The French Fairytale

I was disappointed at the number of couples that I was surrounded by. Everyone around me seemed to be walking arm in arm with someone, leaning affectionately into each other’s shoulders, their steps in synchronised rhythm with their partner. I sat alone on the plush velvet seat before the artworks, but instead of taking in their beauty and the way they seemed to reflect back the golden glow of the chandelier overhead, I found myself searching the crowds of visitors gathered before them, seeking that one person who had come into the art gallery with the same intentions as I had.

 

Perhaps it had not been the best idea to read so many romance novels while planning my summer holidays. I had ended up packing my suitcase and writing out my itinerary not with the intention of exploring Paris (as I had so ardently assured my parents), but rather with the desire to live out the same romantic fantasies as the women I had read about. It had led me to pack crimson lipstick and high-heeled boots instead of my comfortable sneakers and loungewear. I had even planned to visit three different museums in the first week of the holidays (despite having no interest in art whatsoever), as if each gallery would be packed full of elusive lovers hidden away behind every display, leaning charmingly beside renaissance paintings and ready to win me over with their foreign accent.

In one of the books I had read, the woman had been pensively gazing at a painting in a museum, standing alone with her arms crossed (with her mustard beret tilted carefully to one side and her red-rimmed sunglasses hanging elegantly from the collar of her blouse), when her mysterious lover had appeared beside her and swept her away on a romantic evening on the streets of Paris. I had been standing with my arms crossed in front of the painting for almost twenty minutes. My beret was barely managing to stay on despite the clips I had used to secure it in place, and I had now resigned instead to sitting with my arms crossed, to give my poor feet a break from balancing on its high heels. Would the lady’s lover still have been able to find her if she had been sitting down? Surely, the romance would not have been spoiled by the heroine having to sit down to rest her sore feet. I took out the red lipstick from my handbag and reapplied a light coat.

As I reached behind to put the lipstick back, my elbow knocked into the handle of my handbag, knocking it off the seat and sending its contents spilling out with a deafening clatter. I scrambled around on all fours to pick everything up as quickly as possible, hastily gathering the loose receipts and stray coins that had scattered across the wooden floor, before I was stopped by a sudden thought. Was this not the perfect opportunity for my lover to find me, to offer their hand and lift me from the ground? My own romance novel was writing itself before my very eyes. Even without lifting my head, I could already picture it; he would have just walked into the room, and the stylish young lady would immediately catch his eyes as she gathered her strewn belongings from the floor. He would be the only one to notice the item in the far corner of the room (a dainty pocket-mirror, or perhaps an elegant silver brooch?), and he would offer it to her, with a hint of a smile already on his lips…

 

‘Excuse me? Is this yours?’

 

My breath caught in my throat. How should she presume? Then how should she begin?  My manicured fingers reached up towards the stranger’s, whose silhouette cast a soft shadow across the ground in front of me. I could make out the lights of the silver chandelier behind, glistening and shimmering like the lights which would soon be lighting up the Eiffel tower this evening. My heart fluttered with anticipation and I suddenly became conscious of the way my loose caramel curls had effortlessly fallen onto my face…

 

He quickly thrust my battered high school ID card into my hands before I could even breathe a word.

 

‘Let’s go, honey’

 

He linked his arm with his lover, a young lady with flowing golden hair who was wearing a luxurious white fur coat and one of the most elegant leather boots I had ever seen. A neat satin bow swung playfully from her hair as the couple walked away, their steps falling in line with each other.

 

I looked down at my ID card, at the pimple-faced teenager smiling back at me, her braces reflecting the blinding flash of the cameras. I angrily swiped my hand across my face to brush away the hairs poking into my eyes, smudging the red lipstick onto my cheeks.