The Wrong Side of Orsay

I found a seat at the Hemingway Bar and ordered a glass of absinthe.

The bartender set a glass bulb filled with cloudy green liquor in front of me. It dripped out slowly, dissolving sugar cubes in a heavy glass next to it on the table.

It tasted of black licorice.

When I stepped back outside, rain had polished the cobblestones into mirrors. Streetlights stretched across them in ribbons of gold. Gothic towers and baroque facades shimmered in the puddles as I wandered toward my hostel.

Colors seemed a little brighter. Motion lingered a little longer.

Whether that came from the absinthe or its eighty percent alcohol, I couldn’t say.

~

Back at the hotel, I checked my email.

She’d written back.

We’d studied abroad together in Costa Rica. Years later, I’d discovered we were both backpacking across Europe alone.

“I’ll be in Paris in ten days.”

I counted on my fingers to make sure.

So would I.

“How about we meet at the Museum of Orsay?”

The next day, she agreed.

~

The six-story museum occupied the shell of a former train station. While its curved glass ceiling and arched window walls gave the enclosure a prominent, Art Nouveau style, the galleries inside held the largest collection of Impressionist art in the world.

I arrived in my excitement and waited at the museum entrance for an hour, but we never saw each other.

Once, I thought I saw a familiar face wandering alone through the glass—black curly hair, glasses.

I shook my head.

“How could that be? I’ve been sitting right here.”

When I looked again, the face was gone.

Thirty minutes later, I sighed. Then I stood up and walked through the turnstile alone, the crowd swallowing whatever hope I’d carried.

~

That night over email, I learned the truth. She came and waited for me, just as I’d waited for her, but the museum had two entrances—one which I didn’t know about.

I’d stood on the wrong side.