CHANEL
At 7:35 PM, I was supposed to be on a TGV, leaving Paris and heading home.
The weather was good—28 degrees, the kind of warmth that softens everything. I was walking toward the metro, making my way to the train station, when I crossed the wooden pedestrian bridge over the Seine. That was when it came—a quiet sense of unease, sudden and without warning.
I started going through possibilities in my head.
Did I leave something at the restaurant?
Did I forget to say something?
Then I stopped in the middle of the bridge.
“I know…”
That was the moment I understood. This is how a “feeling” arrives—suddenly, without asking. I stood there, surrounded by people passing by, but I was no longer in a hurry to catch my train.
Instead, I found a seat along the walkway and sat down.
“If it begins like this… does it also end like this?” I asked myself.
I took out my phone and searched for nearby restaurants and bars. If that was the case, then maybe I needed a drink—something strong enough to carry me through the moment, maybe even enough to decide whether I wanted to go home at all.
“Is she okay?”
A friend in Paris had asked me about you three hours earlier.
We were sitting outside at a fine dining restaurant when he said it. I smiled without thinking.
“I think she’s doing well—at least, between us.”
He clinked his glass against mine and said he was happy for me.
But behind my sunglasses, there was a quiet unease I couldn’t explain.
The next moment I was aware of, I was already sitting at an outdoor table at a bar. A bottle of white wine sat in front of me, along with a glass, half-filled—7cl.
My phone vibrated. I assumed it was SNCF—probably a delay or a cancellation. It’s always one of the two.
But it wasn’t.
One message read: “Bon courage pour ta première journée! 💪🏻”
The other simply said: “Hello.”
I didn’t reply. I set the phone down, picked up the glass, and finished it in one go.
Not only because the taste was fading, but because I needed something else to fade with it.
Some things had changed.
But life continued, as if nothing had.
When I became aware again, I was lying on my bed, staring at the ceiling, trying to figure out what time it was.
My thoughts drifted in all directions. I turned onto my side, as if observing myself from another angle. Then I heard something—my own voice, or something close to it.
“Have we arrived?”
A train passed behind me.
Or at least, I heard one.
But there was nothing. I wasn’t in LA. That sound belonged somewhere else, somewhere I wasn’t.
“Move to Seattle. You’re gonna be okay, Alix.”
8:10 AM.
I woke up. Or maybe I returned.
I think I had woken up earlier, but my mind never really stopped.
Sunlight filtered through the floor-to-ceiling windows, stretching quietly across the room. I watched it for a long time. I needed coffee.
Three hours later, I was finally holding a cup.
Then LA came back.
Not clearly—more like fragments, or flashes. The lights of a Burlesque club flickered through my mind. I was in a crowd, searching for you.
Six dancers on stage. Bodies pressed close together. Every soul in this sin city was only a few centimeters away from me, and yet, the more I searched, the more I lost you.
The outdoor dance floor was filled with smoke. Perfume lingered in the air, layered and indistinguishable. I could no longer recognize your scent.
Someone approached me. I smiled politely, shook my head, and turned away.
My awareness of you was fading.
I started to wonder—could I even find you?
The alcohol slowed everything down. The disco ball above spun endlessly, like a hypnotic light, disorienting, dissolving any sense of direction.
Who did I come here with?
I wasn’t sure anymore.
Did I come alone? Or…?
I was surrounded, held back by bodies, by movement, by something invisible.
You were somewhere here.
But I couldn’t find your signal.
Every silhouette looked like you.
But none of them were you.
I leaned against the bar and showed the bartender the wristband on my right hand.
“Vodka. Neat. No ice.”
If I couldn’t find you, then maybe I could erase this memory.
Or maybe…
if you came to find me—
it would be easier that way.
12:47 PM.
