- Annie is an art student in Paris who attends a pottery class. She notices a black man, Michel, in her class who she has never seen before. They make small talk and Annie invites Michel for coffee, hoping to make a new friend. - Later, Annie tells her friend Françoise about meeting Michel. Françoise is supportive of Annie branching out and making friends of different backgrounds, given Annie's upbringing in racist South Africa. Annie hopes the coffee meeting with Michel is a chance to become more open-minded.

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Traumaturgy Module Project, December 2015
Annie in Paris
Annie was an art student, all long legs and green eyes, wandering through the streets
of Montmartre. The evenings were always pink here, crisp and mesmerising, melting pinks
and purples and oranges and hot breath white cold in Parisian air. The heels on her boots
clipped on the cobbled alleys and she puffed on a cigarette, feeling so very chic indeed. She
headed towards the metro, wet steps shining against splattered leaves. Standing tall, thankful
for her gloves as she held onto the greasy pole, Annie wondered how many stops were left?
She counted in her mind. One, Montparnasse, two, three, four, Saint-Germain-des-Près, five,
Odéon, six, seven, eight Châtelet. She descended the metro and climbed up to Beaubourg,
which looked almost like an outside metro, tubes and escalators and so many steps.
Annie was going to see a temporary exhibition. What was the name of the artist
again? She would remember once she saw the name at the ticket office. She could already
smell the scent of oil paints and ceramic sculptures. She hoped to sit in front of statues of the
muses, perhaps draw Calliope and her busty figure, draped and exposed, rooted on strong
thighs. She thought to herself that she needed to learn more about classical culture, even
though she wasn’t looking in the right place. Oedipe, Orphée, Emile Zola, Victor Hugo, Jean
Cocteau. The art was opulent and the literature was rich and the myths were common
knowledge. How could she be on par with her friends when she felt so stupid? Stupid, stupid
little white girl from Africa. Annie shook her head. No, no, she was going to be an artist. And
a cultured one at that.
Annie stood in the back of the line. It was quite a busy day, but it gave her time to
count her change. Un franc, deux francs, trois, quatre, quinze francs. I’m a bit short of money,
she thought. That’s okay. This was a little treat to herself, she would ask for a student
reduction. Annie looked up and saw a poster of fleshy oil strokes. Lucien Freud, she nodded.
She arrived at the front of the counter and beamed a big smile at the ticket officer. He had a
big forehead and a couple of greasy strands of hair falling onto his thick, black brows. He did
not smile back.
“Un billet pour Lucien Freud, s’il vous plaît. Avec réduction étudiante, s’il vous plaît.
Merci.” She pushed her student card to the glass.
“Ah, non.”
“Je suis étudiante…. je fais un semestre ici,” Annie blushed as she heard her own
accent.
“Je ne vous vends rien.”
“Pardon?”
The man said nothing and Annie waited. The line behind her became bigger and bigger. What
was he waiting for?
Perplexed, she ushered “vous n’avez plus de billets?”
The man shook his head, and with a hairy, wrinkly knuckle pulled down the blinds of his
office, locked it and left. Annie’s face burned hot and she turned her head slightly, catching
sight of the queue of grumbling people.
“Qu’est-ce qui se passe ici?” a young man’s words stang.
“Je ne sais pas, il ne veut pas me vendre un billet.”
“Ah non! Non, non, non, je ne vends pas des billets à des gens comme ça.”
What on Earth was he talking about? Annie’s hand flitted about to her lips, her teeth, her
hair, her neck as she tried to conceal the moisture in her sweating brow.

