Chapter Thirty-One
Sparrow
SPRING - Un voyage à Paris
I recline on a bed in Paris, the sounds of traffic and fresh air streaming in above my head. The windows are open, and I’m cozied up, fidgeting with the wedding band on my finger while reviewing edits to the recipes for the book I’m creating for my mother. For the opening epigraph, I am including one of my favorite quotes from Sabrina with Audrey Hepburn, where she writes to her father from Paris. I’ve decided to write it for both of my parents.
“I have learned how to live, how to be in the world and of the world, and not just to stand aside and watch. And I will never, never again run away from life. Or from love, either.”
I grin as I think of my life now, set apart from the rest of my days as pre-Rafe life and life now with him. Gently putting the papers all around me aside, I stretch to stand and walk toward the window, Parisian rooftops etched against the bright-blue sky. The sounds of people making their breakfasts and living their lives brings a smile to my face. A light breeze blows across my face, billowing the sheer drapes with it.
“I made it,” I whisper into the air of Paris.
Since our engagement last Christmas, Rafe started going through pictures I had of my mother when she was a young girl and making a list of places in Paris to visit. He recognized many of the locations and has made it his mission to move us across the city so that I can take similar pictures in the places she’s been. He says I’ll want them someday, and I think he may be right. Even though my limited memories of her keep fading, like a dream you remember the feeling of without remembering much of what it was about, I feel closer to her here.
I’m obsessed with how I feel in this city. It’s the only time in my life that I’ve ever been someplace and felt like I was returning instead of seeing it for the first time. I love the way I feel alive and awake while trying to find my way in a new place. And I also love how our breakfast trays include mini jars of Nutella to go with our croissants and coffees.
It’s spring, and Rafe and I are here on our honeymoon before he collaborates with a new singer on songs for their album and before I finalize the cookbook and add another item to our online store. So far, we’ve been selling chouquettes, macarons, and an apron with our logo. Lily lobbied for stickers that say Pain of chocolate , and the next item we’re going to be able to ship is French muffins (Rafe was right; they’re a hit), followed by maple croissants.
I’m so proud of Rafe. After officially moving to Birch Borough, he’s been hunkered down between the studio in town and the ones in Nashville and LA, writing with so many artists. My heart couldn’t be prouder of him. He continuously calls me his muse, but I think, really, that we unlocked something within each other that only we each had the key for. And I know, without a doubt, that he has my heart.
Our wedding was more than I could’ve ever dreamed it would be. The town showed up in both small and big ways that I will never forget. Everyone pitched in, and even Graham and Lily, as best man and maid of honor, respectively, somehow didn’t kill each other. It was a day the deepest parts of my soul will remember as a core memory for the rest of my life.
Speaking of Rafe, I smile as I hear him humming through the bathroom door, the smell of his shower gel swirling with the fresh air. We’re staying in a boutique hotel that used to be a newspaper office. It’s darling, and I never want to leave.
I hear the door open and turn to find Rafe standing there in glasses, hair disheveled and slightly darkened from his shower, stubble already catching the morning light in delicious ways. He’s been threatening to shave it, but I know it’s all talk, especially given how much he knows I enjoy the way it feels against my skin when he nuzzles into my neck. I take in his bare chest and my eyes catch on the top of the towel around his waist. Words leave me.
A wicked grin settles over his face as if he knows what I’m thinking. He slowly walks toward me, leaning over and dropping a kiss on the side of my neck. His slightly wet hair has me giving a little squeal. It’s cold, but he’s so warm—a contradiction in temperatures. A chill runs up my spine as the wind from the spring air hits the drops of water now on my shoulders.
Rafe laughs and looks through my open window. I see the way he looks at it. Like the view is so familiar and yet new.
“What is it like being home?” I ask as I wrap my hand around his forearm. I lightly rub my hand up and down his arm as his gaze trips back to me. He leans down until his lips are brushing mine as he says, “It’s like being with you.”
∞∞∞
Paris has been everything I’ve ever dreamed of and more. We’ve taken river cruises on the Seine, the river murmuring below us as we floated past groups of people dancing on the banks or sharing picnics. We passed the floating bars and night parties, the French flag waving high above the banks.
