CHAPTER 28
We moved up the coast bit by bit, starting at the spot where the mountains ended. It was surreal: the Pyrenees simply came to an abrupt halt not just at the sea, but also at the edge of a vast plain, like a crease in a bedsheet. More importantly, though, we had sand rather than gravel.

We stopped in at the tourist office, where they had a list of hotels that Ange checked against her book, until she went “Ooh! That one there. Not the most expensive, but it’s got a bloody Michelin star!”

“What? Tyres?”

“No, woman. It means even the French rate the food there. Got to be done, this”

She did the booking in her broken French, and I am sure the tourist worker was trying not to giggle as she spoke. We left with some paper vouchers and a street map torn from a thick pad of the things, Ange muttering as soon as we were out of the air-conditioned space.

“Bloody locals, Jen. They speak really, really weird”

“Not just your French, then?”

“I know how you meant that, but no, it isn’t, yet it is, ey? Their French isn’t my French. Look: what’s froggy for wine?”

“Vino? I mean vinn?”

“Not quite, it’s more ‘van’, with the ‘n’ sort of strangled. Down here, they pronounce it ‘veng’. When I think they’re talking about wine, they’re actually complaining about bloody wind! Anyway, I hope the bloody menu here is translated properly. Bit of a walk, but the beach is closer as well”

The hotel looked rather like someone’s idea of a Mexican ranch, all stucco walls and open courtyard, an awning on a vine-wrapped trellis giving some lovely shade as we entered, passing that little sign from Michelin that had my lover so excited. A middle-aged woman was by the counter, and when she spotted our vouchers, she smiled and launched into rapid foreign.

Oddly, Ange seemed much happier with that, and after a moment, the woman called out a younger woman.

“Hello. Madame Boucher is not so comfortable in the English. I am Celeste, and I have more of it”

Ange laughed, giving me a glance.

“I’ve been having all sorts of problems with the local accent, Miss”

“Ah, this is Catalunya, and then, further beyond, is Occitanie. The French is… It is an occasional tongue here, and then it is not as they speak at Paris”

“But I could understand your colleague, much more easily”

“Madame Boucher came to us from the Normandy”

“Ah! What brought her here?”

“She is our… in English… Chief of cooking?”

“You mean that star is hers?”

“Absolutely. We are not in the season, however, so we are less… extravagant? Less complicated in our menu”

Ange said she’d explain ‘the season’ to me later, and we followed Celeste to another spotless modern room that belied the spaghetti western look of the outside. As soon as our bags were dumped, Ange repeated our mantra: “Beach?”

The water was much clearer than down the coast, the sand reasonably coarse, and after we had sated our immediate need to splash, Ange explained a few things I had missed.

“The season, love. The froggies take a month off each year, traditionally, either July or August. They say they’re either July or August people, and that’s when this place gets packed to buggery. We’re ahead of all that by a few weeks. Second, it’s basically one big beach all the way from here to the mouth of the Rhone river, and the sand changes as you go along. Other side of the marina there, book says it’s quite coarse. Up by that river, it’s like talcum powder”

“Oh! Like Chesil Beach?”

“Where?”

“Place I read about in England, a very long shingle spur. Cobble size depends on how far along it you are”

“That’s it!”

We ran back into the water hand in hand, my heartrate peaking at that single word.

The rest of that day was spent alternately slathering sunscreen on each other and seeing how far we could swim underwater, as sunlight dappled a rippled sandy bottom and various fish darted away from us. Penarth it most certainly wasn’t. Back to the room, one thing led to another even more wonderful, which meant a shower, of course, to remove the, er, salt. We chose spaghetti-strapped sundresses for our ‘evening’ wear, and settled at the little bar as Celeste laid out a table for two.

“Is this your first time in Catalunya?”

We both nodded.

