Chapter twenty
By mid-morning, Friday, Darcy felt as if her eyelids were sagging down somewhere near her chin and thought she could do a fair job as a walk-on zombie in a Disney movie, should Disney require one today that was. These random thoughts sifted through her tired brain as she waited in the queue with an over-excited Connor to board the Space Mountain ride. Connor had already ridden once with Gabriel and had been adamant that his mother experience the ‘radically awesome’ ride with him as well. Darcy wasn’t feeling assured…as the queue shortened and the ride drew inexorably nearer she couldn’t help wishing she’d been disqualified to board, as Rosie had, on the basis of being too small. Unfortunately, she had more than met the height requirement.
The sight of other riders being launched upwards in pods inside a sort of oversized steam punk cannon contraption was nerve wracking and she had wondered if it wasn’t too late to back out. Connor, sensing this possibility had held on tightly to her hand from the onset and dragged her forward into the queue.
Darcy envied Rosie, who had been mollified on missing the first go by Darcy taking her on the near-by Orbitron’s flying rockets. More sedate and more to her taste, she thought. To allow Darcy a turn on Space Mountain, Gabriel had taken Rosie off for a session of driving the little cars on the roads of Autopia.
“C’mon Mom, they’re waving us on,” Connor’s voice broke through her ruminations; it was their turn to board the 2x2 seater pod. As the shoulder restraints were lowered Darcy took a deep breath and hoped she would live through the next five minutes. After all, it was a ride designed for kids. How bad could it be?
“I am NEVER doing that again! Why didn’t one of you warn me how bad it’d be?” Ten minutes later Darcy was still waiting for her heart rate to drop below one hundred a minute and her knees to stop shaking. They were sitting on a park bench close to the ride’s exit.
“You do look a bit green Mom,” commiserated Connor gleefully.
“You’re not going to faint on us are you?” added Gabriel’s voice from somewhere above her head. “Do you need to put your head down between your legs?”
“What? And kiss my ass goodbye,” Darcy groaned, “It’s a little late for that. I feel like I have already.” She put a hand on her heart, “How did I ever get talked into going on that nightmare of a ride?” She had hated it from start to finish. From the first adrenaline-pumping moment to the last; being thrown around in the dark, disoriented by the brightly coloured pulsing laser lights and never knowing which direction her body was going to be projected in next was not her idea of a fun time. She’d grown up with the roller coasters of Opryland and Dollywood and thought she was good with this adrenaline stuff but that ride had taken her into a whole other galaxy of fear.
“I vote we move on to another ‘land’. Something with quieter rides that are more suited for Rosie.” She glanced at the map she held, “How about Fantasyland -I hear the Mad Hatter’s tea-cup ride is good?”
“Nah, that’s for babies, we can do that later after we’ve done the cool stuff,” Rosie’s voice broke in, “I didn’t get to go on Space Mountain so I get to choose next and I want to go on the Star Tours ride.”
“Mademoiselle has decided,” Gabriel gave Darcy’s back a reassuring rub. “I’m sure you will like this one much better,” he spoke glibly.
Darcy returned his facile patter with a steely-eyed stare before turning to Rosie, “lead on Princess Leia –and you’d better be right.”
“Ne t'inquiètes pas, Don’t worry -The force will be with you this time,” Gabriel’s voice whispered encouragingly in her ear as they moved towards the next rides’ entrance.
Standing at the window with a glass of red wine in her hand and looking out over the lights of the Place des Vosges Darcy mused on the day. Space Mountain had, if nothing else, woken her up from her sleep-deprived stupor, enabling her to enjoy the multitudes of rides and entertainment on offer throughout the rest of the day. They’d stayed right up ‘til closing, fitting in as many rides as they could and going back for seconds on their favourites. That had been Phantom manor, the haunted mansion in Frontierland for Rosie and the Indiana Jones and the Temple of Doom –well, Temple de Péril here in France-, roller coaster in Adventureland for Connor. Once she’d regained her equilibrium after the Space Mountain debacle Darcy had been pleased to find that Star Tours was fun and that she hadn’t been put off the exhilaration of gut-churning rides for life.
There’d been a scary few minutes with Rosie, later in the afternoon, when her daughter had discovered, somewhat belatedly -like her mother-, as they were moving off from the embarkation platform of the Thunder Mountain roller coaster –a mocked up train that was deemed more suitable for younger children- that she absolutely didn’t like the rolling motion of the cars at speed. Darcy had been mortified to see Rosie genuinely terrified for the first time in her short life but the die was cast and there was little she could do but hold onto her tightly and tell her it would be all over soon. The excited screams of their fellow passengers had done nothing to help the situation and Rosie had shut her eyes and not even peeked until the cars were slowing for disembarking. Blessedly, the trauma had all been promptly forgotten after a toffee apple, cokes all round and the timely discovery of the haunted mansion. Amazing what a ghostly bride and a few singing severed heads could do for a frightened little girl, Darcy thought, shaking her own head.
She was thankful –she’d been envisioning long counselling sessions with a child psychologist in the future and a permanent black mark against her record as a good mother. She mused that some of her guilt might have been due to the fact that under different circumstances, she would have loved to have taken the roller coaster ride by herself –it had been just the right mix of thrilling fun and cowboy kitsch that was the hallmark of a classic Disneyland ride.
