Serenade Mouffetard

He was standing by the cliff, sun bright at noon, not a shadow, not a song by a bird, not a buzzing fly, sweat. She was dreaming of a thunderstorm, lightning exploding, infinitesimal, red dress soaked, rain drops hitting like stones. He saw, distant, a giraffe moving slowly towards the acacias, solitary it was, mournful, he felt the weight of past times but did not recall a specific memory. She woke up agitated, raindrops were hitting the window, the cherry blossoms lashed by a hundred invisible whips at the other side, she felt a strange anxiety, the fear of too many empty days. He hugged his three little sisters and said goodbye, he cried, they cried, yet from within a ghostly peace, rare, the possibility of happiness. She hugged her boyfriend tight and kissed him wishing for infinity, the only one she ever loved, a goodbye and a promise, yet she knew somewhere inside this was the last time. He arrived to Paris the fiftinth of May early in the morning, that very same day he saw tulips for the first time, red tulips, yellow tulips, and another one, black or very dark purple, he just did not know. She arrived to Paris the first of June, the day after at 22.00 exactly, she saw for the very first time the Eiffel tower sparkling, goosebumps, she laughed and felt like a little girl, she had not idea it could be so magnificent. He had made two friends, one was French, one was Scottish, they were his first friends that were not Angolan, and this summer day they were having a pint of beer at a little bar, Rue Mouffetard, the name of which they never knew. She was with two girlfriends, one from Tokyo, the other one she met coincidentally on the flight to Paris, also from Okayama, as they walked down Rue Descartes into Rue Mouffetard she saw, high by the wall, a little poem of a tree and freedom, she felt like toasting. They honestly did not remember the first words they said to each other, but they remembered that toast: “to us!”. Later that night he held her hand and she kissed him.