CHAPTER TWELVE
match point
˚✧₊⁎
The aching stench of petrichor, the shrill whining of whistles, the heaving breaths of exhaustion, the cacophony of shouting teenage boys paired with the beating downpour of rain, and the nippy chill of October air; it filled Juliette's senses all at once like a 100-person symphony orchestra playing the climax of their final piece.
It has been a tight game in its entirety with the students and teachers right at each other's heels. Although Juliette was not the biggest fan of sports, she had to admit there was an energy in the air she could not shake. It filled her lungs to capacity and now she understood why spectators shouted to their hearts content. The teachers were ahead by one point now but the competition was far from over.
Even Simone and Michéle were lulled into the energy as they sat underneath their shared umbrella next to Juliette. Their shouts merging into one shrill chorus.
She was enjoying the game quietly beneath her own umbrella, sitting next to a restless Annick whose uneasy leg shook as if she was high off adrenaline. The adrenaline of which stemmed from her academic restlessness rather than the game at hand, her eyes darted left and right, hoping for one of the teams, literally any one of them, would hurry and score and beat the other.
Schoolwork was piling up now, picking up at a speed in which multiple assignments were due on the same day with essays, research projects, and tests all in sequence.. Earlier today at school, Annick confided with Juliette her stresses academically. How she could not afford wasting valuable free time on stupid games of football instead of using it to complete her work.
It worried Juliette how much Annick allowed school and work to consume her entirety. She understood the sacrifices she had to make, and yet Juliette can't help but feel there is something more than high school stresses plaguing her dear friend's mind.
Annick huffs, her breath causing tendrils of blonde loose from her bun to float in the air. "I should be working on the project, right now."
"I'm sure the game will be over soon," Juliette attempts to comfort her, but she stands abruptly.
"I think I should just go."
Juliette's gaze travels upward, "are you sure—?"
"Yes," Annick walks away without another word, leaving the girl to her own devices as the shouts continued.
She watched as the blonde made her way towards Pichon, his wide grin falling to a pursed line as she mutters something to him, quick and harsh. She stomps away, heels digging into the drenched grass turf. She, along with Simone and Michéle watch her trudge back into the school. Michéle excuses herself quickly as she chased after her.
Juliette flickers a look towards Simone who only shrugs with a frown.
She looks around the pitch, aside from the teachers, she did not recognize anyone playing on the students team. Seniors, she presumed. None of which she was familiar with as the only one she even knows by name was sat a few rows down, smoking a cigarette with his rowdy group of boys. Simone has been strangely keeping her distance from him, yet sharing longing gazes from afar.
Juliette tosses another look over her shoulder, eyes falling onto jovial boys high in energy and practically jumping out of their seats.
And then there was Descamps, whose expression fell flat and unreadable as he leaned against the iron fence surrounding the pitch. Although the rain was much lighter now, his hair was drenched from the hour the game had been going on for. It would only get worse the more he stood there, exposed to the elements of sprinkling precipitation as he reaches into his pocket. A box of cigarettes looked small in his rather large hands, fingers nimble as he takes one out and shoves it between with his teeth. It seems as if Dupin and Vergoux were more enamored in the game than he was.
Surprising to say the least as just yesterday he seemed excited to watch. Perhaps his wet coat and lack of umbrella was the cause of his somber mood.
Juliette tears her gaze away from Joseph as she excuses herself from Simone. With the boys' attention locked onto the game at hand, she was nothing more than another body passing by as she makes her way to the boy.
Joseph's piercing brown eye watches her as she approaches, the cigarette hung loose at the corner of his lip. She offers him a small smile as she stands by his side, holding the umbrella between the two of them.
She does not say as much as a greeting, but rather keeps her gaze towards the game as Joseph stares down at her with curious eyes. He feigns a grin, the action oddly warming him.
"That umbrella's not going to do much for me, unfortunately." Joseph mused with a smile. The umbrella was not meant to fit two people under it—at least not someone the size of him.
