That first Parisian summer with Henri was magical—it made me feel both scandalous and free; youthful and empowered. I gave in to the passion and the freedom and had a spectacular love affair in the world’s most romantic city! So you couldn’t blame me that, two years later, I’d come back, unable to avoid seconds.
“It’s a bit unexpected, isn’t it?” I said to Henri with a slight grimace. “A little last-minute, me showing up here?”
Henri slipped his arm around my waist and unlocked the front door of his apartment complex. “No, no, no,” he said in a low tone. “What’s life and passion if not unexpected? Spontaneous?”
“My point exactly,” I said, a small skip to my step as we ascended the stairs to the very same fifth-floor apartment where Henri and I had spent many evenings and long afternoons wrapped in each other’s arms, devilish grins on our faces to give in, yet again, to lust, to passion.
Henri turned the round, brassy knob of his front door. “As Lao Tzu said: Life is a series of spontaneous and natural changes. We cannot resist them, because it only makes for sorrow.”
Ever the poet, ever the writer, I thought as we entered his apartment.
The apartment, like Henri, like Paris, like our relationship, was just as I remembered it. His place wasn’t much larger than the dorm room Claire and I shared freshman year, and the kitchen not wide enough for two people. It was just as you’d picture a charming Parisian apartment for anyone other than the elite. It had high ceilings, detailed intricately with crown molding. Even the spot encircling the base of the large, white, globe IKEA lamp that hung above was festooned with detailed moulding.
Books lined the entire left wall of the small, rectangular living room from floor to ceiling in a cherry-colored wooden bookshelf Henri’s father had built for him. Henri had so many books crammed into the shelf that many were lying on their sides, wedged atop other books in a row.
Papers and more books littered the desk and chair on the opposite side of the room. A cork board hung on the wall directly above the desk, just clear of the path of the overhanging postcards, notes, and photos that dangled from a lengthy string above.
Henri was a writer, a graduate of the Sorbonne, and he had a passion for American and French literature and great literary aspirations. “To be surrounded by inspiration,” he’d once told me, “in a city of inspiration, with books and photographs and lines of poetry and beautiful things to look at and read, my soul is fed.” His apartment emphasized his point perfectly, romantically.
Henri could be really romantic like that, and really poetic and charming—it was in his blood; it was a byproduct of his job. With that romance and artsy flair, however, came the ability to charm…and the ability to easily let go and move on, in search of new and exciting inspiration.
There were many women whose company Henri enjoyed, and I’m sure many women he loved. And that was all right with me. Henri and I had made it clear when we’d first gotten intimately involved that our affair was just that, an affair. There was never much of a chance of our affair blossoming into anything more seeing how thousands of miles separated us. It was unfortunate, but it was reality. No use fighting it, god knew I couldn’t control it no matter how much I wanted to.
Henri and I had kept in touch, though, over the past two years. Sometimes emails and Skype calls were more frequent, other times we’d go seasons without ever exchanging more than a birthday or Christmas greeting. And now, back in Paris and unable to tamp down that crazy urge to call up the man who made me feel like the most beautiful woman on the planet, Henri and I were reunited. It would be a brief reunion, I knew, but a reunion just the same. It was exactly what I needed right at that moment.
***
“So, my sweet Sophie,” Henri said as he lit a Gauloise, “want one?” He offered the crinkled blue pack of cancer sticks, and I shook my head. Normally I would wince at the nasty odor, as I did with Jackie, maybe even ask that the cigarette be smoked elsewhere, but not with Henri. Not at a time like now.
“I forget,” he said in a husky voice. He took a long drag. “You Americans and your health fears.”
I rolled over onto my side, propping my head up with one hand. “Thank you.” I rested a hand on his chest, gingerly dancing my fingers in his soft hair.
“For?” He gave me a quizzical look as he took another drag. He blew the thick smoke in the opposite direction, dropping his free hand to my shoulder.
