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“He was here again.”
More like here we go again, Sebastian thought rolling his eyes. “Who might he be— pray tell.”
“Ze nice gentleman I am just sure was made for you.”
Sebastian fought the urge to roll his again― barely. Glancing at his grandmamma from where he was kneeling, refilling the plates of pastries on the display cabinet for the lunchtime shuffle. “Maman. The fact that this gentleman who was made for me―” another eye roll. “- and I never cross path is indicative enough that this man who was made for me isn’t really that made for me.”
“I get worried about you, mon cherié. Maman isn’t going to be here forever you know―” a groan from Sebastian. “I want to see you settled and betrothed before I pass.”
“First of all, Maman―” Sebastian looked up at her, dusting the knees of his pants as he stood up. “You are going to live to be a hundred and fifty-one. So don’t even say that. Secondly, no person in this century says betrothed anymore.” his grandmother glared at him in a way so very reminiscent of his’ that it made him snicker. “Thirdly, grandmother please, I am more than capable of finding a mate for myself without you fishing for me from our poor patron who isn’t ready to be suddenly fixed up with the coffee shop’s owner dear grandson before their morning coffee.”
“You just see and wait. Grandmamma will make magic.” she said as she winked at him. Putting both of her hands on his cheeks and pulling him down a little, making the bangles and bracelets that extends till her elbows jingle. “You are wasting your youth away and you know nothing will make me sadder.”
Sebastian groaned in exasperation― for show― as he smiles at his grandmother. “Maman, not of all of us gets to go to India with the Beatles to get high, and not all of us can be muse to Yves Saint Laurent.”
Lana Smythe winked at him, slapping both his cheeks fondly before walking to her usual table by the north window― her long flowy dress billowing behind her. “Now come sit with your old grandmamma and bring a bottle of Bordeaux.”
Lana Smythe means the world to her grandson Sebastian. Having been raised by her in her native France practically his whole life― save for two years in Dalton before coming back to Paris to study philosophy and history at the Sorbonne and coming back to the United States again for Harvard law. Nothing made the studies abroad bearable than knowing that he could come back to his grandmamma’s cooking for summers and holiday breaks. He was spoilt rotten and he knows it. Having graduated Harvard law with flying colors― prestigious law firms all but open themselves to employ him brandishing six digits salary, a million flyer miles, and even a penthouse for himself overlooking Central Park but Sebastian threw it all in the window when the news of his grandmamma’s recurring cancer reached him. Opting instead to be with her and help her manage her chains of five star cafes and vineyards she refuses to sell to big companies.
Sebastian picks up two wine glasses and the bottle of Bordeaux, breath caught for a moment at the picture of his grandmamma and her yellow aura― he keeps insisting he sees that she radiates, looking peaceful as she scribbles something on her journal with the morning sun behind her.
Lana Smythe is a creature of habit. Since graduating with a degree in philosophy ‘of all the things’ if she remembers fondly hearing her dad say those words― fresh out of college in the 65s with a degree in philosophy to boot― add being a woman at that: she was lost. Her parents were rich enough that they let their only girl and youngest to pave a path of her own making and leaving the shipping business to two of her older brothers. Her twenties were spent travelling the world, modeling for designers, partying, and just living. She was at Woodstock swaying through the haze to Jimi Hendrix, and Janis Joplin. She was part of Andy Warhol’s infamous the Factory. She was given a Birkin by Jane Birkin herself― a dear friend. She rallied with the anti-Vietnam War initiative in the United States on her 23rd birthday― where she met the one, Sebastian’s grandfather― then the doctor in charge, Nathaniel Smythe while he dabbed at the scratches on her face being the most perfect of gentleman and vowing to find her after the ruckus was over.
She fell in love after the sixth date. He proposed at the Bow Bridge in Central Park after the fifteenth date with candles scattered all over and a quartet playing a rendition of Glenn Miller’s Moonlight Serenade― she said yes. They got married three months later surrounded by their closest friends and immediate family in Italy under hundreds of lemon trees. They opened La Fontaine de Belleville- a year later after they finally decided to settle in Paris with Nathaniel opening his little family doctor practice― giving birth a week later to twin daughters Lara and Nala Smythe― the latter being Sebastian’s dotting art history professor slash curator mother.
Lana Smythe had lived one hell of a life and every day since the birth of her beloved daughters and business she takes a few hours to visit the original store and drink a glass of wine for the fiber, un épons― and take a few moments to just sit, journal, and people watch sometimes with her husband, with a daughter, but often times with her only grandchild Sebastian.
“Have I told you today how just breathtaking you look today?” he muttered as he approach the table, pouring each of them half a glass of red wine.
“Merci, my favorite grandson―”
“I’m your only grandson.”
“And I love it, mon cherié. You are perfect.” she winked, offering her glass for a toast. “To maman, finding someone worthy for you.”
Sebastian could only huff out a snicker then deciding to humor her. “To that.” he tipped his glass to hers. “To another dashing recovery.”
It has been over a year since Sebastian made the big decision of moving back to France. A year since once again― her grandmamma beat the hell out of that cancer. A year later and he wasn’t hell bent on moving back to the State anytime soon except of course for brief visits to her crazy mother.