"You're shaking like a wet dog," says Juliette as she angles the umbrella to cover him better. Her shoulder was now exposed to the rain and stained dark droplets upon her coat. "I figured I could do you a favor."
He chuckles, fishing out a lighter from his pocket and ignited the flame with a quick flick. He cups his other hand around the fire, protecting it from the wind and rain as he held the end of his cigarette to it. Juliette watches as the embers burned and released a puff of white smoke.
Joseph pulls it from between his lips, offering the cigarette to her as a token of appreciation.
Juliette shakes her head, "I'm okay. I don't smoke."
It reminded her of her father's terrible habit. Half a pack a day and nothing less. The smell of burning nicotine and tobacco was ingrained into her memory; how it filled her entire home up to the point the cigarette smoke stained the pages of the books in their collection, tainting the pages with the vice of addiction.
"Maybe you need to," Joseph murmurs as he tilts the umbrella back over Juliette. The rain was no longer hitting her shoulder.
He smiles and the crowd erupts.
The senior made their penalty kick, and now they were tied with tension growing thicker in the air.
˚✧₊⁎
By the time the game had finished, the rain had come to a stop and the sun was setting, painting the skies in a dull crimson hue through the low hanging clouds. Streetlights flickered on in buzzing shocks of electricity as the bookstore was empty and nearing its close upon their arrival.
"How was the game?" Juliette grandfather asked the two of them as they dried their damp shoes on the aged doormat.
"It was good," the girl muttered as she rested her umbrella by the door.
"The teachers won unfortunately," added Joseph with a notion of lightheartedness in his tone.
Èugene chuckles, "oh, students have been losing to the teachers since my time at Voltaire. Seems as if the curse is yet to be broken."
"Who knows, perhaps we'll break it next year." Joseph muses with a shrug.
"Do you play?"
He shakes his head, "I wish. I played a little when I was younger but never made it far."
"Shame," her grandfather clicks his tongue, a smile appearing upon his expression. "Perhaps if you start playing on that pitch again you'd have a shot at beating the teachers."
"I think my playing days are over, Monsieur." Joseph says as their laughs synced in a wired cacophony.
Juliette clears her throat, capturing both of their attention as she motions towards her book bag resting on the same work table she and Joseph were at before. "I'd hate to interrupt, but we have an assignment to work on."
"Oh, my apologies, dear. We have a new shipment arriving tomorrow morning for the release of Pynchon's newest novel. I will have to move a lot of things around and fix displays." Èugene explains as he goes and flips the store sign from 'open' to 'close.' "I suggest you two head up to your room so I don't disrupt your working."
His granddaughter paused for a moment, lasting a few worrying beats. "My room?" She says as if to clarify.
Èugene flickers her a look, "yes, Juliette. Your room. Unless you'd like to work in our tiny kitchen. Your choice."
Juliette nods, letting out a sigh as she heads upstairs to their apartment. Joseph follows close behind her, the floorboards of the stairs creaked beneath their weight.
The Bellemare home was quiet and quaint as Joseph closed the door behind him. The smell of cozy linen and burning candle wicks filled his senses as he stands by the door, feet planted firmly to the ground while he watched Juliette approach her grandmother. She sat at her usual reclining chair with Edith Paith singing quietly upon their black and white box television.
He watched as she drops down to her knees beside Albertine, speaking to her in a hushed voice that Joseph could not decipher. Juliette presses a light kiss upon her mamie's temple before standing.
To his right was another short flight of stairs to which he assumes leads to their bedrooms. He waits for Juliette to lead the way before he is once again staring at the dark wood flooring of the stairs instead of upwards.
Juliette's bedroom is the first door to the right and upon entering he is greeted by Bonbon hopping off her window sill, trotting her way towards him. She meows as a greeting, rubbing her head and curling her tail around his calf as she purrs.
