A Woman Like Her Read online

  PRAISE FOR A WOMAN LIKE HER

  “Marc Levy is a virtuoso of the imagination … This is his most beautiful romantic comedy. It’s enchanting … a delight on every level.”

  —Pierre Vavasseur, Le Parisien (five-star review)

  “A love story, a wonderful read.”

  —France Inter

  “The beautiful tale of two people who were never meant to meet … Unputdownable … very well done.”

  —Cosmopolitan

  “An action-packed New York comedy.”

  —Bernard Lehut, RTL

  “Guaranteed to be a summer bestseller … It sparkles like champagne and calls to mind films like Notting Hill.”

  —AFP

  “An irresistible, sparkling comedy.”

  —Valérie Trierweiler, Paris Match

  “Irresistible! You’re riveted by the characters from start to finish.”

  —TV5Monde

  “A joyful, original novel with such endearing characters. An ode to diversity.”

  —Europe 1

  “A wonderful comedy … in which anything can happen.”

  —Le Figaro

  “A novel both powerful and fragile. The perfect romantic comedy à la Blake Edwards.”

  —Elle

  “A sure hit. This wonderful novel is an emotional elevator, with Marc Levy the perfect operator at the commands.”

  —M6 News Bulletin

  “A deeply human romantic comedy.”

  —Le Journal de Quebec

  “A love letter to New York.”

  —RMC

  ALSO BY MARC LEVY

  If Only It Were True

  All Those Things We Never Said

  Replay

  P.S. from Paris

  The Last of the Stanfields

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously. Any resemblance to actual persons, living or dead, or actual events is purely coincidental.

  Text copyright © 2018 by Marc Levy

  Translation copyright © 2020 by Susanna Lea Associates

  All rights reserved.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Previously published as Une Fille Comme Elle by Éditions Robert Laffont/Versilio in France in 2018. Translated from French by Kate Deimling. First published in English by Amazon Crossing in 2020.

  All illustrations used by permission from the artist Pauline Lévêque.

  Published by Amazon Crossing, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and Amazon Crossing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781542020541

  ISBN-10: 1542020549

  Cover design by Kimberly Glyder

  To you, my longtime partner

  To my children, who amaze me every moment

  Contents

  Start Reading

  MY JOURNAL

  1

  2

  3

  The Day I Left the Hospital

  4

  The Day They Changed My Bandages

  5

  6

  7

  The Day I Came Back to New York

  8

  9

  The Day I Came Home

  10

  11

  The Day I Took the Subway Again

  12

  The Day I Started Physical Therapy

  13

  14

  The Day I Hit Julius

  15

  16

  The Day I Smelled the Roses

  17

  18

  The Day I Put Away My Prostheses

  19

  20

  21

  22

  23

  24

  The Day I Slept in a Palace

  25

  26

  Epilogue

  Mumbai, May 24, 2020

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  About the Translator

  MY JOURNAL

  The Day My Watch Stopped

  First there was that smell, like fireworks, and the black night that returns when the colors of the grand finale disappear.

  I remember opening my eyes and seeing my father’s face full of anger and tears. Then my parents together, side by side—such an unlikely image that I thought it must have been a trick of the morphine.

  The nurse took my blood pressure. At times when I’m falling asleep at night, I see her face again. I’ve been complimented on my smile—my friends say it gives me a certain charm—but Maggie’s smile is beyond compare. People who meet her outside the hospital see only her largeness, but those who know her adore her for the size of her heart. I’ll never understand why people only see thin as beautiful.

  Julius was leaning against the door. The serious look on his face frightened me, and when he realized this, his features softened. I would have liked to make a joke, to find something clever to say to make all of them relax. I could have asked them if I had won the race. I’m sure Dad would have laughed—well, maybe not. But no sound came out of my mouth. Then I was truly scared. Maggie gently explained that I had a tube in my throat and shouldn’t try to speak or even swallow. Now that I was awake, they would take it out. I didn’t feel at all like making my father laugh anymore.

  Chloe

  1

  By the time rush hour begins in the late afternoon, Deepak has already made three trips. A round trip to take Mr. Williams, a Fox News commentator, to the eighth floor. Another one to bring Mr. Groomlat, the accountant, to his office on the second floor. And now, a trip to the seventh floor with the golden retriever belonging to the Clercs, a French couple. Their housekeeper comes to collect the dog on the landing and give Deepak a ten-dollar bill, which he immediately brings to the dog walker awaiting payment in the lobby.

  Deepak looks at his watch. Mrs. Collins will be calling him soon. The widow keeps her door locked with a dead bolt and chain, as if anyone could get into the building without encountering Deepak first. But the obsessions of the residents of 12 5th Avenue are part of his daily routine. In fact, they are his routine.

  After helping Mrs. Collins get her key out of the lock, he takes her to the ground floor and then returns right away to the second floor. Miss Chloe is waiting for him in front of the elevator and greets him with a smile. She must have been born with a smile on her face. As she enters the elevator, she asks him how his day has been.