“For this.” I bit my bottom lip, feeling risqué. I danced my fingers further up his chest, nearing his chin. “For not asking questions, for letting me be, for making me feel beautiful.” My fingers stopped at his ear, and without a moment’s hesitation I leaned forward and kissed it.
“Now, Sophie.” He took a jagged drag before setting his cigarette in an ashtray, then gripped me around my bare waist. He flipped me onto my back.
“Henri!”
He lowered his body onto mine, and I swallowed, feeling coquettish. Then he said with a grin, “I make you feel beautiful because you are beautiful.”
His lips caressed mine. I parted mine, ready for a kiss and, perhaps, to begin Part Deux of what we’d so quickly and heatedly begun not long after I’d arrived.
But Henri took me by surprise when he didn’t kiss me fiercely, hungrily. Instead, he touched his lips to the corner of my mouth in a tempting way, then dropped kisses from my chin, down my neck, my chest, over one breast…
“Do you want to go out for dinner?” he whispered as I tucked an arm under the plush pillow under my head.
“Now?” I breathed out gutturally.
He laughed softly. “I think I like right where we are now.”
“Me, too,” I said with a groan.
“Shall I make a reservation? For tonight?” He paused his trail of kisses and looked into my eyes. “What do you want to do, Sophie?”
“What did you say? We shouldn’t resist spontaneity because it leads to sorrow?” I bit down on my bottom lip flirtatiously.
“Ouiiiii,” he drew out in suspicion.
“I want you, here, now.” I lifted my head up, gripped the back of his, knotting my fingers in his hair, and pressed my lips firmly to his, deciding that Lao Tzu knew exactly what he was talking about.
It was good to be in Paris, it was good to be with Henri, and it was good to feel passion and intimacy and share a romance with someone. I missed this feeling, and even if it wouldn’t last for long, at least I could have it for a little while.
Chapter Fourteen
“That coral blouse is adorable, Sophie,” Claire gushes as she paws through my Anthropologie carrier bag. She pulls the blouse out and fingers the silky chiffon fabric. “You hardly ever wear much color.” She presses it against me. “Gorgeous. Totally makes your eyes even more bluey-green.”
I look left and right before crossing the Pike Street and 5th Ave intersection, then I begin to join the throng of weekend shoppers crossing the busy downtown street.
“Wait!” Claire blurts, hastily shoving the blouse back into the bag. “I want to look for some new running stuff.” She nudges me back onto the sidewalk. “Niketown. Let’s roll.”
This is turning out to be a great weekend! Having Claire in town is simply fabulous. We’ve gotten to do our girls’ night; she hung out for a bit with me at the café yesterday; she, Robin, and I went out for dinner at a fave hamburger joint in Pioneer Square last night; and today the two of us are on a shopping spree. It’s trying on a pair of shoes here, gossip there, ringing up that fitting pair of jeans left, chit-chat right—it’s, like I said, fabulous!
It’s after Claire’s purchased a new pair of running shoes, two neon-colored sports bras, and several packs of socks, and after I’ve decided I could do with a new pair of yoga pants, when Claire and I decide to meander aimlessly along Seattle’s scenic waterfront. We wander past pier after pier with carrier bags weighing us down, cups of Seattle’s Best in-hand, and love on the brain.
“You know,” Claire says, the straw of her iced moc
ha between her teeth, “I think it’s really neat how Gatz and Emily got to go abroad together.”
I nod in agreement and adjust the weighty collection of carrier bags in my grasp.
“Just between us, I don’t think things would have worked out between them had Gatz gone to Australia without her.” Claire looks at me quickly, making sure I’m following her train of thought.
I nod again and tell her to go on.
“And I don’t think it would’ve worked out if Em had gone off on another adventure and Gatz was left back here,” she continues. She takes a long pull of her beverage. “Know what I mean?”
“Well,” I say, playing devil’s advocate, “she did manage to go to Africa for eight weeks, and their relationship survived just fine.”
