How to Fall - 10/9/09

I was nine years-old when I first witnessed the result of falling in love. She had long, brown hair and deep blue eyes. She was tall, thin, and she was the prettiest woman I had ever seen. She looked like a more modern version of Audrey Hepburn. But to my surprise, her emotion was not like it happened in movies. Her eyes were not full of light, she did not have a permanent smile painted on her porcelain face, and joy was certainly not radiating off her thin, pale body.


I first saw her on the bus back from Maine.  It was the famous movie moment: the woman looking out the window so longingly as if to find the answer in between the passing trees. She looked confused and helpless. She seemed completely disconnected from this world and floating above one of her own. I had never seen such sadness. As a naive, innocent, curious little girl, five minutes later I found myself sitting next to her asking what was wrong.


"Excuse me ma'am. Why are you crying?" I said so genuinely.


"Umm, nothing," said the lady in confusion and slight shock. Even though rejected, I still sat there. 

I sat there looking at her until finally she asked how old I was.
 "I turned nine last week. My name's Annie. What's yours?"


"Hi, Annie. I'm Alison," she raised her eyebrows and smiled a little when saying my name. She seemed to be warming up to me. 

"You really want to know what's wrong?" I nodded my head about a hundred times in order for her to understand the extent of my interest.


She said it happened about a year ago, when she fell in love. She was in Italy by herself. She was escaping her five roommates in Soho, her crazy mother living in Riverdale that came to visit every week, and her boyfriend. She didn't mention much about him. She just needed to get away. She described Italy like those cheesy travel books do, but hearing it from her mouth was far from cheesy. Speaking of it like it was a heaven on earth, she could not stop smiling.


"I fell in love with the city," when talking about Rome, it seemed she was more talking to the world rather than just me, a little nine-year-old, "Every piece of architecture was beautiful. The Spanish Steps, the Trevi Fountain, the Colosseum, my god they were gorgeous. And those little ally ways with little boutiques; I was outside from dawn to dust everyday. You know, I would walk for hours at a time just looking at the people and the kind of life they get to live there. Everyone is beautiful and smiling and loving where they are in life. I had never been in a place with so much bliss and so little worry." The kind of passion she had towards this place astounded me. Every word she spoke made me want to listen even harder. She was talking about Rome as if she knew it personally, as if it was a friend or something. When looking back on my reflection in the window, I realize I was practically drooling from listening so intently. She then paused and listened to everything she just said and kept reminiscing on her days in Rome. She tried, but she just could not stop smiling. 

About a minute later I suddenly interjected with, "That sounds so cool ma'am. But why were you crying?"
 Her face completely dropped. Everything. The corners of her mouth turned down. The creases of her eyes relax, and the light in her eyes turned off again. It was as if she had seen a ghost or something. 

She was still. “Oh, right. Sorry,” she forced out a half-smile. “Well, I guess it started when I first saw him,” I wanted to ask who, but I felt that was coming. “He was a very handsome man; Tall, dark, the typical gorgeous Italian man. I saw him from the corner of my eye. Well, I think ever woman in the cafe did as well. He was gorgeous. I kept my head down looking at my “Travel Italy”, but I was not actually reading. When he was up at the cashier I glanced up to get a second look, and so did he. I smiled and looked back down as if I was only semi-interested. He saw right through me. Once he got his coffee, he came right over and sat with me. He started speaking in incredible Italian. ‘I’m sorry,’ I said in a terrible stutter, ‘I don’t speak Italian that well.” And in his deep, irresistible voice, he said, ‘Me either,’ with a body melting smile. At the time I did not think too deeply about that scene, but now I pictured it like it would be in a movie. Love at sight. Though I still do no know what that means. 

"We talked in that cafe for hours. Three, maybe four. Just talked about everything.  If it's even possible, I think I fell in love with that man in that first hour. He's life was incredible. He was born in the states. But then his parents divorced and his mother brought him there, to Rome. She then died when he was 13 and so he brought up his little sister. When he told me all of this I was on the verge of tearing. He has lost everything yet he is more open to the world then I. He carried himself with a backbone of bliss. Always smiling that amazing smile," she looked out the window again, "I can't imagine that kind of strength." She kept looking out the window thinking. I wasn't sure what I was suppose to do, so I just waited. 

As a nine-year-old, much of the arising emotion she had from her story did not make much sense to me, but looking back, I cry for her. He brought her Portafino, Italy. It's a small town made on mountains all looking down into a dock. Around the dock are great Italian restaurants and little shops. The house was on top of a hill surrounded by trees and brick paths. She said she felt like they were the only people on earth. It was the first time in her entire life where everything was okay. She said everything just seemed to melt away. Like in the movies, the woman gets swept off her dainty feet by a strong, intelligent, cultured man and he takes her away to a place where nothing else matters but them. Together. 

"It was incredible," Alison said still looking out the window.

"What was?" 

"How quickly I fell for him." 

I thought about that for a while. I did not know what she meant. I thought she was going to say something about the view again or the house or Rome or how gorgeous he was. I was caught by confusion. I would have asked her to clarify, but I was scared.  

We were on that bus for five more hours. It was the longest five hours of my life. Not out of boredom, but out of blindside. This women ended up falling completely head over heals for this man, and so did I. 

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Annie stayed a fountain of curiosity for the rest of her life, but grew much in age, in maturity, in beauty, but never in love. Always withholding the space inside her for something so mysteriously forbidden, she waited and waited to experience the same journey Alison did. Fed up, exhausted of supreme patience with no avail at the age of 25, Annie began to hurt. Her body began to ache and she never understood. She needed something, she craved, but did not know how. Annie knew, without knowing, exactly what was to come in her future. She needed an answer to the unconcluded tale told years ago on a life altering journey. She needed the key to the gate Mr. Italy opened for Alison years before. She needed her escape in order to come back and live a life she heard about and dreamt about since she was nine-years-old after a long bus ride back from Maine. The woman opened her eyes and passages in her mind to a world that accepted all colors of love and let you fall without worrying if someone was there behind to catch you. Without Alison, a voice that has stayed in her head for 16 years, she never would have discovered this alone. Frantic by her recently made decision, she packed a bag. Not knowing what to take or what was needed, she threw belonging into her duffle. Shortly after arriving,  she felt it. It was pulsating through her body. It was reassuring. She disowned her aches, and embraced her ancient curiosity. She reached escape. And now, she could finally fall. 

Reviews

[Veritasexlogos]

While reading it I experience a slight formatting difficulty, it might be on my end, but you might want to check into that. The paragraphs stretch on forever horizontally without starting a new paragraph.

The writing itself is good. Nonchalant and real-life. There are a lot of references to cinema, and movie making here, that is something you might want to capitalize on with your imagery. The characters here are good beginnings but still seem like shadows to me. Love is a great topic to write about, be careful though, cliché is around every corner.

I really like description, so what follows is opinion not fact. I would like to see more description. This is a real palpable memory for the narrator, it should be filled with rich sensual descriptions. More sights, smells, and feelings. Nine year olds do not have a great attention to detail, but they do have a wondering mind that maintains odd details.

Keep writing, and feel free to send me any read requests. Good beginning here, but like all stories, it needs a lot of work (in fact this is usually why I stick to poetry... I'm too lazy to shine a diamond). Good luck. Knock ‘em dead.