  “It’s had its ups and downs, Miss Chloe.”

  Bringing the elevator to a stop exactly in line with each floor requires true skill. Deepak can do it with his eyes closed, but when he takes Chloe from her office on the second floor to her apartment on the ninth, he is especially careful.

  “Will you be going out this evening?” he asks.

  He’s not trying to pry. Deepak simply needs to know if he should inform his nighttime counterpart that Chloe will require his services.

  “No, just a hot bath and off to bed. Is my dad home?”

  “You’ll see soon enough.”

  Deepak practices two religions: Hinduism and discretion. Throughout his thirty-nine years as an elevator operator in this posh 5th Avenue apartment building, he has never revealed the slightest bit of information regarding the comings and goings of his employers. Especially not to their relatives.

  Twelve 5th Avenue is a stone-façade building with one apartment on each of its nine stories, except for the second, where there are two offices. With an average of five round t
rips per floor per day, factoring in the height of the ceilings, Deepak travels 594 kilometers per year. Since the beginning of his career, he has covered 23,166. He once calculated the figures in feet and miles but found the result too imprecise for his purposes. Like an aviator logging his flight hours, Deepak tucks a little notebook in the inside pocket of his uniform jacket where he keeps track of his vertical journeys.

  In five months and three weeks, he will have traveled 23,448 kilometers, which is exactly three thousand times the elevation of Nanda Devi, the tallest mountain located entirely within India’s borders. He has dreamed of climbing Nanda Devi, the Bliss-Giving Goddess, his whole life. His goal? To set the world record for most miles traveled vertically.

  Deepak’s manually operated elevator is an ancient artifact. There are only fifty-three such elevators left in all of New York. But for those who live in this apartment building, it is a reminder of a way of life.

  Deepak is the master of a dying art. He isn’t sure if he should be proud or saddened by this.

  Every morning at 6:15, Deepak enters 12 5th Avenue by the service entrance. He goes downstairs to the basement and heads to his locker in the storeroom. He hangs up his baggy pants and unfashionable sweater and puts on a white shirt, flannel pants, and a uniform coat with the building’s address embroidered on the front in gold letters. He smooths back his fine hair and places a cap on his head. Then he takes a look at himself in the little mirror attached to the storeroom door and heads up to relieve Mr. Rivera.

  For the next half hour, he cleans the inside of the elevator: first the woodwork with a soft cloth and polish, and then the copper handle. Climbing aboard his elevator is like taking a short trip on the Orient Express, or, if you look up to admire the Renaissance fresco on the ceiling, ascending to heaven in a royal chariot.

  A modern elevator would be much more affordable for the apartment owners. But how can you put a price on a friendly hello and an attentive ear? How can you attach monetary value to someone who patiently and diplomatically resolves disputes between neighbors, brightens your morning with a cheerful word or two, informs you about the weather, wishes you a happy birthday, watches over your apartment when you’re out of town, and reassures you with his presence when you come home in anticipation of a long and lonely night? Being an elevator operator is not just a job: it’s sacred work.

  For thirty-nine years, all Deepak’s days have been alike. Between the morning and evening rush hours, he settles in at his desk in the lobby. He takes any visitors up in the elevator, after first locking the front door. He also receives packages and cleans the large mirror in the lobby and the glass of the wrought-iron doors twice a day. At 6:15 p.m., Deepak hands over his kingdom to Mr. Rivera. He goes back down to the basement, hangs up his white shirt, flannel pants, and uniform coat, places his cap on a shelf, changes into his street clothes, smooths back his hair, takes a look at himself in the mirror, and heads to the subway.

  Deepak usually gets a seat on the train he catches at the West 4th Street–Washington Square station, a seat he always gives to the first female passenger who enters when the train fills up at 34th Street. When it empties out at 42nd, Deepak sits down again, opens his newspaper, and reads about world events until he gets off the subway at 116th Street. Then he walks the ten blocks to his building. He makes this trip morning and night, in the hot summer sun, in the autumn rain, and with snowstorms raging in the wintry skies.

  At 7:30, he has dinner with his wife at home. Lali and Deepak have deviated from this routine only once in thirty-nine years. Lali was twenty-six at the time, and Deepak feverishly held her hand in the ambulance as the contractions started coming faster and faster. What should have been the most wonderful day of their lives turned into a tragedy that was never spoken of again.

  Every other Thursday, Lali and Deepak have a romantic dinner together in a little restaurant in Spanish Harlem.

  Deepak is fond of his orderly life and devoted to his wife.

  As he sits down to dinner this particular night, he has no idea that his life is about to be turned upside down.

