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No one building in Paris captured her heart quite so completely as the Palais Garnier.
Despite its relative newness, the opera house had a much older, much grander majesty. A dreamy romance seemed to be imbued in its façade, threaded around its columns and the stonework. Aline was no architect by any stretch of the imagination—she could not have named any of the techniques that rendered the Palais a marvel. She knew only that she liked the way it looked, the way it made her feel, and the inspiration that settled over her like a lover when she walked its halls.
She shivered, clutching her shawl more tightly. The gauzy material did little to ward off the autumn chill. It was the hint of weight and resistance that she welcomed. Renoir caught the movement out of the corner of his eyes, inclining his head in silent question. He touched the small of her back, lightly, plucking at his jacket in silent offering. Aline shook her head. They’d be inside soon enough. She could endure the cold a little longer if it meant satisfying her vanity.
The entire evening was an indulgence. After a particularly grueling string of salon exhibits and apprentices, she’d needed something like this. Renoir had seen that everything aligned with her tastes—the ballet tickets, their dinner, their formal dress. He had precious little interest in the former—Les Deux Pigeons premier had gone largely unremarked upon until she mentioned it in passing—and he avoided the latter as often as possible. Tonight, he looked the part of a prince or king, darkly handsome in his suit. The gold in his tie and vest was matched to the gold embellishments of her dress, adding a visual symmetry she adored. They were white and black and gold—all the colors of the Dessendre family tied up in its patriarch and matriarch—a striking couple. She wouldn’t squander the opportunity to preen before members of the Painters and Writers Council.
Aline pressed against her husband’s side, turning her face up towards him. His pale eyes glittered in the lamplight, seemingly rimmed with gold. Renoir bowed to press his lips to the shell of her ear, fingers curling over her hip. “It seems we’ve made an impression. They’re staring.”
“They have eyes, mon coeur." She smoothed a nonexistent wrinkle out of his tie, pressing a kiss to the corner of his mouth. “Thank you. You are too good to me.”
That twinkle in his eyes again, boyish, brought about by the bottle of wine they’d shared at dinner. The low timbre of his chuckle registered like a physical touch. Aline shivered, aware of the weight of his hand on her skin. “Most days you deserve these niceties, ma chérie.”
“Only most days.”
He brought her hand to his lips, smiling against her skin.
The air inside the opera house was blessedly warm by comparison, heated by the presence of too many bodies. A hundred different conversations bled into one another to form a raucous cacophony, at odds with the lilting notes of the piano drifting from the players. Servers meandered through the crowd, offering champagne to whoever happened to catch their eye. Renoir plucked two flutes from the tray. The alcohol's sweetness warmed her as she settled back into her husband’s embrace, making small talk as they worked their way towards their box. After so many decades, it was a practiced dance—how do you do? And: how is your health? And: how is your work? It was possible to fumble through any number of conversations with nothing but those three questions to rely on.
By the time the ushers began directing everyone to their seats, she was well and truly ready for a reprieve. Aline squeezed Renoir’s hand, searching his face. The austere mask he wore in public remained firmly in place. She scratched her nails through his beard to watch that severity slip, the corner of his mouth ticking up in an unwilling little grin, eyes creasing near the corners. She saw so much of their son in that look, so much of Clea, too—fighting to maintain an air of superiority. Renoir tipped his head towards her. Aline glanced away. It felt safer. A familiar warmth coiled in the space beneath her ribs, filling the hollow places between her organs, clutching like fingers around her lungs. She both loved and hated the sensation of breathlessness. It was young and somehow clean.
Renoir offered his arm, expression softening as she relaxed back against him. “Come—we should find our seats.”
For a moment, she’d wanted to argue. The ballet could wait; she wanted to kiss him. That deep-seated ache, a nearly childish longing, grew steadily worse. She pushed it away. Aline nodded, biting down on her tongue. The sharp pain shocked her back to her senses. The Paintress set her hand in the curve of Renoir’s elbow, counting the stairs as they climbed steadily upwards toward their private box.
She could not remember the last time they’d seen an opera from such fine seats. The ballet scene in Paris was largely stagnant these days, relegating old productions to less grand venues. Aline associated the box seats with their trips to the opera, dragging Verso and Clea along after them. A memory flashed through her mind: Verso, lost to the music, desperate to get a better view of the orchestra, leaning out over the railing. Renoir had grabbed their son by his jacket, hauling him back into his seat, before patting his chest. It’d taken a good minute for Verso to come back to himself, wide-eyed and drunk off the deafening swell of the instruments.
She remembered thinking he looked like a boy in love.
The Dessendres took their seats. Aline traced the back of her husband's hand, letting the noise wash over her until the lights eventually dimmed. The darkness was blessedly claustrophobic, despite the room's sheer magnitude.