“Eight weeks, Sophie. Eight weeks, not eight months…or even a year!”
I shrug and readjust the bags again before I take a sip of my tepid latte.
“You really think they’ll be in Brisbane for a whole year?” I query.
The topic’s been up for discussion for a while: Will Em and Gatz remain abroad for a semester or an academic year? I’m guessing it’ll be the latter, seeing how they’re having a blast and Em’s got the permanent travel bug. But I’m selfishly hoping for the former. How great would it be for me to have one of my good friends down the road again? For that extra help back at the café?
“Who knows?” Claire says breezily. “Probably a year. But regardless, six months, a semester—that would’ve been a hell of a long time to be apart in a relationship.”
“True.” I take another sip.
“On the other hand,” Claire’s voice turns upbeat, “true love conquers all, right? If it’s meant to be, it’s meant to be.”
“Yeah,” I sigh. “Perhaps. Long distance isn’t easy, though. I mean…” I’m suddenly overcome with a feeling of relaxation, and I just let my mouth run. “Part of you thinks it can work out—endure all things kind of stuff. The other part says you’re nuts! Maybe one of you tries harder than the other to make the long-distance work…” I wag my head brusquely. “It can’t be easy, no. I’m sure Emily and Gatz could’ve weathered it, but you’re right. It’s best they’re not apart for so long. Long-distance never pans out. Trust me, I know.”
Claire makes a long ah-ha expression, head nodding slowly. “Oh, of course…Sophie and the Frenchie.” She makes a tsking sound. “I see where you’re coming from.”
She pauses and furrows her brow. “Okay, in all honesty, no, I don’t.” She suppresses a laugh. “You never do like to share this bit of your past.”
“Yeah, well,” I say listlessly. “That past is the past and nothing ever came of it.” Memories in the ol’ Memory Bank, I say to myself. “What’s the point?”
“It better not have been some horrible and abusive relationship that’s damaged you, Sophie.” Suddenly Claire’s curious blue eyes grow round. “Oh! Is that it, Sophie? You’re so damaged from that Frenchie that you can’t pick up the pieces and—”
I press a hand to my chest. “Oh, Claire. You goofball. No, no, nothing like that.”
“Phew!” She wipes at a fake stream of brow sweat. “I was going to say!”
I look long and hard at Claire after a few silent seconds following her brief panic attack. She’s gaily slurping at her mocha, checking out the picturesque waterfront spilling forth before us.
“You know, Claire,” I say in a far-off kind of voice. She gestures to the end of the pier where a bench is located as I say, “I never shared much about France, about Henri.”
“Tell me about it!” she gasps as we take a seat. “I’ve pestered you before about him and the juicy details, but the claws come out or you shut down and—” She grins with her straw in the corner of her mouth. “Shutting up now. Sorry. You were saying?”
“I’ve been wandering down memory lane a lot lately.” I lean against the cold wooden bench back. “I think it’s because Brandon’s back in the picture with Robin and the adoption and all.”
Claire says she understands.
“And because I’m lonely.”
“Me, too, Sophie. I’m loving our time together, but I’m so going to be lonely again for you when I go back home tomorrow.”
“Not that.”
She makes a perplexed face.
“Of course I’ll miss you,” I stammer out a retraction. “Of course. But I mean lonely-lonely…”
“For a man.” Claire simultaneously winks and clicks her tongue against the roof of her mouth. “Gotcha.”
“I don’t know why, but I’ve been reflecting a lot lately. Even about…Henri.”
“Are you secretly pining away for him?” Her face has that usual sweet and innocent expression about it. It’s not quite puppy-doggish, but it’s one of those faces that makes you want to give in and appease, spill the beans kind of thing.
“I don’t think so,” I mumble.
She criss-crosses her legs and leans closer to me.
“I should just get it off my chest and tell you all about it,” I say at last.