  2

  The Air India flight landed on the tarmac at JFK. Sanji got up, grabbed his bag from the overhead compartment, and rushed to the Jetway, thrilled to be the first one off the plane. He strode quickly through the airport and, a bit out of breath, entered the large space where the immigration officers were lined up in their booths. An unfriendly officer questioned him about his reasons for visiting New York. Sanji answered that he was on a research trip and showed him the letter from his aunt vouching for his ability to support himself. The officer ignored Sanji’s letter, gave a cursory glance at the visa in his passport, and then lifted his head to examine Sanji. For Sanji, like any foreigner, a moment of uncertainty ensued. Would he be singled out for his appearance, led into an interrogation room, and sent back home for any number of reasons? The officer finally stamped his passport, scribbled the date by which he had to leave the United States, and told him to move along.

  Sanji picked up his suitcase from the carousel, passed through customs, and walked to the area where limousine drivers were waiting. He spotted his name on a sign. The driver relieved him of his luggage and escorted him to the car.

  The black limo moved along the Long Island Expressway, weaving through the swiftly flowing traffic as night fell. The seat was soft, and Sanji, tired from the trip, felt like drifting off to sleep. The driver made this impossible by starting up a conversation as the skyscrapers of Manhattan materialized in the distance.

  “Business or pleasure?”

  “Why not both?” Sanji answered.

  “Bridge or tunnel?”

  “Sorry?”

  “This is a limo, not a helicopter, so you have to choose one or the other.”

  “I’m not sure I—”

  “Forget it, I’m gonna take the Queensboro Bridge, there’s a great view. You from India?”

  “Mumbai.”

  “Maybe you’ll end up driving, like me, that’s what most Indians do when they get here. Most drive yellow cabs, some drive for Uber, and a select few drive limousines like this one.”

  Sanji looked at the medallion displayed in the car. The driver’s photo appeared alongside his name, Marius Zobonya, and his license number, 8451.

  “Are there any Polish doctors, teachers, or engineers in New York?”

  Marius scratched his chin.

  “Not that I know of. But my wife’s physical therapist is Slovakian.”

  “That’s good to hear. I hate driving.”

  The driver left it at that. Sanji took out his cell phone and checked his messages. His time in New York was going to be very busy. He should probably get the family visit out of the way as soon as possible. In keeping with tradition, he needed to thank his aunt, who had so kindly written him a letter of reference. It had been especially kind, as he had never met her.

  “How far are we from Harlem?” he asked.

  “Harlem’s big. East or West?”

  Sanji unfolded the letter and checked the address on the back of the envelope.

  “225 East 118th Street.”

  “Fifteen minutes, tops.”

  “Great, take me there. I’ll go to the Plaza afterward.”

  The car headed up the FDR Drive along the East River and then the Harlem River and stopped in front of a seventies-era redbrick apartment building.

  “Are you sure this is it?” asked Marius.

  “Yes, why?”

  “Because this is a Puerto Rican neighborhood.”

  “Maybe my aunt is a Puerto Rican Indian,” Sanji said drily.

  “Want me to wait?”

  “Yes, it won’t take long.”

  Just to be safe, he took his suitcase from the trunk and walked toward the building.

  When Lali lifted the lid of the casserole dish, the aroma wafted through the dining room. Upon returning home, Deepak had been surprised to see her in a sari (she never wore one), but the fact that she had prepared his f
avorite dish surprised him even more. She only made it on holidays. Maybe his wife was finally coming to her senses. Why treat yourself only on special occasions? After the food was served, Deepak caught her up on the news of the day. He liked to give a detailed summary of what he had read on the subway. Lali listened to him distractedly.

  “I may have forgotten to tell you that I had a call from Mumbai,” she mentioned while serving him seconds.

  “From Mumbai?” Deepak repeated.

  “Yes, from our nephew.”

  “Which one? We must have twenty nephews and nieces, and we don’t know any of them.”

  “My brother’s son.”

  “Oh.” Deepak yawned, feeling himself getting sleepy. “How’s he doing?”

  “My brother’s been dead for twenty years.”

  “Not him, your nephew!”

  “You’ll see soon enough.”

  Deepak put down his fork.

  “What exactly do you mean by ‘soon enough’?”

  “Well, the line was bad,” Lali said with a shrug. “But I think he said he wanted to come to New York and needed a place to stay.”

  “What does that have to do with us?”

  “Deepak, ever since we left Mumbai, you’ve gone on about the splendors of India—but it’s always felt as far away as a fairy tale. And now India is coming to you, and you’re going to complain?”

  “It’s not India coming to me but your nephew. What do you know about him? Is he a respectable person? If he’s coming to us for a place to stay, he must be broke.”

  “We were broke when we moved here.”

  “But we were determined to work. We didn’t camp out with strangers.”

  “A few weeks isn’t the end of the world.”

  “At my age, a few weeks might be all I have left!”

  “Don’t be so melodramatic. In any case, you’re not even here during the day. I’m looking forward to showing him the city. You’re not going to deprive me of that pleasure, are you?”