE APARTMENT all weekend. Tissues littered the floor, giving off the impression that I’d come close to drowning in my own tears. By the time Sunday morning came, I had become fully cocooned in bed and an expert at ignoring my lingering hangover.

  My phone started ringing and the sound made me wince with pain.

  “Hi, Mum.” I’d already ignored two of her calls that morning. Maybe it was time to come clean.

  “Finally,” she said. “Where have you been? Were you at the Sunday markets with Paul?”

  I took a deep breath.

  “Mum, I need you to listen carefully. Paul and I broke up. I know you’ll have a lot of questions but I’m seriously not in the mood to talk about what happened.”

  “Oh,” was all she said, which sent me into a panic.

  “And I know you really like him, but it wasn’t anything I did. He’s decided to go on a soul-searching mission, which he doesn’t want me to be a part of.”

  “So he broke up with you?”

  “Not exactly.”

  “What do you mean by ‘not exactly’?”

  “Well, I sort of broke up with him.” I heard Mum tutting quietly. “But he didn’t leave me much choice. It was either that or wait around for him to come back from his ‘journey of self-discovery,’ whenever that might be.”

  She suggested that perhaps I was overreacting to things, and that maybe Paul was just going through a hard time. “I still think he’s worth waiting for, that one,” she said with a sigh.

  That was typical Mum, always taking his side. I tried to explain to her that Paul and I had never been very well suited, but I struggled to translate my thoughts into words and suddenly, she was accusing me of being unreasonable. Apparently in Mum’s day, you’d meet a man once at a dance and you were pretty much engaged after that. I desperately wanted to make fun of her for talking like a grandma, but thought better of it. I also contemplated asking her if my dad had been worth waiting for, but even in my frustrated state I knew that that would be too hurtful.

  Mum paused and, in a rare moment between us, I couldn’t tell what she was thinking. I walked over to the faux-vintage Smeg fridge and pulled out the dregs of the cheese that Billie had brought around the day before.

  “Well, that’s a real shame,” she said finally. “I liked Paul.”

  “I know, Mum, but there’s not much we can do about that.”

  “He was good for you,” she said, somehow still not grasping the fact that he’d taken me out to dinner to tell me he was leaving.

  “Well, obviously he wasn’t that good for me . . .” I said, pausing to take a bite of the Comté before trying to explain what had happened in more detail.

  “So what will you do now?” she interrupted.

  I tried not to scream down the phone that I had no idea what I would do. That I didn’t have the money or desire to buy a car, pay the deposit on a rental apartment, or set up a house from scratch. I couldn’t find the words to tell her that I was terrified of staying in the city where at any moment I could run into Paul. I was scared to see him enjoying his daily life without me, perhaps meditating in the park or cuddling up with a new girlfriend. I fought back tears and searched the objects around the room in a desperate attempt to find something concrete to tell Mum, and myself, about the future.

  My eyes fell on the block of Comté. I couldn’t help but think of Paris as I looked at the yellow sliver of cheese. I remembered how inspired I’d felt when I’d first arrived in the city, the joy of walking the streets for hours and feeling ensconced in an energy and passion that could only be described as French.

  “Ella, talk to me.”

  And perhaps it was the lack of sleep, or maybe it was my newfound sense of freedom born out of fear, or even just a dehydrated brain struggling to function logically after too much wine and too many tears, but suddenly I had an idea.

  “I thought I’d go away for a while,” I told her.

  “Oh, a little holiday will do you the world of good, make you see things more clearly.”

  I kept talking. “I need to move out of Paul’s apartment by next weekend so I’m going to box up all my things and ask work if I can take some unpaid leave. I might have to quit, actually.”

  “Huh?” she said, sounding surprised. “Where are you going? For how long?”

  It’d been a long while since I had packed up everything I owned and jumped on a plane on a whim. I started to feel excited, making up the details of my plan as I went. Paul wasn’t the only one who could disappear at a moment’s notice.

  “I’m moving to France for a year. I’ll live in Paris.”

  “A year! But what will you do there?”

  “I’ll drink wine, eat cheese, and go to galleries. It’s summer there now. Maybe I’ll take a trip through the countryside, find work—”

  “You can’t go to France to drink wine and eat cheese; that’s ridiculous. What about your life here?”

  “What about it, Mum? It’ll be here when I get back.”

  “Ella, you told me you were finished with all this jetting about. Weren’t you going to settle down? Try and get a promotion at work, try and . . .” She trailed off. I knew she wanted to mention Paul again.

  “Mum, I did try and make it work here. And don’t worry so much; it’ll all be fine.”

  And for the first time since Paul left, I felt like things might actually work out. As Mum told me I was being completely irrational, a wave of freedom and adrenaline rushed through my body. It was high time I went back to doing things my way.

  And what better place to do it than in Paris?

  We hung up shortly after, Mum frustrated and conflicted as to whether or not I was acting crazed because of the breakup, and me feeling certain that moving to Paris was the best decision I’d made in a long time.

  I grabbed my post-breakup to-do list, ripped the page into tiny segments, and started a new one: get boxes and pack belongings, drop boxes in Mum’s garage, quit job, get working-holiday visa, pack backpack, book flight to Paris, LEAVE! It felt manageable, fun, exciting. And although I didn’t have a huge amount of savings, I had some frequent flyer points that would help get me there. I also had a bit of cash set aside—mostly thanks to Paul insisting that I put a percentage of each paycheck in a savings account—that would keep me go
ing for at least a few months. I didn’t want to plan beyond that; a loose future felt good right now.

  A couple of hours later, and after numerous cups of tea and as many chocolate chip cookies, I started to doubt myself. I called Billie to tell her my plan and ask her if I was being stupid.

  If she had any qualms about me moving to France, she didn’t let on. She actually seemed beyond excited and couldn’t contain her enthusiasm for the idea. Going abroad would be the perfect antidote to breaking up with Paul, she said, and she was certain that I’d end up having the best year of my life. Her confidence gave me an additional boost and a necessary jolt of energy that I knew I’d need to get me through this dark period.

  So it was decided. I would spend the next year of my life, and the first year of my thirties, in Paris. I’d relearn how to live life as a solo adventurer. I’d take things as they came and make up a plan on the way. I’d mourn my lost love—and the near-decade I’d lost to it—surrounded by wine, cheese, and the most beautiful city in the world. And after all, I did speak a little French. Je parle un petit pois de français, I thought confidently, not realising I was saying I speak a “little pea” of French, rather than a “little bit.” Regardless, it all felt right.

  Chapter

  6

  AND BEFORE I KNEW IT, I was in Paris. Driving through the streets so full of history, architecture, and—perhaps most importantly—chic boutiques and quaint restaurants, I knew I would be happy living here. I wanted all the city’s beauty to be mine. I wanted to get lost among the streets and to wander the wide boulevards, drinking wine en terrace and eyeing up French men. Oddly, I felt immediately at home.

  I arrived at the Hôtel du Petit Moulin in the glory of the evening light and was struck by the beauty of my new—sadly temporary—Parisian digs.

  I’d stayed with Billie for a week before flying out, which had pepped me up and gotten me through any final moments of doubt that could have put a stop to this whole crazy plan. We’d had fun cooking, drinking wine, and planning out my adventure. We’d scanned blogs and Instagram, which was where we’d found this cute little boutique hotel in the Marais. Billie had convinced me to book it for the first week despite the room rate being well out of my price range, insisting that it was worth the splurge to start things off in Paris on the right foot. Her enthusiasm was contagious.