Anna and the French Kiss: Etienne's POV

17

"Happy Thanksgiving to you! Happy Thanksgiving to yoouuu! Happy Thanksgiving, St. Cla-airrr--"

I hear on the other end of my door after an obnoxious knock. I jerk the door open, and glare at Anna with heavy eyes. She's wearing jeans and a black v-neck with a black choker with three metallic beads. "Stop. Singing."

"St. Clair! Fancy meeting you here!" She gives me the biggest gap-toothed smile. "Did you know today is a holiday?"

I shuffle back into bed but I leave the door open. "I heard," I say grumpily. She lets herself in. My room is a mess. Dirty clothes and towels in piles across the floor. Half-empty water bottles. The contents of my schoolbag spill from underneath my bed, crinkled papers and blank worksheets.

Anna seems to notice. "Love what you've done to the place. Very college-chic."

"If you're here to criticize, you can leave the way you came," I mumble through my pillow.

"Nah. You know how I feel about messes. They're ripe with such possibility."

I sigh, a long-suffering noise.

I hear her rummage around by my desk, and I hear several papers fall to the ground. "These are amazing. When did you make them?"

I don't speak. She must be looking at my anatomical hearts that I've sketched. I drew them for her one day in class when I was bored, but she'll thankfully never know that.

I hear her rummage a bit more. "So. We're celebrating today. You're the only person I know left in Paris."

I grunt. "Not many restaurants are serving stuffed turkey."

"I don't need turkey, just an acknowledgement that today is important. No one out there has a clue."

I tug my covers tight. "I'm from London. I don't celebrate it either."

"Please. You said on my first day you were American. Remember? You can't switch nationalities as suits your needs. And today our country is gorging itself on pie and casseroles, and we need to be part of that."

"Hmph."

She sits on the edge of my bed and wiggles my foot. "Please? Pretty please?"

I'm silent.

"Come on. I need to do something fun, and you need to get out of this room."

I'm silent.

Her frustration rises. "You know, today sucks for both of us. You aren't the only one stuck here. I'd give anything to be home right now."

I'm silent.

She takes a slow, deep breath. "Fine. You wanna know the deal? I'm worried about you. We're all worried about you. Heck, this is the most we've talked in weeks, and I'm the only one moving my mouth! It sucks what happened, and it sucks even harder that there's nothing any of us can say or do to change it. I hate seeing you like this. But you know what?" I feel her get off the bed. "I don't think your mom would want you beating yourself up over something you can't control. She wouldn't want you to stop trying. And I think she'll want to hear as many good things as possible when you go home next month--"

"IF I go home next month--"

"WHEN you go home, she'll want to see you happy."

"Happy?" Now I'm mad. "How can I--"

"Okay, not happy." She says quickly. "But she won't want to see you like this either. She won't want to hear you've stopped attending class, stopped trying. She wants to see you graduate, remember? You're so close, St. Clair. Don't mess this up."

I'm silent.

"Fine." I don't understand why she is trying so hard to get me out of bed. "Be a lump. Drop out. Enjoy your miserable day in bed." She heads for the door. "Maybe you aren't the person I thought you were."

"And who is that?"

"The kind of guy who gets out of bed, even when things are crap. The kind of guy who calls his mother to say 'Happy Thanksgiving' instead of avoiding talking to her because he's afraid of what she might say. The kind of guy who doesn't let his asshole father win. But I guess I'm wrong. This"--she pauses--"must be working for you. Good luck with that. Happy Holidays. I'm going out."

She's about to click the door shut. "Wait--"

I crack it back open. My eyes are blurry, my arms are limp. "I don't know what to say," I finally say.

"So don't say anything. Take a shower, put on some warm clothes, and come find me. I'll be in my room."

Anna lets me in twenty minutes later, my hair wet from showering.

"Come here." She sits me on the floor in front of her bed and grabs a towel. She rubs it through my hair. "You'll catch a cold."

"That's a myth, you know." But I don't stop her. It feels, soothing. Like a warm hug from my mum. I give a small sigh. She works slowly, methodically.

"So where are we going?" I ask when she finishes. My hair is still damp.

"You have great hair," she says.

I snort.

"I'm serious. I'm sure people tell you all the time, but it's really good hair."

I feel my face grow red, and my voice grows quiet. "Thanks."

"You're welcome," she says with formality. "And I'm not sure where we're going. I thought we'd just leave and. . .we'll know when we get there."

"What?" he asks. "No plan? No minute-by-minute itinerary?"

She wallops the back of my head with the towel. "Careful. I'll make one."

"God, no. Anything but that." I say with a half-grin on my face. She swats me again, but she looks like she could cry. Did I insult her?

"Shoes. I need shoes." She throws on her sneakers and grabs her winter coat, hat, and gloves. "Where's your hat?"

I squint at her. "Mer? Is that you? Do I need my scarf? Will it be cold, Mummy?"

"Fine, freeze to death. See if I care." But I pull my knitted stocking cap out of my coat pocket and yank it over my hair. I'm grinning, bigger than I've grinned in weeks.

She stares at me until my smile drops, and I look at her questioningly.

This time, it's her voice that's grown quiet. "Let's go."