She took the TGV to Montpellier. It was her habit, after a long trip, to ride first class, at least on the train. The quiet helped her relax and, in the greater space, she could do some work. Today as the train slid from the Gare de Lyon through the southern suburbs gathering speed, Helen wrote up a report on her laptop and settled into her chair.
After Theo´s death, Helen had left Stuttgart and moved to Paris, continuing to work for the same architectural firm, expanding her experience in designing and building recreational spaces. She found an attractive apartment in the Sixième that had the glassy studio style famous from the days of starving artists in the 19th and early 20th centuries. In these days, such a ‘garret´ studio was only affordable by people with substantial incomes, like hers, and was rarely even available in the better parts of town. She loved the apartment´s fin-de-siècle atmosphere and didn´t mind the cost. When she went on her own, it was a decision she made with care and never regretted.
Paris had been good to her in many ways. She had lived there as a girl, gone to school there until her family´s travels took her to Germany and the university. It had been a secure place to return after the shock of tragedy. She found new friends, one or two casual lovers like René. Her friendship and fond (she could not admit to the word ‘loving´) connection with Johannes was a somewhat different matter, though not enough so to affect her unwillingness to enter what she called a “relationship”.
The episode in Geneva was still with her. Johannes had been a good friend and a rewarding lover since she had left the life whose end she was still trying to forget. After Rummy Harms, he was the most reliable, the most understanding and sensitive man she had known through those years of reconstruction. The night with René had just been an opportunity to bank the fires that had gone unslaked during the days in Geneva and London.
But, as she considered it all, she thought, too, of Johannes, and shivered. ‘I may have to think more about this,´ she said to herself, more aware now of the dangers of modern sexual adventurism. ‘René may be a thing of the past, condoms notwithstanding.´
As her depression and shock over Theo´s death had eased, Helen had thrown herself into her work, gaining additional recognition for her imagination and creative approach, where she had always been known for attention to detail and precision execution. Once she had gone on her own as an architectural consultant, she was able to push for larger roles with previous clients and to advance her creative abilities.
Her partnership with Rummy Harms had enabled her to branch out into project management, as well as creation, building the projects she designed. But her growth was also due to a certain deeper understanding and empathy that she was able to achieve with her clients and express in her work that her position in a larger firm had not permitted. Her recent success in Geneva was another confirmation of her negotiating skills, as well as of her design creativity.
Recreational spaces, she knew, are more than places to play. They must include places for privacy, meditation, where possible for an interplay with nature, and many other aspects of design. And somehow she was able to see and reach for these opportunities amid the myriad technical details of designing and constructing a building.
Even as she built her reputation she found time for introspection she had not taken advantage of in her earlier life. Her long walks on the beach were a part of that, as was her tendency to use travel as a meditative opportunity. She was not a person for whom despair or depression held any attraction. She looked for ways to consider her life and they helped her begin to find a kind of peace, or at least, a cessation of the inner emotional hostilities that had nearly overwhelmed her after Theo´s death. Nevertheless, she had made a basic decision: never again a relationship on which she depended as she had on Theo.
As the train flew south through the countryside, Helen watched the scenery at the middle distance, beyond the blur of the track-side buildings and structures too close to see at speed.
‘I was right to leave Paris,´ she thought. ‘No matter how I love it, I need the peace of the ocean, the quiet of Cap d´Agde.´ But then she thought of the uproar of August on the beaches, when most of France and half of the rest of Europe descends on the Mediterranean coast. The high season at the French seaside is hardly to be believed, and Helen had lived through it more than once. ‘I guess this year I´ll take August somewhere else – have to think about that.´
As the train paused at Mâcon, Helen could see the Alps in the distance. ‘Geneva. What a kick in the gut that was.´ She turned her head from the window and its view, reaching for the refreshment tray beside her as though to turn away from the memory as well. ‘Poor Johannes. I must keep in touch with him. He was good to me, good for me.
‘But what´s happening for me? I´m happy with my work – I don´t have to fuss about that. The Schellen job is a fantastic coup. I´m good at it and I know how to manage my career pretty well. Now that Theo´s estate is settled, I don´t have to worry about money, either. That´s really remarkable. I guess I could throw it all away in Monte Carlo, but that´s not what I do.
‘Funny thing. Mostly, I´m happy. I have a lover in every port. Or, I did… Well, except London. And now, Geneva.´ She dismissed the thought. ‘But that´s not the point. Trouble is, I don´t have anyone I really like. I´ve made a point of avoiding relationships… After all, how can I let myself get really close to someone? I just can´t afford to rely on someone and have them turn on me, leave me the way Theo did. On the other hand, musical beds is beginning to scare me. I like the variety, and doing that makes relationships pretty unlikely. But, it´s kind of dishonest, it´s really unhealthy… At the end of the day, I´ve got lovers, but no one I love. I don´t ever again want what happened with Theo. That´s the real issue. And, I guess that´s why I´m playing all these games.´
That thought brought another mood. ‘Damn Theo! Why didn´t he talk to me about it? I didn´t know he felt so strongly, and I didn´t know he thought I´d been cheating on him! And to do that so completely without warning. We would have been able to work it out. No. He couldn´t face me. Wimp! He went and left me holding the Guilt Bag. Left me feeling as though I´d done something wrong. When I hadn´t! And all those people who believed what was on the tape.´ She turned her face and rested it against her palm, regarding the floor for a moment or two. She shook her head and sighed. ‘…And I´m sure carrying it around. I ought to buy a carry-on just for my guilt. And shame. And fear that it will all happen again.´
But her mind returned again to the remark Rummy had reported in Geneva. To Helen, the more she thought, the more she wondered if there were some sinister meaning behind it. It was almost as though someone were checking out their connections with some organization or some affiliation that meant something more than might appear. ‘I need to really follow this up,´ she promised herself.
Her thoughts had carried her past Lyon, and the hills rose above the Rhône valley, the train veering to the west toward Montpellier. Her thoughts had followed a familiar route as well. Her fears that she had somehow really done something wrong, her anger at being left needlessly alone, her need for a safe harbor in her life – all had been at war for five years or more, now. The battle was far from over.
But the train was slowing to its stop in Montpellier. Helen gathered her bags and went to get a taxi to the airport and her car.
When she arrived home and opened the windows, the orange cat appeared as if from nowhere. He sat up sternly on the rail of the balcony and spoke sharply to her. He was not pleased. Helen shook her head and went on unpacking. After delivering his scolding, the cat dropped down and followed into her bedroom, rubbing himself on her legs. She threw him out when she went to bed but left the sliding door open. When the weather changed in the night, she got up to close the window only to find the cat collapsed on the end of the bed. She put him out and closed the door.