“He was just trying to protect you all,” I said, playing devil’s advocate, but not really feeling it.
“I know. But the way he did it, and the fact that he’s been offering the enemy his protection without informing us . . . I just don’t understand.”
“I’m sorry,” I said, taking both of his hands in mine, and searched his face until he met my eyes.
“No, I’m sorry,” Vincent said. “You don’t need to worry about this. And I can’t do anything about it until I get back to Paris. But you need to sleep if we are leaving first thing in the morning.” Vincent leaned down and lightly brushed his lips against mine, awakening a million tiny butterflies inside me. “I’ll walk you to your room.”
I smelled them before I turned on the light. Lilacs. A huge spray of white lilacs in a vase on my bedside table. Their beauty and perfume transformed my plain hotel room into a scene from a Pre-Raphaelite painting. I looked up at Vincent. A mischievous smile stretched across his lips.
“How did you do this?” I exclaimed. “I’ve been with you all day.”
“I passed a note and some money to the front desk earlier,” he confessed, looking exceedingly proud of himself for pulling off the subterfuge. “You’ve told me you love the scent of lilacs. I thought it might bring you sweet dreams tonight, since I won’t be able to hover around whispering Pablo Neruda poems to your subconscious mind.”
I took a deep whiff of their clean floral fragrance. Vincent leaned on the door frame, beaming with pleasure. “Do you want to come in?” I asked.
He shook his head and gave me a crooked smile. “I didn’t rent a room for nothing. I haven’t forgotten the south of France and your reasonable but maddening request to wait. And in the light of that: You. Me. Beds. Bad idea. I’ll just take these”—he scooped up a couple of paperbacks from the bag—“and be on my way. Anything to keep my mind off the whole Jean-Baptiste saga until I get back to Paris and can actually do something about it.”
“What will you do?” I asked, not really caring anymore about Jean-Baptiste. All I could think about was Vincent standing there with his tousled hair and broad shoulders half in and half out my hotel room. My body was thrumming with a mixture of resolve not to tempt him too far and desire to throw myself upon him before he could get away.
“I haven’t decided yet,” he responded, rubbing the back of his neck worriedly. Obviously Vincent’s thoughts weren’t on the same level as mine. Or else he wouldn’t even be able to speak right now, much less strategize. I knew the decision I had made in the south of France wasn’t going to hold much longer.
“Well, good night.” I threw my arms around his neck and gave him a long, slow kiss. In it was all of the day’s emotion, both the miracles and the mundane.
I almost lost Vincent, and now I had him back. And not only him, but my life. My former life from before I pushed it away. And now my past and my present were joined and I was beginning to feel complete.
Vincent seemed to understand the meaning behind the kiss. It was in his smile as he touched my face and then my hair with his fingertips. It seemed to cost him as much effort as it did me to pull apart, because after one last hasty kiss he practically sprinted out of the room, pulling the door shut behind him.
I changed into an oversize T-shirt and sat on my bed, turning things over in my mind: the way I had almost lost him. And could again. The fragile nature of human life: One minute we’re here and the next we’re gone, like my parents. And the desire to be closer to Vincent. To love him with more than my heart and mind.
My feelings from that morning returned full force. My resolution to actually do something if I was able to get Vincent back. I had told myself I was ready. That it was time. Now that it was possible, did I still feel the same? I realized that, yes, I knew what I wanted. This time I was a hundred percent sure.
I grabbed the vase of lilacs and my room key, and hoped no one would see me sprinting with the flowers down the hallway in my T-shirt and undies.
Up one flight of stairs and I was there, standing nervously in front of Vincent’s door. I knocked. He opened, a bemused expression on his face. “To what do I owe this surprise visit?” He looked at the lilacs and then back to me, confused. “You decided you didn’t like the flowers?”
I pushed past him into the room and placed the flowers on a low table. “I don’t want to be apart from you anymore,” I said.