I describe it for Em, our table outside a restaurant in the Place des Vosges. How we ate, and drank our coffee, and watched the world go by.
How he told me about the history of the place as we sat beneath a curving stone arch, bathed in golden light on a dark December evening. I felt thrilled, like a child away from home for the first time.
‘There was something about that night,’ I say to Em, ‘that was different. Maybe it was the wine. Maybe it was Paris. Maybe it was just that Harry was safe, so I wasn’t so tense about being away from him. I told myself there was no harm in it, that we’d done it every year, that I wasn’t being unfaithful to Harry in any way – in fact Harry encouraged me to have the time to myself.
‘I suppose, and this might sound weird, but that night I realised it wasn’t about being unfaithful to Harry, it was about being faithful to myself. Even if it was only for a few hours a year. And suddenly, as we were walking around that beautiful place, on that beautiful night, it didn’t feel like enough.’
We strolled around after dinner, slightly drunk. Happy to be together again. He was wearing a new black leather jacket and a dark cashmere scarf that I gave him the year before, his thick blonde hair tucked beneath it. I remember gazing at him when I thought he wasn’t looking, noting how bloody gorgeous he was.
‘You okay?’ he asked, looking slightly concerned.
‘Me? Yes? Why?’
‘You sighed. Loudly.’
‘Oh. Right. Well, that’ll just be a delayed reaction to the crème brûlée, I think. I like your jacket.’
He looked down at himself, and shrugged.
‘I don’t often buy clothes,’ he said, ‘but I saw this yesterday in Stockholm, and thought I’d dress up for the occasion. Paris, you know – you can’t dress down for Paris.’
I’d bought a new dress for exactly the same reason. I’d been to Paris before, but only en route to Disneyland when Olivia was younger. I loved Disneyland – but it didn’t feel like Paris. That place, that night with him, felt like Paris.
As I tell this story, I see that Em is resting her face in her hands, looking enraptured. I’d never have her down as the romantic type, but I can see a wistful look in her eyes that makes me smile.
‘I don’t suppose we’d ever really been just friends, Em, beneath the surface of it all,’ I say. ‘And that night … well, it just all seemed irresistible. I wanted to touch him, and be touched by him, and to see his body unwrapped from its winter layers. I wanted to kiss him and do all the things I’d never let myself think about. I wanted to fall asleep in his arms and wake up with him in the morning. I wanted it more than anything.’
I felt about sixteen again, that night. I was blushing, and everything felt deliciously uncertain, divinely insecure. When he reached out to hold my hand as we walked, I was breathless with attraction and possibility. With the simple not knowing – not knowing what it would be like for this man to make love to me.
Somehow, without either of us saying or doing anything, the atmosphere between us changed. We walked back to his hotel, his arm slipping around my shoulders, me allowing myself to loop mine around his waist. It wasn’t a lot, but it was enough. Enough for a simple goodnight to feel less than platonic.
We stopped when we reached the doorway to the hotel, a small unobtrusive sign on a picturesque street. He held my shoulders, turned me to face him. Both of us bathed in starlight.
‘Stay with me,’ he said simply.
I wanted to, so much. Physically, emotionally, with every molecule of my being, I wanted to. I even could have got away with it – Harry would accept it if I told him I was tipsy, I was crashing out, I’d be home for breakfast … but I couldn’t.
‘I want to, Alex – you know I do,’ I said. ‘But … I can’t. I just can’t do that to Harry. I can’t be unfaithful to him, even with you.’
‘I know,’ he replied, smiling sadly and kissing the top of my head. ‘I know you can’t. Though every time you leave me, every time you go back to him, it feels like you’re being unfaithful to me somehow … but I know. I understand. I understand, but I don’t have to like it.’
I never thought of it that way, but he was right. Whenever I went back to the house I shared with Harry after one of these meetings, I felt out of place. Out of time. Like I was trapped in somebody else’s life. I never even thought of how painful it must be for him – imagining me back there, with another man.
He went on dates, but there wasn’t anyone special. I had no idea how I’d feel if there was. How would I feel if he got married? I realised I’d be heartbroken, even though I’d have absolutely no right to feel that way.
He wrapped his arms around me, and for a few minutes we just stood there, on that small street, our bodies close. I remember inhaling the scent of him, letting my fingers graze the skin of his back. He kissed the scar on my forehead, nuzzled my hair. We were so close it reminded me of being together underground, battered and bruised and trapped. A time that was terrible, but gave us each other.
I wanted nothing more than to walk into the hotel room with him. To be with him, to fall asleep and dream of sunsets, and the close of days, and the moments that change everything. Those precious moments that define all the ones that come after.
‘I’ve been offered a new job,’ he said, when we pulled apart. ‘For a charity. Working in communities in Africa, Asia, South America. Looking at ways to develop and build homes for local people that they can afford to live in. Working with those people to actually build them. It’s hands on. I’ll be designing, but I’ll also be wearing a hard hat.’
‘That sounds wonderful,’ I replied. ‘You’ll be perfect at it.’
‘Come with me. I’ll teach you how to lay bricks and build timber frames and install plumbing. Come with me – travel. Do something important and useful that you’ll enjoy. Be with me.’
I allowed myself a single moment of fantasy. A moment where my life took a different path, one where I worked hard all day, where I built things. Where I sat with this man, and watched the sunset every night.
It was only a moment though, and only a fantasy. Harry was so much better than he was, but he still needed me. I made a commitment. I married him. I said those words, made those vows, and I knew he would be devastated if I left him. He loved me. Needed me. We’d been through too much together for us to part ways. I simply couldn’t do that to him.
