outside, only she was moving too slow, so I took her elbow and walked her through the crowd. ‘Not so fast,’ she said, trying to pull back. ‘Adèle…’
My pulse quickened once we made it across the street, remembering the excited moments it took for me to paint it, moving closer and closer, until the next thing I knew we were feet from the wall. I let go of her arm as much as she pulled away. My own painting had taken my breath away. I was speechless and proud—yet I dare not even smile about it.
Charlotte stood quietly staring at the image before reaching out to touch the wall where some of the paint was still wet. She looked confused and distraught feeling the paint between her fingers. Some others stood stupefied as if in a dream, before backing up to the kerb, not wanting to be too close to it. Whispers of ‘Catchfly’ fluttered over the crowd.
‘Catchfly? Is that what they’re saying?’ She never looked at me but asked those around us, tapping shoulders. ‘Catchfly the weed?’
An ageing man with his wife by his side leaned in. ‘It’s signed Catchfly,’ he said. ‘That must be who painted it.’ The pair smiled to themselves and then put their arms around each other as if they were looking at a piece of art hanging in a museum. ‘It’s very bold,’ he said. ‘Brave.’ He elbowed Charlotte, but she grimaced as if his touch hurt her like a poking finger.
‘This is not art.’ She wiped the paint from her fingers with a hanky she pulled from her pocket, and then folded her arms over the top of her tiny baby bump. ‘This is a disgrace.’ Her chin quivered. ‘Disgusting as the words painted above it.’
Men took off their hats while women prayed openly for the members of the Résistance. Charlotte grew increasingly upset by the second, and pale, her skin looking pasty and white. A truck sped up to the station and lurched to a stop, spraying bits of rubble into the crowd. A handful of Milice jumped from the back, aiming their rifles at the wall as if it were alive. They looked over the crowd, yelling into people’s faces to back up.
People scattered like flies when they aimed their guns into the crowd. I reached for Charlotte’s coat sleeve, but she’d waddled off ahead of me, holding her belly up from the bottom. ‘Wait!’ A stream of watery blood coursed down her leg, and I slipped in a small puddle of it left on the ground where she had stood. I gasped, taking only a quick moment to look at it before chasing after her. ‘Charlotte!’
She ran into her boutique and flipped the closed sign over in the window. I tuned the knob over and over again, bumping my shoulder into the door asking her to open it, but she had locked it up good.
Papa flew out of his wine bar when he realized something was wrong, looking somewhat upset. ‘What’s the matter?’ he said as my painting unveiled itself from the fleeing crowd. ‘Is it the picture?’ Papa tried turning the knob himself, mumbling under his breath, ‘Damn Résistance—upsetting everyone.’
‘Papa—’ A little boy hopped through Charlotte’s blood trail, stamping his feet on the cobblestones, giggling, as his mother shielded his eyes from the painting. ‘It’s not the Résistance,’ I said.
‘No?’ Papa let go of the knob and then smiled to himself after scratching his head. ‘Women! Reminds me of your mother when she was expecting.’ Papa motioned for me to follow him into his wine bar. ‘Come now, ma chérie. You know if Charlotte doesn’t want to open up, she won’t. You’ll have to wait.’
I shook my head, looking at Charlotte’s door, and then to Papa’s as he’d led me inside. Unsure what else to do, I sat down at a small table next to the window, waiting for Charlotte to come out of her boutique next door, my stomach twisting into a knot.
Papa reached for two glasses and a bottle of wine. ‘Papa,’ I said, swallowing. ‘It’s morning.’
‘Wine comes from the heavens,’ he said. ‘Morning, evening. Doesn’t matter. It always comes.’ He turned the bottle around so I could see the label. Mama had at least three of the same bottles in the root cellar, his best year. ‘Last one I have of these. Let’s savour it together.’ A sweet smile rested on his lips as he sat down and handed me a glass, but I felt dizzy