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A young couple with matching leather jackets walks up the sidewalk toward me, hand in hand. The girl pulls a face at something the boy says and then tries to extricate herself from his hold in an act of defiance. He leaps behind her and wraps his arms around her waist, not letting her get away, holding her tight as she laughs and puts up a weak fight. It’s obvious she doesn’t really want to get away from him, not even a little bit. I smile, living vicariously through them as they pass me by, completely unaware of my presence. I realize I should be sad that I don’t have a boyfriend with me here, but I’m not. It’s the exact opposite. I’ve never been filled with so much hope and excitement for what the future holds. Here, no one knows who I’m supposed to be. My past is an ocean away, and I don’t need a man to make my trip special. I’ll have a love affair with Paris instead.* * *Over the next few days, Cornelia and I take turns setting the agenda. We have no plans we’re beholden to, which means there’s never any reason to be anywhere at any given time. We stroll through the Louvre slowly on our second day and barely make it through half the exhibition halls, so we decide we’ll go again the next day. Obviously, I can go at a much faster pace than Cornelia can, which is why we make the perfect pair. I speed her up and she slows me down.
For an entire afternoon, we sit outside a cafe on the bank of the Seine and watch the restoration work at Notre Dame while we switch from coffee to wine, reading when we feel like it, chatting when the subject strikes us.
She asks me if I’ve ever been in love and I’m embarrassed to admit I haven’t, not unless being in love with the memory of my parents counts.
She tells me of a time she summered in Paris when she was a teenager. She had a French tutor who was only a few years older than her and extremely cute. As her understanding of the French language deepened, so did her feelings for him. By the end of summer, she was convinced she was wholeheartedly in love with him and she needed to remain in Paris instead of returning to the States.
“What did he say?”
“He gave me my first kiss, patted my head, and told me there would be someone much better for me down the line.”
“Was there?”
“Oh yes, though it would be years before I found him.”
“Nicholas’ grandfather?”
She smiles fondly and nods. “Edward was not at all my type when we first met. In fact, I thought he was a little rude. He didn’t like me much either. I wasn’t afraid to speak my mind in an age when most women would have happily zipped their lips and married a nice boy from a nice family.”
“What happened?”
“Oh, he fell hopelessly in love with me, of course. I know I might not look it now, but I was a great beauty.”
“You still are.”
She smiles like she’s humoring me. “It was so fun to have him wrapped around my finger in the beginning. I could have told him to jump off a bridge and he would have done it.”
“Sounds like you had quite the evil streak,” I say with a laugh.
“I didn’t let myself get too carried away. I eventually put him out of his misery and proposed.”
“You proposed to him!?”
She laughs. “That’s about the same reaction he had. You should have seen his face, this proud, arrogant man staring down at me on one knee—I’ll never forget it.”
“Maybe I’ll do the same one day when I fall in love.” I shake the silly thought from my head. “Or better yet, maybe I’ll never marry and I’ll just stay with you forever.”
I see her frown out of the corner of my eye, though I was expecting a smile. “Nothing would break my heart more.”
“Why?” I challenge with a furrowed brow. “Women can be happy without a husband, without children.”
“Yes, my dear. You’re right. Could you though?”
I take a moment to think about her question, glancing back across the Seine.
“I hate to admit it, because it feels like I’m giving in to some preset societal demand that I have to become a mother just because I’m a woman, but the truth is, I’ve been on my own since I was thirteen. Nearly every person and every place in my life has been temporary, and I want something permanent. I want a real family and a home, wherever and with whomever that may be.”
She reaches across the table to touch my arm. I stare down at her elegantly aged hand and the emerald wedding ring she never takes off.
