After Ruby left her apartment, I drifted to her kitchenette. The pixie dominated my thinking as cold water swished and removed coffee rings lining two cups—hers and mine. I filled and boiled the kettle on the stove: a mindless sequence. Finally, the jug whistled, and steam vapours rose.
I paused and surveyed the kitchenette inside Ruby's private piece of the world. I smiled because fragments of the private brunette joined me yesterday afternoon and last night, late into the night, past midnight. Yet my flight schedule planned to leave Paris in a few weeks. Melbourne, a career, lay in front of me, yet I contemplated us.
I entered complicated thinking, and complication is the enemy of the finite liaison.
Did Paris equate to finite sex?
I shelved the brooding and probed broader.
Was Ruby thinking of us?
I suspended an answer and made a coffee.
Instead, I told myself to do the girl a favour and change the bedsheet.
Mulling as I sipped a coffee, did our selfish revelry promise more than physicality?
I hoped so as I drained the coffee cup. The dregs tasted bitter and grainy.
Inside her bedroom, I removed the plain tan doona and shook the white sheet crumpled on the mattress. My hands stayed occupied as I searched the bottom of the wardrobe, hoping to locate a spare sheet. The apartment lacked other storage options.
There was a matching tan doona cover.
Maybe Ruby brought them as a pair?
A pair?
I concentrated on the dirty sheet. I considered a launderette, then decided to find a local one was problematic! So, I hand-washed the sheet in the kitchen sink. Using a small sink made the task difficult and time-consuming. Over an hour later, I had washed, wrung and spread the sheet to dry on the sofa.
Then, I cloaked myself in my public identity and headed to the metro and the Louvre. There was no seating on the busy train I boarded. Any personal space disappeared as I assumed a faceless stance. The press of strangers surrounded me. I folded myself in, yet everyone jostled. I swayed into unknown individuals at every station stop and start. As unrecognised commuters milled near, Ruby occupied my mind.
My initial thinking was tentative.
Accept her body; don't search for meaning.
I built my confidence.
No, we hit it off, and we can build more.
I peeked a close-range glance at the faces in the carriage. So many posed expressionless yet hiding tumbling thoughts. Like me, mine was a Ruby-fuelled romp as my face held a blank, unreadable expression. Around me was an inaccessible cauldron of yearnings; they swarmed, congested, heaved and teemed. Personal dreams, hopes, fears and cravings I would never know.
Stations passed by in the metro. I focussed on my stop by checking the overhead diagram of the system lines. The Palais-Royal–Musée du Louvre station approached fast. I launched a wistful glance at another overhead advertisement: Impulse body spray.
A riot of thoughts filled my head.
Last year, I was not in Paris. My life pursued a different girl, continents away. Last year was stashed like lost luggage; it could turn up or never reappear.
After leaving the metro, I joined the queue outside the Louvre. Being the first Sunday of the month, it was free admission day. Several illegal souvenir sellers hassling along the line provided the patient queue's sparse action.
A vendor caught my eye, his stock of key chains. On impulse, I purchased two kitschy metallic Eiffel Tower chainrings. Ruby's thin apartment keys were the beneficiaries. A practical purchase, avoiding exploring the notion of the key chains as a gift without giving the pixie an obvious present.
Would she accept a gift? As a token, yes, as more unlikely.
The queue moved forward as I stalled to complete the negligible transaction. I gave my brief apology in French to those behind me. They smiled and laughed at my broad Australian accent.
As I entered the Louvre, I pondered Ruby might not notice the new key tags. Then, I marvelled at the famous broad stairway leading to The Winged Victory of Samothrace. I saw the sculpture soar; it took flight. My thoughts centred on the prior evening.
Ruby and I soared.
About halfway up the majestic staircase, I paused to view and hold in memory the glorious sculpture. Then, in haste, I bounded to contemplate it closer. Finally, at the top of the stairs, in awe of the sculpture's energy, I gathered optimism in pursuing Ruby.
Relationship: I let the word swirl inside me.
As I explored the gallery rooms, Ruby flitted in my fancies between masterworks of art. The Louvre overwhelms. A bit like attempting to understand and take in everything about Ruby's tattoo; in one go.
I recall highlights of the Louvre—the intimacy of a glass of water in a Chardin still-life. Later, harem sensuality dominated in Ingres, La Grande Odalisque. Flesh and curves declare the sexual nude as I passed peaceful hours in the galleries.
After the museum, I returned to the metro. A window seat allowed me time within myself. I watched the fast pace of the underground walls rush. The movement led me to picture Ruby bounding down the apartment stairs. Ruby as action, framed as an artwork. She emerged as Duchamp's Nude Descending a Staircase.
Suddenly, I decided I loved her.
Could I share my revelation?
Ruby and I engaged in a blur of incredible encounters in the following weeks.
I recall a morning when I returned to her apartment carrying grocery items. The pixie rarely shopped. Up the stairs, I carted a bag, including a fresh breadstick. A spring in her step as Ruby descended. Her eyes locked onto mine. A short ogle. Then her leer guided her hands to my crotch.
Her other hand grabbed behind my neck as she stuck her tongue deep and found my tonsils. My heart raced as Ruby pashed, publicly unashamed, the complete temptress.
I dropped the bakery bag.
To grab her butt or not to grab?
My hands reached for her butt, ahead of the thought.
Her firm derrière massaged, agreeable to my pressing hands.
Ruby shaped my face in her hands, and her eyes expressed impropriety as she unzipped me. Her deliberate eyelash flutter and widening pupils were pants arousing. Then she slid low and gave head on the fricking stairs. Ruby operated slick and deftly. I spurted in swift embarrassment, thankful no one saw us.
The brunette's eyes twinkled as she scanned the stairwell on her knees. Then, in a flash, she sprung, pushed by her toes. She flicked my chin. This levelled my eyes to hers, and I stopped zipping my pants.
The pixie licked her lips, blew me a kiss, and raced downwards as I used my shoe to smear the evidence of my spill.
Next, I stumbled a few more steps to the second-floor landing. One of my hands attempted to adjust the bulge inside my jeans. My other hand clutched the breakfast bag.
I ate alone after floundering into the apartment.