There was just no accounting for children’s tastes, she thought, wryly as she sipped at the rich silky burgundy. Connor had been quite freaked out by the house and hadn’t wanted a second visit and yet he adored the roller coasters. He and Darcy had managed half a dozen goes on the Indy ride near the end of the day when the crowds had thinned out and the queues had all but disappeared, while Gabriel and Rosie paid a return visit to the haunted house. Darcy liked to think that the multiple two minute rides on the twisting roller coaster had gone some way to redeeming her in the eyes of her son after her freak-out at Space Mountain.
Darcy heard the door to the room open. She turned towards the sound. It was Gabriel, returning from parking his SUV in a nearby parking building. As they had driven into Paris he had commented that no self-respecting car owner who cared anything for their vehicle would leave it out on a Parisian street.
He’d been amused, earlier in the day when he and Rosie had been ‘driving’ –with Rosie doing a very able job at the wheel- around the Autopia roads that there’d been a sign cautioning participants not to bump one another. As it was a well-known Paris practice to bump-park, where the cars in front and to the rear of a park were less-than-gently nudged to make space for another car, he found it quite ironic to be told to ‘Ne pas tamponner’ at Disneyland Paris. Rosie, who had yet to read French had happily banged into a couple of other cars motoring slower than she wanted to travel until Gabriel had told her that the park staff might take her licence away should she do it again.
Darcy had replied that they were quite familiar with the bump-parking method of car parking in London as well and that perhaps the Chunnel was to blame for the disorder spreading from France to the UK. Gabriel had guffawed and retorted that it was quite typical of the English to accuse the French for just about anything that went wrong in England. He wasn’t buying it.
As he closed the door, he dropped his keys with negligent familiarity into an antique Meissen bowl sitting on a magnificent Neoclassical French walnut credenza just inside the door and picked up the bottle of wine to pour himself a generous glass. Tipping the bottle towards Darcy he raised a questioning eyebrow as to whether
she required her glass refilling.
“No thank you,” she replied tartly, “I’m watching my alcohol intake around you. I don’t think either of us wants a replay of Monday evening.”
“Oh, I don’t know, I found it quite-,” he paused, reminiscing, “informative –and just a tiny bit amusing to see what kind of drunk you were.”
“I was not drunk!” she protested hotly.
“You may not have actually consumed a great quantity of alcohol but you were certainly well on your way to being ‘in your cups’ as you English-speakers say.”
“Hmphf,” she couldn’t disagree so she sat sipping her wine on what she knew to be another antique –a Louis XVI settee. It looked like the real deal and judging by the rest of the furnishings tastefully arranged in the room … salon, she self-corrected, she had no reason to assume otherwise. There were just enough contemporary pieces among the antiques, like the Mondrian painting on the wall that she was certain was an original and two Philippe Starck Miss Lacy chairs, to stop the generous space from looking like the set from a French historical drama.
When Gabriel had commented on their late return to the Disneyland car park that they were all too exhausted to travel back to Belagnac and then suggested that they might as well make a weekend of it in Paris by staying at his apartment, Darcy had, eyeing her pair of drooping half-asleep children and feeling completely drained of energy herself, agreed. Gabriel had called Bertrand to make provision for Frodo and the kitten and they had piled into his SUV to make the shorter drive into central Paris. Darcy had not expected said apartment to be a five-bedroomed showplace on Place des Vosges, arguably the most chic residential square in Paris, but in hindsight she realised, she should not have been surprised. Most of the time, Gabriel was so unpretentious that it was easy to forget just where Forbes magazine had placed him on their most recent rich-list.
“While I remember and before I get annoyed at you for anything else,” she thought it safer to change the subject, “thank you for wonderful day. The children had a terrific time.”
“You are more than welcome,” he replied, “I think the days ‘cultural and historical enlightenment’ went off quite well, with the exception of one or two rides that none of us will mention in the hope that they will be forgotten by a certain little girl and her Maman.”
“Quoi?” Darcy queried, raising an eyebrow and practising her French at a level she could handle. “What do you mean ‘cultural enlightenment’?”
“Well, let’s put it this way. It may be worthwhile for us to pop into the Louvre or the Natural History museum for a petit visit just in case either of the children’s schools should ask about what they have seen on their day off.”
“Oh, liar, liar, pants on fire! You said you would sort them about the day off.”
“And I did. It’s just that in the interests of diplomacy and face-saving for the schools concerned I may have toyed with the truth a little as to exactly what we were planning on doing on the precise day in question.”
“Don’t want to know. Don’t care,” Darcy covered her eyes, her ears then her mouth with her hands in quick succession. “We had a great day and I’m prepared to leave it at that.”
“De rien. So -tomorrow? Louvre or Natural History museum?”
“Either. Dealer’s choice,” she replied. “The children will equally happily spend time with both atrophied mummies and fossilised dinosaurs so I don’t mind which it is. If you’re sure you can spare the time, that is. I thought you had a global business empire to run?”
“Ne t'en fais pas. No worries. You’ll be helping me out –if I don’t take some time off, who knows what my mother might do? I don’t want her to have to send more old furniture. Besides, I have COO’s, CFO’s, CTO’s and all sorts of TLA’s who are more than qualified to run the empire for a short time without me checking in at five-minute intervals.” If they didn’t, he thought sternly, they’d all be out on their ear and looking for new jobs in the next financial quarter.