LITMIR.BIZ

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the day was quite dull. She mumbled an apology to a pair of male feet clad in high-performance hiking boots. She noted Jacquie curled almost foetally in one seat, a decidedly pale Jeanette staring vacantly ahead in another. She saw Anita and Rochelle sitting together, lowering their eyes to their laps as she passed. She found an empty row towards the back, slumped down, closed her eyes and prayed for the Nurofen to kick in. A twangy Australian voice disrupted her need for absolute silence. She assumed it belonged to the hiking-boot man but there was no way she was going to open her eyes to verify this.

      ‘Right guys, we’re off to Mont Saint Victoire this morning – immortalized in the paintings of Cézanne. But we’re not going to sit there with our watercolours, we’re going to climb the fucker.’

      ‘Just you try and make me,’ Alice muttered under her breath.

      Alice was the last one off the coach. A surreptitious glance around revealed that most of her colleagues – in fact everyone but her, Jeanette and Jacquie, were dressed appropriately for a walk up Cézanne’s mountain. Alice, though, was wearing a denim skirt, a velour hooded top the colour of bubblegum and a pair of beige Hogan trainers with no socks.

      ‘OK guys, let’s go!’ enthused the bloody Australian.

      ‘I’m not a guy,’ Alice said to herself, pinching the bridge of her nose to see if that alleviated the throb in her skull, ‘so I’m not going.’ She turned to face the coach and saw the driver tucking into a hunk of baguette, with slices of ham the size and texture of chamois leather draped over his knees. Her stomach lurched.

      ‘Excuse me?’

      Christ. The jolly Antipodean.

      Alice turned. ‘I’m not going to walk up your mountain,’ she said politely to his feet, ‘I’m feeling a little fragile. And anyway, none of my mags have anything to do with hiking.’ The hiking boots gave one irritated tap. She travelled her eyes up over the laces to ribbed socks rolled down. Above those, tanned shapely lower legs with a masculine smattering of coarse hairs.

      ‘What’s your name?’

      ‘I beg your pardon?’ Alice balked, looking up a little further and seeing a pair of knees, one of which was grazed.

      ‘Well, Ibegyourpardon, I always find that a stroll in the fresh air clears a hangover far more thoroughly than sunglasses and a sulk.’

      Alice’s eyes travelled over a pair of thighs so shapely they’d be termed ‘thighs to die for’ in Lush magazine. She stopped for a moment at the jagged fringe of frayed denim shorts. Then looked upwards; over a lean torso clad in a faded T-shirt lauding some obscure rock band, skimmed over tanned forearms, on up to broad shoulders and a strong neck.

      ‘Come on,’ he urged quietly, ‘it’s more of a stroll up an easy incline. And if it is too much for you, we’ll do some team bonding and make a stretcher from twigs for you, hey? Deal?’

      ‘Oh fucking hell, deal deal deal,’ she muttered. Finally, she established eye contact and found herself ensnared by a pair of eyes the colour of cypress trees. She flashed a lascivious smile in automatic response. Miraculously, her hangover was lifting already.

      ‘Who are you?’ she asked.

      ‘I’m Paul Brusseque,’ he said, extending his hand, ‘I’m your group’s guide.’

      Alice was very tempted to remark to Anita, whom she overtook as she strode on to contrive a position closer to Paul for the hike, that there is a God after all.

      ‘Teacher’s pet,’ Jacquie hisses at Alice with a wink.

      ‘Thought you were married!’ Jeanette remarks with an arched eyebrow.

      ‘Fuck off!’ Alice retorts, blushing a little.

      The afternoon’s session, back at the hotel, was a crashing disappointment. Alice had turned up early with a careful slick of mascara and a subtle change of clothes only to discover that the workshop was being taken by a large Belgian psychologist with a peculiar moustache-less beard and an annoying habit of interspersing ‘non?’ throughout his sentences. She skimmed through the itinerary and wondered if Paul would be umpiring the pre-supper rounders match.

      He was.

      Alice had always been good at rounders at school. She and her team were delighted to discover that almost fifteen years later she could still bat magnificently and field like a dream. She was the centre of attention, a place she knew she thrived in. It seemed to her a while since she’d been there and, as she sat at the refectory table talking left, right and centre, she thought how much she loved it. It suited her: she became wittier and more energized. Her words were hung upon, her anecdotes were laughed at, she had something to say about everything and everyone wanted to hear it. She felt popular and attractive and she simply didn’t have time to listen all the way through Mark’s chatty message on her phone. Everyone was meeting at the bar for the evening. Including the Bearded Belgian and including that Paul bloke.

      It was as if cogs of concupiscence, recently dormant, started slowly to turn again in Alice; oiled by bottles of Kronenbourg beer and lubricated by frequent eye contact from Paul Brusseque. She’d absorbed the information that her colleagues’ polite chat revealed about him. He worked there each spring and summer and then did the ski season. This was his third year. No, he hadn’t been to England but he’d like to. His mum was Australian, his father was French. Originally he was from Cairns and this year would be his first trip home since he left for Europe at the age of twenty-six, three years ago. He was the ‘outward-bound bloke’ – Fritz the Belgian shrink conducted the formal workshops. And yes, he had a heap of physical activities in store for them. Pont du Gard the next day. A cathedral at Les Baux the following day. Yeah, he lived on site – in a chalet just like the ones guests had, but painted just white. The pay was pretty cool. The region was pretty cool. Hiking the petticoats of Mont Saint Victoire on a weekly basis was pretty cool. Arles and Nîmes were pretty cool towns. Carcassonne was awesome, Montpellier a bit of a dump. The French in general were a pretty cool nation. France on the whole was awesome. French food was fantastic. And French beer was just the best.

      ‘And how about the French ladies?’ Alice asked casually but with slyly lingering eye contact.

      Paul regarded her levelly. ‘Some are pretty cool,’ he said, ‘some, however, are hot – so liberated.’ A bolt of desire struck Alice but she quickly swept all evidence behind a coquettish smile. ‘You married?’ he was asking. Alice wanted to say no. She ought to say yes. But nothing came out. ‘That’s some fuck-off ring,’ Paul commented.

      Alice looked down and wished she wasn’t wearing it. ‘It’s fake,’ she lied.

      ‘So you’re not married?’ Paul asked.

      ‘I didn’t say that,’ Alice said haughtily and saw how it made his pupils darken, ‘I said my ring was a fake.’ She took a consciously lingering sip at her bottle of beer. ‘The real one is in the safe at home.’

      Paul held out his hand and raised an eyebrow. Without batting an eyelid, Alice took off the ring and dropped it nonchalantly into his hand. He assessed its weight and held it up to the light. He placed it back on her finger, his thumb travelling suggestively to the centre of her palm as he did so. ‘Your husband must earn a fair whack,’ Paul commented, chinking his bottle against hers.

      ‘I’m very lucky,’ Alice acquiesced.

      ‘He’s the lucky one,’ Paul said, regarding her squarely and with no ambivalence.

       In his terms of engagement, there’s probably a rule of involvement.

      Alice walks back to her room.

       Some code – both contractual and moral. Like teachers and pupils. Liaisons with clients is probably forbidden. It’ll be a sackable offence, no doubt. However, there’s probably a fine line drawn and delineated in his job description – and his nature – when it comes to flirting. Flirt all you can and thereby boost morale. He’s probably being paid to flirt.

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