A waitress made her way over, and before any of us could utter another word, Bastien scribbled in the air and interjected, “L’addition, s’il vous plait.”
He stood up and grabbed my jean jacket from the back of my chair before I was even off my seat. “What kind of shoes are you wearing?” He eyed my feet.
“Huh?” I glanced down, not incredibly sure where he was going with this line of questioning.
“You should be fine. Allons-y!” And with that, he tossed a handful of euros on the table, grabbed me by the hand, and whisked me toward the door. I glanced back just in time to see Odette shrug in Elliott’s direction as they grabbed their belongings and tried to keep up. By the time they met us on the street, Bastien had already hailed a taxi. Elliott jammed his Frankenstein frame into the front passenger side, while the rest of us piled into the small back seat.
“Bastien, do you mind cracking the window? I get motion sickness, and these winding roads aren’t doing me any favors.” I shuddered at the thought of ruining the night with a repeat of yesterday’s performance.
“You should sit up front, then. Sortez! Allez! Allez!” He took my hand, led me around the side of the car to the front, and yanked open Elliott’s door. “Changez, s’il vous plait!” he pleaded as he continued to gesture with a flap of his hands.
Elliott, startled, regarded Bastien like he’d lost his mind. But once he comprehended the ask, he begrudgingly squeezed himself out of the passenger seat and into the back.
“Bastien, where are we going?” Odette’s expression was somewhere between annoyed and not surprised. I maneuvered the visor mirror, pretending to check my mascara, and glanced back and forth between the two of them. I searched their faces for some hint at the background of their past relationship. Were they ever an item? Nothing in their expressions indicated any kind of romantic history, even though the tension between them was certainly hard to miss.
Bastien leaned forward and poked his head between the two front seats. “Are you alright, Plum? Do you feel less sick?”
“Yes, thank you.”
“Bien. I am glad.”
A few turns later, the taxi pulled up under a streetlamp on a rather quiet side of town. We were dropped in front of a large, nondescript warehouse-type building not at all typical of the local architecture. And suddenly, I felt like I was back in West LA instead of Provence.
Chapter Thirteen
Did Bastien give the driver the correct address? This couldn’t be right.
I glanced at Odette, who didn’t seem the least bit nervous, which I took as a good sign. But still, I was worried that perhaps Bastien and I had some epic lost-in-translation moment. Maybe I somehow inferred that I wanted to tour a sketchy part of Avignon while slightly tipsy on a white blend?
“Bastien, where—”
But Bastien was already out of the car and knocking at the building’s back door. “People usually use the front entrance around the corner,” he explained, “but my friend works security most nights, and he said he’d just let us in through the back.”
A clean-cut man in his midforties pulled the door open and, seeing Bastien, began bantering in fast French after exchanging the customary kiss on each cheek. The man let Bastien in and eyed us, holding the door open wide as we passed. “Bonsoir. This way.”
I nodded in appreciation, and a tingle ran up my arm when I realized Bastien had doubled back to reach for my hand. He led the way with the confidence of someone who’d been there quite a few times. We wound through a maze of service entrances and employee-only areas finally to emerge into the depths of the building. With each step we took, a pounding, pulsing thump of powerful bass grew in intensity, rattling my bones until I had to set my jaw to keep my teeth from chattering.
Just as we reached the threshold of what I imagined was the entrance of the main dance club floor, based on the thump thump thump of the bass line, Bastien turned to us and said, “Don’t worry, I know it is very noisy, and we may want something not so loud. I have another friend who works the door at the VIP, but the only way to get there is through the club—there is no shortcut.”
By the looks on their faces, this seemed to assuage both Odette and Elliott. It was clear from everything I knew about him, plus the look of terrible discomfort plastered upon his face, this was definitely not Elliott’s scene. Bastien opened the door, and the smell of sweat mixed with the heady, sweet aroma of the fog machine, tinted with the earthy scent of marijuana, wafted in our direction. Even more substantial than the smell was the heat. The temperature climbed at least fifteen degrees in an instant, and suddenly my clothes were clinging to me like a second skin.
We wriggled through the crowd of partygoers grinding and bouncing to the techno beats until we finally reached the VIP lounge entrance. I guessed by yet another warm reception of Bastien that this was his VIP buddy, and we were ushered in and took a seat at a small booth tucked into the corner. I wasn’t sure how it was possible, but it was significantly quieter and more intimate in the small space.
“Drinks, yes?” Not waiting for an answer, Bastien was already on his feet heading to the bar. Elliott and Odette seemed to not even notice his departure. They were lost in conversation, looking super cozy as they spoke into one another’s ears over the music.
“So, Odette,” I spoke loudly, “have you ever been here before?”
