She just wanted to finish. To actually achieve something.
‘Come. On. You. Stubborn. Bastard,’ she hissed, opening and closing the shears against the resistant stem with each coughed out word.
Then, suddenly, she heard laughter.
Slowly turning, she saw a man standing behind the wall, looking down at her as she waged war on the stubborn tendril. She felt her face get hot, and stood up, brushing bits of bark and grass and weed and plant from her jeans.
Why, when anything was going wrong in her life, did she have to endure the additional shame of being laughed at by a random stranger?
For once, at least, it wasn’t Frédérique.
The man was tall, with dark brown eyes and brown hair that sprung from his head in curls. He was casually dressed in khaki trousers and a jumper. As she rose, enough to see over the small wall, she realised he was holding a lead, which led to a small, brown dog that was sniffing the lower half of the wall and depositing little drops of pee while it waited patiently for its owner.
She glared at the man, affronted that this stranger could literally stand and laugh at someone he’d never met, when she was clearly having a terrible time trying to tame this beast of a garden. ‘Qu’est-ce que c’est?’ she asked, haughtily. What is it?
Rather than looking abashed, he grinned widely, clearly finding her French, or her accent, or something else about her, highly amusing. She felt her nostrils flare. ‘Vous riez!’ she said. ‘Pourquoi?’ Why are you laughing?’ She longed, suddenly, to be in England – speaking her native language. Then she’d know how to be cutting, yet non-aggressive, to make it clear that she was angry, without resorting to name-calling or violence. She would be able to send him on his way chastised but not angry or insulted.
Here, she was left with no choice but to ask him why he was laughing.
‘You are Lily, yes?’ he asked. ‘I am Claude, a friend of Frédérique.’
‘Oh,’ she said, feeling less inclined to be angry. ‘Hello.’
‘I am sorry to laugh like thees. But to see you curse at that plant, it – how you say? – tickles me.’
‘Yes, well,’ she said, still not feeling entirely Zen. ‘It’s hard work.’
He laughed again. ‘Yes, it iz le hard work with a pair of ciseaux, er – how you say? – skissers.’
‘Scissors?’
‘Yes.’
‘These are gardening shears.’
‘Yes, they are shears, cisailles de jardinage, I see that. And per’aps in your English gardens, they are the right solution, yes? But ’ere in Limousin, they are no better than ciseaux. Things in Limousin, they grow, oui? They are tough, like the Limousin men.’ He gave her a wink and flexed an admittedly sturdy bicep – she wasn’t sure whether he was making a joke or starting to flirt.
‘Oh,’ she said, looking at the small space she’d hacked into the weeds over the course of an hour. She suddenly felt completely exhausted. ‘It’s just,’ she said, ‘my friend is coming and I want it to look…’ She felt tears prick in her eyes and blinked them away. What was it with all this crying recently? She was tired, that was all.
‘I do not mean to be cruel, eh!’ Claude continued, his brow furrowed with concern. ‘I – how you say – I would like to ’elp you, if you want?’
‘No, it’s OK,’ she said stubbornly. ‘I’ll manage.’
He laughed. ‘Madame,’ he said, ‘you can curse at ces plantes all you wish, but I am afraid they do not speak English!’
She looked at him, aiming for a glare, but found that when their eyes met, she smiled instead – a reluctant smile, the sort a child uses when he’s determined to stay cross, but can’t quite manage it. ‘Well, what would you suggest?’ she said. ‘And it’s Lily,’ she added, a little annoyed that he’d gone straight for the Madame. It made her feel ancient. Then again, playing the Mademoiselle card would have embarrassed them both.
‘Sorry, I no understand “suggest”? You want to know what would I do?’ he queried.
‘Yes, what would you do, Claude?’
He grinned. ‘I can come later, if you like. I ’ave a tractor. I am – how you say? – un agriculteur, a… a…’
‘A farmer?’
‘Yes, a farming. I can come wiv my tracteur if you want. Frédérique, ’e tell me you might need some ’elp and ’e waz not wrong, uh?’