Pam and I had often talked about having a girls’ weekend in Paris. The idea started at art school thirty years ago when we first became friends—more than friends for a brief period—and over the years we were in the habit of meeting for coffee or visiting an exhibition and talking about our proposed dream-trip; less often after she got married, but we still met up – and even though we both went to Paris on different occasions with different people, we still talked about going together. Then, without warning, she became ill, and in a matter of weeks, she passed away.
It was at her funeral, when I was talking to Mark, her husband, about the trip that we never made, he suggested (much to my embarrassment) that he could come in her place. He said it would help him keep in touch with her.
I’d only met Mark a few times and knew little about him, other than what Pam had told me. He had apparently taken early retirement from teaching to look after his mother, who had died the previous year. He was in his early sixties; a gentle-looking man, attractive in a way, with a slim build and pale blue eyes. But don’t get me wrong, there was no sexual attraction. It was Pam I fancied, not Mark. But I could see he was upset at his loss, and although I wasn’t crazy about the idea of going away with him, I thought it would be mean to refuse. Also, I thought Pam might be amused by it.
So, less than two months later (when he phoned to remind me), I selected a hotel and booked a couple of tickets on Eurostar. Mark was clearly looking forward to the trip. When I met him at St Pancras station, he was carrying an enormous guidebook and spent most of the journey reading aloud from it and showing me pictures and telling me where he had been with Pam. He was like an excited child.
The hotel was a twenty-minute walk from the station, and I thought it would be nice to stretch our legs after a few hours on the train. I got the first inkling of what was to come when Mark told me he’d prefer to take a taxi.
‘Why’s that?’ I said.
‘I don’t want to get lost.’
‘Don’t worry. We’ll be all right,’ I said with a quizzical smile.
‘Well, as long as you know the way. I’m not going to spend hours wandering around.’
‘No, of course not.’
I was quite taken aback by his tetchy attitude. And I can’t say it made for a very pleasurable walk, especially as he kept a few steps behind me, as though absolving himself from any responsibility. I tried to put his mood down to his still being in mourning, but I think that was probably being generous.
We got to the hotel without any problem and I checked in and gave him the key to his room.
‘Oh, aren’t we in the same room?’ he said.
‘No, of course not!’
‘I…I didn’t mean…’ he said, blushing. ‘I just thought we’d be sharing a room. I haven’t really got used to being on my own yet.’
‘Maybe it’s time to start,’ I said, as pleasantly as I could, while wondering if I’d made a mistake in booking three nights at the hotel. I told him to go and rest for an hour and that we’d go out early evening.
Five minutes later, he knocked at my door.
‘D’you mind if I wait in here with you?’
‘Yes, I do, Mark. I’m just about to have a shower. I’ll give you a knock in a little while.’
When I was ready, I went to his room. His door was ajar, and he was sitting on the edge of his bed. Pam had never mentioned this side of him.
‘Okay, let’s go have some fun,’ I said, with more hope than expectation.
‘Yes, I’m looking forward to it.’
There’s something special about Paris on a spring evening, with everyone sitting outside the bars and cafés, drinking and talking and laughing. It was a wonderful atmosphere in which to be strolling along, and I felt glad to be there, despite the fact that Mark still walking a few steps behind me. Why was he doing that? I began to think he didn’t want to be seen with me. But later I realised that it was probably his way of showing his independence, while at the same time safely following someone.
When I stopped for a moment to listen to an old man playing a guitar, I turned to Mark and told him to keep his eye open for a vacant table so that we could have a drink and become part of it all instead of merely observers.
‘Don’t you think we ought to eat first?’ he said.
‘What? No one eats before eight in Paris. This is the time to relax and have an aperitif.’
‘But we could beat the rush if we eat now.’
‘It’s only six o’clock, Mark; the restaurants don’t even open until 7.30 – except for maybe a few tourist places.’
‘That’s all right.’
‘Really?’
