Short Story (in progress)

Jean was completely sheltered. He did everything with his father; he went to the zoo with him, was tutored by him everyday. He lived to please his father, to have some connection to the mother whom he never knew; he knew that his father was always dreaming about her.

He disliked Celeste because she was the only one who didn’t love everything he did. He heard her muttering under her breath about how spoiled he had become, and he never understood exactly what she meant. All he knew is that she made him do all the stuff that he didn’t want to do, like practicing his math and his French when his father was busy.

Lemonnier devoted himself to spending time with his son, no matter what business changes came up. He made sure to plan outings at least three times a week, despite Celeste’s insisting that the boy’s time would be much better spent learning instead of constant pranks and playing. Yet Lemonnier insisted on spending as much time with his son as possible.

Jean loved sports, including soccer and tennis. He would play with his father all the time, with their games often dissolving into fits of laughter. Lemonnier’s friend M. Duretour often came by as well, and joined in the action. Even strict Celeste, watching from the window, couldn’t always hold back a smile watching the two men and the boy chasing each other around the field.

M.Duretour had become somewhat of an uncle to Jean. When he traveled, he would bring back little trinkets so that the boy had a small collection of items from across the globe. Jean looked up to him a lot, in some ways even more than his father. He once told Duretour that he wanted to be just like him when he grew up, and travel all around the world to all of the different cultures. Duretour also was willing to talk about Jean’s mother, a feat that Lemonnier had not yet achieved. He was full of stories, and always told Jean how much he was like his mother.

As Jean matured, he had become accustomed to a lot of attention. However, as a few more years went by, he began to feel the way Celeste had known he would feel eventually – restricted. He began to notice things about how his father behaved. One day he approached his father and inquired as to whether he could invite his friend to come and visit. Lemonnier was completely surprised. “My Jean,” he said. “We were going to go for a walk in the park that day! Don’t you remember?”

Jean accepted that excuse for the day, and had a lovely time in the park. Yet he couldn’t help noticing that his father seemed to have something planned for every single time he wanted to do something on his own. When he asked if he could go and speak to some children his age while watching a tennis match in a nearby town, he was told no, and asked, “Don’t you enjoy spending time just you and me?”

As Jean grew a little older, he was saddened by the fact that many children living on his road were being sent of to boarding schools. Jean, who had never really been farther from home than two or three towns, was intrigued. He went to his father one day, and asked casually, “Father, have you ever considered sending me to boarding school? Many of the other children are going, and I think it could be fun.”

Lemonnier didn’t skip a beat. “Jean,” he said. “I’ve been teaching you for a very long time now, and we’ve always had fun, haven’t we?”

After a few more incidents of this sort, Jean began to get fed up. Everywhere he looked he saw opportunities for more freedom, but when he asked his father, his requests were always denied. He grew more and more exasperated.

Once, as he left one such meeting with his father, he ran into Celeste outside the door, smirking. Still incredibly frustrated by his father’s lack of understanding, he had absolutely no patience. “What?” he snapped. “What’s so funny?”

“I knew this would happen, from the day you were born,” the nurse responded. Ever since your lovely mother died, he could not let you go for a minute. God forbid that you scrape your little knee, and he would never let himself get over the guilt of it. But to let you go away and be taught by someone else… it would take several major miracles to convince him of that one.”

Jean stormed off to his bedroom, and flopped into one of the soft, deep blue armchairs in the corner. He buried his face in his hands and sat there, contemplating what Celeste had said. “Ever since your mother died…” His mother. That was the key to the whole thing. He was being doted upon beyond words because his mother wasn’t there. He laughed out loud. Knowing that Duretour was coming for dinner that night, he decided what he was going to do.

After dinner that evening, Lemonnier went into his office to do some work on a particularly difficult project. With his father gone, Jean presented his idea to Duretour. However, Duretour was skeptical. “It will be very difficult to pull off… your father never loved anything or anyone more than he did your mother. We’ll see what happens.”

The next weekend, Duretour informed Lemonnier that he was going to bring a guest to dinner. Lemonnier, of course, thought nothing of it. He assumed that Duretour had finally found a nice woman to date. He was not at all prepared, though, for what happened next.

The woman who came to dinner was equal in beauty, if not more beautiful than his wife had been. She was a head shorter than Lemonnier, and was thin, but not sickly thin. She had a shy, gentle smile in the shape of a perfect quarter moon, and huge grey blue eyes. She wore her rabbit soft, dirty blond hair so that it draped gracefully down her back, reaching to just below her shoulders. Her skin was very pale, but with the tanned hue of being out in the sun.

As she stood in the front hall looking around, Lemonnier’s first thought was that he had never seen a more perfect looking woman. He immediately reprimanded himself for having that thought, thinking it an insult to his wife’s memory. At the same time, he couldn’t help thinking that after twelve or so years, his wife had become just that – a memory. “She would want me to move on,” Lemonnier thought to himself. “But I don’t know if I can. How can anyone be more darling than my Jeanne?”

Pulling himself together, he realized he had company. He hurried down from where he had been standing to welcome Duretour and the mysterious woman to his home. Jean, who had been standing near by, had judged his father’s thoughts by his facial expressions. He smiled to himself. His plan was actually working!

During dinner, Lemonnier could not stop talking to the woman. They discovered that her name was Rose, and she and Duretour were friends, but were not dating. Jean smirked as a quick smile darted across his father’s face.




*** To come: as Jean wishes for more freedom, his father finds a woman he loves as much as his first wife, and begins to ignore Jean. Having received his freedom, Jean wants his shelter back.****