Page 35 of The Village Cafe in the Loire

‘You are not well?’

‘I’m fine. Honestly. It was all a bit of a mix-up.’

Pascal looks even more confused than before. ‘I don’t understand,’ he said. ‘Are you sick or not? Should you be at work?’

Sighing, she explained about the doctor, about her overzealous diagnosis. About the fact she was making the best of it, although she’d honestly rather be at work. And now this ridiculous panic when she’d just been asked quite a simple question. ‘The crazy thing is that I would have been able to answer it easily a week ago,’ she said. ‘I practically know my files off by heart. But I was so surprised that my mind went blank.’

Pascal nodded.

‘Now they probably think I’m incompetent as well as crazy,’ she said, rolling her eyes.

It was meant to be a joke, but Pascal doesn’t laugh. ‘Why do you say these things about yourself?’

‘Oh. It’s… I’m joking, sort of. I just… I’m imagining it through their eyes I suppose.’

‘Or perhaps your mother’s eyes?’ He cocked an eyebrow. ‘Do not be offended. I am just thinking of myself, how I sometimes used to call my work useless or say I was wasting my time. One night, Maud asked me why I would say such things about myself. She told me that I had to try to believe in myself no matter what. Because nobody else would unless I started to. It really hit me here,’ he tapped his chest. ‘And I realised that I had been brought up with so much negativity around my work – not my academic work of course, but my passion – that I was looking at things the wrong way.’

‘That was nice of her. Of Maud.’

‘She told me that her mother was similar. And Maud, you know of course that she was a lawyer before she came here. Then her sister – your grandmother – got sick, and she died quite young, I think. Perhaps fifty? And Maud realised that she wanted a different sort of life.’

‘That makes sense.’

‘Oui. Of course some people, they dream of being a lawyer. And some people dream of having a career like you have or my mother. But it is not for everyone.’

‘Oh, it’s definitely for me,’ Becky said. ‘I was just going through something.’ She didn’t mention that the fact she’d found out he was living in the café was the catalyst forLaptopgate.It didn’t seem fair.

Pascal nodded. ‘Well, if you ask me, your work are to blame. They should not be calling you when you have been diagnosed sick by a doctor.’

‘Yes, but I think everyone knows… I mean, “burnout”?’ Becky uses her fingers to create air quotes. ‘Seriously, it’s not really something that people in my industry buy into.’

‘I’m sorry. Burnout?’

‘Yes. You know. You work too hard, you get sick.’

‘Ah!Surmenage.’ Pascal nodded. ‘But this is a genuine problem for many people.’

She nodded. ‘Yes, I know. It’s just… you have to be quite tough in my firm.’

‘I do not know much about it, but I don’t think that burnout is for weak people. Perhaps it is for strong people. Because they push themselves too hard. Everyone has their limit.’

‘Maybe.’ She shrugged. ‘Anyway, I’m feeling better now, so…’

‘No, you should rest.’

She shook her head. ‘Honestly, resting is like my… kryptonite.’

He laughed. ‘Ah, so you are Superman?’

‘I just mean I can’t do it.’

‘You cannot rest?’

She shook her head, realising both that her words were true and that this wasn’t normal. ‘I sleep OK at night most of thetime. But during the day… I just feel better when I’m working, when I’mdoing.’

‘Yet your body is perhaps telling you otherwise?’

Why did he have to be so bloody perceptive? ‘No,’ she said. ‘It was a blip.’

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