Baguette Rhymes with Dead || ONC 2024 | ✔

Chapter 12: The Picture of Two Cities

Though I kept my guard up and expected trouble—a student calling out my name, coming face-to-face with Abelard or suddenly finding Heloise's hand on my shoulder—I reached L'Hôtel without running into any trouble. No subway delays, no getting lost; not even the ghost I dared ask for directions once I emerged from Saint-Germain-de-Prés Station gave any indication she suspected I wasn't as dead as her. My theory proved true so far. On my own, I blended in, appearing to be nothing but just another of Père-Lachaise's deceased. And by the time I walked into L'Hôtel, I still had an hour and a half on the clock.

My visit here would have to be a whirlwind one, but I was confident I'd make it out.

I'd never been inside a five-star hotel before, let alone in Paris, but L'Hôtel's entrance looked inconspicuous and less grand than I'd envisioned. The doorway was adorned with a pewter ram's head and I saw a plaque commemorating Oscar Wilde's stay and death on the premises. A powerful remembrance symbol in the land of the living, but oddly akin to one of those family name sign things my mother had insisted we needed to display by our front door. As I stepped into a dimly-lit hallway, I wondered if Oscar Wilde thought of it that way, too.

I made my way through the lobby, seeking a receptionist of sorts, one who'd know where exactly in the building Oscar Wilde could be found. The place's interior left much more of an impression on me than the exterior: I felt like I'd stepped right into an opulent fin-de-siècle residence for the rich and famous, the highest of Parisian society. A sweet fragrance hung in the air and the colours around me were deep and warm. The hotel had to see cleaners much more frequently than the prison I'd just left behind, too.

Following my instincts and the sounds of human voices and clinking glasses, I entered a bar area as luxurious as the rest of the hotel, where well-dressed ghosts enjoyed drinks and each other's refined company. The bartender I approached wasted no time pointing out I wasn't adhering to the dress code in my old coat and worn sneakers, but softened up when I told him I was only here to try and talk to Oscar Wilde.

"He has the apartment suite on the top floor to himself," he informed me. "Go ahead, knock on his door. You'll find out soon enough if Mr. Wilde is willing to entertain a visitor today."

I didn't need to be told twice and accepted the challenge. Conquering the spiralling staircase proved yet another assault on my lung capacity; only after five floors of pure splendour did I find myself on the top one, facing an elegant door.

If I'd had more time, I would've stared at that door a little longer, catching my breath, collecting my thoughts, rehearsing all the burning questions and insightful things I wanted to voice in my head. But I didn't have that kind of time. I just knocked loudly without another thought, forced by the clock to make like Luc and wing it.

I didn't have to wait long.

The man who opened the door for me was, without a sliver of doubt, Oscar Wilde himself. Unlike Peter Abelard, he hadn't embraced modern-day dress trends as freely: his style seemed an only marginally updated version of what I'd seen in a well-known photograph of him, where he sported shoulder-length brown hair and quite the fabulous fur coat. Judging from the glass he held in his hand, filled with a liquid a lethal shade of light green, he hadn't lost his taste for absinthe, either.

I won't lie. I gaped. All that time, all that effort, and finally I could look the author I'd admired for years in the eyes. My nerves and excitement, combined with that horrific climb to get up here, turned my brain into slimy mush.

When he realised I wasn't about to say anything, Wilde broke the silence. "Tell me, dear fellow. Were you or were you not gifted with the ability to speak?"

Mentally rebooting, I startled out of my starstruck haze, blinking fast and replying even faster with a waterfall of words. "Mr. Wilde, I'm Nick and I don't have a lot of time, I'm kind of, sort of, passing through, and I need to leave soon, but I came all this way tonight to ask you for your autograph. I've read your novel, The Picture of Dorian Gray, and it's a masterful work, the best book I've read in my life and it's helped me through a lot and..." I dug my passport out of my pocket and held it out to him. "Can I just get your autograph, like, right now and really quick? Please?"

