One Summer in Paris

Grace gathered her up and hugged her. “You’re going to be fine.”

She felt Audrey’s arms tighten around her. “You’re the best. I’m so glad I met you. And I’m so glad we’re friends.”

“I’m glad we’re friends, too.”

Audrey sniffed and stepped back. “Shit—I mean, darn, you’re making my eyes red.”

Grace nodded. “Mine, too. The difference is that you look great when you cry and I look like an overripe tomato.”

She watched the two of them leave, hand in hand.

Without Audrey, the apartment seemed quiet.

Grace carried her coffee back to the balcony.

Opening up with Audrey had been therapeutic in a way she hadn’t expected. To begin with, she’d done it because she’d wanted to encourage Audrey to talk about her own mother, but in the end she’d been doing it for herself. It had made her feel lighter. Like having a massive clear-out of things you’d been hoarding for far too long. Things that used to fit you but didn’t now. Things you’d never wear in a million years.

It felt like a mental decluttering.

She finished her coffee and checke

d her emails.

Sophie had messaged her some photos of Sienna, and Mimi had emailed her with more pictures of the garden.

Grace replied to both and stared at the screen for a moment.

Nothing from David. No email. No call. He seemed to have cut her out of his life.

She flipped the lid of her laptop shut and stood up.

She should probably be relieved that he wasn’t in touch. It made it easier to move on.

She locked her apartment and went downstairs to the bookshop. There was something about the still silence that seeped into her. Beyond the walls of the bookshop Paris was in the grip of a heat wave, but the thickness of the walls kept the rooms cool.

The moment she opened up the bell rang, and Toni walked through the door. On Sundays the store only opened for a few hours in the afternoon, but he never missed a day.

Grace was pleased to see him. She liked his old-fashioned manners and the kindness of his smile.

Did he live alone? Was that why he spent so much time in the bookshop? Maybe he was widowed and filling his time.

So much of life was habit, wasn’t it? You got used to living a certain way, with a certain person, and when it ended you had to find a new way. Form new habits.

“I was just about to make a cup of tea,” she said. “Would you join me?”

“If you have the time, I’d like that.”

“Sundays are usually quiet.” Grace stepped into the tiny kitchen at the back and made tea, talking through the open doorway. “I plan to sort through more of the books in the back. There are boxes and boxes. Elodie says that some of them go back decades.”

“On your own? Where is Audrey? She is out with Etienne?”

Toni obviously saw a lot more than he let on.

“Yes.”

“And you’re worried.”

“Crazy, isn’t it?” She set two cups of tea down on the old leather desk that Elodie used for paperwork. “I worry about her as much as I would about my own daughter.”