“Uh…morbid much?” I say.
“Morbid but true.”
Touché.
I glance at the electronic countdown board. The next train leaves in six minutes.
“We have to call her first,” I say, pulling up the photo of Grandma Joan’s note. I dial the number and hand it to him.
A moment later, I hear someone pick up. Louis winks at me. “Bonjour, Madame,” he starts. Obviously that’s not all he says, but I only follow little snippets of the conversation in French. “Mia Jenrow…Train. Aujourd’hui. Merci beaucoup.”
When he hangs up, Louis has the most mischievous grin on his face. “She can’t wait to meet you.”
* * *
We get off the train an hour later, and two elderly ladies are waiting for us at the station. I recognize them from Grandma’s pictures. The older one is obviously my great-great-aunt Vivienne, who does indeed look pretty great for her early nineties.
She lights up when she sees me. “Tu dois être Mia!” You must be Mia!
She gives me la bise, then wipes what I assume is a lipstick stain off my cheek. She continues speaking in French, and I glance at Louis, desperate.
He starts translating right away. “She says that you look exactly like your grandmother.”
“C’est vrai!” I say extra-enthusiastically. It’s true!
The other woman is her eldest daughter, Madeleine. Since Vivienne is my grandmother’s aunt—my great-grandmother’s sister—I’m pretty sure that means Madeleine and I are cousins a few times removed. I should have asked Grandma to run me through the family tree one more time before I left.
Madeleine has very short, bright red hair, and wears wide-legged pants with a white tunic. She looks about the same age as Grandma Joan. I’d guess late sixties. She also speaks some English, which makes me feel better right away.
“Maman was, uh, very happy…when your petit copain, uh, boyfriend, called,” Madeleine tells me over her shoulder as we get into her car and she starts driving. She pauses every few words, searching for the right ones. I can’t imagine she gets to practice her English all that often. She speaks again before I have time to correct her. Sorry, I mouth to Louis about the whole boyfriend misunderstanding, but he just smiles back. “Maman doesn’t drive anymore, but I live nearby, so I visit her often.”
“Thank you, Madeleine. It’s so nice to meet you.” Then I lean forward to my great-great-aunt. “Vivienne…Grandma Joan is going to be very happy to know I came here.” Louis translates for me, and Vivienne responds with a big grin.
We pass villages and fields where cows happily graze, before Madeleine parks the car on the side of a little square, by a row of stone houses. On the other side of it, and I swear this is true, is the entrance to a castle, or as the French say, chateau. The building itself is at the end of a long, tree-lined alleyway and is about the size of ten houses put together.
Vivienne catches me staring and says something I don’t understand.
Louis explains. “She said: ‘The owners are lovely, but we almost never see them. It would be nice to know what it looks like inside, wouldn’t it?’？”
I let out a sigh of relief. I’d think Grandma Joan would have told me if we were descendants of French royalty. Instead, Aunt Vivienne and Madeleine take us inside one of the cozy houses on the square. A tiled corridor goes straight through the whole length of the house, with small, dark doors on either side. There are plants and framed photographs everywhere, and a staircase going to the second floor. I take a peek at the photos as we walk by, but they all seem like your typical family portraits. No tutu in sight.
Aunt Vivienne leads Louis and me to a veranda, and then outside to a walled garden. The three of us sit under a wide, leafy tree, sheltered from the bright afternoon sun.
“I thought Joan would have taught you French,” my great-great-aunt says through Louis.
“She did, when I was younger. But then my parents insisted I take Spanish in school.”
Louis repeats my words in French. Vivienne nods, somewhat disappointed. Right now I feel the same, and wish I’d worked harder to learn the language.
“Spanish is very useful, too,” Madeleine says, bringing over a jug of orange juice and a plate of biscuits from the kitchen. The word beurre is stamped on them, just in case you can’t tell from their golden color that they’re full of butter.
“Maman is very proud that you’re dancing at the Institut de l’Opéra de Paris,” Madeleine says to me.