Thunder, right on cue. Was that real? Everyone looks up-except for the actors, who ignore the low rumble and the first drops of rain.
A few of the technicians look at Pascale, who gestures with her hand: Keep going, keep going.
The man sits on the edge of the bed. The girl curls toward him. Dana stops and watches them. Her face shows confusion, then pain.
The man takes the girl in his arms and lies down next to her. It seems as if the girl is a half second from orgasm already. Her body is writhing, her low moan is rising. Jeremy thinks she should be pulled from the movie-she is overacting. She belongs in a porn film, not in a serious film of Dana’s!
The man strokes the girl’s body, petting her as if she is, in fact, his cat. She purrs. Oh, God, stop! Jeremy wants to scream. What is this?
Then Dana circles the bed, watching them. Her expression changes-is she enjoying this? Jeremy hopes that someone will let him in on the joke. Has Pascale made her first comedy?
Dana sits at the edge of the bed. She reaches out her hand and lets it rest on the man’s hip. He’s facing away from her, covering the girl with his caresses. He doesn’t seem to notice Dana.
It’s a fantasy, Jeremy decides. The bed, the naked lovers, the distraught woman. She’s imagining this. And in a rare moment of poor cinematic taste, Pascale has brought the fantasy to life. On a bridge in the middle of the Seine.
Spare me, Jeremy thinks.
He turns to Chantal. He’ll shake his head, show her his disgust. But she doesn’t take her eyes from the scene in front of her.
The rain gathers force. No one moves. A red umbrella appears above Pascale’s head. The crowd along the Seine leans forward over the barricades and peers-what can they see? Jeremy wonders. Do they see the man’s cock, the girl’s shaved vagina? Do they see Dana’s look of desire? What does she desire? The man? The girl? He wants to scream “Arrête!”
And then-thank God!-Pascale yells, “Cut!” and calls, “Bravo!” The crowd applauds, as if they were at the ballet and the performance was exquisite. Jeremy can’t imagine what everyone is so goddamn pleased about. He’s the only one not cheering.
“It’s art,” Chantal says, almost breathlessly.
“What?” Jeremy barks.
Chantal looks at him, surprised.
“That was beautiful. She has the most expressive face.”
Jeremy feels like a prude. Maybe everyone was looking at his wife’s face when all he could see was a penis and a vagina.
Dana walks over to them, grabs Jeremy’s arm, and calls, “Follow me!”
She wraps one hand around Jeremy’s elbow and the other around Chantal’s arm. She maneuvers them toward her tent at the far end of the bridge. Only then does Jeremy realize that the skies have opened and the rain is pounding on them.
“Lindy!” he shouts. He feels a sudden panic, as if she has disappeared in the middle of this chaos.
“I’ll be there in a minute!” Lindy calls back.
Jeremy turns-she is right behind them and then she turns toward a young man with a clipboard and begins talking to him in French.
“Let’s get out of all this!” Dana shouts.
“All this” is the storm, the relentless grumble of thunder, the clatter of rain on the iron bridge, the movie people herding equipment in every direction. And Pascale is braying over the loudspeaker. Jeremy can’t understand a word she says.
Dana’s assistant opens the flap of the tent as if she’s been waiting all day to save her boss from the rain, and Dana shouts, “You’re a love!” as they rush through-first Dana, then Chantal, then Jeremy. The assistant follows them and leads Dana behind a screen, where she helps her out of her wet clothes. Jeremy knows the young woman-she’s been with Dana for a couple of years now. He likes her more than most, because this is all she wants-not her boss’s job, just this: to make her boss’s job a little easier. She’s a simple girl, and there aren’t many of those in the movie industry.
“Don’t say a word,” Dana says from behind the screen. “I know what you’re thinking. I know you’re horrified.”
“You’re horrified?” Chantal asks Jeremy.
“He’s horrified. I warned him. But still-I wanted you to come. Wait. Let me dry my hair. Go on, Elizabeth. Would you get them hot tea? I can do the rest.”
Elizabeth emerges from behind the screen. She hurries to a makeshift kitchen: hot pot, small fridge, all set up for a few hours’ shoot on a bridge in the middle of the Seine. Jeremy is still amazed by what the film industry can pull off-not only on the screen, but for the working lives of its stars.
“Is it the nudity?” Chantal asks Jeremy quietly. Does she not want Dana to hear? No, she is encouraging me to speak, Jeremy thinks. She knows that in a moment Dana might answer for me.
And oddly, he wishes Dana would answer for him. He doesn’t quite know why he’s so upset. It’s not the nudity-it’s the absurdity of the scene. It’s something else: It’s Dana.
“You would not do that,” Jeremy says to Dana as she steps from behind the screen, wrapped in a plush robe, a towel turban around her wet hair.
“What would I not do?” Dana asks.
“You would not sit there and watch them.”
“You don’t know my character,” she says simply.
“No one would watch them.”
“It’s a fantasy.”
“But it’s a playing-out of someone’s inner desires. To watch her husband and his lover? That’s absurd.”
“What would I do?” Dana asks.
“I don’t know,” Jeremy says quickly. “I guess-you’re right-I don’t know your character in this film.”
“What is she like, the role you play?” Chantal asks. She leans forward, eagerly taking it all in. For a moment, Jeremy had forgotten about her. They have switched to English. Chantal speaks perfect English! She has an American accent! Again, everything shifts in the kaleidoscope that is this young woman. I know nothing about her, Jeremy realizes. And I thought I-he stops his own thought. What did he think? That he wanted to sleep with her? That he wanted to love her? It seems ridiculous to him now. He’s as foolish as the man swinging his dick on the set.
Dana takes a teacup from her assistant and sips at it. “I play a wealthy American woman who has come to Paris with her husband. She shops while the husband has his business meetings. But at some point during the day she finds him strolling through the park with a young girl-”
“Who wrote this film?” Jeremy asks, interrupting her. His heartbeat is fast, his palms are damp. It’s clammy in this tent and the rain beats heavily on the canvas, creating a kind of hum like a beehive nearby.
“Claude,” Dana says. “The young man you met at dinner.”
“He’s a kid,” Jeremy snorts.
“A very bright kid.”
“What does he know about love?”
“You’re so funny, darling,” Dana says.
Jeremy looks at her, surprised.
She is smiling at him, her wide, gracious smile. She reaches out and touches his arm. “Not everyone knows love like we do.”
Jeremy is lost. He can’t find any words-in any language. His mind churns and comes up with nothing.
And then the flap of the tent flies open and Lindy dashes in, laughing.
“Oh my God, that was wild! Wild! How did that happen? I mean, the storm in the middle of the scene! It was like you planned it that way.” She shakes her body like a wet dog and water flies everywhere. She is radiant-the shine of her scalp seems to light up her face.
“And that girl on the bed,” Jeremy says. “That was pornography.”
“You’re still here,” Lindy says, staring at Chantal.
“Lindy-” Jeremy says.
Chantal stands. “I must go.”
“No,” Dana says. “She’s being rude. You’re my guest now. Please stay.”
Chantal looks at Jeremy. He nods. “No reason to leave,” he says weakly.