A soft purple dusk was creeping out like smoke from beneath the trees by the Seine when I saw her. A small, pale figure with a mop of black hair, sitting on the right bank, knees drawn up, a big pad of paper in her lap, her upward glance fleeting. Sketching. Sketching me.
I was leaning on the parapet of the Pont Neuilly, watching the shadows fall over the river, the lights on the barges berthed along the banks painting the oil-black water with streaks of yellow and white. Behind me, the homeward-bound traffic of Paris roared, yet I didn’t notice it. My mind was tired, in neutral, all thoughts of college and home and family drifting like the dusk across the water. The last thing I expected was to see the face of the girl who had watched me having sex with my flat- mate and her boyfriend two weeks ago...
She was only fifty metres away and I hadn’t paid her much attention when I reached the bridge; yet as the dusk gathered her face took on a familiarity that surprised me. Then I realised I had seen it before, across the Place Bicêtre, when I had gone to the window for a breath of fresh air that wild night.
My sense of recognition must have flown to her, for as I straightened up she rose to her feet and stared openly at me, her pad clasped in her arms like a shield. After a moment’s pause, she turned and ran along the footpath to the bridge.
I thought she was running away, so I ran along the bridge in pursuit. I felt an urgent need to talk to her, to find out why she had watched us. As I neared the end she emerged onto the path - and faced me. I stumbled to a stop a few metres from her and we stood staring at each other for a long moment.
I saw she was older than me by only a few years; early twenties, perhaps. She wore white culottes with training shoes; slender calves showed pale in the streetlight and her feet were bare in her shoes. A loose cotton top of some sombre shade of taupe covered a boyish figure. Dark gamin hair swirled about her head like a thundercloud as she peered at me from beneath dark lashes. Slowly, she lowered her pad until it hung by her side.
‘You were watching us,’ I said at last, pitching my voice to carry above the traffic’s roar.
‘No,’ she replied in English, ‘I was watching you.’
‘Why?’ I asked, not bothering to ask how she knew my nationality. My French is good, yet a native always seems to know...
She looked around, then grimaced at the cars passing on the road a few feet away. ‘We cannot talk here. Won’t you come with me?’
I hesitated. She looked sad and began to walk away.
‘Wait!’ I called, and hurried to walk alongside her. She looked along her shoulder and flashed me a smile.
‘Who are you?’ I asked.
‘Annette Duchesne. I’m an artist.’ She shot me a quick glance. ‘And you’re Christie Ellison.’
I was stunned. ‘You know me?’
‘My aunt told me. She’s your concierge.’
I had asked the woman if she knew the girl who had spied on us, yet she denied any knowledge. Madame went down a little in my estimation then.
‘What made you ask about me?’
She stopped and gave me a level stare. ‘For the same reason I suspect you asked about me!’ Annette shrugged one shoulder. ‘We would have met before, but of necessity, I was at my parents’ house in the Auvergne these last weeks. I come here to escape.’
With that she turned away and walked in the direction of the Place Bicêtre, with me trailing her by a few paces, my mind in a whirl.
I didn’t know what attracted me to her. Since I had begun college in Paris that Autumn my eyes had been opened to many things I wouldn’t have dreamed of before. My Australian flat-mate Helen had introduced me to lesbian sex at the same time she introduced me to the three-way. The experience had left me hungry for more. Although I had dropped hints about trying a repeat, we hadn’t slept together since. She was too taken up with Alain, her French actor boyfriend.
And now this strange girl out of nowhere was taking me back home.
She could have just wanted to talk; she may have wanted to have a drink with me, to make friends. Somehow, I knew she had more in mind than just social niceties...
We returned to the Place and Annette led me to No. 9, the apartment building next to mine. I was half-nervous of being seen by one or other of my friends about the place, yet the few people we saw were strangers.
Annette led me to a fourth floor apartment. When she opened the door I was greeted with the smell of old cooking, underlaid with the sharper tones of oil pigments and spirits. She turned on the lights and dropped her pad carelessly on a table, turning to reach past me to close and lock the door. Her firm breasts brushed against my arm as she moved, something we were both very aware of.
Her gaze was level as she regarded me. ‘Would you like to go through to the sitting room and undress?’ She smiled as my mouth dropped at her boldness. ‘I wish to paint you.’ She tipped her head to one side and regarded me. ‘Would you not like that?’
I shrugged. ‘I’m okay with that,’ I managed to say.
‘Good! Just relax. I’ll be with you in a minute or two.’ She headed off to the bathroom. ‘Oh, and make sure the shutters are closed!’ she called back over her shoulder.
The sitting room overlooked the Place. I hurried to the window and quickly drew the shutters closed, then turned on the only light I could find, a table lamp standing on a low shelf. I looked around.
It was an uncluttered room, with all the signs of an artist at work. Finished canvasses stood against one red flock-papered wall, their drying paint redolent on the still air. Palettes were stacked neatly on a small blue ceramic-tiled table alongside boxes of pigment tubes. I looked at the paintings; all were portraits, none of them nude. In the centre of the fine beech-wood floor were two rubber mats, like those used in gymnasia. An easel stood on one side, a cheval glass on the other.
Only one painting hung upon the wall, and I went over to look at it. It was a colourful portrait of a plump young woman, blonde ringlets trailing down her cheeks, merry green eyes of a startling hue looking out at the viewer as if about to burst into laughter. From her fine green dress, I guessed the period to be mid to late 19th century. The title of the piece was “Isobel Duchesne.” I looked at the artist’s signature, then stepped back in shock.
‘Renoir?’ I whispered, staring in awe at the vibrant colours, the brushwork. I know a bit about Impressionism. Who could live in Paris for any time and not be aware of it? Everything about the little painting screamed original, yet it hung like any old work on the wall of a simple apartment in Monceau.
Shaking my head I retreated to the mat and undressed slowly, nervously glancing up at the door for Annette’s return. Perhaps she did just want to paint me; I didn’t mind posing, although I felt a small, sharp stab of disappointment. I laid my clothes over the back of a chair, then, nude, I perched on the edge of it, my hands on my knees, my thighs pressed together.
A few moments later Annette appeared in the open doorway. She was naked. I admit, I gaped at her, for the light cast her fine figure in planes of light and shadow. Surprisingly full breasts were topped by deep red nipples. Thick erect teats became small mesas of sensuality, inviting touch, and taste. The thick black knot of her pubic hair made a dark triangle on her belly, hiding her sex as she leaned in the doorway to gaze at me, her hands on the lintel above her head, a soft smile on her lips when she saw my confusion. My heart began to beat strongly.
Cat-like, she stalked across the floor to stoop and plant a quick kiss on my lips, before turning away to her easel. ‘I will paint you now,’ she said, taking up a palette and squeezing pigments into the hollows with practised ease. ‘Although, I think you have never been painted before - especially like this!’
‘How do you want me?’ I stammered.
‘Kneeling on the mat, so.’ She knelt, stood a water jar beside her and gestured for me to kneel opposite. I did so, my heart beginning to pound harder. Taking up a large sable brush, she looked at me, then dipped it into a bright carmine red.
Reaching out, she began to paint my body, swirling the colours over my skin with soft, sensual strokes until I trembled with the touch. ‘You have a fine, smooth skin,’ she sighed, drawing the brush over my right nipple until I thought it would explode. ‘Like silk, smoother than any canvas. I can feel your warmth.’