"I think she's obsessed with you," the girl muses as she shuts the door behind them.
"In love, more like." He chuckles.
"Always something to feed your ego..."
A smirk melts upon Joseph's lips as he tosses her a look, "jealous, perhaps?"
She rolls her eyes, setting her coat on the back of her desk's seat. "Yes," she answers and Joseph's heart lunges in his throat, "of Bonbon giving you all the intention instead of me. Come here, girl."
He lets go a breath he hadn't realised he was holding. A strange feeling tickled at his stomach that subsided with relief and disappointment all at the same time. He just hoped she didn't catch the wide-eyed look plastered all over his face as he turns away, dropping his things upon her desk.
Juliette pats her hands onto her thighs, beckoning her pet to jump into her arms. She drags her palms through her long fur, keeping a mental checklist to put her in for a long overdue trim at the groomers.
"I wish I had a bigger desk, but if you want you can take it and I can just work on the floor," Juliette says as she sets Bonbon down to roam freely.
"Why work on the floor when you have a perfectly functional bed?" He gives a curious look.
"Terrible idea," she says.
"How so?"
"I'd fall asleep immediately," Juliette chuckles, "beds and productivity are never a good mix."
Joseph hides the smirk threatening to form on his lips as he simple nods, "good to know."
The two of them pick off right where they left off—a blank page. The previous day was filled with nothing but spending a few hours staring at a wall and hoping for a miracle to happen. They were easily distracted and terribly confused but came up with a topic at the very least. Simone de Beauvoir was surely a unique character to talk about with a very slim chance any other group could have picked her. This easily eliminated Juliette's tragic fear of comparison.
In order to compose a proper exposé, however, you first had to know who you're writing about from their birth to present day. Considering de Beauvoir is still alive and well, she and Joseph only had to worry about researching the fifty-five years she has been alive.
Perhaps there were quirks to living above a bookstore when a trip to find textbooks about authors and literary figures were nothing but a short trip downstairs. Much better than a ten minute walk to the library, or worse—hoping the school was still open to fetch a few books from their library. And technically, (if her grandfather was feeling particularly nice) they were free.
A peaceful silence ensued them for the next few hours. With their noses stuck between pages, nothing but the sound of Bonbon's occasional purrs, their scratching pencils, and Cliff Richard and the Shadow's latest record spinning on the turntable filled Juliette's room in a light hum. Somewhere in between, Èugene had offered them a few bites to snack on—apples, biscuits, and tiny crackers that Bonbon definitely did not try and steal.
Their working tandem came to a brief pause once the skies finally dimmed from its grey overcast into a vast nothingness. Not a single star appeared in the sky nor a slither of moonlight escaped through the dark storm clouds that still hung over the town, blocking out the mysticisms of the cosmos for another round of trickling rain.
Joseph decides to get up from Juliette's desk then, stretching out his legs with a groan. Something about her overfilled bookcase held a kind of allure and magnetism that draws nearly all her guests towards its towering being as Joseph eventually found himself browsing through it like a curious child.
His gaze, meddlesome as ever, catches a square shaped photograph tucked in between her copies of The Iliad and The Odyssey. A polaroid based on its thick white borders, held a still scene of Juliette in her old school uniform; a tie loosely hung around her neck with a boy nearly a foot taller than her had his arm slung over her shoulder, wide, saccharine-coated grins plastered upon their faces. The boy's tie hung loose around his neck as well and Joseph would be lying to himself if he denied that fact that the boy was good-looking. If he schooled at Voltaire surely all the girls would take a liking to him, including Juliette.
Dean, he concludes. And all of a sudden Joseph was filled with envious spite.
He shoves the polaroid back into its original home, stuck between the crevices of two Archaic era epics.
Joseph continued eyeing the bookshelf up and down as he attempted the swallow back the hollowness he felt within the crevices of his chest. It was a feeling he hadn't felt in a while, nor a feeling he was all too familiar with. Jealousy—which he hated to even call it—was not something he felt often. He had always been content with the things he had. Anything else had nothing to do with him.
