Peindre d'abord une cage, avec une porte ouverte...

First, paint a cage, with an open door...

—Jaques Preverts (How to Paint a Bird's Portrait)

***

Don't shit on the sixth sense. I manage to keep my VW on the highway, while my traditional five senses are all shot to hell. The car wobbles in its lane, but it stays on.

Next question is, which way do I go?

Depending on what is happening in the burning castle, someone could come looking for me in a short while.

Scali, if he isn't dead...possibly isn't dead? A painful pang tugs on my heart, but the pain I survived overpowers it. Scali could come after me if he's pissed enough about the damage to the property or the theft. Also, even his life in the mafia might not have prepared him for his women setting him on fire. I didn't mean to, but he doesn't know it.

Scali's murderous relatives—they'll come after me, for sure. Same reasons as Scali, minus the sexual tension.

The police?

Perhaps not, unless I'm caught driving dangerously, in a bullet-hole marked car, in the vicinity of the fresh bodies roasting in a gigantic explosion.

They will all come after me, so I do what I hope is an unexpected thing. I don't turn North on the highway, toward Paris. Instead, I limp-drive South, to Marseille.

Once I put a few miles between me and Motteciel Castle, my talon-like grip relaxes on the steering wheel. I pull over to punch a few additional stops into my GPS: the self-service gas-stations and 24/7 supermarkets where I can purchase my survival kit.

First comes the clean gauze padding, the tape, and the anti-inflammatory meds for my eye. I huddle under the hood like a teen angst-lord, to hide the dirty eyepatch I already wear. With the unsavory image I project, the cashier would be totally justified to call the police, but she doesn't, God bless her soul. I change the dressing in the public bathroom of the supermarket, trying not to cry out in alarm. The sooner I can see a doctor, the better, but not in France.

"J'ai été agressé," I explain, as I lean against the counter in the next store.

The teen teller peppers me with questions in French. How could anyone be this peppy at this hour? She keeps talking, an talking, and talking while I repeat my line every time she stops and glances at me.

"J'ai été agressé." I was mugged.

She shrugs and rings my purchases through: a pair of owlish sunglasses and a bunch of gardening and wedding magazines with as many flowers on the cover as the designer could fit on it.

Next, I buy a novelty bullet-hole shaped car sticker.

And food. Lots of food. I buy food every time I stop. My stomach is a bottomless well, so I fill it with as many risky road sandwiches, sorry-looking bananas and scentless apples as I can. I devour it all until my guts push it back up my throat from overeating.

Apart from the shopping pit-stops, I have to turn off to the shoulder every time panic jams my throat when some car follows me too closely or for too long; when I can no longer see the gray lane of the road; when I need to stretch my back, aching from the beatings and stress.

At those times, I lay my forehead on the steering wheel and do a happy counting song.

One. Let me run!

Two. Don't see you.

Three. Go go me.

Four. I am pro!

Five. Stay alive.

After a few hours, I don't have to stop quite so often. As the night drags on, miles build up between Scali and me. What's done is done.

But if there's an ounce of goodness in this universe, a drop of benevolent Providence, by that shred, let him be alive!

***

I drive into Marseille during the early morning rush, dodging accidents every block by some miracle. People honk and roll down their windows to flip me off and yell insults. The joke's on them. I don't speak French.

In the hilly, seaside and infested with the petty criminals city, my feeble j'ai été agressé makes perfect sense.

Yet, judgment flickers in the eye-roll of the guy who sells me the burner phone, the kind that the criminals use in the TV dramas. He says nothing, but his thoughts are as plain as if he spoke English. What did she expect, wandering the streets at night like she's local?

Despite the judgment, I feel safe shielded by a big city versus being on a highway in a distinctive car. If only sweat didn't dribbles down my spine whenever a fragment of a conversation in French touches my ears. I'll probably break into sweat hearing this language till the end of my life.

In Provence Airport, an argument over returning my poor Polo reignites my flagging spirit. The clerk is livid that I brought the car to Marseille, instead of Paris, but he hides it under a too-polite explanation that I would save myself a lot of money if I just climb back into the car, drive it to Paris and return it there.

"How do you expect me to drive back to Paris, Monsieur, if I can't see? J'ai été agressé." I pout. "Do you want me to die? Crash your company's car, and die in the crash?"

Battered women don't see salesmen falling over themselves to please them, like the young and the beautiful. I look hangover forty with my sallow skin, wrinkled, baggy clothes and sunglasses over the eyepatch.

"Very well, Madame," he says. "Let's do an inspection, but the extra-charges—"

"I'll pay." My heart speeds up as he walks around the car.

He purses his lips and pokes at the sticker on the side panel of the car. "What's this, Madame?"

"A petite joke by some French cretin who hates tourists, oui?" I tell him with the sweetest smile. "Found it like this in the morning. I didn't want to break a nail by scraping it off."

"No, we can't have that, Madame." He slants a pointed glance at my stained hands. The semicircles of dirt under my nails are the specialty of the manicurist in the dungeon salon I've been to.

Pah! "You should see my toes, Monsieur." I instantly regret the quip and rush to cover up the slip-up. "I'll pay, okay?"

