literary aspirations himself. And at the same time that he was annoyed about us louting up his chances you could see he also enjoyed it, the way that we imparted a hint of the ghetto to his wooing.
There was no sign of Lazare when we got back to work and so we sat with our feet up on the packing tables, eating sandwiches, gasping after sips of Orangina, crunching chips.
‘Did you see Luke after all that running around, legs buckling—’
‘Breathing hard, unable to speak—’
‘Coughing up blood – “Just let me get my breath back, you see I’m not like the others” – then bam! the ball smacks into the fence about an inch from her face.’
‘What she say Luke?’ Matthias wanted to know. ‘What she is like?’
‘She’s nice.’
‘What is her name?’
‘Nicole.’
‘Oh Nicole! Horny name. And what does she do, horny Nicole?’ Matthias pushed his tongue into his cheek, moving his hand back and forth in front of his open mouth. Luke shook his head. Matthias belched and tossed his empty can, clattering into the bin.
We would happily have spent the whole afternoon like that, grilling Luke about his attempted courtship but, hearing Lazare’s decrepit Renault scrape through the gate ten minutes later, we leaped to our feet. By the time he walked in we were hard at it, as if we had been so busy packing orders that there had scarcely been time to grab a sandwich.
A few days later, when Nicole next passed by the playground, we decided to let Luke go over and talk quietly, without the ball thudding into the fence, like we were on our best behaviour. She was wearing a dress and a quaint mauve cardigan so that he could not see her arms which one day soon would be around his shoulders as he kissed her, which one day he would grip hard in his fists, shaking her, leaving ugly bruises. I can still see them over there, separated by the fence, wondering what each other was like. She was holding some books in front of her. The sun flashed out from a cloud, the wire fence threw angles of shadow over her face. She held up a book for him to see and he bent towards her and conceded that he had never read Nietzsche or Merleau-Ponty or whoever it was she was reading. Not that it mattered: the important thing about the book was that it served as an intermediary, a bridge between them. Luke watched her looking at him through the fence, sweat dripping from his hair, breathing hard. His sleeves were pushed up over his elbows, the veins stood out in his forearms. Strands of her hair breezed free. She fingered them back into place, over her ear, and he noticed her hands, her woman’s hands holding the large book of philosophy.
They were running out of things to say. Luke asked if she would like to meet up sometime if . . . His voice trailed off, he looked to the floor, at the sun-catching grit, making it as easy as possible for her to say ‘Well, that’s difficult.’ He was still gripping the fence, separated from her like a prisoner or an animal. When he looked up again he saw her pausing, weighing things up, knowing the hurt a man has the power to inflict on you. But that pause was already giving way to a smile of assent.
She smiled at him and he looked into her eyes which, at that moment, held all the promise of happiness the world can ever offer. He suggested Tuesday which was no good for her.
‘Thursday maybe . . .’
‘Thursday I have dance class.’
‘Oh . . .’
‘I could meet you afterwards.’
‘After your dance class?’
‘Yes.’
‘This is what it means to be a man,’ said Luke, glad he was saying something clever-sounding. ‘To be a man is to meet women after classes. After dance classes, after Spanish classes, after acrobatics. Women go to classes, men meet them after their classes. After your dance class would be perfect. What time?’
‘At nine?’
‘Yes. Where shall I meet you?’
‘My class is at the Centre de Danse, in the Marais. Do you know it?’
‘Yes,’ said Luke (he didn’t). ‘Shall I meet you there?’
‘OK.’
In the road a delivery truck was holding up traffic. Cars began honking.
‘I should be going,’ she said.
‘They’re not honking at you,’ Luke said.
She smiled, turned to leave. Luke started walking back towards us. Daniel floated up the ball for him to volley, with all the force of his happiness, into the top corner of the segment of fence we called a goal.
‘And the crowd go wild,’ shouted Luke.
The Centre de Danse was in a cobbled courtyard off rue du Temple. Luke arrived at nine o’clock exactly. The building was old, soot-blackened, subsiding so badly that it looked rubbery. Such was the efficacy of dance, it seemed, that even glass and concrete were susceptible to rhythm, supple. Bicycles were lined two deep against the walls. Classes were in progress on three sides of the courtyard. Piano and tap-dancing came from one window, jazz-funk from another. The windows on one side of the courtyard held warped reflections of those on the other. Through these reflections Luke could see the lunge and surge of leotards and limbs inside rooms with huge ceilings and mirrored walls. Men and women, Luke’s age and younger, came out carrying bags over their shoulders, all looking pleased. Nicole came out at five past nine. Oh, and she was gorgeous, in a green linen dress and tennis shoes. She carried a green and yellow bag over her shoulder. It would have been impossible to dress more simply, or to have looked more beautiful. Her hair was wet, she smiled. She wore no make-up. Luke held out his hand.
‘You look lovely,’ he said.
‘Thank you.’
‘How was your dance class?’
‘It was hard,’ she said, letting go of his hand.
‘Hard?’
‘Yes, but was OK.’
‘What kind of dance do you do?’
‘Oh, is jazz or something.’
‘Jazz?’
‘Disco.’
‘Jazz disco?’
‘Tango.’
‘Tango too?’
‘Ballet.’
‘Ballet?’
‘Techno.’
‘Flamenco?’
‘A little flamenco, yes.’
Luke could not think of another form of dance. They were standing in the courtyard. Mopeds were revving into life. Nicole waved at a man – gay, surely – who blew her a kiss as he cycled off.
‘Are we standing
