Ensemble

by Van Kida

Isabelle H.

The other night, I saw you at the Odéon, as Araminte. You were stunning on stage, perfectly matched with Garrel. Give Luc my best regards.

—Isabelle A.

The letter—no, the note—had been handwritten with blue ink on cream colored stationary. It came not in the mail, not addressed to the formal ‘Isabelle Huppert,’ but instead through Anne, who had been given it by someone or other and had passed it on. Had it come in the mail, Huppert’s assistant would have had the good sense to tear it to shreds and leave her none the wiser. Instead, because of her colleague, the note was in her hands.

Isabelle, The other night, I saw you

Isabelle sat down on the couch, kicking off her heels. The day’s makeup still sat heavy on her face. She was glad to be shooting in Paris, no need for hotel rooms or too much time spent in trailers, but now it meant that the letter was in her own apartment, between her own hands as she sat on her own couch.

She was not unfamiliar with this kind of note. She had been subject to them incessantly at one brief point in her life. When they had lived together, the Isabelles, this was the ideal method of communication. Part of the issue was schedules, both of them always away at some rehearsal or shoot. Part of it was that they couldn’t really stand to be near each other. Most of their notes were reminders. Lightbulbs, soap, dishes. Keeping the key under the mat or leaving the chain on. Sometimes a little more pointed, but usually, if either wanted to say something nefarious, then it was said to the face. Otherwise, the notes kept them afloat.

Most notes were trashed. This one should have been too. Instead, it went in her purse.

***

The next day, as Ty did her hair, her mind kept returning to the card.

“Ty,” Isabelle started. “Was I good in False Confidences?”

“Yes, of course. I thought you were fantastic.” he replied, pulling a lock of red hair through his straightener.

“Better than usual?”

“I think you’re always great.”

“But do you think I was particularly good?”

“Why the third degree? Did you get a bad review?”

“The opposite,” Isabelle said. “Adjani came to see it."

“The other Isabelle.”

“Don’t start with that nonsense.”

“Well I’m sure you showed her that you are great in theater too, as good as her.”

“She left me a note.”

“What?”

Isabelle leaned away from his comb and grabbed her purse, rummaging through it before pulling out the card.

Ty took it in his hands.

“This seems very nice.”

“I know.” Isabelle said, settling back in the chair.

“Maybe she wants to make amends.”

“I’m sure she’d rather have my head.”

“You’re not twenty-seven anymore. No longer fighting over roles and makeup.”

“No.”

“And she’s no longer twenty-six.”

Isabelle kissed her teeth, rolling her eyes. “You’re making fun of me.”

“I just think… I think perhaps this isn’t a bad sign.”

“She does this,” Isabelle said. “You don’t know really, because she hasn’t in a while, but she has no problem doing things like this. She will write to me. Or tell a journalist something. And then two seconds later—just like that—” Isabelle snapped her fingers. “She’ll say something vile.”

She remembered distinctly the last time they spoke to each other directly, perhaps now over three decades ago. The call had been unexpected, arriving at Daniel’s office, back when she was still seeing him, when he was still alive, when he was still producing her films.

He had picked up the phone with his back to her, then turned around grinning. “It’s for you,” he had said to Huppert, putting the phone on speaker and handing her the receiver.

“You took the camellias, but you gave me Camille,” Adjani said over the line, her thin voice pointed and taut.

“I didn’t give you anything. It was all Chabrol.”

“But if you had said yes to him, he would’ve never-”

“It doesn’t matter. I don’t care.” Huppert cradled the receiver between her shoulder and her ear. Staring at Daniel, she went through the list in her head. Loulou. Lady of the Camellias. The Trout. She was winning. It didn’t matter.

“I wanted to thank you,” Adjani said. “For never tiring of playing two-bit whores.”

“I’m an actress, Isabelle. I don’t tire.”

***

She was not interested in reliving that sordid little memory. Even now, just thinking about it made her shoulders tense. Looking into the mirror, she half-expected to see something obvious in her face. Lucky for her, today she was not betrayed.

“What are you going to do?” Ty asked.

“Nothing,” Isabelle replied dismissively.

“She’s thinking of you.”

“Why would that matter to me?”

“At least it’s interesting to know.”

“To find that sort of thing interesting, I would have to be thinking about her.”

***

Later in the day her lie nagged at her. Huppert did think about Adjani, but admitting it would corrupt her thoughts. The issue was that she did not think about Adjani now. As in, as she was now. Her thoughts about Adjani were stuck in the time back when they last knew each other.

When Isabelle thought of Isabelle, when Huppert thought of Adjani, she thought of the back of her head. The shock of black hair in a long plait by the nape of her pale neck. The body of Adjani reclined in front of their fireplace, sensual yes, but also unaware. Adjani, delicate and beautiful, virginal and pure. Huppert's blankness left something to be filled, Adjani had nothing to be filled. If Huppert tried to imagine her naked, she could only think of a doll, smooth all around.

Huppert envied her. Girls envied each other, that was part of their condition, but she didn’t think at the time that Adjani returned her envy. Now she thinks she might have, maybe her coolness, maybe her disposition. How she didn’t feel. Adjani had said it to her once, You are so cool, and she understood that she meant it in demeanor more so than in social currency. Huppert was not trying to be cool or cold or distant, it was just the way she was.