Juliette had something to do with him.
She was his partner after all and most of all, a friend of his. He liked to believe so, at least. Knowing her, Juliette would not spare him the niceties of, well... anything if she didn't believe them to be friends.
Yeah, that's it. Joseph has always been possessive of his friends, protected them, defended them, made fun of them whenever he can. Vergoux, Dupin, and her—Juliette Bellemare.
His scrutinizing stare stopped again on another trinket hidden in a weird spot on her bookshelf. He picked up the picture frame, brow furrowing at the tiny cracks that formed at one corner of the frame's glass. It was a family photo, displeased and impassive. Juliette's words from the previous night rings through his head.
My parents and I don't get along...
Quietly, he sets the frame back down. He sets it down on its face at first, back into its original spot as if he never touched, but instead he tucks the frame deep into the far corner of her bookshelf until it was no longer visible.
He protected his friends after all.
"Why did you move here?" He asks, tearing his gaze away from the bookshelf.
Juliette is slow to bring her head up to his attention, quickly jotting down her final bullet point before looking at him. "Because of family," she answers. It's haphazard like a simple toss over her shoulder.
Joseph narrows his gaze at her, curiosity filling him as it always did whenever he was around her. Friendship was a funny, fickle thing. You could hangout with someone often, hell, see them for hours on end almost everyday and crown them the title of 'friend' and yet there is still a possibility you don't know a single thing about them outside of surface level details.
He did not even know her favorite color. Or her birthday. Or her favorite food. It was laughable, really. Though, he couldn't defend himself entirely. He was not one to share much about his personal life, either.
"I mean, how did you manage to get a spot at Voltaire?" he reinstates, "You move here a few days before the first day of school, no?"
Juliette's pencil stops in the midst of her phrase, trickles of lead dusting the page from the pressure she was not aware she was applying. Her lips purse into a tight line as she hesitates for a few solid beats before swallowing whatever lump forming in her throat.
"My mamie is sick," she mentions as if in passing.
Juliette mastered her casual tone when talking about serious topics out of habit. Out of necessity. It was the best way to keep her tender beating heart from accelerating at immense speeds until she couldn't breathe, the best way to keep her from anxiously picking at her nailbeds until her fingertips bled crimson, and the best way to keep her from breaking down again.
"And my papi is getting too old to juggle being her caretaker and running the shop, so my parents shipped me over here to help them out."
"Did you agree to it?" Joseph asks.
Juliette shrugs, "not like I had much of a choice, anyway. I love London and my friends there, but at least I don't have to live under their roof, anymore."
Was it strange to say that Joseph was relieved too? He turns around, fingertips grazing the spines of her books.
"You had friends in London?" he questions as if the idea of which sounded impossible. Rather it was to hide his burning curiosity. He wondered if she would mention him.
"Yes, I have the ability to make friends, thank you very much Descamps." Juliette rolls her eyes at him, "Dean and Laurie, they're my closest friends."
Joseph nods slowly, waiting to see if she would elaborate. What did she consider close, anyway?
"When's your birthday?" he then follows up.
He doesn't miss how her brows furrow, "January 30th. Aquarius."
"I knew it," (He didn't. He did not know jack shit about zodiacs nor did he care to learn.)
"What about you?" she asks with a tilt of her head.
"April 3rd," he answers.
Juliette held a peculiar look to her expression as she nods, "An Aries. I should've known."
He scoffs, "what is that supposed to mean?" Should he be offended?
"Oh, nothing." She snickers as she brings her attention back to her notes, "nothing at all..."
Joseph simply shakes his head then. He should be getting back to work now, but his fatigued brain refused to even fathom the idea of reading paragraphs upon paragraphs on minuscule size print. Instead, he takes his attention back to Juliette's bookcase and lets her collection take up his time.
