Not for a Second

Summer was over, and so were we. The idea of a summer romance always appealed to me. The sun, the salty skin, warm nights under the stars, alcohol and passion. But I never did think of the end.

Summers like this change you. At your core. How do you just pack up and return to your everyday life after a summer like that? You can’t. You want to stretch it out. Keep it going. But I guess that doesn’t work. Trying to stretch summer into autumn is like keeping leftover soup in the fridge a day too long. Every day the taste turns a little stranger. By the time you admit it's spoiled, you're already sick.

At least that's what I was telling myself in hopes that it will make going home easier.

------------------------------------------ 2 months earlier ----------------------------------------------

The sea was glistening in the hot early June sun as I stepped on the still slightly damp sand of Plague de Midi in Cannes. I arrived in town just a little more than an hour ago, dropped my bags at my sister's apartment that she so lovingly agreed to let me use for the whole summer, and then headed straight to the beach, only taking a slight detour to stop at the bakery. The last thing I wanted was for hunger to disrupt my first afternoon there.

I looked around and found a fairly empty spot and settled down on a towel. The sea breeze filled my lungs and I paused for a moment, suddenly aware of how alone I was. Alone in a city where nobody knew me. It was terrifying. It was exhilarating. Take a deep breath, I told myself. Take it one moment at a time. The weight of all the feelings subsided like the gentle waves rolling on the beach were washing them away. I took off the dress I had on over my swimsuit and headed for the water. It was heavenly. The water was cold enough to freshen me up, but warm enough so that once I was in I took my time. The embrace of the sea always calmed me down. Somewhere between work, obligations, and doing what was expected of me, I'd forgotten what I actually liked. Cannes seemed as good a place as any to remember. I took a deep breath and dove down. My mind instantly going quiet.

For three weeks I settled into a life that was almost aggressively peaceful. Work in the mornings. Swimming every afternoon. Dinner with a book. Somewhere between the sea and the solitude, it felt like I was starting to hear myself think again. See what kind of routines suited me. I realised that for the first time in my life I was living by myself. I was living for myself. And I also realised that I am boring. As fuck.

So about a month into my escape in Cannes I decided that I need to change something. I signed up for a book club. And even though that wasn’t that far out of my comfort zone it was the first domino in the series of events that culminated in a totally changed perspective by the end of the summer.

The book club, aptly named The Plot Thickens on the Côte, was, of course, run by a handsome French literature professor who looked far more like he belonged on the cover of the next GQ than in a cozy beachfront café discussing the season's best crime novels. It only took five minutes of the first meeting I attended to know that my love for crime fiction won’t be the main reason I will be returning every week. It wasn’t just the heavily accented French English, but his dark eyes that stood out against his sun-warmed olive skin. Oh, and his hands. For some reason, a man's hands were always my weak point. It was the feature that most predicted my interest. And his hands definitely piqued my interest.

Walking home from that first meeting I could feel a shift. Feeling almost like a teenager again I turned around every possible scenario of my summer romance in my head. By the time I came to my front door I could practically see the way my best friend would be rolling her eyes at the cliche. But isn’t this exactly what this summer was for? To get to experience the world for what I would like it to be? However cliche it might be.

Apparently the universe conspired with me. As the next day while I was enveloped in my brand new copy of The Talented Mr. Ripley - the current book club read - a shadow appeared over me. I took a deep breath and moved the book out of the way to see who the hell was standing between me and the sun. My stomach twisted. It was him. Professor Julien Moreau.

The professor was grinning down at me, dark curls dripping seawater onto his sun-warmed skin.

"Hello. I thought I recognized you."

His heavy French accent somehow made an already unfair situation even worse.

"Oh, hi!" I scrambled to my feet. "I guess the book gave me away, huh?"

He paused for just a beat, as if he'd expected me to retreat into awkwardness. Instead, he ran a hand through his wet hair, smiled, and casually nodded towards the beach club behind him.

"Would you like to join me?"

I followed his gaze. It was the beach club—the one I'd briefly considered treating myself to before taking one look at the prices and deciding I'd rather eat for the rest of the month.

"Sure."

I slung my bag over my shoulder and fell into step beside him.

"So... book club, beach club..." I glanced sideways at him. "A fetish of yours?"

The corner of his mouth twitched.

"One of them."