The ballet deserved its praise. Aline watched, fascinated, as the lead dancers swanned about the stage. The technical proficiency necessary for them to perform the various movements was awe-inspiring. Even at her best, she’d have been incapable of managing half the movements of the pas de deux so fluidly. There was a liquid grace to the way they spun, contrasting with the sharp, avian way they bobbed their heads.
She hugged Renoir’s arm more tightly to her chest, amused by the simplicity and charm of the ballet’s story: a dissatisfied pair of young lovers, a wayward young man, ran off to chase his passions. Rather than leave the matter lie, his fiancée gave chase, charming her way through the company of those he thought to impress. Simple, relatively silly, but no worse for it.
Aline observed Renoir out of the corner of her eyes.
He appreciated the opera. He’d learned to dance well enough to make himself presentable in public and to avoid embarrassment when Aline invariably dragged him after her—but dance, and ballet in particular, would never be his passion. Renoir watched with a more casual eye, appreciating the beauty, but without her own naked fascination. The science of the compositions, the individual movements of the dance, mattered less than the sum of their parts.
The deep ache settled between her ribs again. Renoir was here for her. Her enjoyment was enough.
After so many years of marriage and two children, the thought should not have surprised her. Perhaps surprised was the wrong word entirely. It was more—
Gourouli flitted about the stage, effortlessly lovely, her dark hair streaming behind her. She leapt. One of the gypsies caught her about the waist, whisking her into another movement before Pépio could take so much as a step in her direction.
—What? The openness still caught Aline off guard. Renoir could lie—could lie exceptionally well, in fact. It made him a deft hand in business and politics. He loved her—and their children—honestly, openly, and by choice. She supposed it was the last bit that left her a little breathless.
She slid the hand curled over his knee higher. The heat of his skin radiated through the material of his slacks, the muscles flexing when she brushed her fingers up the length of his thigh. Even in the theater’s low light, she saw him arch a brow in question, shaking his head, amused or bemused. One of the two. Perhaps both.
Words were crude tools, too one-dimensional for her taste. Half of their squabble with the Writers stemmed from this fundamental difference in their mediums. Words were flat. Everything she felt was so much, so rich, so full of color; attempting to put those sensations into words stripped them of meaning.
Love was raucous and intoxicating. Love was suffocating and heady. Love was the richest shades of red and summer heat. The word itself was so little in comparison to all those things.
Renoir’s expression shifted, curiosity mixed with fondness coloring his smile. He dipped his head in invitation. Aline brought her free hand up to cup his cheek, leaning in to kiss him. He touched his tongue to the seam of her lips. She parted for him, sighing. The ballet and theater seemed far away.
He hissed, catching her wrist as she feathered the tips of her fingers over his groin. Aline smiled, licking into his mouth, swallowing gently the chiding noise he made.
“This is not the place,” Renoir grumbled, tangling a hand in her hair. His fingers curled behind her neck, keeping her from pulling away. He was still kissing her, despite his half-hearted protests, guiding her into a more languid rhythm.
“No one will see,” she murmured, dragging his lower lip between her teeth.
He huffed out a laugh, words whispered and airy as she pressed the heel of her palm down. “That cannot be the only consideration.”
It could be. It was. She wanted him. That was enough. More than anything, she wanted to convey the depth of her feelings.
Aline pulled back, breathing hard, eyes flicking back towards the door. On either side of the box, a pair of dividers cut inwards. The design amplified the sounds of the production below. It also offered some privacy, sequestering them from the rest of the auditorium. The Paintress stood on unsteady legs, swallowing, holding her hand out to her husband.
Renoir stared up at her, blue eyes wide, lips kiss-swollen. She squeezed his hand. He released an unsteady breath, looking lost as he stood, letting her pull her after him into the alcove.
Aline pressed herself against the wall, winding her arms around her husband’s back and pulling him into another kiss. Whatever token show of resistance he’d intended died the moment he stepped into her. His right hand settled at the small of her back, pressing to bow her against his chest, folding himself over her. The scent of his cologne amalgamated with her perfume in the too-small space, floral and spicy all at once. She felt him groan more than she heard it; the orchestra swelled below them, shifting into a faster tempo. Aline slipped her hand between them, cupping his half-hard length.
She wanted him inside her, wanted them joined again, wanted to share every part of her she could, but even she could not justify that indulgence. Aline sighed against his lips, unbuttoning his slacks to take him in hand. He bared his teeth, the muscles in his jaw clenching as he fought to remain silent. She leaned in, nosing into his throat as she lazily stroked him, swiping her thumb over the head of his cock.
She adored the sight of him like this—looser, the iron-clad grasp on his control slipping as he turned himself over to her care. His eyes fluttered shut, lips parting as he allowed himself to relax into her rhythm. Renoir rested an arm over her head, leaning forward. She smiled against his skin.
