21 Steps To Happiness - F. G. Gerson Mills & Boon Silhouette

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it, Lynn, swap responsibilities.

      “Well, why don’t you explain to me why you are here!”

      What? Is she serious?

      “But…you’re the one who made me come here,” I stammer.

      “She’s right,” Nicolas says and looks at me as if I was some sort of doom she had forced upon them. “Inviting Lynn was your call,” he reminds her, making it obvious he never wanted me here in the first place.

      I feel the need to defend myself. “I came here to…”

      To what?

      “To…help you,” I try.

      “Help me?” Muriel nearly shouts.

      Think, Lynn. What do you mean by help her? How does she need your help? Remember what Roxanne said.

      “Well, we all know…that…you’re just spending your father’s money for this…fantaisie…right?”

      Oho, don’t go this way, Lynn! But it’s too late. I already am.

      “And…this is just, like, a rich-dad-financing-his-daughter thing. Nobody really believes that you’re for real. So…I came here…to make people believe that you’re for real.”

      Bravo moi!

      They both look at me. Then they look at each other. It’s clear that she hasn’t been addressed like this…ever!

      She is going to kill me. They are all going to kill me. She is going to press the ‘kill the ugly American bitch’ button on her intercom and a herd of gay Asian designers will pour into the office to crush me!

      “Mais de quoi elle parle, celle la?” she yells out. “Do you listen to yourself?” She grabs the triangular gizmo and throws it at the poor Buddha.

      “Muriel, calm down,” Nicolas says. “This is not the right time or the right place for one of your tantrums!”

      He looks perfectly used to this. She yells. He hushes. She breaks. He fixes.

      “Nicolas, tais toi!” She points at me. “You, you are coming with me!”

      I must have hit a sensitive spot. She stands and leaves her office in a fury. I look up at the Buddha. I just want to check if he has opened his eyes, but no, he still pretends that he can meditate amidst such mayhem. I turn to Nicolas for an explanation but he just shrugs.

      “I guess you better follow her. And, Lynn…”

      “Yes?”

      “I’ll need a copy of your CV, you know, for Pierre.”

      Shit.

      “Lynn!” Muriel yells all the way from the reception area.

      I just want to go back to the hotel, take a last shower and return to the airport to catch the next plane home.

      Paris. The city of love. Yeah right. It’s the city of people going bonkers!

      I’ll just tell Jodie I caught the flu.

      Or dysentery.

      Jodie’s so scared of microbes, she’ll forgive me for giving up so fast.

      I have no idea where we’re going. I have to run after Muriel and she makes a point of walking a few steps ahead, but then, all of a sudden, she stops and turns to me.

      “I am not just spending my father’s money. I have been in this business for five years. I have talent! Everyone says that I have talent. So who are you to talk to me like that?”

      I swear, she is about to cry. Just like the silly little teenage girl that she tries not to be.

      “Muriel, I don’t want to play this game with you, we’re both too old.”

      “What game?”

      “The little-spoiled-girls game.”

      “I’m not like this! I’m…I am just so stressed. Merde, tout va mal!”

      She walks away. We’re on the run again, only this time I grab her wrist and stop her.

      “Things are never as bad as they seem.”

      “You’re wrong, Confucius! Things are generally much worse.”

      Confucius?

      I smile at her. I like her. She is wild but I like her. And she smiles back at me. She’s cute when she smiles.

      “What is there to smile about?” she asks.

      “You. You’re funny. Confucius!”

      “Are you always like this?”

      “Like what?” I ask.

      “Saying whatever pops into your head?”

      Please. She should take a peek in my head! So far, this is nothing.

      “You’re weird,” she says and resumes the chase, sliding among the tourists and passersby to disappear inside a coffee shop. Only, it’s not a coffee shop, and once I follow her into the place I immediately understand a thing or two about Muriel B.

      The coffee shop is a tiny secluded bar. It’s full of women. Tall women. Short women. Fat women. Thin women. Young. Old. Dark. Blond. Women only.

      Muriel is at home in here. She kisses the barmaid on the lips.

      “C’est ta nouvelle copine?” the barmaid asks.

      “She thinks you’re my girlfriend. Do you think we would be a nice match?” Muriel says, smiling at me over her shoulder.

      Oh, God!

      “She is not my girlfriend. Lynn is from New York.” She explains to the barmaid.

      “Quoi? J’parle pas anglais, moi.”

      “Do you mind talking in French, Lynn?”

      Shit!

      “Non,” I say.

      The barmaid asks me something in French, so I just smile mysteriously. I do a smile that’s neither yes nor no. A kind of undecided smile. She asks me again, and looks at Muriel, seeking an explanation.

      I decide to say oui, and they laugh. I laugh with them. And I nod, of course.

      “So? What do you want to drink then?” Muriel asks.

      Oh, I see.

      “Just a coffee. A trim latte. Something like that.”

      The barmaid looks at me as if I had just landed from outer space.

      “Donne lui un café.”

      That grants me a horrible short-black and a disapproving face. It’s 11:30 a.m. Coffee time is over. Muriel orders a perroquet. It’s like a strange anise cocktail with mint syrup. The barmaid takes the same thing but without the syrup. She doesn’t take it too sweet.

      “Ça fait combien de temps que tu es à Paris?”

      “Muriel, we need to talk. In private.” I take her glass and walk to a booth far away from the bar. I want to take her away from the barmaid and all this maddening French language.

      She caresses the barmaid’s face and comes to sit with me.

      “Do you like it in here?” she asks.

      Two Japanese girls have just entered. They are dressed in school uniforms, only their skirts are far too short and reveal their underwear. Their faces are covered in colorful makeup. They look like two little porcelain dolls out of an sleazy old man’s fantasy.

      “The place has character,” I lie. I feel so inappropriate. Hell, I’ve never been in a place like this before.

      Once, with Delia, we went into a sauna parlor, but apparently they

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