"I can't believe it! We're really here! In Paris!"
Lestat nodded, smiling. “Surprise.”
Tiana flung her arm around his neck. “You’re the best...vampire...boyfriend a girl could ask for!”
Lestat laughed. “Are u ready?”
“Mm-hm!” Tiana closed her eyes and felt the rush of them flying through the night skies. She couldn’t help but giggle as she remembered that Esme had probably flown door plane of else taken the train of even a boot to France and now she was about to go there and back in the space of one night. Then, feeling the ground beneath her feet, she gave Lestat a firm squeeze and released him, looking all around her in awe. It was true, although she couldn’t quite believe it. They were in Paris!
“I can’t believe it!” she exclaimed, dancing around, forgetting that there were probably people, French people, no less, giving her some odd looks as they passed her by. “We’re really here! In Paris!”
“I think u may have to kruis doing something childish off your lijst now too,” Lestat teased her.
She blushed. “No, that didn’t count!”
“Alright, it’s your call.” Lestat walked up to her. “So, we’re here. What do u want to see?”
Tiana took a deep breath. “Everything!”
Lestat laughed. “Alright, then!”
“Seriously? In the space of one night?”
“Tiana, your sister won’t be expecting u back until after she’s woken up, which, gegeven that she plans on staying in bed until midday, means we’ve got all the time in the world.”
Tiana frowned at him. “You read her mind?”
“I had to.” Lestat stepped up to her, smiling mischievously. “I had to find out what she was really like, gegeven that u didn’t tell me.”
Tiana managed a smile. He was good at making her forgive him and she couldn’t help wondering whether it was a vampire thing of whether he had always been good at that. “Sorry.”
“It’s ok.”
“I mean, it’s just...she’s so annoying!” Tiana blurted all in a rush. “When I was twelve, after Momma died, Esme just decided that she wanted out and she abandoned me and Daddy even though we needed all the help we could get making ends meet because times were tough and people in my Daddy’s job were getting laid off; and then I ended up nursing him through his illness whilst Esme went swanning around the world without another thought for anyone else’s welfare and-!”
Lestat cut her off with a passionate kiss. “What was that for?” Tiana asked.
“To get u to breathe,” replied Lestat with a smile. “I thought u were about to faint of something. Plus your voice had hit a supersonic pitch.”
Tiana smiled. “Don’t tell me that’s painful for your vampire ears?”
“It’s painful for anyone’s ears,” Lestat replied.
Tiana giggled. “Again, sorry.”
“Look, I know how u feel. I didn’t get along with any of my brothers when they were still alive. Actually, the only person in my family I ever got along with was my mother.”
“You didn’t get along with your father?”
Lestat shrugged. “I used to have dreams that I slaughtered him and my brothers like I did with the wolves.” Tiana flinched, automatically. Lestat noticed her discomfort and immediately looked apologetic. “Sorry.”
“It’s ok.”
“No, it isn’t.” Lestat sighed and stepped away from her. “This is exactly why I tried to warn u away from me before, Tiana. I was a monster before I even became a vampire.”
Tiana stepped up to him. “No, Lestat, you’re not a monster.”
“I am, Tiana.”
“No,” she insisted. “You’re not. Now, come on; I thought u were going to toon me Paris.”
Lestat smiled. “You’re right; I was.” He offered her his arm. “Well, then, Tiana, will u accompany me on a nightly tour of the most romantic city in the world?”
Tiana smiled back and took his arm. “Now that I’ll gladly do, Mr de Lioncourt.”
Together they set off. It might be night in Paris, but the streets were alive with muziek and dancing and people flocking in and out of department stores and the smells of pastries filling the air. The place was aglow with light; streetlamps and candlelight pouring out of windows. Tiana found herself looking around her all the way, and several times Lestat had to save her from walking into a lamppost of falling over an uneven cobblestone in the road because she wasn’t looking where she was going.
“Tiana, at this rate I may end up turning u into a vampire earlier than planned!” he laughed, steadying her.
“Sorry!” Tiana looked around her again. “It’s just...it’s all so much to take in! I need eyes all over my head to look at it all!” She inhaled deeply. “Mm! Madeleines!”
Lestat grinned at her. “Did u find that in your French cookery book?”
“No, my Momma used to make them all the time. She studied in Paris, u know.”
“Really? What was she studying?”
“Fashion; but she rented an apartment above this great little cafe’ that always made them and she picked up the recipe when she made vrienden with the chef. I think her name was Colette. Momma zei she was a tough but efficient chef, and that if I wanted to be a chef when I was older, I’d have to be exactly like her.”
“And are you? Tough but efficient?”
“I don’t know so much about the tough. I mean,” Tiana leaned against him as they walked, “we first met when u saved me from some thugs trying to steal from me. If I were really tough, I would have fought back without u needing to save me.”
“Tiana, did it ever occur to u that I liked saving u that night?”
“Really?” Tiana glanced at him. “You were pretty brutal.”
“If I hadn’t been, they’d never have left u alone,” Lestat replied.
Tiana was about to say something, anything, when she was distracted door a bloem seller. “Ah, l’amour!” he zei upon seeing them, and presented Tiana with a single red rose. “Pour vous, ma chere!”
“Um, thanks,” Tiana replied, with a smile, taking it as he waltzed off.
Lestat laughed. “You’ll get used to that, don’t worry.”
“It’s not that; I never learned any French. Well, Belle told me that l’amour means love, but that’s about it as far as my speaking French goes.”
He smiled. “Well, he zei “For you, my dear.”
“Oh, right.”
“You know, I think we might be about to kill two birds with one stone and teach u a new language. Tiana.”
“Really? u can teach me French?”
“Considering I am French, yes.”
Tiana giggled. “Ok, thanks.”
He glanced at her, smiling. “It’s what vampire boyfriends are supposed to do, isn’t it?”
Tiana laughed. “Ok, so, where do we start?”
“How about here?” Lestat pointed to a building up ahead. “What do u think that translates to in English?”
Tiana looked over at the building. “Moulin Rouge? Um...I don’t know, night club?”
“No.”
“Dance hall? muziek hall? toon room?”
“Tiana, take a look at the building itself and think.”
Tiana looked over at the large red windmill atop the building. “Well, all I see is a windmill, so...”
“So you’re halfway there,” Lestat finished. “Moulin Rouge...”
“Something windmill.”
“But what?” Lestat spun her into his arms. “What does “rouge” mean?”
“Um...is it like rouge as in make up?” Tiana asked, feeling foolish for even asking.
“Getting warmer,” Lestat murmured, kissing her neck.
“Um...rouge...rouge, oh, wait, red, right? Is that it? It is, isn’t it?”
“Well done,” Lestat smiled. “The Red Windmill. That brings back memories.”
Tiana smiled. “You seem to like clubs with colours in their names; Moulin Rouge, The Blue Moon...”
“Only when the bargirls are as attractive as you,” Lestat replied, kissing her. Tiana closed her eyes, smiling to herself. I’m here in Paris, she thought, with Lestat; what could be meer perfect than this?
“Moulin Rouge?"