He taps his knuckle on The Count of Monte Cristo's faded title. A low thump emitted from its thick, inch and a half book spine. "You know, I never finished this book," Joseph says as he breaks the silence once more, "it's still sitting on my desk, collecting dust."
Juliette did not have to lift from her head to know what book he was talking about. She chuckles, "I told you so."
"I still managed to get a thirty on the essay," he defends.
"Right, out of forty points."
"So what?"
Juliette looks up at him, amusement coating her face as she holds back a laugh. "That's seventy-five percent, Descamps."
"Still above average," he shrugs. "Aside from that poem book you recommended me, I have not found another book I've been interested in finishing."
"Sounds like a personal problem..." the girl teases.
Joseph tosses her a look, thoroughly unimpressed.
He sighs, another wave of procrastination drenching him as his arms slump to his side. "You know..."
"What is it now?"
He taps his pointer finger atop her bookshelf as a sly look melts upon his visage. His weight shifts idly from his heels to the balls of his feet, "I'm still waiting on those recommendations I asked for weeks ago..."
A chuckle forces itself out between Juliette's peach-tinted lips as she tosses her notes to the side, standing from her seated position on the floor as she makes her way towards Joseph. "Well, what are you in the mood for, then?"
"Anything really," he says, lifting his shoulders in a shrug. "Well, anything but Dostoyevsky."
"Perhaps I should suggest Nabokov the way he despised Dostoyevsky like you do." It was mostly a joke on Juliette's own amusement, noting that Russian literature just may not be his cup of tea.
"His characters talk too much," he complains.
"One of his characters wrote an 11-page letter in Crime and Punishment so I don't blame you." Juliette sighs as she peers closer at her bookshelves, focusing on the ever changing size and style of book titles as she ponders. "You did mention you liked philosophy," she mutters as she pulls a slim novella from a lower shelf.
She hands Joseph a copy of The Stranger by Albert Camus.
He pushes it towards her, "Read that in middle school, Bellemare."
She shoves the book back into his chest, "You'll read it again."
"Yes, ma'am."
Juliette brings her attention back to browsing her wall of books. The following novels she deshelved all came quickly to her. She figured she needed to give him something known, something well-loved for a higher chance of his enjoyment, yet all different enough within themselves to add a bit of diversity in his reading. She stayed within the limits of European authors, however, she was tempted to give him one of Sylvia Plath's poetry collections or Emily Dickinson for a change.
"Here," she says, dropping a pile of books that threatened to spill from her hands. It seemed to fit just fine in Joseph's rather large ones.
He inspects them: The Stranger, Pride & Prejudice, The Picture of Dorian Grey, and Wuthering Heights. All popular book titles that even a child has heard of before. Surely Juliette was pulling at his tail with these basic suggestions.
"Do you think that lowly of me, Bellemare?" Joseph feigns faux offense.
"A true reader should know or have at least read these titles," she answers with a tap of the cover, a seriousness coating her tone.
Joseph hums, clicking his tongue against his teeth. "I don't know, sounds a bit pretentious to me."
"You're the last person I want to hear about pretentiousness when your interests involve philosophy, Descamps."
He forces down a smile, "Touché."
AUTHOR'S NOTE !
so i switched the timeline of events around just a little bit to help fit the plot a bit more. in the show, annick's bike gets stolen before the game, but in this story i'm having it happen a few days after instead.
i also made up joseph's bday and made him an aries lol yall can fight me on this but that man is a fire sign if i see one!! aquarius and aries pairings are also so underrated,, they're definitely unconventional but somehow balance each other out and i think that describes the two of them perfectly.
not to mention we also have officially hit 10k reads!! i genuinely did not expect much to come out of this fic as i purely started writing for the purpose of being self-indulgent but thank you sm for those still reading this! i know the hype around mixte 1963 has died down a lot but i still have every intention to finish this story if it's the last thing i do.
thank you lovelies once again for reading :))
— fei.