Strawberries and Whipped Cream

Chapter 8 - Pluie (2)

I changed while you got the car keys from Baba again and packed some more things. You had come to a point in life where this had become your home as well and I couldn't blame you, I would be lying if I said that I didn't treat your uncle's house as my own as well. 

The sun was shining brightly as we drove down to Grasse for whatever reason you could see to visit that part of the south, but I didn't mind and I also didn't ask. I didn't view it as a surprise I didn't or did want to ruin and I also cared, but I trusted you to have something good in mind, you always did when you were planning something.

Normally I would plan ahead. When I met up with friend it was me who thought of what to do together, who suggested where to eat, who planned the trips and the parties and who made sure everybody was happy. I hated giving that part away, but with you it felt ok, even when I sometimes would have chosen something else, simply because I could spend the time with you and relax my overcompensating mind. I didn't need to plan; I didn't have to do anything but enjoy... was that how white straight men felt? 

You urged me to choose the music and unlike before, I was confident to play what I liked. Because I had realized with you, that if you liked the person, genuinely, you would like the music even if you didn't. You would like a lot of things you normally wouldn't. Just because it is them. Because it was you.

We didn't enter Grasse per say and I became more and more puzzled as to where you were taking me, but it was definitely not the town center. I looked at you and never wanted for this car ride to end, even if I was curious. 

Don't you hate it when moments become memories? Either you will think back to these times and wished you could go back and relive it all again or they show a side of you that got lost along the way. And it happens at some point in life. Even then I thought about how the first few weeks of our summer together had already passed. And the thought of these times becoming mere painful memories made my heart ache. But the warm breeze that blew through our hair, since the windows were rolled down a tat , made it hard to feel bad. I looked at you and your laughter, as we locked eyes, brightened my day each time. We drove further away from the beautiful sea and into the lands of the south of France.

We stopped for coffee at a small café. An elderly couple with a German Shepard and their thirty-something year old son were looking at us weirdly when I touched your hand or let you look at me the way you ever so often did, like you were admiring a statue you had only ever seen in magazines or school books and that you had always liked. The stares were compliments, it showed that what I felt, what was between us was not locked away in our brains and hearts, but that it was visible and I liked that. 

And for once I too tasted the bitter-sweet cream of a rich coffee on my tongue and was able to enjoy it. I didn't get nervous, I didn't shake, I felt good and more and more ready for whatever you had planned. You let me pay, which I liked, I didn't have more money than you, but I didn't want you to worry, I wanted you to feel as good as I did despite the coffee in my veins. The scenery we passed fit perfectly. Flower fields, trees, old houses. I loved it.

But when we parked by a small empty road, that was barely one to begin with, I started to wonder even more what this would end up being, but you just told me to follow you and so I did. And when we reached a big lavender field with unusually high stalks, I had to soak in the image before me. You walked into the purple ocean, carrying our belongings with a smile. 

"The province experience" you had laughed and I followed you through the field until you put down a blanket for us to sit on. You had brought a bottle of cider some fruit and music. I used to hate nature. I lived in a relatively green neighborhood and I loved to play outside, I needed nothing more than sticks, a filed and my imagination. I was a happy child, but with growth there comes fear and nature brought all kinds of dangers. But with you I wasn't afraid, I just had the urge to drown my feelings, that I did not know how to handle, since I had been a cold unalive statue before I had met you. It was new, it was exciting and for once I didn't hate feeling something.