All But Words

We were walking down the streets of the 11th in Paris on a sunny October day. It was the second time I saw him, the first being our date in Seoul. I was staying with him in his small apartment on Rue de Reuilly.

I’d just started learning French, so when we passed a bookstore I suggested we go in. “Librairie is not library,” he said. I rolled my eyes and said of course I knew. Inside, I brushed my hands over books whose titles I barely understood. The place had a French vibe of… je ne sais quoi. Maybe it was the staff in the brown checkered shirt, curly chestnut hair, and golden glasses, the perfect hot nerd. We exchanged a secret look of shared appreciation.

I had no idea what I should buy. Maybe Le Petit Prince. “I haven’t even read it. I had a nightmare about it in kindergarten,” he said, before asking the hot nerd for it and any other beginner recommendations.

The staff, all three of them, went into a helpful frenzy. They were all mobilized to search around the store for the much anticipated le Petit Prince (how can they not have it in the storefront). Moments later, the hot nerd handed me, le Petit Prince.

“Par carte ?” I asked timidly. Hot nerd looked at me with a small, amused surprise. A bien sûr, some wrapping, and a merci beaucoup et bonne journée later, hot nerd smiled so widely he almost clapped. We were so amused we burstsx into laughters. “I told you French people can be friendly!!” He said as we walked out of the store. 

In the months after, I stumbled through the book, sending him so many j’abandonnes that it became our inside joke. I read about the pilot, the alien prince, the proud rose, the fox. And “On ne voit bien qu’avec le cœur. L’essentiel est invisible pour les yeux.”

Five trips to Paris later, Christmas is around the corner again, and it’s been more than a month since we parted. It’s been a sweet year with France for me, despite the sorrow. 

The writer parted with the prince, and the prince said, at the end of Le Petit Prince, when he smiled in his little planet:

Et ce sera comme si toutes les étoiles riaient… Tu auras des étoiles qui savent rire.

As if all the stars could smile just for you.