Another Day Another Penny

Digested, earmarked, tea stained, and relished, each book written by Colette percolated through Bridgette’s veins as a rich café laced with precisely the right amount of sucre and crème fraîche. Stacked upon her desk askew, there they lay lonely; only the dust now touched the acclaimed author’s books, the single most source of inspiration for Bridgette’s own rough draft she had laid to rest and placed on a war time pause.

The days were long and upside down, strangled and hung by the hint of death and extinction in the Paris air and in the next room. He didn’t have to know. A lie of omission when stacked against starvation should surely be forgiven by an ailing heart. How could her dear le Père know what she was doing all day when she wasn’t tending to his needs. He could barely see and barely walk to the latrine and back to his sick bed unattended, let alone over to her Triumph typewriter as she wrote word after word of erotica.

At a penny a word she did the math.

*“His tongue traced my skin like a cartographer, traveling from head to toe and back, lingering just the right amount of time between my legs before he thrust himself inside me,”….

Equals Une pound of Le boeuf haché

**“Her supple breasts longed for his touch, and she could see how much he wanted her,”....

Equals Une grande baguette

***“They are alone now casting naked shadows by candlelight, ready to pleasure each other until the sun comes up,”....

Equals Une douzaine d’oeufs

“Ahh ma chère fille, they are paying you well now, no? A dying old man can appreciate a warm egg yolk sliding down his gullet.”

“Oui, mon père. The magazine editor told me the reviews on my short stories are quite favorable and the work will be steady. For now anyway. So eat up mon cher père.”

“You must read some to me later, oui?”

“Oui, of course mon père.”

Bridgette knew she was skilled at changing the narrative. If she wasn’t, she would not have landed her current job. Later that night she read right from her daily passages to her audience of one, her dear le père, handily cleaning up the pleasure seeking text from X to G rated.

*“The cartographer traced the lines of the map as he traveled north to south, lingering just the right amount of time between the mountainous ridge, enjoying the view, then thrusted the throttle towards home,”....

**“The supple ripe melons he collected along the way looked too good to eat, too juicy enroute, yet he longed to rip into the fruit right then and there,”.....

***“When he arrived home, he lit the candle, unable to detect the fatigue cast in his shadow. He lay down knowing he would sleep soundly through the night until the sun came up,”....

“Très bon! Ma chère. Merci beaucoup for taking such good care of your old père with your marveilleux words! Feeding us and entertaining us at the same time! Time to close my tired eyes. Bonne nuit, mon amour. Till the morrow. You bring me such pleasure."

Bridgette kissed her father on the top of his head, and turned to walk out of his room, lowering her eyes and her voice, sheepishly whispering words out of earshot,

“That’s what they all say. If you only knew the half of it.”