The phone started ringing and Sebastian glanced at the device, a picture of his mum flashing on the screen. He answered it and put it on speaker as he circles Arc de Triomphe on his way to Marché des Enfants Rouges.
“Hello mother. I was just thinking about you.”
A shuffle on the other line. “Hello, my little boy. Oh! Fuck―” falling books.
“Mum? Are you okay?” Sebastian rolled his eyes glancing worriedly on the sound coming out of his phone before looking ahead on the road again.
“I’m okay, my sweet. You know how I am. Just finished dressing and wanted to hear your voice.”
“I miss you too, mother. How are things?”
“I’m on my way to the Met right now. Finally convinced the board to exhibit this performance artist I had been bugging them about for months now― oh wait. Quel jour sommes-nous?”
“It’s a Saturday, mum.” Sebastian muttered used to this kind of erratic and crazy calls from his mother. Only on times of distress and urgency did his mother speak her native tongue anymore. A minute passes and- “Mum?”
“Still here.” she chuckled. “I’m so sorry, Seba. I just can’t seem to talk and clasp my shoe strap at the same time. How are you and my crazy parents?”
“We’re okay. Maman kicked me out of the Belleville to go to the market to pick up a bunch of raspberry for tomorrow. I’m going to pick up Papan on the way, too.”
“That’s nice. It makes me happy that Maman is fully recovered.”
“Yes. I know.”
“I know that voice,” she laughed. “She’s forcing you to get married again isn’t she?”
“Worse. She’s foisting me towards this particular regular on the café―”
“Oh. Mr. tall, pale, and elegant?”
“I actually have never seen the guy yet.” Sebastian said glaring daggers at his phone. “And of course you would know, too.”
“I talk to my mother every day, Sebastian. Of course I know.” she paused. “She gets worried and you are inching towards your thirties―”
“I’m twenty-seven, mother.” he ran a hand on his face in annoyance. “That’s three years away from turning thirty.”
“Well―”
“Mum please. Can we not? I hear this speech every day from your mother too, you know?”
A quiet breathing for a while then a groan. “Oh, gosh. I’m turning into her aren’t I?”
“You’re close to it.”
“Oh. We can’t have that.”
“We really can’t. I need you to keep me sane even though you are insane.” he chuckled as he heard his mother huff out a snort.
“I miss you, son. You need to come get me soon.”
“I miss you too mother. And we’re still on for next week, right?”
“Of course. I hate flying alone but I’m with you this time and I miss Paris, too.”
“Says you, Mademoiselle I-can’t-wait-to-study-live-and-work-at-the-United States.”
His mother laughed on the other end. “It’s probably the old age. Making me sentimental. America also appreciates some Frenchwoman like me unlike there where there is about a million of us.”
“I love you, mum.”
“I love you too, my Seba. Mucho mucho.” his mother made kissing sounds making him smile. “I got to go now. Drive safe and call me tomorrow.”
Sebastian smiled as his mum hang up thinking about her fondly. Nala Smythe values her independence too much. After graduating from high school in Paris it only took her a week to pack her life and move for school to New York. She tends to fall in love with the wrong lot and that’s how she met Sebastian’s father. On her junior year of Museum studies at Columbia, and Grant is twenty years her senior, married at that― just a shy five years behind her own mother. Nathaniel was furious, Lara couldn’t stop laughing― this is her crazy twin they’re talking about after all, but Lana just shook her head in amusement murmuring something on the line of ‘it’s the Frenchwoman in her.’
Sebastian came out of that love a year later― three days after she got her degree, instantly stealing the three women’s heart and his grandpapa who secretly always wanted to have a son. The family of three lived happily for three years but Lana’s itch for independence never left her, she was happy and Sebastian was her world but she wasn’t contented. Sebastian rebelled against this fact for some time in Dalton but as he left again for Paris to study in the University he could almost understand her, and the weight of his love for her and vice versa ruled out in the end over the bitterness.
Sebastian is close with his father albeit being a lovechild. He tried his hardest to come to Paris for brief visits on birthdays and holidays most of the time, and making it up to Sebastian on the handful of times he couldn’t go with gifts and hours long phone calls. It doesn’t hurt that his trust fund is also almost always full as a result of the rigorous agreement with lawyers between the two parents both mutually wanting Sebastian to have everything. He is the reason why Sebastian decided for two years to study in Ohio. He is also the reason that Sebastian wanted to be a lawyer and chose to come back to America for Harvard. It was good as any year those five years of stay in America, and his mum and dad made it a point to stay friends― that has to count for something. And his grandparents did a great job spoiling him and raising him to become this overconfident kid.
He was contented and happy surrounded by the love of his unconventional family, taking a day at a time, always in the moment. No one even his father or grandpapa batted an eye or a disappointed gaze when he came out at age twelve. Only notorious in his younger promiscuousness which his grandmamma is trying to change a day at the time with pressure to marry, and most recently these pressure over that certain man.
So much for embracing the French ways― Sebastian thinks to himself with a chuckle.