Page 35 of The Bordeaux Book Club

They’d barely brought a thing over with them. Peter’s contract was for three years initially, then they’d decide on whether to stay or go. The flat in London was sitting empty, full of the debris of their old life. The clutter that Monica had longed to clear out but never had the energy for; the souvenirs and trinkets they’d acquired from when they’d gone travelling a decade ago. A lifetime ago. It would be silly to bring it with them and clutter their perfect new life with relics from the past.

This would be the new her, she’d thought, when they’d arrived and she’d felt the space around her, the cool, calmness of the newly renovated apartment that made her feel peaceful. Throwing open the shutters and stepping onto the balcony, despite the cold, she’d imagined the spring to come when she’d have a baby in her arms and would feel part of the community that thronged below.

Monica wished she could recapture that feeling now. Next to her, the baby monitor lit up slightly as Bella stirred, but settled again. Later, they could go for a walk, she decided. It would be nice to pass people who smiled and saidbonjour, to sit in a café and sip a cool glass of juice with her baby at her side.

At least, they’d probably go. She looked down at herself and her new uniform of jogging bottoms and baggy T-shirt. Somehow, the immaculate apartment made her feel even more unkempt and shabby. Her old clothes didn’t fit, and she hadn’t the energy to order new ones or even make an effort. She didn’t recognise who she had become.

Sometimes Monica would think back to the woman she was before they’d tried to conceive – so certain about her desire formotherhood, so sure that she’d be a pro at it. Now, when she looked at Bella’s trusting little face, she sometimes wanted to cry. Because she simply wasn’t up to the job. She loved her baby, but at times, she felt a resentment building inside. There wasn’t a moment’s peace: a moment to herself. She missed the woman she’d used to be, but couldn’t see a way back. And no matter how hard Monica tried, she never felt as if she was doing a good enough job for her daughter.

Right now, too, she was painfully aware of being alone. She’d already spoken to Peter on the phone today, and Mum. She’d sent her emails, scrolled through social media. She’d connected with the people she had in her life. And in Bordeaux, she only had the group – but she just didn’t feel she knew them well enough yet to call any of them or ask to meet up.

She stood up, stretching, walked to the floor-length windows and opened them wide, then carefully pinned them back, before looking out over the sun-drenched street below.

Suddenly, she was no longer alone. There were people moving purposefully or meandering along. Mothers with pushchairs, couples hand-in-hand, important-looking men and women dressed in office clothes. Tourists taking photos of the architecture. She sometimes wondered if she appeared in any of these photos – a little stranger on a balcony, a faceless figure in the background of people’s holiday snaps.

Moving back to the kitchen table, she sat again at her laptop and tapped her fingers briefly on the table’s marbled surface, before typing in the name of a bookstore and ordering a copy ofPride and Prejudice. She’d never read it, but had watched the film a couple of times. Maybe the book would be different, more engaging. It had always seemed a little odd for her why people romanticised it – all those women pursuing men for their money: their only option to better themselves. To her, it justmade her feel frustrated that the women had had to marry well or be damned.

Of course, she had married well, she reflected. Peter came from a family with money – had had the kind of childhood she couldn’t imagine, where everything was paid for and nobody worried whether they’d be able to pay the electricity bill.

But it had been Peter’s easy charm, his sense of humour and the way he loved her so completely that had drawn her in. Not the money.

Her own childhood had been fine – her parents both had jobs with the council and she’d never wanted for anything. But when she spoke to Peter about the house she’d used to live in, the perfectly good state school she’d attended, and the fact that she’d had a paper round when she was thirteen, it was as if to him she’d lived some sort of Dickensian, deprived existence. ‘Well,’ he’d said when they’d been together a few weeks, ‘you’ll never have to worry about money again.’

She never really had. Money had been tight on occasion but had always come along.

She’d left home at twenty-one and secured a good job as a trainee in an accountancy firm, drawing a good salary and renting an apartment in Brixton with friends. ‘You live above a shop?’ Peter had said when she’d first taken him home. He was incredulous. ‘How do you manage?’

