― Rainer Maria Rilke
I met her over drinks, a year ago in a tiny bar in the Village. From that first magical moment, she took my breath away.
She was Alison’s former research assistant, now lecturing freshmen in Psychology—an impressive achievement for someone, tottering on the brink, at the tender age of twenty-five.
Julia Asher—long honey-colored hair—yoga practitioner. What more did I need to know?
O, but there was more, much more, and first impressions being what they were, I sold her short.
“So Declan,” she smiled mischievously, “You’re a Professor of Romance and Victorian Literature—so impressive.”
The light was dancing in her glass of wine—in her eyes, her hair, my mind—I had to bring myself to focus.
“You make it sound so stuffy,” I teased.
The tiniest line furrowed her brow. “Oh, not at all—I think it's intriguing.”
“Really?” I parried, “Messers Ruskin, Carlyle at al?”
She made a face. “Oh, not them—they are boring—I meant the Brontes, the Brownings and Christina Rossetti.”
“Ah, I see. But Romanticism, as such, was a literary movement—you seem preoccupied with romantic love.”
“Perhaps I am,” she smiled, “aren’t you?”
I felt my insides divide into hot and cold—and I was frozen into a brittle smile—like the sun on ice, she held me captive.
I tried to regain my voice. “Are you always this precocious, Ms. Asher?”
“I think I’m an old soul,” she whispered, a wistful, far-off look in her eyes. “And please, Call me Julia, or better, Jules—everyone calls me Jules.”
“Everyone?”
“All my friends, Declan.”
She spoke my name as a soft caress. And I wanted to be numbered among those friends—maybe even on a shorter list.
We fell silent for a moment, and then, I had to ask:
“Did you mean what you said about being an old soul?”
She nodded. “Do you think it’s silly?”
“Not when you say it.”
She had a dreamy look in her eyes.
At first, I thought she’d drop the subject, but then she sighed and said, “I have these feelings sometimes—and it’s as if they’re not mine—as if I was feeling something from another time.”
I shook my head sadly, “Time after time…”
“What’s that, she asked?”
“Oh, just a song from the 80’s by Cindy Lauper.”
“Don’t remember much of the 80’s,” she smiled.
I colored at the allusion, but she seemed oblivious of my age.
“What line from that song do you remember?” she asked suddenly.
“ Um, I don’t know—I guess, If you're lost, you can look and you will find me, time after time—for some reason, that’s the line that sticks in my mind.”
“It’s not for ‘some reason,’ Declan—there’s always a reason.”
It was then I wondered what would become of us.
Something huge and greater than us was carrying us along and I felt helpless as a boulder in the path of a glacier.
The night was spent like that—I’m not sure what became of Alison—but Jules and I were lost in our drizzly dream, and I didn’t want to wake up.
We parted near Queen’s Park Circle, the street lamps haloed with tiny rainbows in the mist. I didn’t even bother to ask for her number since I was certain I’d see her again.
I was wrong.
I drove home that Friday night in a fog—the one within, and the one without. Everything touched by her aura—her colors stained my soul.
Perhaps we were born under bad stars because after that night our paths never crossed and I began to despair that I’d ever find love.