The spice honey cake is delicious and the coffee brewed to perfection. Everyone has gone awkwardly silent at this delicate moment. We all want to know what really happened, but no one is about to ask Francois for any details. Perhaps, later, Melissa, or Carl, will be more forthcoming. The large orange cat comes over and sniffs discretely at Francois' ankle, then jumps onto his lap. Carol has been trying to engage him in conversation, but he seems more absorbed in caressing and absorbing himself in the affectionate orange presence that is now purring on his lap. She has just made the big mistake that a lot of people make with persons of colour. She has just asked him where he is from. He looks up at her and murmurs, "Montreal."
"Yes", shes says, "But where are you REALLY from?"
Instead of reacting to her offensive question, asked likely out of pure privileged ignorance, Francois merely says calmly, "I was born in Montreal. Grew up speaking French and English, simultaneously." Then he holds her in the bright dark gaze of his eyes, and asks Carol, "And where are YOU from?"
"Why, I am from England, of course!"
"But where are you REALLY from? "
"I am from England", she says, already struggling to contain her impatience. "My family can be traced back to the sixteenth century. A female ancestor of mine happened to be lady-in-waiting to Ann Boleyn."
"Who was she?"
Before she has a chance to explode and say something really offensive, chimes in Carl in a fake Cockney accent, "She was one of the wives of King 'Enry the Eighth. 'e lopped off 'er 'ead, y'know!"
Only Carol is not laughing...
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