They met on the steps of the Sacré-Cœur beneath a sky of the most fierce and unerring blue, so without variation or hesitation it was as though a painter had brushed cerulean across the horizon, no shade or blight anywhere, yet undeniably a cover up. Or perhaps it was only so blue by contrast to the dome and cupolas of the Sacré-Cœur, which too seemed arranged, virgin white paper cut out and laid across the perfect wash of the sky.

Laure was reading and smoking on the left staircase, her long legs thrust out before her, her prematurely greying hair flipped over and hanging across her narrow face. Erica approached, sweating from the ascent through Montmartre’s cobbles in her polyester skirt printed with great bunching florals, rippling and sticking to her thighs. She swears it was the right staircase, remembers turning to her left to look up at the dome pinned against the sky. Smoke in her eyes, an instinctive irritation that did not serve her well in Paris. Each will remember it differently, but on this fact they agree: it was Erica who smiled first, and said—

“Bonjour.”