The town was a blur of light, in which the houses seemed dancing, and the palace waving little wings. The mountain turned into an umbrella where they got lost to enjoy the view. The city of Agra was stingingly cold but staying with her was an idea, warm enough for him, to bear it. While showing her the Taj Mahal, he cracked a joke about it. After that he cracked the same joke on the Tour Eiffel. But she did not laugh, even not a smile. She talked and he listened. He was good tempered and affectionate but a little formidable. However he always felt like a baby in that strange presence, a baby who unexpectedly receives a toy, without asking for it.
It was the moment of the despised and rejected. So she gave up, living between France and India was getting too difficult. He knew that she did not love him as much as he loved her, and he was ashamed of pestering her. But that shocking revelation made his heart quiver, turned it sombre from red.
They trusted each other, although they were going to part, perhaps because they were going to part, he just kept listening and saying yes to everything and then she concluded half kissing him, “you and I shall be friends”. “Why can’t we be lovers now?” said the other, holding her affectionately. “It’s what I want. It’s what you want”. The earth didn’t want it. Ego, egoism, egotism, self-esteem, self-respect, self-love… they said in their hundred voices, “No, not anymore”, and the sky said, “No, not there”.
She was getting engaged and all what he can do was accepting once again what she already told him at the beginning of their relationship, but he kept saying to her, advienne que pourra! And now it was too late. Late because he just started his career, late because he wasn’t rich enough, late because he couldn’t stop enjoying the time without any expectations, late because he needed more time. She could at certain moments fling down everything that is petty and temporary in their natures but this time it was too late.
It was too late for us a long long time ago
I can't explain why we don't part I just don't know
To be together only happy now and then
It's much too late for us that's how it's always been
Wasting years together surely is a sin
To know no peace of mind that's how it's always been
Why did they wait so long to let us know
It was too late for us a long long time ago - Jean Shepard
Day after day and night after night, he wished that it never happened, her wedding. The time of her engagement was gone and he couldn’t do anything. He was mortified, puzzled, like dazed by a blow on the head.
Few years later, the birth of her little daughter gave him the coup de grâce, that’s what he thought but the last blow was coming soon. With his remaining courage he wrote her on a postcard showing the Taj Mahal a request to meet him once at the same old spot where perhaps the story they finished was never the one they began. The feel between his fingers while writing the postcard generated deep remorse, regrets. A dull pain of body or mind, waiting to rise to the surface.
This time there were round white clouds in the sky, and white pools on the earth; the hills in the distance were purple, almost crimson, maybe the dull before the storm. With a heartbreaking pathos and a cruel irony, he told her that now he quite agrees with her that life is too short to cherish grievances and she was relieved that he was able to come into line with her wedding to some extent…indeed to some extent, because he couldn’t love anymore…
L’on n’aime bien qu’une seule fois : c’est la première ; les amours qui suivent sont moins involontaires. – Jean de la Bruyère
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