Never Turn Back Read Online Free PDF Page B

for famous people from around the world. Those were Kaija’s words even though I told her the French have no love of foreigners. They believe we’re good enough to wash their clothes, not design them.”
    “You told Kaija this?” Meri stared at Tuula, watching her dollop stew into the three mismatched bowls.
    Tuula stopped dishing up the stew and met Meri’s gray eyes, “I did. I even warned her about coming. As you can see, life for me isn’t so easy.” Tuula turned to Elina and smiled gently. “But we’ve made a fine life for ourselves here. I’m just telling you, Paris isn’t for everyone.”
    “Paris is for me, Mamma!” Elina said almost as a toast before she gulped down her first spoonful of stew.
    “Paris is for me, too. You will see,” Meri said, following Elina’s lead. She felt her heart quicken again with anticipation. Or was it apprehension?
    Tuula shrugged. “All right, here’s to Paris being for everyone!” Tuula was nothing if she wasn’t agreeable, as long as certain lines weren’t crossed.

Chapter 4: An Informal French Education
     
“How dreadful knowledge of the truth can be when there's no help in the truth.”
Sophocles
     
     
     
    During the first two months Meri stayed with Tuula and Elina, she learned a number of valuable lessons.
     
    §
     
    Meri’s first lesson: Tuula was right.
    Parisians did not welcome foreigners, and she was a foreigner. Meri carefully packed the lace dress she had designed and made, and carried it with her to every design house and dressmaker within the garment district, though she rarely even got the opportunity to show her handiwork. Most often, her rejection came without entering the establishment. She needed no fluency in French to understand the curt wave of a hand and the pinched eyebrows silently telling her to go away. Could these French couturiers tell by simply looking at me that I’m not one of them? Is it my face? My clothes? What is it about me that makes me so different, so inferior, to them? Meri wondered, but never discovered.
    After nearly two months of rejections, a fashion house owner spoke to her after glancing at her delicate lace dress she anxiously presented to him.
    “You say this is your work?”
    “ Oui, Monsieur.” Meri had barely learned the rudiments of French, forcing her to keep her answers brief.
    “It is clear you’re good with a needle and thread. How are you with other domestic work?” he asked while examining the lace.
    Meri did not understand most of what he said, but she recognized “good,” “domestic,” and “work.” In the finest French accent she could muster, she delivered the phrase she had rehearsed so many times, “ Je serais honoré de travailler dans votre maison de belle façon.” (“I would be honored to work in your fine fashion house.”)
    He laughed. It was not an insulting laugh, just an amused one, Meri knew, by the crinkles around his eyes. Papa crinkles . She remembered them so well. “Come back if you decide you would like a job working for my wife.” As he carefully wrapped Meri’s lace dress in the packaging, he added, “Your work is beautiful, but I cannot hire a foreigner to do the job of a Parisian.” Then he looked at her and said to her soft, but confused gray eyes, “You look like a young woman who deserves a chance. What is your name?”
    Meri stared at him, befuddled by all the French. No one had spoken that much French to her since she had arrived because either the Parisians ignored her or she stayed close to the Finn-French community.
    The man touched her arm and asked again, “ Votre nom ?”
    “Oh! Meri. Meri Vaarsara.” She hoped she correctly understood.
    He picked up a piece of heavy paper with the name and the address of his shop. On the back, he wrote his name and another address. “Meri Vaarsara, if you want a job working for my wife, go here.” He spoke slowly and pointed to the address on the back of the paper. “My wife is having a baby and