Finally, she is awake!” bellowed a plump old man with a black beret barely covering the top of his bald head and a gray mustache hovering over his lips. I stood in a state of confusion in the back doorway of Julien’s house, still groggy from my four-hour drunken siesta, as a slew of French people sitting at a long table, which appeared to be set for a feast, turned around to look at me—Julien’s new American girlfriend. Oh, God. The old man smiled a toothy grin before standing from the table, the view of the sun setting over the vineyard just beyond his beret. Then he waddled up to me, leaned in and kissed both of my cheeks. “I am Pierre-François, Julien’s uncle.” He leaned closer and whispered gruffly in my ear. “Julien said you were a beautiful girl, but I did not expect you to be quite thees beautiful!” Julien had told his uncle that I was beautiful? Obviously it was just part of the act since apparently we were now telling not only his mother, but his entire family, that we were an item.