Renoir tipped her chin up, pale eyes blazing in the dark, holding her gaze as he rucked up the material of her skirt. She inhaled sharply, jerking as his touch slipped between her legs. The ridiculous man nearly purred as he stroked through her wetness, the leather of his gloves strange but not unwelcome. It was soft, a contrast to the calluses on his fingertips. Aline gasped. He swallowed the sound, tongue pressing back into her mouth.
She spread her legs, adjusting her rhythm to match his. The pair rocked together, tangled up and increasingly lost, moving out of time with the music below. Aline closed her eyes, listening to the increasingly erratic sounds of his breathing. She wished he could be loud for her. Later—there was always later. She squeezed, feeling him stutter, rolling into her hand and hip. Renoir held her still, breaking the kiss long enough to bring his hand up, pulling his glove off with his teeth. The press of skin-on-skin left her whimpering against his lips, a sharp shock of pleasure rolling down her spine.
His free hand cradled the back of her skull, keeping her head from jerking back as he worked her higher. The rush of blood in her ears was nearly deafening. She was burning. Aline kissed him, bruising, attempting to steal air neither of them had left in their lungs. Her grip loosened, tightened, increasingly erratic as the world began to lose its edges. She wanted to watch him come apart, wanted to see the moment of his pleasure, wanted—
Renoir grunted, doubling over her as he hit his peak. Her husband buried his face in her throat, panting, warm breath licking down the front of her dress as he worked her through the haze of his own pleasure. Aline winced, biting down on his shoulder to muffle her cry. Below them, the orchestra played on.
She felt simultaneously dizzy and drunk, swaying with him, pressed back against the wall. Renoir shifted his left leg between hers. She nearly sagged into the support. He cupped her face, turning her cheek to the side to drag kisses across her skin, smiling, still panting. The Paintress wiped her hand on her dress without thinking.
It took her a moment to realize what she’d done. Aline stared down at the mess, snickering, nosing her love. “Mm. Well, at least the dress was already white.”
Renoir lifted his head to stare at her in bleary horror. A slow smile split the poor fool's face. He shook his head, chuckling and pressing his forehead to hers. “Aline.”
She nipped at him. “Renoir.”
Another lower chuckle. Renoir pulled the handkerchief from his breast pocket, eyeing the mess on the front of her gown. He brought the square up, touching it to his tongue. Aline hid a smirk behind her hand, tone lilting. “More fluids are surely the answer.”
“Chérie, please.”
Laughing, Aline traced the tip of her finger through the mess. Renoir took her hand in his, tidying it as best he could. He eyed her dress with less conviction. Her husband shrugged off his jacket, draping it over her shoulders with a gravitas she found both comic and endearing. With the same mock severity, he said, “A better solution, perhaps, than—as you so succinctly put it—more fluids.”
“We might have played it off as an embellishment.”
Renoir made a choked noise. “No.” He shook his head, smile still broadening. Aline traced the curve of his lips. The swell of warmth in her chest spread outwards, cleaner now. That feeling of wanting him was further away. It was contentment now—their shared pleasure and his joy made her happy. He kissed her palm. “Will you be comfortable staying?”
A reasonable question. Aline couldn’t say she cared for the wetness between her legs or coating her thighs. Shifting her weight made her uncomfortably aware of both, alongside the lingering ache. Aline nodded, hugging Renoir’s jacket more tightly around her, welcoming its weight and warmth. She tucked him back into his slacks, buttoning them back up. “I’ll manage.”
Aline wrapped an arm around his waist. He draped one around her shoulders, holding her against his side as they crossed the short distance back to their seats. The ballet continued apace below them. Pépio, now staring longingly after the fiancée he’d thought so dull. Renoir turned his hand up in invitation. She linked their fingers.
The remainder of the ballet was predictable, but no worse for it. Pépio, brought to his lowest point, realized what he’d lost and returned to Gourouli to make amends. The lovers reunited despite their differences. Aline somehow doubted such indiscretions could be swept so neatly under the rug in reality. Still, it appealed to her more romantic sensibilities. As the orchestra played its final notes and the dancers took their last turns, she found herself smiling.
They managed to duck out before the worst of the crowds. Aline kept his jacket hugged tight around her, feeling the weight of his hand between her shoulders as Renoir maneuvered them back out into the cool Parisian night. The sky was clear and full of stars, achingly beautiful.
Renoir squeezed her hand, handsome, smiling, and looking younger than his years in the silvery moonlight. “Did you enjoy the production?”
Aline chuckled, shaking her head.
Words were clumsy. It was easier—better—to pull the silly man into a kiss. Let that express her gratitude.