Rather shy and reserved by nature, I completely broke down and defied my prohibitions during a book fair with a famous author.
When you start to work in publishing, you learn two things: to read a manuscript in two hours flat and to handle the art of conversation during book fairs. In this patriarchal milieu, press attachés are often seen as American-style PAs (personal assistants) to these power brokers, ready to do anything to satisfy their slightest whims. Some dream of meeting a publishing star, or even more if they have an affinity. That’s what happened to me, except I had never thought of it.
It’s summer, by the sea, in La Rochelle, on the occasion of a Unmissable book fair for publishers and their proteges that happened. For me, it’s a first, and a pleasant weekend away from Paris, the opportunity to combine business with pleasure. After a long day, before returning to my hotel in the city center, I go, with many other professionals participating in the show, to drink a glass of champagne. We go to the bar near the town hall, just a few steps from this large, somewhat ceremonial room where the signatures took place. I had noticed her during the day. I appreciated his stories, intimate, written with a sickle, and borrowed from emotion. You have sometimes wondered ‘And in life, are writers as passionate and tortured as in their novels?’ Me too. Not really one to play the groupie, I hesitate to exchange a few words with her, especially since a host of editors in suits gather around her. And for good reason, a few months earlier she had won a prize, not the most prestigious but one of those which make a career take off, which accelerate notoriety by a few years in an environment where selling 5000 copies is an achievement.
Her brown hair, her almond-shaped eyes with deep green irises, her poised voice, a bit authoritarian but gentle, everything attracts me. While I try to take my courage in both hands to say a banality and give the illusion of being completely at ease in this environment populated by 90% white males over 50, I don’t see her departing from the small troop of talkers to get some fresh air and quietly return to her novel and a drink in her hand. A little lost in my thoughts, I turn around and nearly knock over her drink… No accident for our first meeting, but an “Oops, sorry, sorry, I didn’t see you”. I feel that I blush when she looks into mine. Sometimes a completely innocuous exchange of glances can twist immediately.
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“I feel his gaze resting more intensely on my body”
C. is very different from her media image: reserved but not shy, a look that captures you and does not let go, and makes you understand in a few moments that she has discovered your secret. We talk about everything and nothing, the discussion is playful: the day that has just passed, his future novel, but also more personal things. She lives in the 5th arrondissement, loves champagne, the sun, cream that smells of monoï, and Italian wine, she has a house in the South. On the other hand, she doesn’t really like these promotional days, but she knows that it’s part of the game. And her darling, precisely, dreads these promotional tours, she is wary. Besides, she tells him that she only chooses old and paunchy publishers, to reassure her. I laugh, a little yellow. Then, I innocently slip in a little phrase “Oh, what’s going on at the book fair?”. “Maybe the inspiration for a next novel“, she answers me with a small smile. The conversation seems banal, but very quickly, I feel his gaze resting more intensely on my bodyhis shoulder brushing against me for no real reason in the middle of this hubbub.
It’s hot, and after a while, she offers me to escape to go talk more quietly, take a walk. I blush like an embarrassed peony, and then I finally accept. This getaway might look like a game, but not so innocent. Not at all even. Girls, the idea had already tickled me but so far I’ve only gone out with boys, I’ve never had experience with a woman. Separated for a few months from the boyfriend I was with in college, I feel a little lost. With her, I feel that something is happening, it’s different: a physical attraction, coupled with a bond. I let myself be carried away and in my turn really enters the seduction. I support his gaze, I release small allusions. But I’m less comfortable than her, a little impressed I admit by her charisma and her personality. We walk around, somewhat haphazardly, and the more time passes, the more I would like this evening to last forever.
“I taste his tongue, his mouth, his neck”
We sit on a bench in a park. It is she who takes the first step and takes my hand, very naturally. I do not withdraw it. She then leans towards me and kisses me. A first kiss as an evidence. Not a stealthy lip kiss, but a real languorous and deep kiss. Our tongues play with each other and intertwine, as if this first kiss was not one, a recognition. A kiss salted by the spray of the port not far from us. And very quickly, a craving for more and more seizes my stomach. The need to stick together, to merge, to feel your skin. I, who am rather of a modest nature, discover myself without any taboos or restraint. We could be seen, so what? I taste his tongue, his mouth, his neck, a hickey, why not…
Completely elated by this meeting, completely absorbed, I forget that I had planned to join colleagues for dinner. The sun begins to decline when I hear in the distance that the park is closing, and that we will have to take off. Break up now? Especially not, I do not even consider it. I suggest that we stay together… And that’s what we do: we go to Les Halles to have oysters for dinner, stroll, we dance in a small bar, near barrels. We then decide to go back to the hotel. without getting grilled by everyone, together. If I fully assume to share this moment, I think above all of her, of her reputation in this small environment that we know is passionate about gossip. We then decide not to go back together and I leave him 5 minutes in advance, the time to go almost unnoticed. Very quickly, I return in my turn, I do not meet anyone. I find her, as we had said, in her room on the top floor, necessarily larger, with a small flowered balcony. I arrive, trembling, with half a bottle of champagne and two flutes. Seeing me, she smiled at me, touched by the little attention and my memory.
“A night made of caresses for some strangers”
Very naturally, we get closer and we undress each other, very quickly, letting the clothes line the hotel room. I still remember 15 years later, her polka dot blouse, falsely wise. Her skin is soft, golden from the sun, her muscular thighs. She tells me she works out 3 times a week, hence her abs and flexibility. I tell him that I should have taken up yoga. We kiss, we laugh too, a real sensual and physical complicity sets in. I love her skin, immediately, delicately scented with a mixture of monoi and Orange cologne. At this moment, I let myself be carried away and follow her in her actions. It is she who takes the initiative of caresses. At first, I’m a little afraid of not being up to it, of disappointing her, of being clumsy, but very quickly we invent our own language. In the moment, I whisper his name eye to eye. We make love all night long a magical night made of caresses that were unknown to me for some. I would not have imagined experiencing such chemistry for the first time, the evidence of the other’s body. We give so much to each other that we end up falling asleep entwineda little exhausted it must be said.
The next day, a little exhausted but smiling from ear to ear, we go down to the breakfast table. At the next table two publishers, a bit scalded by their evening, do not see us sitting down “I went back to the hotel alone… Too bad she is very pretty C”. It makes us smile.
We saw each other a few times, then less and less, then not at all. This passionate relationship opened my eyes to who I really amand allowed me to find the path allowing me to blossom on a romantic and personal level.