Nine Years Ago Munich, Germany
Hallie
Ace and I skittered away from that annoyed German woman, giggling under our breath.
I’ve never felt the way I did that night, not before or since—buoyant and light as a feather, my pulse racing with the thrill of our connection. The world belonged solely to us. Everyone else barely existed on the blurry fringes.
My feelings for Ace were magical and instant. The moment I met him—saw him standing across the lawn, staring up at the cathedral with a look of awe in his eyes—I felt safe and curious. But it didn’t take long for his charm and looks to capture my attention.
Maybe it was the fact that we knew from the moment we started talking about ourselves that we only had that night. He was deploying. I was going home to start med school after I finished my year-long jaunt around Europe.
Our time together was a gift, something like a rare shell you pick up on the beach, admire, maybe even place in your pocket, but at the end of the walk, before you brush the sand off your feet, you toss it back out to sea where it belongs.
Ace was my rare shell. And I held him that night. Then I tossed him back and brushed the sand off to return to life as it had been before I found him.
We strolled down a street in Old Town Munich where the buildings pressed together shoulder-to-shoulder, a seamless wall of pastel facades with steep rooflines.
Windows on the buildings were spaced evenly across the smooth stucco finish.
Shops lined the street on the first floor of the buildings.
Residences took up the upper two or three.
Our conversation was as light and warm as the streetlamps bathing the paved ground in their soft yellow glow.
We wandered to the west crossing Stachus, the large square where the charming cobbled streets of Old Town emerge into a wide open plaza with a fountain.
Tram lines embedded in the pavement brought the occasional night tram through with only a few straggling passengers.
We walked through the old city gate—a stone structure with three arches and towers. Then, among the more modern storefronts, we found a pub still open to college students and other locals.
“Do you play pool?” Ace asked, glancing inside the pub and back down at me.
“I’m grauenhaft,” I said, using one of the German words I mastered. I wasn’t joking. My pool skills were horrible.
He chuckled and his eyes sparkled with a kind of mischief that drew me closer. There was this kind of protectiveness about Ace. I sensed his careful strength the moment I spotted him at the cathedral. This man would never hurt me. I don’t know how I knew it. I just did.
“Well, let’s go play some pool then,” he said. “Maybe I can teach you a little.”
His smile was broad and free.
“Does that line usually work for you?” I asked him, with a flirty glance up into his eyes.
I followed him into the pub.
“I don’t know. I haven’t ever used it on anyone. Maybe you can tell me if it works later.”
It already was working, and I think he knew it. But Ace was a gentleman, and even though he was as caught up as I was in whatever was passing between us, he wasn’t going to cross any lines.
We played pool. Well, he did. I scrubbed the table with the tip of the cue and hit the wrong balls, barely making any into the pockets.
We laughed a lot, and he pulled the move I hoped he would, positioning himself behind me to teach me good form, holding my arms just so.
As if I could concentrate on playing pool when I turned my head and my nose met his neck, filling with his warm, slightly salty scent.
Ace wrapped around me. I settled back into him and all thoughts of sinking the ball into the pocket evaporated.
After a while, we abandoned the pool table to a group of students and grabbed two chairs at a small wooden table in the middle of the room.
“I want something warm to drink,” I said. “Like hei?e schokolade.” I used another German phrase, maybe to impress him.
“Hot chocolate?” Ace smiled and his eyes crinkled at the edges with amusement. “I thought your German was horrible. You said that perfectly.”
“I learned the most important words,” I told him, laughing at my own joke.
“And hot chocolate is one?”
“Definitely. A girl can survive just about anything with the right amount of chocolate.”
“Well, let’s go find you some hei?e schokolade,” he said, a new determination taking over his body and face. Here was the soldier, going to battle, single-minded on the mission at hand.
He asked the bartender and it was no surprise when he got a laugh in response. So, we left the pub to go exploring—on our hunt for my hot chocolate.
I’ve had men ask me out throughout my lifetime.
Some have even brought me flowers or gifts.
Danny did his share in the early months of our relationship to impress me and to show his growing attraction to me.
But I’ve never felt so cherished and spoiled as I did when Ace made it his sole purpose in life to find me the warm drink I was craving in Munich.
We walked into the area west of Karlstor where the streets took on a more modern look with commercial-grade pavers evenly spaced around the tram lines and tram wires running overhead.
The buildings were still reminiscent of the older architecture, only with more glass and clean lines, but the same European feel.
We weren’t in a rush, but Ace was quieter, his eyes searching for the perfect spot to get my drink for me.
I shivered slightly and he instinctively wrapped his arm around me.
It could have been a gesture of friendship or simple kindness, but it felt like more, and the idea of a cup of chocolate felt almost unnecessary as long as he kept me tucked into his side.
We came across a bakery. Technically, it wasn’t open yet.
We stepped under an awning and peered through one of the plate glass windows.
Two workers were inside, preparing for the day to come.
Ace rapped on the glass pane of the wood door.
One of the workers, an older woman, round and soft with pink cheeks and warm eyes, looked up and smiled at us.
She left her work and approached the door.
When she opened it, Ace simply said, “Hallo. Meine Freundin braucht hei?e Schokolade.”
I glanced up at him, smiling, but his eyes were on the baker.
I knew enough German to know he had chosen a word that could mean either girlfriend or friend, and it was obvious the storekeeper thought Ace and I were two people in love, out late at night looking for hot chocolate.
I’ll never forget her smile as she opened the door wide and shouted something in German to the other woman in the shop.
The bakery smelled of warmth and yeast—as if the scents were baked into the very walls. The other worker was lifting large silver trays that clattered when they met the racks.
The store interior was simple and functional, but it felt like we had entered our own private hearth.
I guessed the baker didn’t make a habit of opening her doors before business hours. She stepped behind the counter and, in English, but with a thick German accent, she said, “You will also need a Butterbrezel and Apfeltasche. Ja?”
Ace nodded and smiled one of his naturally charming smiles in her direction. “Yes. A pretzel and an apple turnover are exactly what we need.”