Le Caveau de la Huchette

Le Caveau de la Huchette

The doorman joked that my ID wasn’t acceptable. Perhaps it was the language barrier or my embarrassment but I was close to nodding and turning around. Instead, I smiled. I’m good at smiling and he understood that I wouldn’t give him back-chat so he laughed it off and stood aside for my friend and I to enter. The ticketbooth reminded me of vintage American cinemas, just big enough to fit a person and a computer. I slid my student card across the surface and paid the ten euro fee. He wished us a good evening as we advanced down the dark corridor. Right away, it was obvious that people of all cultures are drawn to this place like a child is to magic. The menus had small print English translations. The room was plastered with posters of familiar jazz musicians and scenes from the movie LalaLand. Music bounced off the walls, running across the curved ceilings.

I ordered a mojito from a blond. He liked that my French was bad and showed off his English. We made our way to the back. We reached a staircase, made up of large ancient bricks that twisted down towards the music.
We entered and immediately felt the swing music vibrate in our chests. Zippy beats and saxophone buzzed around us.

We squeezed past spectators and found a small gap on the booths that ran along the side. In the centre couples moved together, whirling and light-footed, their bodies moving before their minds could plan their next step. The band was made up of five. The singer was a mouthy Texan, dazzling and confident. The guitarist next to her, a Frenchman, wore 50’s style clothes with greased back hair. His fingers moved like Reinhardt. I was distracted by a flash next to my face. An excitable Swedish couple recorded the dancers. Click, click, click.

My friend translated, ‘They like the old guy over there with the hat’. She pointed to an elderly man in a fedora, moving a young woman gracefully, a sweet grin across his face, his eyes closed. I took him in. He was delicate and precise. It made me want to dance too.
I turned, ‘One more drink and we’re up.’ She laughed and nodded, a touch of fear flickered in her eyes.

After each song, the audience erupted and the singer chatted with her audience. She asked who spoke French, we raised our hands.
‘Who here speaks English?’, we raised our hands again. She stepped off the stage, and stood between us, shoes on the leather seating.

‘Where are you two ladies from?’. She liked England and Sweden, commenting, ‘Both countries are so polite!’. This made me laugh; she should try spending an evening in the pub with my family.
The swing started up again. Our glasses rattled, just ice and mint. It was time.

We were a little clumsy. A dancer next to me smiled, her hair was scraped back like a ballerina, her frame elegant, movements exact. I wondered if she had been coming here for years, the subtle signs of age scattered around her eyes and mouth.
After a while, the floor was full. Tourists tripping and plodding, locals spinning and jumping. The room fizzed with delight.