Page 7 of Just One Night (Just One Day 2.50)

Allyson shakes her head. “No. I think I’d remember.”

“In Paris. In the Latin Quarter.”

Allyson’s mind spins and lands on the carousel of postcards that she had pretended to look at while Willem chatted with some girls he’d known from home. Ana Lucia was one of them?

“But why would she hate me?” Allyson asks, remembering her own jealousy at any girl Willem seemed vaguely interested in. But jealousy was one thing. Ana Lucia had literally thrown Allyson out of her dorm room.

“Because she caught me buying the airplane tickets to find you.”

Airplane tickets? Find me where? Allyson mind scrambles to incorporate this new information. It still doesn’t make sense. Willem had gone to Spain to meet the French girl he’d been cheating on Ana Lucia with. Allyson had suspected it was Céline, even though Céline had told Allyson she had not seen Willem since the day he was with Allyson in Paris. At the time, Allyson had believed her.

And just like that, Allyson understands it. How jealousy contorts things. She thinks of Céline, how jealous she had been of her, and how wrong about her. She was Ana Lucia’s Céline.

There was no French girl. There was an American girl he met in France.

“So you didn’t go to Spain?” Allyson asks.

“Spain?” Willem says. “No. I went to Mexico.”

• • •

The more questions are answered, the more are asked. But now Willem has to leave to meet Petra and Linus. Neither Allyson nor Willem wants to part. For now, they wish they could both stay like this, talking.

He would like to bring her with him now, to put her in his pocket. Except he must face Petra, his cantankerous director, who he knows is furious with him about last night’s performance. He ignored her direction to play the part safe, to play it as Jeroen had played it. Instead, he had done what his friend Kate had suggested. He’d done it his way, found his own Orlando and in doing so, opened up a vein of himself on that stage. It had been the most exhilarating experience of his life. Well, until the knock at the door today.

Much as he would like to keep Allyson close by, he knows it is unwise to parade her in front of Petra. Though he cannot wait to introduce her to Kate. He will introduce her to Kate tonight. And Broodje. And W and Henk and Max. All the people who led him back to her.

“I am in trouble with the director,” Willem explains. “Maybe it’s better if we meet later.”

There is something then that hangs between them. Meeting later is what got them into this predicament in the first place. Willem stepping out for a bit. Accidents happening. And a year before they found each other again.

They both seem to recognize the moment. But they also know now is not then. And as if to prove it, Willem slides a key off a ring and gives it to Allyson. She stares at it in her palm. So does he.

A year ago I had a backpack, and now I have a key, he thinks.

A year ago we didn’t give each other our names, and now he gave me a key, she thinks.

(Also, Willem has just glanced at the birthmark on Allyson’s wrist, giving himself an urgent desire to taste it again. Between her feet and her wrist, he is having a hard time getting out the door.)

(Speaking of feet, Allyson is looking at the zigzag scar on Willem’s foot—left foot—and remembering she wanted to find out how he got it. Along with his birthday and his favorite ice cream flavor and ten thousand other things there don’t seem to be enough time for.)

So for now Willem tells her to make herself at home. Eat what is in the kitchen. Use the computer. There is WiFi. Skype. Have a rest. His bedroom is the yellow one. He likes to picture her in his flat.

“Here is my cellphone number,” he tells her. He writes it on a pad. He resists the urge to write it on her arm, to tattoo it there.

He is about to leave, but stops in the doorway. They are now mirror images of how they were a few hours ago, Willem in the flat, Allyson in the hall. Neither is sure what this means.

What they are sure is that they want to kiss. Both of them do. There is a pull, it feels almost like a chain, linking them.

“I’ll be back here at six,” Willem promises.

“Six,” she repeats. It’s after four now. She has officially missed her flight to Croatia.

He starts to close the door behind him. Then opens it again. “You’ll be here?” He is nervous now about leaving. He can’t help it. The mirror images. The Universal Law of Equilibrium. Last year, he vanished. This year, it could be her.

Except he thinks he has stopped believing in this universal register of deposits and debits, of good things coming at a cost. And when Allyson closes the door, promising that she will be there, he allows himself to believe it.

• • •

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