And Huppert envied everything about Adjani. Her hair, her pale blue eyes, her jaw, her nimble fingers, her flat waist, the soft, sweet lilt in her delicate soprano. She seemed to be made of candy floss and tea and glass. Perhaps what she envied the most in Adjani was this inherent girlishness, a sense of self that was somehow, astoundingly, not brought down by the indignities of adult womanhood.

Not that Adjani was brought down by adolescent indignities either. Huppert’s family visited often, her parents bringing in groceries and general household supplies. Prying into the little adult life she had built so far, asking questions and following her around whenever they were over. Comments about the fluctuation in her weight, who she was seeing, how her hair looked. Adjani, having been a boarder at the Comedie-Francaise as a teenager, was accustomed to her independence and was only ever seen cavorting with friends and networking with other young artists. At the time Huppert believed it to be a kind of independence. Now it seemed closer to having been abandoned.

Still, Huppert was the first to grow up in another way, move out of their bachelorette apartment and into the place of a lover. Really, in hindsight, another position of dependence. The night before she left, they decided to go out one last time to commemorate something between them that did not exist. Adjani had a bad habit of being recognized so they donned large shadowy glasses and very short dresses. Hair was kept loose and simple down their backs, and they shared the same glossy, glaring red lipstick between them. They went out on the street with their elbows linked. Feeling, for once, not like actresses, but something more impenetrable. Schoolgirls pretending to be hookers. Roommates pretending to be friends. The type of pretending that does not lead to an occupation or neuroticism, but instead shields against pedestrian growing pains.

They did little else but dance and drink that night. The clubs and bars Huppert does not really remember. Her memories from around that time seem to all be the same. Sweat and skin and sweet drinks that made her teeth ache. Everyone used to be so uninhibited that she imagined their souls floating up to the ceiling and looking down at the fumbling bodies below. Or maybe just her own soul and her own body.

Anyway, she liked drinking and she liked dancing, so she’s sure she had a good time while she was there. On the cab ride back she remembered being so swimmingly drunk and nauseous that it felt like little worms were wriggling under her skin.

She was more conscious of the sensation when they got back to the apartment, stumbling all around in the doorway, one stockinged heel on the cool wood floor. Feeling a certain sense of dread, she rushed to the bathroom, placed her cheek against the cold toilet bowl and began to throw up.

In the midst of this, she felt fingers gently pull her hair back away from her face. Another hand dragged down from the bare nape of her neck where it began to rub small circles on her spine. Her face felt flush and cool at the same time. Her skin throbbed from vomiting so quickly.

Instead of relief, she felt ugly and small, like a child who wakes up sick in the middle of the night and realizes, suddenly, that they are a nuisance.

She opened her eyes to find Adjani looking at her, smiling kindly, but also obviously a little entertained.

“I’m going to miss you,” Adjani said, patting her head, a gesture that still bewildered Huppert when she thought of it now. It was also the wrong thing to say, a Romantic thing which was unsuited to both the occasion and their personalities. “Are you going to miss me?”

Huppert nodded, closing her eyes and feeling the bathroom careen. Now was the best time, she supposed, for false camaraderie.

“You’re not married you know,” Adjani said, her voice now so far away as if an echo. “And you’re beautiful too.”

“What?” Huppert asked hoarsely.

“I’m just saying. You don’t have to. You’re capable of being loved, you know that right? And of loving too. You don’t think it’s true, I don’t know why, but I’m being honest. I think you’re just too into your head.”

Huppert was suddenly wide awake now, and her mind completely sober, although her body had not caught up. She stared at Adjani, whose soft expression seemed to only disorient her further. What was she saying? What were they even talking about? The words spilling out of Adjani had the tenor of warmth, and yet they were strange and warped accusations.

“What do you think I am?” Huppert meant for this to be a pointed comment, but it came out earnest.

Adjani stroked her hair, again not unkindly. “I think you’re a little girl who's scared of being left alone.”

Huppert got up at once and pushed Adjani to the side. “If I’m that, then what are you?” she questioned.

“I’m not that,” Adjani said, now clearly indignant. She shook her head. “You’re no coward Isabelle, but I’m not as afraid as you.”

Huppert stumbled out of the bathroom, her cheeks aflame. She would not dignify her with a response. She should’ve stopped talking hours ago. She stripped and slipped into bed, before slowly entering into a fitful, dubious sleep.

***

The next morning, Adjani had gone out for the day before Huppert even awoke. Isabelle did not know where the other went. They had no right over each other over things like that.

Huppert’s belongings were mostly packed, only her jewelry and a few stray books remained. As she came into the kitchen to make herself some coffee, she noticed a vase with yellow and white mums on their small kitchen table. Propped up next to it was a cream notecard.

Her fingers stuck to the note as she opened it up.

Isabelle H.

The other night, I saw you in The Lacemaker. I didn’t say anything, because I didn’t want to make it strange. I know you think you are her, Pomme, but it’s not true. You have many more reasons to be adored. There is more to you than you admit.

You don’t need him. I know it’s not my place to say.

—Isabelle A.

______

Van Kida lives in New Jersey. She likes most things a normal amount.

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