He held my gaze just a second longer than necessary. The afternoon sun was bright enough to make me squint, but somehow his eyes looked darker than before, glinting with quiet mischief.

I silently thanked God the sea was only a few metres away. At this rate, I'd be needing another swim.

Once we'd settled onto the loungers, a waiter appeared almost instantly. Julien ordered in effortless French before turning back to me.

"So," he said, "are you actually liking The Talented Mr. Ripley?"

"Of course."

"You're lying."

I blinked. "Excuse me?"

"You hesitated."

I laughed before I could stop myself.

"I think everyone's pretending to like it more than they actually do."

"Better."

"What do you mean, better?"

"You answered because you thought that was the right answer." He shrugged. "I'd rather know what you think."

I looked at him for a moment.

"I thought literature professors liked people agreeing with them."

He smiled over the rim of his glass. "The boring ones do."

By sunset the book talk between the innuendos got shorter and shorter. We had moved to the lounge part of the beach club and were 3 drinks and multiple shared dishes deep when Julien's knee, raspy with hair and salt, brushed against my thigh. Shivers went down my spine, ending in that pleasurable tingle.

“Can I tell you something?” he stared at the drops of condensation slowly running down the glass of his Old Fashioned.

“Depends,” the sudden change of tone in the conversation made me feel like there was a pit in my stomach.

“I’ve spent the last hour trying not to ask you back to my hotel.” He met my eyes only after finishing the sentence.

I was about to ignite. But there was something deeper than just the feeling of lust. The fact that all this could be is a summer romance made it so much lighter, freer and hotter, but there was some bitterness as well. Knowing there was an end date before it had even begun. But the fact that I had been alone for almost a month didn’t help me think rationally. Fuck thinking rationally in a moment like this. Some experiences are simply worth the pain. And a fully fledged movie-worthy summer romance on the French Riviera was surely on top of that list.

That night set the tone for the next eight weeks. We became the sort of couple who argued over fictional murderers, stole bites from each other's plates, and forgot whose towel was whose. Somewhere along the way I also became the sort of woman who said yes before asking whether it was sensible. I swam after midnight, butchered the French language with complete confidence, ordered truffles even though I'd sworn I hated them, and discovered that disagreeing with Julien was almost as much fun as kissing him. We tangled our bodies between the cool, crisp white sheets of his bed, read on the beach, and skinny dipped in the moonlight. In that order. It felt like living inside the montage of a perfect summer romance, right before the film cuts to the part where everything falls apart.

But our tragedy didn't arrive out of the blue. With every ridiculously perfect day, the feeling of finality crept a little closer. Like a summer storm gathering just beyond the horizon. Every now and then you hear a distant roll of thunder and remember it's coming for you, even while the sun is still shining.

By the last week of August the thunder had become too loud to ignore. I found myself growing quieter, trying to memorize everything: the smell of his hair after swimming, the roughness of his stubble against my cheek, the warmth of his hand finding mine without looking. As if I could pack those moments into my suitcase alongside my swimsuits. The final book club meeting came with a bittersweet feeling. As everyone else lingered on the sidewalk in front of the cafe talking cheerfully I drifted from the group. Without thinking, I slipped off my dress, left it in a heap on the sand, and walked into the sea. The tears on my face became one with the sea and my mind went quiet once again. I must have floated there for some time, because by the time I swam back to the beach, I saw Julien sitting by the shore, everyone else had already left. I sat down beside him, feeling a lot calmer. We sat there for some time, just staring at the horizon.

“Are you okay?” he asked.

I thought for a few seconds.

“No.”

The word surprised me as much as it surprised him. It was probably the first time in my life I'd answered that question truthfully instead of politely. And even though I was aching, the feeling of freedom at that made me smile.

He wrapped his arms around me, not caring that I was still soaking wet, and kissed me on my forehead. “Yeah, me neither.”

"Can I tell you something?" he asked after pulling me in even closer.

"Depends," I said with a teary smile as I relived our first evening together.

He smiled. "I knew this would break my heart."

I looked at him.

"Do you regret it?"

"Not for a second."

Two days later I boarded my flight home. Summer was over, and so were we.

Somewhere between the sea, the solitude, and Julien, I'd remembered the woman I'd misplaced somewhere between obligations and expectations. Losing him hurt. Never finding her again would've hurt even more.