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"I grew up here."

"Are we French? We're from Canada? So we're French?"

She pulled her lips in, lowered her voice. "My mother came here from a small town right outside of Paris when she was a child. She was from Yerres, France. Left there, went to Paris for a while, worked, saved her money, came here alone. Will tell you all about her one day."

"So we are French."

"My father died... and Mother... her new husband... I had to leave. She took his word over mine. I was young. And I had to leave. Had to get out in the world and make it on my own."

"He was mean to you?"

"He did things he should not have done. Same for another family member."

"What did they do."

"Not now. One day. We'll talk about those horrible things one day. I told Margaret about all the bad things that happened to me. She was the only one I ever told. And I will tell you one day."

"Who is Margaret?"

"My best friend. My best friend in the whole wide world."

"Where is she now?"

"Heaven."

She wiped her eyes, created a smile. "You're starting to smell. Need to get you into a toilet and wash you down. Maybe we can sneak you into one of the malls." "When are we going to get a house?"

"I always wanted a house. Mama doesn't have the money. We'll get an apartment." "When?"

"Working on a place to stay now. But I want to make sure no one is looking for us before I get us a place. And I have to find a way to get a place to live without using my name."

My words put stress lines on her face. Saw the fear and the pressure she was masking even when she smiled. What she had told me, I didn't understand all of that, but I nodded. A man came over to her. He was monstrously large, looked like he weighed tons.

"Suces-moi?"

"Oui. For fifty."

She tucked the .22 inside my jacket, told me to wait where I was.

Nervous, I stood up. A stranger in a strange land. A child in an adult's world.

She snapped at me, said, "Don't be afraid. Be a man. Don't be afraid."

She kissed my face and smiled at me.

I sat back down. My hands shaking.

She left with that huge man. A man the size of a basking shark.

I hated the way I felt. The sensation of being powerless. The sensation of being alone.

Seemed like she was gone two years, but she came back thirty minutes later.

I ran to her.

She handed me an ice cream cone. Vanilla. Hers was praline pecan.

I asked, "What does suces-moi mean?"

Her shoulders weakened. She frowned and walked away.

She said, "That is not the French you need to learn."

"What French do I need to learn?"

"I will teach you. The things you said, never repeat them. Never."

We gathered our things.

I followed her, vanilla ice cream dripping down over my fingers.

We passed other people living in the streets. One man had a family of dogs with him, him and his mutts living in a small parklike area. We walked until we passed a metro station, than came up on a larger park. We squatted there with other squatters.

She said, "I have having to do this, having to hide with the bums. But I love you and I don't want them to find out what happened. They'd ask a lot of questions. And they'd take you away from me. You are all I have. All I love. My best friend is dead. She's been dead for a long time. You are all I have. You are all I love. Would you want them to take you away from me?"

I shook my head. Part of me wanted to shed tears. But men didn't cry.

She said, "I'll find us a decent place, a room with four walls and a bathtub."

She had to have enough cash. Credit cards left an electronic trail. It wasn't the cash that slowed us down. She needed a fake ID. She had to start all over with a new identity.

Another man came up. "Suces-moi?"

"Oui. For fifty."

"Forty. I'm a college student."

He turned to walk away.

"Wait. College boy."

"Forty."

"Oui. This time. Forty for the handsome college boy."

She left with him, licking her praline pecan.

Gun hidden, our possessions at my feet, I sat down and finished my ice cream cone.

Two weeks later she found us a room.

That hostel was on the edges of downtown at Sherbrooke and Jeanne-Mance. We were about three blocks from Sainte-Catherine, on the line that divided the moneyed areas from the red-light district. We lived on the border of her dreams and her reality.

It was nice at first. It was normal.

As normal as life could be for people like us.

During the day, when the weather was nice, we walked Rene-Levesque and took the side streets toward the cobblestone roads in Old Montreal, went by the waters. On weekends my mother took me to see the basilica, or we went to the observation area in Parc du Mont-Royal, watched the Rollerbladers. We blended in with the crowd and watched all the street performers, one dressed like a golden Elvis, others doing henna, took all of that in while I ate ice cream and she sipped on a coffee she'd bought at Second Cup.

That was August. Temperature about twenty-five Celsius. Some days we just sat on a stoop watching people get on and off the bus. I had comic books that she bought from Librairie Astro. Spider-Man. Punisher. Batman. She had a stack of paperback books she bought from the same bookstore. Romance books. She always read romance books. She always had a cheep cigarette case in hand, smoking du Mauriers down to the filter, then flipping those long filters out on the pavement. We'd been there a few weeks. Long enough to get comfortable.

As she read her book, she puffed her cigarette and said, "Dimanche. Lundi. Mardi."

I read my comic and repeated, "Dimanche. Lundi. Mardi."

"Mecredi. Jeudi. Vendredi. Samedi."

I repeated, "Mecredi. Jeudi. Vendredi. Samedi."

"Those are the days of the week. We'll work on the months tomorrow."

"How do you know all of these languages?"

"Been on the move most of my life. Never really had a home, I guess."

She inhaled, wiped tears from her eyes, then created a broad smile.

"We have to find you a new name."

"Jean-Claude. I like Jean-Claude."

"I like Jean-Claude too. Who should I be?"

"Catherine. Like the street we were on."

"Okay, Jean-Claude. My name is Catherine."

She smiled, leaned over, and kissed me on the lips.

An African man stopped in front of the stoop.

"Tu suces sans capote?"

"If you have a place, it can be arranged."

"How much?"

"Pour cinquantes piasses. "

She left with that man, went across the street, vanished inside a worn hotel.

I sat there repeating, "Dimanche. Lundi. Mardi. Mecredi. Jeudi. Vendredi. Samedi. "

We bounced from our hostel to renting a small room at Hotel Du Fort

Not long after that, the money was better and we slowed down, moved into L'Appartement, a hotel-apartment in the same area of Montreal, at the crack of the Frenchwoman's ass, still walking distance to Sainte-Catherine East. She called that strip her job.

 
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