Once Upon a Time in Paris

Once Upon a Time in Paris

What he didn't know that night, when he crawled into my hotel bed like Goldilocks finally finding the one mattress that felt just right, was that he'd be the first man I'd slept with in over two decades. How could he? We'd just met. Two Americans in Paris, each on our own mission of self-discovery or pandemic escape, colliding like two lost socks that somehow found their match in the dryer.

We met at a bear bar in the Marais on a cobblestone street. We wandered to another bar, trailed by a drunken Frenchman we eventually learned to ignore. We cuddled and kissed in the taxi, then in the elevator, then in my room at the Le Grand, as if Paris itself had hung an invisible sign at every turn that read, "More Kissing Here."

For me, that first kiss wasn't just a kiss.It was a revolution. Sirens wailed. Cannons boomed. I’m certain a choir singing La Marseillaise was somewhere in the background.

And then the gum he chewed. Unmistakablely spearmint. As we kissed, I had an idea.

“Give it to me,” I commanded. Without hesitation, he transferred it into my mouth. I chewed it for a few seconds, letting the mint burn my beer breath away, then passed it back to him like some kind of romantic hostage exchange.

My hotel room was bright red, the color of the moment when I opened the door and dragged him inside. We inched our way to the bed, our lips never leaving each other’s. I’m going to leave the details over there, but when it was all over, we collapsed together, breathless, tangled, glowing in shared relief.

Then I got up to fetch him a warm, wet towel from the bathroom.

But when I returned, there he was already burrowed under the covers like a little kid in his homemade fort, having turned my hotel bed into his hideout. I stood there, towel in hand, staring at this beautiful, oblivious boy, my face still smelling of him, a scent I’d wear all night.

And I felt my heart do something dangerous.

It melted.

That same heart that had spent twenty years barricading itself. The heart that had refused, resisted, held firm in its grief like a prison with some old shadows for bars.

And now?

That heart was watching a handsome, naked man make himself at home. And I was letting him.

What he didn’t realize, as I played the big spoon to his small, was the little puddle of tears forming on my pillow behind him. I hadn’t held anyone like that in so long. I never thought I would.

I let out a big sigh. Sleep came easily.

The next morning, I woke with a start, startled to find someone else in my bed then I exhaled and pushed myself against his warmth, inhaling the back of his neck, desperate to hold it together. I willed myself not to start blubbering and ruin everything.

Instead, I kissed the back of his head as he stirred, then I slipped out of bed to pee. And that’s when I saw it. The spearmint gum sat on the bedside table, chewed into something that looked suspiciously like a heart.

I stared at it. And I knew. There was no turning back.