11
Paris December 1949
Jasmine’s friendship with Antoine was thriving. In the atelier she’d detached herself from her fellow students, preferring to block them out and focus single-mindedly on her drawing. Yet the atmosphere in the studio had been more relaxed since Antoine had befriended her. His acceptance of her appeared to make the other students more affable. Not that Jasmine actively sought the friendship of any of them. Detachment fostered calm. Calm fostered concentration and hence observation. And that made her drawings better.
Antoine continued to boss her about and Jasmine let him steer her on trips to the cinemas along the Boulevard Saint-Germain. She shared his passion for films – if not his intellectual dissection of them. For her, the magic was the darkened room and becom