“You would take an aperitif before the meal? A gift of our hotel. Kir royale”

She showed us a bottle with an incredibly colourful label saying ‘Crème de cassis’, with pictures of blackcurrants, poured a drop into each of two champagne flutes, then topped it up with some fizzy wine, wished us something in frog and awaited our reaction.

It was very, very moreish, like slightly dry fizzy Ribena, and it went down rather quickly. Ange whispered to me, “This is all going on my card, love. I think this will be special”

The menu wasn’t translated, nor did it come with pictures. We looked at it, Celeste offered hints, Madame Boucher came from the kitchen to give more detail in French, and then we were ordering. Both of us plumped for something called ‘pop’ on the menu, which Celeste managed eventually to explain meant octopus, as a first course, and then ‘lamb mice’ for me (seriously!) with something involving duck legs for Ange. As we ordered the octopus, Madame Boucher started to laugh, saying something very rapid to Celeste.

“Madame says that her daughter would disown her, as she adores the pop, but as a living creature rather than on a plate”

I rather adored the ‘pop’ as well, and my lamb mouse, which turned out to be a lamb shank, the meat incredibly tender and full of flavour that worked very, very well with the obligatory jug of pink wine. As our mains were cleared, Celeste produced two small glasses, and asked if we wanted a hole.

I was utterly lost as to a sensible reply, but Celeste was smiling, so we clearly weren’t in any form of trouble except, perhaps, as the butt of some obscure joke. Madame B appeared yet again, though, with a bottle, and I was treated to a very confusing explanation that finally came down to Norman tradition. Apparently, their food is so hearty (which I translated as ‘heavy’ in my imagination) that they have to make a ‘hole’ for more food partway through a meal, which is done by taking a belt of their apple firewater thing, Calvados.

Our ‘hole’ was also on the house, apparently.

We had cheeses, we had a rosemary sorbet to ‘clean our tongues’, and then celeste told us that dessert was a house speciality, so, well, yeah. We were pigging out, and after making that hole…

How on Earth did summer pudding make its way to the edge of the bloody Med? No complaints from either of us, for it was superb, and very, very well done, in fitting with that star award. Finally, though, we were at the staring-at-coffee-cups stage, despite that hole. It also seemed to be past last orders for the kitchen, as Celeste explained.

“Madame is very clear: this is a restaurant, not a bistro, and she will serve full meals, not ten minute steak-frites for people with no manners, and here she is”

The woman held a small notepad, and as Celeste interpreted, she talked us through the meal, clearly an absolute professional in what she did, as well as a bloody amazing cook. Once done, she rattled something off to Celeste, who blushed, before the older woman waved her to speak.

“This is not of comfortable, Mesdemoiselles. I should explain that my brother is an apotheque, a seller of drugs, those allowed by law”

I nodded.

“A pharmacist, we would say. I am a paramedic, so sort of related. In an ambulance, yes?”

“I understand. It is… My mother is become, in a way, grandmother to the daughter of Madame Boucher, Julienne. Julienne is Madame, I am sorry. The daughter is called Sophie, and Julienne, she asks if things are good for people like you in England. Her daughter is like you, she means”

Ange sighed.

“PCOS again, love. Celeste?”

Somehow, in limited English and worse French, Ange got across the concept of my condition, and ‘Julienne’ began apologising in floods of words, so I simply held up a finger to pause the flow.

“Celeste, please explain if you can: I’ll keep things short, in bits”

“D’accord’

“I am not trans. But I know many trans women. I help them when I can, when they need. Things are not always good. Some of us try to make it better. She clearly loves her daughter. That is more than many have. She should feel good about that”

More rapid-fire French, and Ange translated for me.

“I got that the girl has a brother and wants to take her to meet friends in England, trans friends. Something nasty I couldn’t get” At that last remark, Celeste looked at her colleague, eyebrows raised, and the woman shook her head sharply.

What the hell had gone on? I remembered poor Maisie as we had first met her, then that group of girls laughing around Debbie the psycho biker bitch. It seemed shit knew no borders. Up to us, then, to help clean some of it up.