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“Je ne vends pas de billet à des Sud-Africains.”
Oh! She understood now. Didn’t he know she was not like them? Annie was a sweet girl, she
never raised her voice. But what could she say? She had maids back home, but they were her
friends, and raised her. Aggie and Maria had cried when she left for Paris five months ago.
“Et nous alors?” snarled the young man, his mouth shining.
“C’est une question d’éthique. Je ferme mon bureau.”
It seemed like thousands of red eyes and red mouths stared back at Annie, and now she
longed for her Mommy’s tanned legs. She wanted to hide in the creases of her skirt.
“I can explain,” she tried. The queue stared at her dubiously.
Never mind, she thought. I’ll go to another museum. And just like that, Annie was off again,
green eyes shining and brown boots clipping. She could not have walked away any faster,
feet tripping over the reflecting puddles back into the metro.
Annie sat in the metro, her shaky legs too weak to hold her up. She put her head down
and melted in the crowd of anonymous faces. They don’t know me here, I do not have to
explain. She counted the stops on her journey back. Fifteen, thirteen, ten more to go. At least
it would give her some time to replace her thoughts. She fiddled with her bootlaces, tying
them and retying them, meticulously bowing and knotting them tight so they constricted her
sore ankles, and loosening them to splay out her toes.
She remembered the time she had visited France with her mother, many years ago.
They had packed heavily for their journey and her mother’s body strained to carry all the
luggage. Annie had her own suitcase, decorated with a little pink bow. Annie felt proud of
her beautiful suitcase and the pink bow, a pretty suitcase for a pretty girl. She loved all the
smiles the women gave her, and the compliments, “votre petite fille, qu’elle est charmante"
that the men would coo, staring longingly at her mother. At the station they saw a little black
girl carrying a suitcase.
“Look, Mommy! Isn’t she so lucky? The maid is carrying her
suitcase.” Her mother, raising an eyebrow, only tutted.
The thought filled her with a wave of heat, crawling like pins and needles from her
feet to her fingertips. Little Annie was guessing, how could she have known that the blacks
here were like the whites? Enough! She was a smart girl now, and she was a better person.
Besides, she lived in Paris, the city of upheaval and the country of liberté, fraternité,
égalité. Tying her bootlace, she decided she would be different. Annie, yes, Annie from
the Transvaal would make some black friends! And what could they say then? Never mind
the sketches, it was her pottery she needed to work on. She’d be throwing vases tomorrow.
The studio smelt of charcoal and pastel. The materials were put on little tables by the
side. The corners of the high windows fogged up slightly, the view pouring into the drizzling
streets. Each breath fell heavily, mingling smells of bodies and fingers dipped in paints and
stained by etchings. Pink flowers in pots lined the room. The tiles on the walls were cracked
and stained with paint splatterings, white and blue and brown. Annie sat in front of the wheel
she had chosen, close to the window. It was a colder part of the room, but she like the scent of
the mandevillas. She scratched lines back and forth on a notepad as she waited for the
practical session to start. Conversations and chatterings around her slipped past her thoughts
of sunshine and mangoes, of her family back home. Each time a student came in, spluttering

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and huffing with cold breaths, the wooden floors would heave and creak. Her mind fluttered
to the heat of an African summer when she felt an elbow push into her.
“Ouch!”
“Excusez moi. Sorry,” a young man’s voice uttered.
She looked up, frowning, rubbing her arm. A strong brown hand touched hers slightly.
“Oh!”
Her face scrunched up at him, couldn’t he just look where he was going? The boy’s
smile shone against his wooden skin. What bright teeth! He gestured to the wheel next to her
and she eased into a nod. Relax, Annie, relax. Don’t let him think you are… She had never
seen him before. How funny, a black man studying Fine Arts. In France? Fine Arts was a
white man’s passion. But she was a woman, and he was black. Maybe they liked it for the
same reasons. She wondered where he could be from.
“Bonjour, what’s your name?”
“I’m Annie. Et vous?”
“Tu. Michel. Enchanté.”
She giggled at his name. Imagine that— a black man called Michel.
“Are you new?” Annie asked, as he took off his coat and placed it by his feet.
He was only wearing a thin shirt and she could see the outline of his muscles in his arms.
“Non, non, I’ve always come to this class.”
“Oh, désolée. I never saw you, je ne t’ai pas vu.”
“Ah oui,” his teeth glinted. “Normally I sit in the back.”
The boy looked at her. His body was beautiful, but she was too shy to admire it. She probed
the ball of clay in front of her and sprinkled it with some water to smoothen it. Annie counted
the dots on the clock. Three minutes to ten. Two.
“Do you… live in France?”
“Oui. Pour un semestre,” she slurred.
“Et vous? Sorry, I mean, tu?”
“I live in Paris.”
“Ahh… Where are you from, Michel?”
“I’m from Paris.”
“No but where, vraiment?”
“Paris…”
“Oh! You don’t look…” Annie started, but stopped herself.
“Pardon?”
Monsieur Dubois entered to awaiting faces, bringing in a gush of cold air, slamming the old
door with a rattle.
“Bonjour les jeunes.”
“Bonjour Monsieur,” her classmates voices echoed.
“Aujourd’hui c’est la poterie. On continue les vases de la semaine dernière. Vous
savez quoi faire.”
Annie was always surprised by this, but reminded herself that it was just the French
attitude. Even in teaching, they gave a cool aura of laissez-faire. The students that had been
huddled up against each other, gossiping about their samedi soir all sat down to a wheel.
Monsieur Dubois gently fingered his piece of clay in the middle, creating a crevasse. His foot
methodically pushed down on the pedal and his two arms cupped it into a bowl. Annie did the
same, or at least so she thought, but her pot was coming out lopsided.
“Annie,” Michel whispered. “You need to sit up. Erect. Like your head is pointing at
the sky, vers le ciel.”