My question seemed to catch her off guard, and she looked up at me, as if surprised by my presence. “Non. But I have had many friends who’ve organized hen parties here. It’s très chic and bien sur, très populaire. I imagine your life in LA is full of VIP lounges and hot spots like this.”
I wondered if she was alluding to my temporary reign as the Everly “wild child” during my later teen years. Yeah, I did go a little bananas back then, and even a few moments since when my role-of-the-moment called for it. It was as if I were trying to sow the oats I never could while the cameras were constantly rolling on EVERLYday. As Rhys’s popularity grew and he was seeking more time in the spotlight, he and I went out most nights and partied hard. The barrage of tabloid pics and salacious headlines were a far cry from a flattering portrayal of me, and I guess they were also confirmation of my ultimate descent into the role of the black sheep.
While Lemon, Peach, Pear, and Kiwi were spending their time on high-powered phone calls with entrepreneurs working hard to get their businesses off the ground, I was usually nursing a hangover by day, and getting ready for my next alcohol-addled extravaganza by night. Maybe Bastien was under the impression that a place like this might impress me, but truth be told, it wasn’t much my scene anymore, and thankfully hadn’t been for some time. Just another phase, another stab at me trying to find myself.
“Not so much these days, but I have definitely seen a fair share of VIP lounges along the way.”
Bastien, juggling two handfuls of drinks, chimed in, “My apologies if this place is not to your liking. I just figured that our small town is not so impressive as everything you are used to. I wanted to show you that we have some exciting things here too, no? It is not just sleepy, quaint villages full of old people and shriveling grapes. We can be fun, je te promet! I want you to love it here, Plum. Now take a big sip and let’s go dance. C’mon, you two,” Bastien said, looking at Odette and Elliott—who didn’t look at all interested in going anywhere. “Everyone, let’s dance!” he repeated.
I looked at them and tried to help Bastien’s cause. “You guys sure you don’t want to join us on the dance floor?” Maybe if I extended an olive branch, I could smooth out whatever weirdness had been brewing between all of us since the brasserie earlier.
Elliott opened his mouth to answer but was interrupted by Odette. “We’re going to stay here and chat a bit. You two go ahead,” she said and waved us on.
“Okay then. We’ll be right over there if you guys change your minds.” I pointed to the dance floor, and before I knew it, Bastien had taken my hand again and was pulling me in the direction of the music.
We moved to the corner of the floor and snaked into an open spot. Bastien pulled me close, the pressure of his body on mine like a weighted blanket. Suddenly, I forgot how to breathe, and my legs could no longer support me. I wrapped my arms around his neck, pressing my chest against him. I breathed him in; he smelled of cloves and well-worn leather. He held me close with an arm he wrapped around my waist. We swayed together with the song “We Found Love” by Rihanna, losing ourselves in the music, and the beat, and each other.
I glanced over Bastien’s shoulder back to the table. It seemed that Elliott got up to grab some more drinks at the bar, while Odette sat alone, texting away on her cell. Just as Elliott approached with their next round, she tucked it back into her purse and smiled a little too graciously as she took her drink. He sat down next to her, so close their bodies touched, and I could not for the life of me figure out why I was worried about Elliott while in the arms of a very sexy Frenchman. I turned my attention away from their apparent canoodling to my drink and took a few hearty slugs, the cold and bitter liquid burning as it slid down to my stomach.
Shifting back to Bastien, I focused on the music, the feel of his hands on my hips, and relished in the freedom of the anonymity I was currently enjoying, unlike most of my nights in the US. Behind the DJ booth, beams of lights and lasers pulsed in time to the music, and sparks of bright colors zoomed across the dark space like a kaleidoscopic dream. Between the heaviness of my body and the hazy aura suspended around the lights, it was clear that the drinks had kicked in faster than I’d realized. I concentrated on standing upright as the blurred faces around me swirled like the stars of a Van Gogh painting. I glanced back over at Elliott and Odette again, squinting my eyes in their direction just in time to see the outlines of their bodies practically on top of one another.
“I think I need to sit for a minute,” I announced in Bastien’s ear.
“Parfait, I have to make a quick phone call, anyway, but will come right back,” Bastien said.
I made a beeline to the table, and my sudden plop into the booth seemed to stir the little love birds from their nest. “So . . . whatcha guys talking about?” I raised my glass to take a sip out of a need to fill the awkward spaces between our conversation, but then placed it back down when I realized it’d already been drained.
“Here, have mine. I haven’t touched it,” Elliott said, sliding his full glass of wine across the table before continuing. “I was just telling Odette that I was thinking of calling it a night soon. It’s almost one, and we have an early start tomorrow.”
“No way!? It’s one a.m.!”
