Meeting Dalia: A short tale

We got into a nasty quarrel the first time we met.

She had walked into the café, with filthy shoes and filthier trench coat, and sat at the table of one of my regulars. From my spot behind the cashier, I fought down the urge to shoo her. I didn’t want her to scare away my other customers.

“Mademoiselle, cette table est réservée.” I raised an eyebrow when she continued shedding the layers of clothing she had on. I scrunched up my nose and pulled away; she smelt of gasoline and sweat. “Mademoiselle, vous m’avez entendu? Ce tableau est — ”

“I don’t see any sign on this table.” She settled her trench and jacket on the chair beside her. “And no sign means the table is up for grabs.” She finally looked up at me. “I’ll have a coffee with a little bit of milk.” She peered behind me. “Oh, and maybe a basket of croissants.”

Relax, I thought, there are other customers here. I reminded myself that Monsieur Barton, a 70-year-old university professor and one of my favorite regulars, had been sitting at the table by the window; I had to stay calm. but her rudeness and horrible odor made it impossible for me to smile my salesperson smile and scurry away to prepare her order.

I pointed at the small vase with the single yellow tulip in the middle of the table. “C’est le signe de reservation. And like I said, this table is reserved. You can sit at that one. ” I pointed at another table.

“You mean that table outside? It’s cold out and I’m comfortable here.” She raised her brows.

I knew Madame Fillon, the lady who usually occupied this table, wouldn’t stop by at all; she had gone to Chartres to visit her cousin. But something about this woman and her sense of authority challenged me.

“You understand English right?” She bit out. “One…coffee…with a pinch of milk and…a basket of croissants.” She emphasized each word, as if I were an idiot.

I leaned down and whispered, not so quietly, in her ear. “You smell like a factory. Other customers have the right not to be suffocated.”

Months later, when we laid side by side on my small futon, she told me that she had wanted to punch me in the face that day. “But to be honest, I didn’t want to bruise your pretty nose.”

She hadn’t put up a fight. She’d looked around the café, avoiding the stares of other customers, and had collected her dirty stuff one by one. Surely she’d leave, I thought; she wouldn’t lounge at a place that had humiliated her like that.

I had gone to the small kitchen at the back, and when I emerged, I saw her sitting at the small wobbly table outside. She had put her layers back on and had wrapped a shabby scarf around her neck; she even had a dark green trapper hat on. I prepared her order with a frustrated sigh.

“Une noisette et des croissants.” I put the tray in front of her and hurried inside.

I stood beside Monsieur Barton’s table and asked him if he needed anything else. He shook his head curtly without looking at me. I knew him well enough to know that he was mad at me. To him, good manners stood above anything else. He was one of those petite old men who wore formal attire with polished shoes and went out for a 30-minute walk every day. He’d been a regular at the café long before I had started working here. He was the first person that welcomed me into the neighbourhood; the only person who showed an ounce of interest in getting to know me. He even knew my birthday and gave me a bouquet of yellow tulips as a gift, and since then , I always tried to decorate the round wooden tables with yellow tulips as a tribute to his kindness. Monsieur Barton had become a friend, a confidant and I felt ashamed for letting him down.

I went behind the counter and busied myself with wiping the floor that didn’t need wiping. I observed the woman through the window. She sipped on the coffee, and I saw how her hands shook. It hadn’t snowed for the past two days, and the bitter cold could freeze a person’s bones. Why had I asked her to sit outside? So, what if she smelt? I had been in places that smelt so much worst; been around people who reeked of their own filth.

I tidied the table by the wall and made a fresh cup of noisette.

“Come in.” I beckoned to her from the entrance. “I’ll bring you a blanket.” I felt Monsieur Barton’s eyes on me.

She settled down and wrapped both hands around the steaming coffee cup. I stared at her bony fingers with short, chubby nails and grimaced at the obvious pink hue on her skin. Why had I been so cruel?

Then she looked up and smiled at me and for a moment, I couldn’t look away.

Meeting Dalia was the only good thing that happened to me in the winter of 1939; the only good thing that happened to me, ever, really.

Because when the war came and the Nazis took control of Paris in June of 1940, I had already been summoned to gather information for them.

I had already been neck-deep in the filth of my own cowardice.

Notes: This little scene is from my upcoming novel, “Fleeting Uncertainties”.