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“I know what I’m doing,” she grumbled, then softened. No, she liked the look of this
boy.
Maybe he could be her friend, her first black friend. “Désolée. Oui. Tu as raison. Pottery is
like meditation. I must pray and stay focused.”
“Focused?”
“Comme déterminée.”
“Ah oui. C’est bien cela.”
Michel returned to his pot, throwing it until it was tall and magnificent. His arms
stretched, muscles pulsing and veins raising, foot rhythmically tapping the pedal. One, two,
three, one, two, three, staccato. The brown of his hands stopped in a line at his palms, lighter,
pinker, yellower, melting into the clay. He closed his eyes softly, breathing. Annie blushed
and returned to her vase, wonky and withering. Its edges were too thin, once burned they
would crack at the slightest tap.
Monsieur Dubois made his way around the studio, nodding at students or quietly
ushering a suggestion.
“Annie, concentrez-vous. Recommencez. Il faut vous centrez. Natalie, recommencez aussi,
n’ayez pas peur d’appuyer plus fort. Michel, continuez comme ça.”
She dug her fingernails into her clay, collapsing into into a gooey, muddy ball. Annie
used to be the best student when she was back in the Transvaal. How irritating. She looked at
the clay, wet it slightly and poked her thumbs in its centre. Her fingers were caked a pale
brown, just like Michel’s. The room buzzed with light conversations as the teacher made his
way to the back of the room. Now was her chance.
“Michel, do you want to get a coffee with me? We can talk. Un café?”
Michel laughed.
“Oui, si tu veux. If you want!”
Annie smiled to herself. Ha! If that damned ticket officer could see her now.
“Françoise! Guess what?”
Françoise sat curled up on the green futon, stroking her silky sleeve and picking at her nail
polish.
“Mmm?”
“Ah! Tu m’écoutes?”
“Rôh! You sound so French, darling,” Françoise drawled.
Annie struck a pose. “Ah oui?”
“What do you want to talk me about?”
“Talk to me.”
“Oui, oui, dis.”
She took long-legged steps towards the living room table, merely two paces out of the
kitchen. She grabbed Françoise’s pack of Gauloise.
“Qu’est-ce qu’on dit? Ask first.”
“Tu permets?”
“Oui, vas-y Annie. Now tell me.”
She took out a Gauloise, put it to her lips and lit the cigarette. The first puff curled up into the
air and she pulled her jumper closer to her chest.
“Well. I was in my pottery class today.”
“Mmm…”

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Françoise pulled out a pocket mirror and rearranged her fringe, pouting at her reflection. She
prodded the blue beneath her eyes.
“I want to make some new friends. I don’t like the people in my class too much.
There was a new person I had never seen before. A black man in my class!”
“Oui… ?”
Annie paced in the room, taking off her satchel and placing her cigarette in the ashtray. She
wrung her muddied hands. and went to wash them in the sink. Off went the dirt. Off went her
failed vase. Off went Monsieur Dubois’ comments. Doesn’t he know I am always focused?
Foolish man. She rinsed them, once, twice, three times. Off went Michel’s touch.
“I think I made a friend.”
“Un nouvel ami?”
“His name was Michel. Isn’t that funny, a black man called Michel?”
“Annie, enfin! What are you trying to say?”
“I don’t have any black friends back home,” she picked up her Gauloised and puffed
nervously. Did that make her sound bad? She could talk to Françoise about this. “But it’s
different there. I didn’t choose that.”
“Yes, your country is not so good for… how you say it? Human rights. Very
racist.” Annie recoiled. Françoise put her hand out, and Annie grabbed it.
“Viens là, ma chérie.”
Annie sat in Françoise’s lap. She stroked her hair.
“I’m sorry Annie. I know you don’t like that word.”
“No, it’s fine. I want to be better than them.”
“Je sais, ma chérie, je sais. La France, c’est comme ton pays. We have African
colonies too.”
“Françoise, when I was a kid I used to play with black kids. They were the servants’
children. I don’t have any brothers or sisters so they were my friends.” She kissed her cheek.
“I’m your friend now.”
“Oui, ma Françoise. C’est pourquoi je te raconte mon histoire. And then when I went
to high school, when I was in boarding school—”
“Boarding school? C’est quoi?”
“Where you live in school?”
“A l’internat. C’est horrible!”
“You can’t imagine, Fran, it was terrible. I hated it!” she shook her head. “When I
was in boarding school, two black girls joined us. They were sisters. They were brave, brave
girls, but I didn’t know them. They were few years below me. Some people said that they
mixed butter and sugar and ate it on their toast.”
“How revolting.”
“Dégoutant! But I can’t say that, can I? Coming from where I come from…”
“Non, chérie, évite. You can only say it to me.”
Annie continued puffing on her cigarette and coughed a little.
“Give it to me. So, tell me about Michel. Is he revolting too?”
She passed her cigarette on. Coughing whilst smoking? Decidedly not chic.
“Well, he was so very handsome. So I asked him for a
coffee.”
“Ah! Un rencaaaaard,” Françoise squeezed her cheeks.
“No, no, not a date! I’m too blonde for him, don’t you think?”
“Wouldn’t your mother like that? Some brown little babies with green eyes! Tes yeux
de chat…”
“Stop it,” Annie blushed. “It’s not like that.”

