(by Rose)
His tea had long since grown cold, but he drank it anyway. As he drained the dregs from the chipped glass, he slowly slid off his stool and out of his long-held spot at the bar. He tossed some change in the direction of the heavily pierced student who had been bringing him drinks all night and limped out of the repugnantly modern glass and chrome diner, trying to shake his foot awake. Picking the street that seemed most likely to head east, he set off with a purposeful stride, the kind of eyes straight ahead, no nonsense pace meant to keep any unsavory characters at bay.
Just as the sun was beginning to rise over the odd mixture of ugly square apartment buildings and crumbling historical monuments and he was beginning to despair of ever reaching his destination, the fog from the early morning sea began to envelop him. With relief, he sank into the sand, opened his coat to pull from a pocket a tiny beat-up, leather-bound notebook and the pen he had swiped from the travel agency, and began to scribble furiously.
It seemed that he had been writing for only a few minutes when the bright noon sun was obscured by large dark clouds and the downpour started without warning. Unable to maintain the flood of words that had come to him for the first time in a long time, but unwilling to leave the peacefulness he found in the water surrounding him, he sat steeled against the wind and rain, allowing the elements to move him into a trance and drift him down memory lane.
It'd been years since he'd been to France, but he still remembered every street sign, every cafe, every word learned, every second of that one fateful day, from his first step off the train to the last words whispered in his ear as he floated off to sleep. The young greenhorn had ended up in Nice on a whim, an adventure picked by a stray dart and a much abused map, and as he plunged into the warm sunshine, he felt certain that lady luck was on his side.
He settled himself at the first small table, at a sleepy sidewalk cafe, and watched as the rest of the tourists, his day's travel companions, milled into the town, buzzing about the quaintness and the salty air.
Shunning his menu, he smiled at the bright-eyed eager girl who came to take his order and enquired, "Is there anything in here as sweet as you?
As she blushed and stuttered, he straightened and barked out his order, "Coffee, black, and pernod, just a little water."
"Ah, poor boy," called a lilted laughing voice from behind. He turned, just as heard the scrape of another wicker wire chair being pulled up beside him. "You think you admire purity and innocence, but you can't stand the dull-wittedness of the girls fresh from the farm."
"But if she had joined in your parrying, you would have thought her hardened, rude, all too boringly world weary," she said. The woman could have been anywhere between twenty and fifty, dignified but svelte, and dressed in an impeccable traveling suit. She continued on, not letting him get a word in, "You fancy yourself a writer, don't you? You have that air of clever self-importance about you. Give me your most recent story."
Feigning an air of confidence, as if being challenged in such a manner by such a woman was an everyday occurrence, he passed over his best piece, a detective story with a charming, mysterious, standoffish hero and an equally strong, clever female counterpart, exactly the type he wished he could find. Somehow, he thought, he maintained an unruffled mien as she read, skipping back and forth between pages, pursing lips, clucking, laughing fiendishly. When she finally came to the last dog-eared page, he was on pins and needles. Two cups of coffee had come and gone, while she nursed her red wine and contemplated.
"Have you ever been with a woman?" She nailed him with a stare.
"Of course!" he protested.
"Was it what you wanted it to be?"
She seemed to see right through him. It was hard to tell whether an affirmative or honesty would be more worldly, more right.
"No answer needed. Your problem is that you're too young, too idealistic. You want things to be grandiose, meaningful, perfect. Maybe that will happen. Maybe not. But either way, you're not getting it on paper. Wit is that which was often thought but ne'er so well expressed."