The Day After Tomorrow

9

HER NAME was Vera Monneray. He’d met her in Geneva when she’d come up to him shortly after he’d presented his paper and introduced herself. She was a graduate of Montpellier medical school and in her first year of residency at the Centre Hospitalier Ste.-Anne in Paris, she’d told him. She was alone and celebrating her twenty-sixth birthday. She hadn’t known why she was being so forward, except that he’d caught her attention the moment his speech began. There was something about him that made her want to meet him. To find out who he was. To be with him for a little while. At the time she’d had no idea if he was married or not. She didn’t care. If he’d said he was married and with his wife, or if he’d simply said he was busy, she would have shaken his hand, told him she admired his paper and left. And that would have been that.

But he hadn’t.

They’d gone outside and crossed the footbridge over the Rhône to the old city. Vera was bright and filled with life. Her long hair was almost jet black, and she swept it to one side and tucked it behind her ear in a way that no matter how animated she became, it stayed where it was without coming loose. Her eyes were nearly as dark as her hair and were young and eager for the long life still ahead of her.

No more than twenty minutes after they’d met, they were holding hands. That night they had dinner together in a quiet Italian restaurant just off the red-light district. It was curious to think of Geneva as having a row for prostitutes. Its reputation for chocolate and watches and its aura of sobriety as an international finance center somehow didn’t play against the skintight, thigh-slit skirts of street hookers, but there they were anyway, populating the few odd blocks allotted them. Vera watched Osborn carefully as they walked past them. Was he embarrassed or silently shopping or letting life be what it was? All, she thought. All.

And dinner, like most of the afternoon, was more of that same kind of thing, a tender, silent exploration by a man and woman instinctively attracted to one another. A holding of hands, an exchange of glances and, finally, the long, searching stare into the other’s eyes. More than once Paul had felt himself become aroused. The first time it happened they were browsing through baked goods in a large department store. The area was crowded with shoppers and he was certain every eye was on his groin area. Quickly picking up a large bread, he discreetly held it in front of himself while pretending to look around. Vera saw him and laughed. It was as if they’d been lovers for a very long time and shared a secretive thrill playing it out in public.

After dinner they walked down the rue des Alpes and watched the moon rise over Lake Geneva. Behind them was the Beau-Rivage, Paul’s hotel. He’d planned dinner, the walk, the evening, to end there in his room, but suddenly, now that it was at hand, he wasn’t quite as sure of himself as he thought. He’d been divorced less than four months, hardly time enough to get back the confidence of being an attractive bachelor, and a doctor at that. In the old days, he tried to remember, how did he do it? Get a woman to his room? His mind went blank, he couldn’t remember a thing. He didn’t have to; Vera was way ahead of him.

“Paul,” she said and smiled, tucking her arm in his, pulling him close against the chill of the air coming across the lake, “the thing to always remember about a woman is that you only get her in bed if the decision is hers.”

“Is that a fact?” he deadpanned.

“Absolute truth.”

Reaching in his pocket he took out a key and held it up. “To my hotel room,” he said.

“I have a train. The ten o’clock TGV to Paris,” she said matter-of-factly, as if it was something he should have known.

“I don’t understand.” His heart sank. She’d never mentioned a train, or that she was leaving Geneva that night.

“Paul, this is Friday. I have things to do in Paris over the weekend, and Monday at noon I must be in Calais. It’s, my grandmother’s eighty-first birthday.”

“What do you have to do in Paris this weekend that can’t wait?”

Vera just looked at him.

“Well, what?” he said.

“What if I told you I had a boyfriend?”

“Do beautiful residents with boyfriends sneak out of town to pick up new lovers? Is that the medical world in Paris?”

“I didn’t ‘pick you up’!” Vera stood back, indignant. Trouble was, a little smile escaped from the corner of her mouth. He saw it and she knew he saw it.

“Is there an airport in Calais?” he asked.

“Why?” she pushed back.

“It’s an easy question.” He smiled. “Yes, there is an airport in Calais. No, there isn’t an airport in Calais.”

Vera’s eyes shimmered in the moonlight. A light wind off the lake lifted her hair.

“I’m not sure—”

“But there is an airport in Paris.”

“Two.”

“Then on Monday morning you can fly to Paris and take the train to Calais.” If she wanted him to do this, make him work for her, he was.

“What would I do here until Monday morning?” This time her smile was a little broader. But, yes, she was making him work for her.

“For a man to get a woman into his bed, the decision must be hers,” he said quietly, and once again held up the key to his room. Vera’s eyes came up to his and held there. And as they did, her fingers reached up and slowly encircled the key.