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“Wouldn’t you like that? To irritate your mother… Petite rebelle.”
“Arrête!”
“So did he say yes?”
“Il a dit oui…”
Françoise got up and twirled around.
“Annieeee, oh Annie! You must tell me about your not-a-date!”
Annie got up and danced with her on the dusty carpet. Their hips locked for a second.
Françoise smelled of roses and vinegar. She made Annie spin, again and again, six times in a
row until she fell back onto the futon, head woozy.
Annie was going to make a black friend. She toyed with the word boyfriend. No, don't
get ahead of yourself. She was going to make a black friend. Annie stared up nervously at the
cathedral that loomed in front of her. Its gargoyles stared back with menace. They snarled at
her, teeth chopping. She pursed her lips and counted the arches. Disgusting, black cathedral.
She caught herself. The gargoyles whispered, racist, racist, racist. No, that was not right. She
meant dirty cathedral. Dusty cathedral. Exhaust-pipe waste cathedral! Notre-Dame was
certainly in need of a scrub and she had no reason to not think so. She eyed up her
wristwatch. Ten minutes late. What was she doing? She had hardly talked to Michel, stupid,
stupid girl. Why would he want to be friends with her? What was she trying to do? A few
pigeons flitted by her feet and she stamped. Poof! They circled away, feathers and coos flying
into a man in a knitwear.
“Ah!”
It was Michel.
“Bonjour, Annie!”
He was less handsome than she had remembered. Deep lines in his forehead creased against
his white scarf.
“Annie, good to see you again.”
Annie awkwardly stuck her hand forward, but Michel laughed it off and extended his cheek,
making little kisses.
“You are not used to la bise are you?”
Annie choked. “Si, si, sorry, I didn’t think you were coming…”
“Je suis en retard, I am late. Sorry.”
Annie nodded, smiling. African time. They had that in common.
“Will we always meet like this?” he asked, smiling.
“Like what?”
He pointed at the pigeons, heads cocking back and forth away.
“I run into you, your pigeons run into me.”
Annie laughed. “I guess that makes us equal now.”
“Equal,” he acquiesced, and shook her hand.
They started walking away from the cathedral.
“Elle est belle, cette cathédrale, non?”
“Non. Elle est noire,” Annie coughed, flustered. “I mean, elle est sale.”
“That’s what makes her charming,” he drawled.
“Je suppose.”
“Do you want to go to the bookstore? It’s an English one, for writers, just across this
bridge. Like your home! Shakespeare and Co.”
Annie didn’t correct him. Let him think I’m English. He doesn’t know we come from the
same place.
“Oui, pourquoi pas? Why not?”