The dick names an exuberant sum, but I expected that, and lined my pocket with enough money to pay without opening the suitcase.

"This should cover it, I think." I push it to him over the counter, not bothering to count, and I leave him with Polo's key, the pile of money and a jaw hanging low. It feels oddly satisfying to throw money around like that.

I pay another king's ransom to fly ASAP to the happy land of beaches, mariachi bands and cheap medical bills.

With the precious ticket secured, I find a discreet corner to dial the phone number that is seared in my memory. Sheila picks up on the third ring.

"Hello, Sheila," I say in the burner phone, over her gurgling: joyous greetings, Floribunda's number one customer! or some such nonsense.

Her honeyed tone changes the moment it clicks with her who is calling. "Bryn, you have the nerve to call me! No, you can't have your job back and—"

"You can take your fucking job and shove it." Gosh, that's the first! And it sure feels good to say that. "Wait! Don't hang up! I need your help."

Before she could tell me where to go, I hit send. She gets a picture of the swollen ruin of my eye. Making it almost caused me to pass out in a washroom stall after I peeled off the medical tape, so let's hope the image shuts her up.

It does for a minute. After that, she rattles on, "O God! Is it you?"

"Of course it's me. Do you think I'd just send you a random picture to make you squirm?"

"The moment I saw this asshole Scali offer you a ride, I knew it would not end well," Sheila says with a sigh.

"Hold on! How do you know that it's about Scali?"

"What else could it be? I saw how he looked at you. I should have warned you, but I thought you were smart enough to stay away from him."

I gulp. I didn't expect Sheila to be this perceptive. "So you know Scali? You know the Tangorello? Like, know them, not just heard of them?"

"How stupid are you?" Sheila asks in a tone that makes me think she is wringing her hands. "The Floribunda has been in my family for three generations. You simply don't own a downtown shop in L.A. this long without— never mind. What happened to you?"

The phone's clock winks at me. Yeah, yeah, I need to wrap up this conversation, lest I miss the boarding time. "No, that's not Scali, but it's because of him. Anyway, it's a long story, Sheila, and I need your help right fucking now."

"If you think I'll do anything to piss off Tangorello, you can forget it right now. I don't want to hear it."

"Good grief, no! I wouldn't ask anything like that." Irrepressible snorts shake me at the thought of Sheila vs. the Tangorello Mafia Family. Of all the preposterous ideas... "Look, it's nothing dangerous. I've just mailed some garden magazines from France. Store the box in the warehouse for me once it arrives, Okay?"

She scoffs. "Garden magazines? Since when are you—"

"Don't stick your nose inside the box, and you'll be fine. Just store it, and post it again when I tell you." Then, remembering who I am dealing with, I add, "I'll pay you."

"Garden magazines! It can't be just some garden magazines..."

"Well, there're a few wedding magazines in the mix too. I'm planning a big one."

"I don't believe you, Bryn."

From all days to be introspective, Sheila picks today. Must be a slow afternoon for the florists or something. "Thousand bucks to store it. Deal?"

"Hmm. Just store it? What about postage?"

"I'll pay the postage too, no worries. Expect a money draft."

"Okay, but if it has anything to do with the Tangorellos—"

"Gotta go, Sheila, or I'll miss my flight."

"Where—"

I cut the connection and run for the gates, pressing a new purse to my chest like a baby. It holds as much cash as I could legally bring into Mexico without declaring it, which should be enough to fix my face, if I live in a slum.

The rest of my ill-gained treasure is layered with dirty laundry and worn clothes in my shoddy black suitcase. I cannot declare the source of my income on a customs form, so... luck be a lady! Let's hope the dough survives the trip intact.

Easy come, easy go, I whisper in a quivering voice, as my eye finds my bag on the trolley rolling toward the plane, but I lie. Now that I have the money, I dream about the superfluous things forty thousand euro can buy me.

The privacy of an expensive hotel. More sunshine and manicured beaches after the surgeries than I strictly need. Yummy food. And the gigantic seats in the front of the airplane that lean all the way back so you can actually sleep during the fight.

The airplane races me down the strip of tarmac, jumps into the sky and spirits me away before the mafia with the machine guns storms the airport or a garbled voice on the intercom requests that Bryn Williams comes to the counter.

Adieu, la France! I've escaped thine clutches.

I close my eyes and lean the seat all the way back. I swallowed as many legal painkillers as was safe, so my aches and pains are down to a dull throb. But the sleep doesn't come. Instead of sand, palm trees waving in the breeze and lapping waves, I visualize Scali's face pinched in concentration and that controlled fury.

Over and over, I try to visualize a tropical beach with swinging palm trees, convince myself that I've escaped, and I can't. I still see Scali before my mind's eyes.

Finally, I give up. "Can I have a drink?" I ask the chirpy flight attendant with a bright company scarf. She brings champagne, and I gulp down the glass despite suddenly having nothing to celebrate. Hopefully, it plays nice with the painkillers.

My hands shake as I put the empty glass down on the tray for the attendant to collect. I drag the blanket over my shoulders and snuggle in. Sleep still doesn't come, until I cry myself into it in the dry, quiet way—without the tears, without the sobs.

Matteo, Matteo, Matteo.... You're my pain and my pleasure. please be alive!