A Voir Sans

III. The Balcony (Musee d'Orsay)

Their trip to the Musee d'Orsay consisted of Professor Kane lecturing about 18th century Bourbon influence, and the rest of the group paying more attention than they had the entire year; not to his words, of course, but to the glances he and Isabel shared in between his pauses of speech. Olivia traveled at the back of the group, lingering to listen in on the other guided tours and to look at paintings that caught her eye while trying not to focus on the fact that this entire trip was a careless conversation away from imploding on itself. She also tried not to think about Mina's words, not that it was the first time someone had said something untrue or unkind about her, but something about what she said stung and stuck to her like a sandspur, and no matter how hard she tried to separate herself from it, it burrowed and nestled itself deeper into her skin.

Maybe it was the fact that what she said wasn't untrue at all. She didn't have much of a life, and the death of her father, that was technically ruled an accident, left her unable to join the rest of the living, as if she had been stuck in limbo ever since.

There was a painting in the next room the group entered of an elderly woman, dressed all in black and sitting in a wicker chair. Her prune-like hands folded neatly on her lap. Olivia recalled an old, leather-handed woman who lived in the floor above when she was child, the neighborhood voodoo lady, who made herbal remedies that claimed to heal everything from scraped knees to cancer. However, word had it when someone got on her bad side, she would craft small effigies made of twigs and leaves and place them on the sill of her window. For seven days, she would whisper the offender's name twice over each one. In time, the sun would dry them out, and leave the person whose name she spoke withered and brittle. She wondered if her father's death put the same kind of hex on her.

Why did she think this trip would change her? There would be no growth, no blossoming, she was dried up inside, like the leaves and the sticks on the window sill.

She began to retreat further into herself. Professor Kane's insights and jokes, always told in an animated voice, started to seem hollow sounding, and the murmurings of the group as they seem to grow more familiar with each other made her feel even more cut off. The feeling stayed with her, long after they returned from the museum and back to the Rue de Constantinople, Olivia passed under the eyelike windows of the Hôtel Littéraire and they seemed to look at her with shame and pity. She spoke to no one, and told Kate when the sun went down and the city streets became active with all that the night had to offer, that she felt too sick to go out tonight.

"Well, you get some rest then. I hope you feel better." Kate told her, and look on her face, although kind and concerned, looked as if she had expected her to back out.

Isabel had also turned down the club offer, claiming jetlag. She was laying down in the twin bed beside her own, and as Kate left to get ready she asked. "Are you really not feeling well?"

"It's just a headache, I'll be fine." Olivia wondered if she should tell her about the conversation she overheard while she was in the restroom, as a fair warning. But she wasn't sure how Isabel would react to the group knowing something that personal. She suddenly got up from the bed, the room began to feel suffocating. "I'm going to get some air."

The balcony gave her a much needed place to think. The summer breeze was gentle, the night air crisp, filling her lungs. She allowed her thoughts to wander away from Isabel. On the eighteenth floor, Olivia stood on the shoulders of Paris, and below was the rhythmic pulse of the city; people coming and going with lives and passions and desires that stirred them into action, the blaring of car horns, shouts from drivers on the narrow street, and the sound of live music playing from the clubs that were just beginning to open their doors. There was a sense of wonder at the life all around her, but there was something keeping Olivia from joining in.

Her phone chimed, and she looked down. It was Jaiden, she wanted to know how her first day in Paris went. It had to be around 6 a.m. in New Orleans, the sun still low and hidden from their part of the world. It was the time Jaiden always got up to get ready for her shift at the shelter. She pictured the look of disappointment on her face if she were to tell her she spent it avoiding interaction and feeling sorry for herself. She imagined her sigh and her head shaking, her eyes low and weary from too many early Louisiana mornings. Meanwhile, her best friend was in Paris and feeling anything but thrilled. Far from the girl in Harmony Oaks whose idea of a fun vacation was when a fire hydrant broke and turned the street in the front of their building into a water park. One day, when she's neck deep in debt and museum paperwork, she'll wish that she allowed herself to be indulgent and careless for a moment. One day, when she's somebody's mother and her joints creak like the floorboards of an attic in a childhood home, she'll wish she had more stories of her youth that didn't involve putting it aside.

Something stirred in her; an intense urge to be present. To exist in only one moment, to hold onto it, before it passes and eludes her completely.

Olivia knew she couldn't waste any more time.