A flooding sense of relief washes over me at the thought of divulging the memory of Henri and what transpired in Paris. I know talking about what “once was” is kind of fruitless, but I think it’ll do my heart some good. Maybe talking about it will remind me that the past really is the past and it’s over, and that it’s okay to talk about something that didn’t necessarily lead to anything promising. It’s worth a shot.
A large grin coats Claire’s lips, and a rough nod of the head follows. “You want to dish? About Henri? Finally?”
“There isn’t that much to dish about, but…” I backtrack slowly.
“There’s something!” she says eagerly.
I give an unsettled laugh as I set my cup down. “That’s true. There is something you don’t actually know about me.”
“Ha, ha.” She pulls her legs in tighter. “Come on, you’ve got to tell me now. You’ve been reflecting a lot…Henri…and?”
“I have been reflecting a lot, Claire.” I inhale deeply.
“And?”
“And…” I look out across the water. “I don’t know.”
“Look. Brandon’s back in the picture, you’re lonely, of course you’re reflecting! And…” She moves her head around, gesturing for me to meet her eyes. I oblige and she says, “Also because you’re unhappy in love.”
“Yes,” I say in a small voice. “That’s true.”
“And you want to find answers as to why you’re unhappy, why you’re lonely.”
“Yes.”
“So you start rooting about the past and try to puzzle together where you went wrong!” She’s waving her free hand wildly about now. “I read women’s magazines, Sophie. I watch the occasional soap. I totally get this behavior.”
“All right, all right,” I say with a chortle. I turn to face her, pulling one leg up onto the bench. “Maybe, if anything, it’ll just feel good to talk about it, you know?”
“Totally! Ohhh! Sophie’s steps to getting on the loooove train!”
“Okay, the dork factor has got to be checked at the door before I go dish steamy romance gossip.”
“Oooh, steamy.” She raises and lowers her eyebrows seductively. “Tell me more.”
I playfully nudge her in the arm. It’s as if nothing’s changed since freshman year when she had a very important piece of information about a certain frat boy she’d met in the cafeteria and couldn’t keep her excitement levels from jumping off the Richter scale.
“Okay, so you know we first met two years ago, Henri and I?”
“Yes, yes.”
“We met and it was charming and all that…”
“Yes! And why you’re still not working at something with him?” She holds out a questioning hand.
“It was great,” I say slowly, “but never meant to last. Like Brandon.” I roll my eyes. “Minus the horrible heartbreak and deceit and—”
“Sophie.”
“Hmm?”
&nb
sp; “Back on track.”
I clear my throat. “Right. Okay. So you know I saw Henri again? This summer?”
She nods excitedly.
“It was just as wonderful then as the moment we first met. Seriously, Claire,” I clutch a hand to my chest, “just as amazing, as if time had stood still!”
The girls all knew, though only vaguely, that I’d had a particularly romantic affair with the sexy Parisian named Henri Rochefort and that we’d done our best to stay in touch via Skype and email. (A pathetic excuse for a relationship, oh-so quasi.) Henri had even sent me the most gorgeous teal-colored Hermès silk scarf as a congratulatory gift upon opening my café, telling me he was so happy for me and that his door was still open whenever I made it to Paris next. That was Henri—charming and irresistible.
I’d dated rather inordinately that very first summer in Paris two years ago, but Henri was special. So special I couldn’t pass up the opportunity to see him again during my return trip. Being with him this past summer was just like the first time. It was invigorating! I was living in the moment, and all that mattered was the here, the now.
The fact that Henri would inevitably become nothing more than a memory—a beautiful memory and experience—escaped my mind for a few fleeting but fabulous days when I lost myself in the breathtaking moments of passion and freedom in the most romantic city in the world.
Chapter Fifteen
Four Months Ago, Summer in Paris
“Only five more days with my beautiful American baker,” Henri said, giving my hand a gentle squeeze. A grin tugged at the corners of his mouth.
When Girlfriends Find Love Page 11