His own apartment, when she’d made it back there a couple of days later, was breathtaking. The sort of place that exuded luxury, with lifts and polished marble halls and security cameras. ‘It’s not much,’ Peter had said, ‘but it’s home.’

She’d never been sure whether he’d been joking.

She’d been pregnant when Peter had landed the job last summer – ‘it’s based at Bordeaux airport,’ he’d told her. ‘Obviously, I could commute from almost anywhere – no harmhaving to travel a bit for work. But wouldn’t it be exciting to live there for a bit, bring this little one up in style?’

She’d known his new position would involve some time away – Peter was often away in his current role with a London-based airline. But she had just assumed that she’d manage as well as she did in London. She was used to being alone, enjoyed it to a certain extent. And it kept their relationship fresh – that first reunion after a three-week stint felt magical every time.

The first time he’d gone away after they’d moved, she’d spent time wandering the shops, picking up baby clothes and things for the nursery. Her mother had come to stay, fussing over her bump and making her put her feet up. The time had flown by.

The second – just a month before her due date – had felt a little fraught. Mum had been busy at home and planning to come after the baby was born. And Monica had realised as if for the first time that although she was at the heart of things location-wise, she didn’t yet know anyone in the city. She’d crammed a bit of rudimentary tourist French, could handle herself in a café or restaurant, but had no idea how to make connections with the couple who lived on the ground floor of their building, or the old lady who lived on the floor below. They were all smiles andbonjoursand friendly greetings – often enquiring about her baby and its due date. But nothing further – how could there be, when they could only really communicate in a combination of mime, smiles, gestures and broken English?

After Bella had arrived, life had filled up. But now Peter was away – this time for four weeks – she felt the emptiness of the apartment settle around her again. The white cupboards, the white walls, the whiteness of everything made the place feel like a hotel. And opening the windows and looking at the scurrying life below didn’t mitigate the feeling of loneliness, as she’d hoped, but exacerbated it. She was watching life throng below her, but was cut off from it entirely.

She hadn’t yet told Peter how she felt. Didn’t know how to.

‘He’s working so hard,’ she’d say to her mum on the phone. ‘And it’s only a few years! And my French is getting better.’

‘But I worry about you, love,’ her mum had said. ‘All your friends are here. Your sister, our family.’

‘I know, Mum,’ she’d said, trying not to let the fact she was crying show in her voice. ‘But its only for a few years. And if we stay, well, I’ll be settled in by then. And I have Bella,’ she’d added.

Friends had come and stayed – for long weekends or, in one case, a fortnight. Together, they’d done the tourist things – looked around the cathedral, wandered the boutiques. Each time, she’d felt like a salesperson, showing the best of her life, without admitting the worst. They’d gasp at the apartment, express jealousy at her balcony view, enthuse about the cafés and architecture and coo over Bella. And for a little while, she’d bask in it – feel happy, tell herself that they were right; that she was indeed, living the dream.

And then they’d go, and it would be her, her baby and the white walls again.

She’d started to seek out other English speakers and, when Peter had sent her the ad for the book group, had decided to give it a go – hoped perhaps it would be the answer. But, so far, she’d felt a little out of place in the group – she wasn’t sure whether Grace liked her, she always seemed a little closed off. Leah seemed OK, as did George. And Alfie was sweet. But none of them were real friends, not yet.

She’d come to realise that the life that had felt so simple in London had also come about slowly. She’d moved there knowing only two people, but she’d been in her twenties then – that time of life where everyone goes out, everyone wants to meet others. There had been endless possibilities to find new friends, join new groups. Not in the forced way she had to now, but naturally.People would stick to each other like sprinkles on ice-cream as they bowled along enjoying the ride. They’d go to clubs, bars, concerts, festivals. Their group had grown as more and more acquaintances joined in or popped round to the flat. Then Peter, the wedding – she’d felt absolutely surrounded by love in the midst of their 200 guests.

Then suddenly, it seemed, she was here. And starting again. But this time, she was in a different phase of life – the kind where you have children and meet up with others who have kids. Or maybe chat to other mums in the park. You find your tribe.

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