Her Name Was Nadine
Fiction Friday
Her name was Nadine. When I first heard it and repeated it back to her, it fell awkwardly from my mouth, the syllables disagreeable to my tongue. I wanted it to be more beautiful, more sibilant, like Cassandra or Mischa. She looked like a Mischa to me, I thought.
That was before I fell for her, like a star heavy with longing falls to the earth. In the humid days that followed our first meeting, I grew to love that name, and now cannot imagine any other that would fit her so well.
It was spring, when the dew gathered before sunrise on the new buds of our apple trees. Of this time in my life, I remember that detail above most others, because it was the morning after I met Nadine. I could not sleep. I awoke early, while the rest of the house drifted in and out of consciousness in those hazy moments before the end of dreams.
It was one of those rare instants, when we pause and allow life to pulse through us without thought. I remember vividly those early droplets catching the light of day, the sound of the birds chirruping in the high maple boughs, and the rumble of distant traffic. I remember thinking of Nadine, and knowing I was in love with her. For the smallest gap of time, I was free to be in love, free to grasp it completely and to savor it. My gut was warm with the fullness of my love for her. It spread through me like an electric wave.
And then — oh, then… Not even the distance of a breath passed before my turgid mind clucked its doubts and disapprovals. I did not know it then, but that was when I lost her.
Nadine had come from France to spend a summer perfecting her English. I thought her manner of speaking effortless and the trip a superfluity, but then, every night, I would stare up at my rough popcorn-textured ceiling and think of her and thank the stars for sending her across my path.
And my mother. I thanked her, too, for insisting I take that summer class. She knew how my mind wandered, how I would be up to no good if I sat around the house. I chuckled at that, thinking how “no good” would consist mostly of reading books and tossing stones into our pond to startle the koi.
I changed on that first day of summer school. When I met her. When I saw her sitting upright, dark hair so striking against a pale, slender neck. I don’t know if it was the eyes or the accent or the intangible force that came out to meet me when I stared into her that convinced me, but — whatever it was — I began to care, suddenly and earnestly, about who I was.
I flatter myself if I think for a moment I would have approached her and introduced myself and suggested we study together. I know it would have been the opposite, that I would have stared wistfully at that beautiful neck, my stomach tumbling for the duration of the summer, each moment the one that I summoned the courage to say hello and ask her… anything.
No, it was (thankfully) Mr. Weiss who paved the way for me when he went around the class and counted off twos, pairing us together. It was merely chance that I sat behind her, and that we had an even number of students, and that Mr. Weiss counted down the rows instead of across.
Isn’t so much of life just… chance?
Those days were limned with a soft, white light. I loved the birds and the colors of spring and the oppressive heat of summer and my father’s stubborn dislike of air conditioning. My mother was the first to notice, but I blushed so furiously at her innocent questions that she never brought it up again. To her everlasting credit, she did not share it with my father, who would have taken the magic out of it. My sister surely saw it, but she, being a kindred spirit in so many ways, limited herself to knowing looks. She knew I needed to be alone with my thoughts, fruitless as they were.
Nadine and I grew close. At least… I thought we did. While in hindsight I never think she hinted to me a thing beyond cordial friendship, I built in my mind a beautiful realm of fantasy. She was the fairest maiden in the land, and I was the humble knight tasked with rescuing her. From what, I never stopped to consider.
We spent a portion of most afternoons discussing the hidden meanings in Age of Innocence. I fancied myself Newland Archer, trying to win over the Countess Olenska. Only later did I realize how little I understood the story, and how ironic a sense of humor the Universe possesses.
Her English was beautiful, a cheerful brook to my guttural sputtering. She laughed at my self-deprecation. With each smile I won from her, I felt we grew closer.
The last day of school was not the last day I saw her, though it should have been. From nearly the start of summer, I felt I had to tell Nadine how I felt about her. Maybe she would stay, if only she knew that I loved her. I felt my love was strong enough to compel even the most irrational choices.
My heart thumped and pounded that final day. She turned to me and smiled and said, in that wonderful accent, It has been a pleasure to study with you. She turned around and finished packing up her things. I quickly calculated the seconds before all would be lost, and opened my mouth to ask — what?