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“It must be hard to be away from home…”
“Tu connais, peut être?”
Michel shook his head, eyebrows arching. “Non, non, toute ma famille vit ici.”
Michel didn’t speak like an African man. Maybe her French wasn’t good enough to hear an
accent.
They walked in silence across cobbles. She shrunk further into her coat, pulling on the ends
of her gloves. Thumb, index finger, middle finger, ring finger, pinky. And again on the other
side. Thumb, index, middle finger, ring finger, pinky.
“Do you think my French is good, Michel?”
“Très bien, Annie. You are talented.”
Annie bumped into his shoulder. “Pas aussi bien que toi en poterie!”
“Ah oui, mais c’est mon art de choix.”
Annie’s pace loosened as they entered the shop. It was perfect. Book stacked to the roof,
slanting. Wooden floors, cubby holes, little treasures hidden everywhere.
“Tu aimes?”
“Tellement! Merci Michel, for bringing me here.”
“Viens là, il y a des livres de Charles Dickens. C’est mon auteur préféré.”
“Tu connais Charles Dickens?”
Michel’s brown hands reached above her and grabbed a copy of Great Expectations.
“Mais bien sûr! I’m interested in all the arts. Je l’ai lu en français, naturellement.”
“Naturellement.”
He flicked through the pages, settling to one in the middle. His thick pink lips traced the
words, mouthing them as he read.
“Oh, et par ici, Othello. I don’t like tragedy so much. Poor Desdemona.”
“It’s my favourite Shakespeare play.”
“Ah oui? You like it even though he kills Desdemona?”
“It is the only Shakespeare with a black character who is not a
servant.” Annie leaned her body away from his strong frame.
“So you think Shakespeare was…,” she hesitated, looking around her and whispered
“racist?”
“Annie, you don’t have to whisper. I think times are changing.”
“I think so.”
“I hope so, too. C’est n’est pas trop demander— égalité, fraternité. My black brothers
in America did it, and now my black brothers in South Africa can do it too. Nous faisons un
boycott international pour atteindre la liberté. To become free.”
Annie spun on her heel and narrowed in on the shelf behind her. That international boycott
was affecting her here too. Didn’t he know that not only the blacks were affected? Innocent
white people too.
“Tu m’écoutes?”
“Bien sûr…”
“Bon, allons prendre le café!”
“I thought you would never ask,” Annie breathed.
His torso grazed her back as they pushed through the door.

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Annie lay in her bed, bundling up in the cold. She peered at her calendar, counting the
days until her flight home. 30, 40, 45. She sighed and faced the window panes. The raindrops
hit the windows with a thump, splashing and connecting as they dripped down.
“Annie, tu es là?”
Françoise’s keys jingled. She heard her put them down on the table, breathing softly and
unzipping her shoes, rubbing her feet from the cold. She put on the kettle.
“Tu veux un café? Du thé?”
“Non.”
Françoise knocked on her door and came into her room. Annie turned away.
“Bon, ton rencard alors?”
“It was not a date!” Annie protested, and covered her eyes with her hands.
“Not good?”
Annie huffed and pulled her blanket tight around her chin.
“Are you going to tell me about it?”
“He just kept talking and talking and talking.”
“Ah oui, il n’est pas du genre à écouter?”
“I thought maybe we could talk about Africa.”
“Le continent africain est grand, Annie. Just like you. You said he was French
anyways.”
“Yes well I didn’t think he meant it. It doesn’t matter.”
“Do you miss home?”
“I miss my Mommy.”
Françoise came up and cuddled her in her bed.
“Tu voulais pas te faire des amis?”
“He tried to kiss me.”
“Ouhlala, Annie, tu fais des ravages!”
“Non, non, non! I will not kiss a black man just because my mother would hate it. I’m
a good white girl. Why can’t people understand that?”
“Annie, maybe he is a good black man too.”
“N’importe quoi. No respectable man would assume that because I ask him out for a
drink, I want to kiss him too.”
Françoise pulled up the cover and slipped her legs underneath, pushing them against Annie’s
feet.
“Arrête! Your feet are cold!”
She rubbed them all over her legs.
“Stop it, stop it, stop it!”
Françoise cackled and Annie pushed her. She giggled too.
“I wanted to tell him about the ticket officer in Beaubourg.”
“Why?”
“So he would know I’m not guilty too. I wanted to make a black friend.”
“You can’t just dream up a black friend, Annie. Just say that you want to make
friends. If they’re white, they’re white, if they’re black, they’re black.”
“Everyone thinks I’m racist!”
Françoise tucked her hair behind her ears.
“No, you think you’re racist.”

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Annie thought of Michel’s body pressed against hers as she said goodbye. He was so
tall and strong. He stroked her shoulder gently and said “j’ai été ravi de te rencontrer Annie.”
She stared into his eyes, deep, dark brown. I wonder what he must be thinking? Does he find
me beautiful? She looked at his rich, thick lips. A little spit covered them and his teeth looked
stained. She hadn’t noticed his ears before, sticking out each side of his face like two tufts of
unkept grass. Was he handsome?
He leaned in towards her, and her heart clenched. She stuck out her cool, pale cheek.
His lips were too big, he could eat up her entire face, greedily sucking.
“Bon, je devrais y aller.”
She could only whisper “oui.”
His hands fell limp and he rushed away, leaving her alone in front of Notre-
Dame. Raciste, the gargoyles sang. Petite fille raciste! Stupid, stupid, stupid Annie. What on
Earth was she doing here so far away from home?