Chapters (45)
- Cover
- Blame Iton Paris
- Copyright Notice
- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
- Book One
- One
- Two
- Three
- Four
- Five
- Six
- Seven
- Eight
- Nine
- Ten
- Eleven
- Twelve
- Thirteen
- Fourteen
- Fifteen
- Sixteen
- Seventeen
- Eighteen
- Nineteen
- Twenty
- Twenty-one
- Book Two
- Twenty-two
- Twenty-three
- Twenty-four
- Twenty-five
- Twenty-six
- Twenty-seven
- Twenty-eight
- Twenty-nine
- Thirty
- Thirty-one
- Thirty-two
- Thirty-three
- Thirty-four
- Thirty-five
- Thirty-six
- Thirty-seven
- Thirty-eight
- Thirty-nine
Despite everything, the moment was deeply romantic. For the first time, I truly felt how important it was to have done this wedding in French, in the language and country home to Sébastien, as well as in English, in the language and country home to me. I had known it was important, but I had not really felt that importance until now. I smiled at him as he gave an extra squeeze to my hands and our eyes held. He had deep circles of fatigue under his, I saw, but the warmth and sweetness that had first attracted me to him were still there.
“She can actually speak French,” the curé said out loud over the microphone. “Isn’t that amazing? Well, we got that over with. Now I think it would be nice if the couple led us all in the Lord’s Prayer.”
The romantic moment broke. I stared at the priest, and Sébastien gazed at the stained glass behind the altar. Fortunately, he hadn’t taken to rugby the way his father and uncles had.
“I can only recite it in English,” I said. I would have thought the curé would have guessed that himself, since he still started every time I spoke French. “I never memorized it in French.”
And Sébastien, as we had told him, was not a practicing Catholic; he was even an adamant atheist, something the priest may have begun to suspect. I knew God would eventually make us pay for that Baptism lie.
“You’ll do fine,” the curé said. “Recite the Lord’s Prayer.”
“I can’t in French,” I said.
“Recite the Lord’s Prayer.”
I threw up my hands. “I can’t in French,” I said very loudly. Cameras flashed all over the place. I supposed it was a bit unusual to see a bride argue with the priest in the middle of her wedding.
“Go ahead,” the priest insisted.
I gave up and shrugged. Sébastien calmly closed his mouth, locked eyes with the priest, and said nothing at all. Several minutes of dead silence followed.
The old curé finally recited the first two lines. I had been to enough Masses in French that I could nearly follow along, like a half-memorized song, if I could hear someone else saying it, so I joined in quietly.
The curé stopped.