Mr. Weiss appeared, then, conjured out of thin air by the cruel universe to thwart my procrastinated plans. He placed his hand gently on Nadine’s shoulder, for a brief moment, and said how lovely it had been to have her for the summer. She blushed at his compliments, and I felt a pang of hot jealousy, forgetting that I owed this man everything, he who had inadvertently made possible all of those dreamy days with her.
I felt my face redden, so I turned to my backpack to hide my naked emotions and kill the moments until Mr. Weiss would disapparate. An empty desk and tightly drawn flap greeted me. I had been too efficient, too quick, had mindlessly shoveled my books and pens into that canvas maw, sparing not a pencil shaving for my idle hands to spring upon in my moment of need. Though it couldn’t have been more than a few seconds, I felt my legs grow heavy with disuse, the weight of passing moments dragging down on me, the mocking eyeballs of every living thing in the room pressed upon the creeping redness of my skin.
In a whirlpool of juvenile emotions, I surrendered control of all motor function to my feet; I hardly knew what I was doing until the hot sun on my scalp informed me I was outside, several yards from the door.
I was alone. The muted hisssk of a car in the nearby lot faded and gave way to a quiet chorus of insects.
It was then, in a moment of profound stillness and presence, without a thought even for that symphony of nature and sunlight, that the clutching fist of doubt and despair evaporated, and I found myself walking back inside with a calm sense of purpose.
Mr. Weiss had moved on to bid his farewells to other students, and Nadine stood alone once again. She turned just as I approached, and as I saw her unguarded eyes appraise me, I fell from the present; my resolve wobbled, the already formed words in my mouth changing as they brushed past my lips.
Would you like to get a soda? I blurted. I was vaguely aware that I had been about to say something else, something far more genuine, something better. My cheeks burned with shame. I stole a quick glance at my classmates to see their jeering stares, but no one was paying any mind; they were busily and happily packing up and leaving.
She smiled and said, Oui, I would love to.
So, we had a soda.
It was nothing special. Nothing special at all, that soda, until the very end. I was too nervous, too preoccupied with telling her. I was prepared the entire time to open the gates to my heart… prepared, and knowing that I wouldn’t. I couldn’t bear to see her smile defensively and hear her say, You are so sweet, and I have had such a good time with you… but I do not feel ze same.
So we sat there, making superficial remarks and reminiscing about the summer. She must have known I wasn’t myself, for she grew ever more inward, her animated chatting diminishing, at the end, to silence.
I opened my mouth once, twice, three times, then said, Well, I suppose this is it. I felt my cheeks flush once more, but she smiled and said, Oui. We stood, walked out, and stared at each other for a moment. I felt a creeping awkwardness, for I could not bring myself to say the only thing I wanted to, and I felt it must have been so plainly written on my features that she couldn’t help but see into my frightened soul.
She startled me by stepping close and wrapping her arms around me. For a blip of time, I was lost in my senses. I inhaled her mild floral scent, felt the wisps of dark hair tingling my temples, the lightness of her touch, the firmness of her modest breasts against my chest.
It was over too soon.
Of its own accord, my mind calculated the pressure of her embrace, the pace of her breathing, the motion of her hands. What did it all mean? I lost forever the final particles of that embrace in a bewildered seesaw of logic, convincing myself in equal measure to utter and swallow the fateful words I had been waiting for weeks to say.
She stepped back. My mind took in that face one final time, adding numerators and denominators to its endless formulae, frantically grinding out one final, definitive answer…
Au revoir, she said.
I do not remember how I answered her.
The last time I saw Nadine was some time later, in a dream. It was vivid, the kind that stays with you for days or weeks and feels as though it really happened.
We were back at the soda shop. In that embrace she gave to me, I told Nadine I loved her. There was no mental arithmetic, no frantic crackling of neurons. My entire body experienced the fullness of that embrace.
She said nothing.
Find yourself a good French man, I murmured into her dark hair. Find him.
I let her go. She melted into the gray early morning light of my bedroom, and I cried myself back to sleep.
