Only After We Met

1 Ginger

1

Ginger

When you meet a person, there’s no way of knowing all at once that they’ll turn your world upside down. In the blink of an eye. The way a soap bubble pops. The way a match catches fire. In the course of our lives, we meet thousands of people: at the supermarket, on the bus, in a café, in the middle of the street. Maybe the person who’s meant to shake things up for you is standing there in front of you at a crosswalk or grabbing the last box of cereal off the top shelf when you’re out buying groceries. Maybe you’ll never meet that person; maybe you’ll never even exchange a word. Or maybe you will. Maybe you’ll lock eyes, run into each other, make a connection. It’s just that unpredictable. That’s where the magic lies, I guess. For me, it happened one freezing night in Paris when I was trying to buy a ticket for the subway.

“Why aren’t you working?” I moaned to the machine. I pushed the button so hard it hurt my finger. “Stupid piece of trash!”

“Are you trying to kill it?”

I turned around when I heard a voice that spoke my language.

And I saw him. I don’t know. I don’t know what I felt just then. I don’t remember clearly, but there are three things I can’t forget: the collar of his jacket was turned up, he smelled like spearmint gum, and his eyes were a bluish gray like the London sky on one of those leaden dawns when the sun tries to break through the clouds but can’t.

That’s all. That’s everything. And that’s all I needed to start shivering.

“I wish. But for now, it’s winning. I can’t get it to work.”

“You’ve got to choose what kind of ticket you want first.”

“Where…uh, where do I pick?”

“On the start screen. Hold on.”

He stood beside me, pushed the buttons to get back to the main menu, and looked at me. And it was intense. Like when someone arouses your curiosity, but you don’t know why. Or when you wake up in a cold sweat.

“Where are you trying to go?”

“Well…actually…” I was nervous, and I tucked a strand of hair that had come loose from my ponytail behind my ear. “Downtown?”

“You’re not sure?”

“Yeah! No! I mean, I don’t have anywhere to stay tonight, so I was thinking, like, I’d get to know the city a bit. Any place you recommend?”

He leaned against the machine and arched his eyebrows. “You don’t have anywhere to stay?”

“No. I just caught the first flight out.”

“Just like that, throwing caution to the wind?”

“Yeah, basically. Like that.”

“All by yourself…?”

“So what?”

“No, I get it. I do the same sometimes.”

“Great, congratulations. So, getting back to the ticket…”

“What’s your name?” he asked.

“Ginger. What’s yours?”

“Rhys.”

His accent was American. And he was so tall he made me feel tiny. But he had something. That something you can’t always put in words when you meet someone. It’s not that he was handsome or that I felt lost in the city I’d just arrived in. It was that I could read things in him. I still wasn’t sure if those things were good or bad, but when I looked at him, the very last thing that came into my mind was empty , which was funny, because I’d find out later that the emptiness was one of the things Rhys feared most. But I didn’t know that yet. We were still two strangers looking each other in the eye in front of a ticket machine for the subway.

“Do you have any advice for me?” I said, getting back to the subject.

He hesitated but didn’t look away. “Yeah. I could show you Paris.”

“Look, before this gets uncomfortable, I might as well tell you I just broke up with my boyfriend. We were together a long time, so I’m not into getting to know someone else or having a one-night stand…”

If only someone had told me what a fool I was being then.

“I offered to take you to see the city, not to bed.”

He crossed his arms with a wry grin. I blushed like a fifteen-year-old.

“Of course. But, like, just in case…”

“Right. You’re planning ahead.”

“Exactly. I try to, anyway. I mean, actually, at this moment, I’ve obviously done anything but plan ahead, but fuck it, I’m trying to get…to get my life in order. And everything…”

Rhys didn’t seem bothered by my momentary insanity. That should have been the first sign. I should have known right then he would be different. I was talking nonstop, the way I usually did when I felt nervous, and that was what was special in that moment, the way he just listened, nodded, and agreed.

“…everything’s just chaos right now, you know? This situation. My life. Maybe I’m here in the middle of an unfamiliar city as a kind of symbol of what I feel like right now. Sorry, I don’t know why you haven’t turned around and walked off yet.”

“I like people who talk.”

“Why, to fill the dead air?”

“Maybe. I haven’t really thought about it.”

That was a lie. I’d later learn Rhys was a good talker, the kind who asks questions others don’t even think of, the kind who can stay up all night rolling over whatever’s in their head and never get bored of it.

“The thing is, my flight back leaves tomorrow.”

He looked at me a few moments, tense, interested. “You want to do this visit or not, Ginger?”

I remember all I could think right then was, Why does he say my name like that? Why does he sound like he’s said it a million times before? It scared me, but I liked it in equal measure. Or no. I liked it more than it scared me. Because he uttered it delicately, and I’ve never liked my name. Ginger’s a spice or a root, not something romantic or spiritual, but when Rhys said it, it sounded different. Nicer.

“You’re a stranger,” I said.

“We’re all strangers until we meet.”

“Yeah, but…” I licked my lips, nervous.

“Whatever. It’s your call.” He shrugged.

Then he wished me a safe trip, his face brushing the collar of his jacket, and he walked toward the tunnel that led outside.

I weighed my options. I was lost in Paris because I’d just broken up with my boyfriend and I thought I was being a rebel by buying the first ticket I could find, even if it was a round trip with a quick turnaround and I had nowhere to stay and nothing on me but a backpack with a pair of panties, a change of socks, and a pack of crackers. And I didn’t know where to go. And I couldn’t ignore the shiver I felt when I heard his voice the first time.

I don’t know. It was an impulse. A sudden attraction.

“Wait!”

He stopped.

“Where are we going?”

“We?” He turned around.

“I know I just told you I don’t know you, but if you turn around and leave right now… I think I’ll follow you.”

Rhys looked surprised.

“I mean, yeah, let’s go. Because I don’t know where I am and I don’t have any data on my phone because the company sold me this garbage plan and… I feel like if I stay, I’ll end up getting eaten by a bear or whatever happens when you get lost in a city instead of an enchanted forest. You know what I mean.”

“I don’t have the damnedest idea what you mean.” He smiled.

“Whatever. Just…don’t leave me.”

“Fine, but you need to relax and go with the flow.”

I nodded and he laughed. And I followed him. I followed him without thinking another thought, bought a couple of train tickets, and cut through the crowd to get into the first subway car that stopped there.

I didn’t know then that my life was going to change.

That Rhys would be a before and after.

That our paths would join forever.