Wilde took a cautious sip of his absinthe, but I could see him smiling slightly; at least I amused him, if nothing else. "Fascinating. You do speak." The ghost turned away, taking my passport out of my hands and gesturing for me to follow. "Yes, hold on for a moment. I should be able to write something for you."

Grateful beyond belief, I stepped into Wilde's apartment suite in silence while the author placed my passport on his cluttered ebony desk and hunted for the nearest pen. Unsure what else to say, I awkwardly studied the spacious room, which came complete with a mini-bar, a small chandelier and a private terrace outside. It was an apartment you'd house a king in if the French didn't get off on guillotining those. A stunning space. Beautiful. Damn-near everything in this necropolis looked beautiful.

At least on the surface.

"I see your words come only in short bursts." Oscar Wilde's voice grabbed my attention again; he didn't look at me, focused instead on writing something on my passport's final page. "Many of my visitors bombard me with the most tedious of questions. In that regard, I have no cause for complaint with you, but it is quite curious. What is on your mind, dear fellow?"

The necropolis. Paris. Beauty.

The Picture of Dorian Gray.

"I guess this necropolis, it's a little like The Picture of Dorian Gray, isn't it?" I blurted out. "Because Dorian remains beautiful, but it's a lie, because his true self becomes uglier and uglier with every trespass and his picture reflects his true self back at him as this twisted mirror image. Béatrice said the necropolis and Paris are like mirror images, too. But in the end, in Dorian Gray, only one of the two images is beautiful, but the other one is real. It's honest." I paused to catch my breath. "And maybe the real beauty's in there sometimes. In honest things."

The Other Paris surpassed the wildest figments of my imagination; it was a dream and a nightmare all rolled into one. I'd seen its loveliest sides, the darkness looming underneath, and life-threatening adventures aside, I wouldn't have wanted to trade the experience of our ghost tour for anything. But the night was coming to an end, and though I hadn't thought it possible mere hours ago, I missed my own Paris. The real Paris, connected to the outside world, complete with hordes of commuters and starry-eyed tourists, funny smells everywhere, rats scurrying along the Seine under clear night skies.

That Paris was alive, and I could learn to love its rough edges for that reason alone.

Wilde remained silent as he contemplated what I'd said, putting his pen down. I might've thrown him a snarky comment about his lack of a quick reply if he wasn't Oscar fucking Wilde and I hadn't just been rambling bullshit about his masterpiece of a novel. I gulped, suddenly worried I'd offended him. Why, of all times, did my words have to fail me now?

"I'm sorry," I apologized, "I'm sorry, I'm probably abusing your work in some way. Twisting its intended meaning. I didn't want to disrespect–"

"You ought to read the preface to the book once more," Wilde interrupted. Though he'd written the text over a century ago, he recited lines from memory. "All art is at once surface and symbol. Those who go beneath the surface do so at their peril. Those who read the symbol do so at their peril. It is the spectator, and not life, that art really mirrors." Another slight smile tugged at his lips as he held my passport out to me. "I hope this means something to you."

I nodded, reeling from everything, and pocketed the document now containing my coveted autograph. "I'll treasure it forever."

~~

High on the euphoria of having succeeded, I hurried out of L'Hotel and back to the subway station. I was full of adrenaline and drunk on happiness, happiness about accomplishing my goal and finally getting to go home. I'd never forget this night, but I was tired and more than ready to leave the necropolis behind. And with over an hour still to go before the sun would rise, I'd make it to Père-Lachaise well within the time limit.

In that moment, I was invincible. Nothing could hurt me anymore.

Upon reaching the subway station, I descended the stairs, making my way underground. It was almost deserted; between six and half past seven evidently wasn't rush hour in the necropolis. Grand. The fewer ghosts I encountered, the lower the chance one of Abelard's students would be among them, though if Luc had made it back to Père-Lachaise safely, they'd no longer have use for me, anyway.
I rounded a corner then, only to come to an abrupt halt, confused by the sight in front of me.

Béatrice, with Luc by her side.