We chatted for a few more minutes about our backgrounds and what had brought us to Paris. I was surprised to learn that Sandwich was from Ohio.
She rolled her eyes. “Born and raised. I couldn’t wait to get out of there. When I graduated from high school, I used every bit of my savings and bought a ticket to New York. I’d planned on staying there but I met a man who was on his way to Paris and before I knew it I was tucked into his cabin and on my way too.”
Tucked away in his cabin? I tried to hide my shock, but I must not have done a good job because they both laughed.
“Not everyone has a rich daddy,” Sandwich said. “A girl has to make choices, and sometimes that means sharing a cabin with a gentleman old enough to be her father. One way or the other it comes back to a daddy of some kind.”
“Or mother,” Saffron said, with a mischievous grin.
“Are you and Reynaldo married?” I asked. The minute it was out of my mouth, I felt stupid.
“Reynaldo and I live together,” Saffron said. “He’s not my husband.”
She and Reynaldo lived together without being married? Until recently, I’d never heard of such a thing. My cheeks flamed.
“Do you love each other?” I asked, inwardly cringing at how childlike I sounded in front of these two women of the world.
“Sure, we do. We care about each other very much without having to change ourselves or pretend to be something we’re not.” The women exchanged a look between them. I was embarrassed but didn’t know exactly why. “Let’s just say we have a symbiotic relationship. One that allows me to do as I please and the same for him.”
“Men always do as they please,” Sandwich said.
“You know what I mean.” Saffron flicked the end of her cigarette into the ashtray.
I didn’t but decided to keep quiet. Listening to these two gave me a lot to think about later.
“You’re not in that little mountain town of yours any longer,” Sandwich said. “People like us belong in Paris.”
People like us? Did she mean me too?
“Do you want to fall in love and get married?” I asked Sandwich, hoping to deflect the conversation away from myself.
“Sure. I was in love once and it got me nothing but a broken heart. For now and maybe forever, I’m a girl looking for the next party. I’ll tell you one thing—I knew I wasn’t born to stay in Ohio and marry bucktoothed Raymond. He was the boy my father wanted me to marry, so our farms could merge. That’s one of the reasons I had to hightail it out of there.”
“Were there other reasons?” I couldn’t imagine anything worse than marrying a man you didn’t love just to merge wealth. Then again, I was lucky not to ever have to entertain such ideas.
“Sure. Aforementioned broken heart. But that’s neither here nor there.” Sandwich pulled another cigarette from the tin they’d left near the ashtray. “I don’t recommend married men, even though the French seem to think it’s a fine way to live.”
I couldn’t help but gasp. “You were in love with a married man?”
“It wasn’t on purpose,” Sandwich said. “I was young and impressionable.” She used Saffron’s lighter on the end of her cigarette. The tip flamed red.
“We’re all outcasts here in our little group,” Saffron said. “I ran away from home when I was only sixteen. Do you know I was a stowaway on a ship?”
“No. It can’t be.” I couldn’t imagine anyone actually doing such a thing. “I thought that was only something that happened in books.”
“Yes, it’s true. Desperate people must do desperate things,” Saffron said.
“I understand,” I said. I was starting to, anyway. Perhaps they would sympathize about my feelings for Li. After all, they’d been through difficulties and felt outside of societal expectations.
“What is it, little mountain girl?” Saffron asked. “What’s your secret? We all have them, you know.”
I said, hesitantly, “It was a secret. Now people know. Some, anyway. Including James.”
“Ah, so there is something.” Sandwich’s eyes gleamed in the light from the sitting room. She waved her hand around, making the red end of her cigarette write in the air. As if to punctuate her question, a horn blared from one street over, followed by men shouting.
“I’m in love with a man,” I said. “But it’s all hopeless. I have a broken heart right at the moment, if you want to know the truth.”
“Why’s it hopeless?” Saffron asked.
“He doesn’t love me,” I said.
“I find that hard to believe.” Saffron’s gaze flickered to Sandwich and back to me. “You’re pretty and smart. Kind, too.”
“None of those things matter to Li,” I said. “He sees me only as a child. I think, anyway. I thought it was his natural reticence that had kept him from confessing his feelings, but it turned out there were none. I read everything wrong.” I explained about our musical partnership and how we’d essentially grown up together.
“What else? There’s something more,” Saffron said.
I nodded. “Yes, there is. He’s of Chinese descent.” I didn’t know how to explain bigotry and hatred. However, my new friends understood without me having to go into detail.
“He’s seen as unequal to all the fine white folks,” Saffron said.
“Not that it matters to me or the rest of my family.” Without going into too much detail, I shared with them the plight of the Wus and how Papa had found them near death and brought them home. “Li went away to college to study music and things were hard for him in Chicago.”