We’ve never walked so much. I had the best ice cream of my life, Berthillon from Le Flore En L’Ile (yes, the café featured on Emily in Paris ). It was otherworldly. I’m going to be dreaming of that ice cream for some time. Rafe fed me spoonfuls of it—I think because of how much he realized I was enjoying it. He really does love to see me smile.
We also strolled across Pont Neuf , the oldest existing bridge across the Seine. Turns out, the Seine really is a character with its own personality and style. I adored walking around its edges, having our own picnic as the sun set and dancing our way around its ledges with the bands and the other couples who decided to rest in Paris for a while.
In Montmartre, we got our portrait sketched (I’m framing it immediately when I get home), walked through the Sacré C?ur , and kissed in front of Le mur des je t’aime, or the Wall of Love. It’s in a tiny garden in Montmartre and has I love you written 311 times in 250 languages. We’ve had more coffees than we can keep track of, and Rafe has been an angel through it all. He says that it’s because even though he grew up here, all of it is new when he’s with me.
Rafe has been passing out business cards to people and asking them to come to America, aka Birch Borough, to taste the best croissants they will ever have outside of Paris. I typically laugh and push him along, apologizing for my husband, who has taken it upon himself to be my very own marketing agency. He’s also slightly changed his style while we’ve been here by wearing pieces like a button-down shirt paired with suit pants, Chelsea boots, and a fitted suit jacket to complete his Parisian look.
We’ve been stopped quite a few times for people to take selfies with him or get an autograph, mainly because of his parents, but for the most part, people have been respectful. And if any woman has tried to get a little too friendly (I get it, he’s gorgeous), he’s quick to put his arm around me or pull me into a bone-melting kiss.
The patisseries are enough to keep me inspired for the next several decades, and we’ve even traveled across the city. Turns out, Rafe is quite adept at riding a moped. It’s both one of the scariest and hottest things I’ve ever seen in my life (as if he needed any other reason to have me melt). We drive all throughout Paris, weaving in and out of back roads and streets that are hidden from tourists and full of life. He even talks of getting one when we get back to the States. I wouldn’t hate it.
He speaks only in French unless we’re on our own. He says he wants me to feel like I have the full French experience when we’re on the streets of Paris. It’s adorable how much he wants this trip to be everything of my dreams. But what he doesn’t fully realize is that it’s only this way because I’m with him.
So, when we’re riding on the metro all over Paris, and I see the Eiffel Tower, la tour Eiffel , in the distance (some of their metros are above ground), I’m taken back to the moment I first saw Rafe and how much our lives have changed for the better. How funny to think I was once afraid to let myself love him, when now the only fear I have is of one day not being able to remember every moment we share together.
Now, I’m leaning on the ancient stone wall of the Pont Alexandre III bridge, the wind playing with my hair that’s caught in a low bun, the light dress I’m wearing billowing around me. The air smells different here. Like croissants and cigarettes that carry a different smell of tobacco. And coffee. So much coffee. The sounds of the Seine move around us, along with the sounds of Paris traffic. I thought it might be strange for me to hear French all around me or that I’d feel out of place, but really, I feel at peace.
“You look happy,” Rafe says as he rubs small circles on my lower back and brushes his beautifully calloused fingers across the diamond ring on my left hand.
“I am happy,” I say as I turn to look at him, the setting sun causing part of his face to glow. “I’m with you.” I smile. “Husband.”
He grins before stepping behind me and wrapping his arms around me. I cover his arms with my hands and lean back onto his shoulder, allowing one of my fingers to trace his strong wrists. He marks a trail of small kisses beneath my ear and down my neck before lifting his head so that his cheek is resting beside mine. I reach one hand back to rest against one side of his face, enjoying the feel of his stubble beneath my palm.
And this is how we stay until the sun sets and the lights turn on. We hold each other while the Eiffel Tower glimmers and the city becomes the City of Light it’s known to be.
Time begins to lose meaning, except that it gives us these moments, and I think of all the ways I would try to describe how I feel. I don’t think I’d ever be able to explain it fully. Lily once asked me when it was that I knew. And it had to have been somewhere between a train and guitar picks, a dance and a very memorable croissant. But years from now, when I look back on our story, I know I’ll have no regrets for opening my heart. I’ll think about the ways I moved through fear and how he moved through fear for me. I’ll recall moments like this when I held him as my own. And oh, the way that I loved him. With a full heart, I loved him (in French).