I would say he finally agreed to relax and sit outside a bar, but the truth is I saw a free table and without saying anything sat down, leaving him with no option but to do the same. In a rather petulant tone, he said he’d have whatever I was having, and then frowned when he was served with a Ricard.
‘I didn’t want a drink,’ he said.
‘Oh, I thought you said you’d have what I was having?’
He didn’t reply.
‘You know something,’ he said after a long silence. ‘I feel quite guilty being here having fun so soon after the funeral.’
I nearly burst out laughing. He was having fun?
‘We would have come back to Paris this year if Pam hadn’t.…’
‘You came here quite a lot, did you?’
‘Not as often as Pam would have liked.’
‘But you know some good places to eat?’
‘Pam did. She liked to choose. But she’s not here, is she?’
‘No, she’s not.’
After telling me for the second time that he didn’t like drinking on an empty stomach, I gave up and we went to an Italian restaurant of his choosing. The food was ok, though not what I would have preferred. The strange thing was that although he could apparently speak French, Mark had to be almost told what to drink and what to eat. Pam had obviously treated him like the child that he evidently was. I so wished she was there. I’m sure he did as well.
After the meal, I suggested a stroll down to the Seine and maybe having a cognac on the Left Bank – for his sake as much as mine, hoping that another drink would finally loosen him up.
‘I don’t mind,’ he said, ‘but we don’t want to be late back, do we?’
It was only just after eight.
‘It might be dangerous when it gets dark,’ he added.
Half an hour later, we were back at the hotel, where Mark wanted to play cards. I told him I was too tired.
After that, the thought of spending all weekend with him was more than I could bear. Fortunately, he had mentioned that he didn’t want to spend his weekend in galleries and museums, so during breakfast the following day I told him there were a couple of exhibitions I had to see and quickly went off on my own.
During the afternoon I was delighted to bump into an old friend in the Musée d’Orsay. She was going down to Nice with some other friends and when I explained my situation and said how I envied her, she tried to persuade me to join them. Of course, I said I couldn’t.
As evening approached, I reluctantly left Maxine and gritted my teeth for another meal with Mark. When I got back to the hotel, he was sitting in the lobby, where I think he’d been for most of the day. He wanted to return to the same restaurant as the previous evening, but I told him it was my turn to choose.
I know I said I couldn’t go south with Maxine, and I meant it at the time, but after another evening with Mark, I changed my mind. I’d had enough. It was when he suggested going back to the hotel after the meal and having a game of Scrabble that I cracked. His face turned white when I told him.
‘But… I thought we were here together.’
‘Yes, sorry, Mark, but I didn’t expect to meet Maxine.’
I know he was shaken at the thought of being left alone, but to be honest I didn’t care. Besides, part of me thought it might do him good. He needed to learn to stand on his own two feet.
And so the next morning off I went to the Cote d’Azur, relieved and looking forward to what I fully expected to be a wonderful care-free trip after spending those two evenings with Mark. Much to my annoyance, however, I couldn’t stop thinking that I’d been wrong in deserting him. I was actually worried that he might not be able to cope on his own. What if I had underestimated the extent of his fragility? Maybe he just didn’t know how to stand on his own two feet? What might he do if he really couldn’t cope?
The real trouble was, I felt as though I’d let Pam down. I had initially hoped that by agreeing to the trip to Paris, I would ease his suffering at her loss, but clearly I hadn’t been up to the task. Deservedly, perhaps, the feeling of guilt completely ruined my trip south. And even when I got back to London, I found myself unable to contact him – just in case something horrible had happened.
It wasn’t until three or four months later, when I bumped into Pam’s sister, Megan, that I learnt the truth. Inevitably, I suppose, it wasn’t as bad as I’d feared. The fact is, while still in Paris (probably still in the lobby of the hotel), Mark had met a couple of mature English women and had begun a relationship with one of them, which continued in London. I guess that’s what he wanted all along. Maybe that’s what Pam would have wanted for him as well. And so, if I’d contributed to his doing that by leaving him on his own, maybe I hadn’t let either him or Pam down after all.
