Love, Andre (Excerpt from "Gypsy")

The Parisian streets were like columns of shining, autumn-drizzled scales. Cobblestone spoke to me as no other pavement could. It toyed with rain’s scent and café lamplight and women’s heels, imbuing the eye with romantic luminescence, winding away in early haze to bend at a florist’s shop or brasserie.
I drew my umbrella and inhaled, savoring the clip of my boots on the curb.

“Coucou Aimé.”

Andre’s violin-hardened hand slipped easily into mine as he ducked into the umbrella’s small curve against the rain. I let my lips spread into a smile. But something curdled in my stomach at the urgency in his eyes.

“Coucou Andre,” I replied. He smiled at my improved accent.
“Aimé, I’ve been looking for you,” he said, the words curling and softening on his Parisian tongue. “I went to your apartment, but you’d gone. I feared for good. And it came over me, like this rain, in that moment, that –”

“Please, Andre love, I’m not gone…don’t let’s spoil anything.” My lashes fluttered down as I brushed the tip of my nose gently against his flushing cheek. He would forget everything in light of the moment.

But he brushed a finger against my closing lips. “No, mon cheri, do not change the subject. I must tell you. When I thought you would go, I – it was my soul wrung out like a sponge. And it occurred that – that I could not imagine a life that is full and good and beautiful without you in it.”

My back stiffened. A cab wailed obnoxiously as it blazed by, spraying against my leggings.

“Andre –,” I said, edging my voice with coy and petulant impatience.
“Aimé, mon amor, mon belle, marry me…and I will be faithful to you, make you happy. And we will read poetry and I’ll play you Vivaldi until your hair melts silver. Please, say yes. Say you’ll marry me.”

Of course, he would ruin everything. His violin whispering on the terrasse, overlooking my beloved cobblestone corner. Dancing and cabernet and letters scrawled in affection and praise. Spontaneous after work trips to secret hideaways. Patient lessons in French poetry on le Senne. Now he was going to burn it all away with the same eager passion that he began it. No, I was.

“I can’t, Andre...I just can’t.”