The Difference

In college, I worked out the exact date and time the moon would rise in the right location and appear at the right size to perfectly halo the Eiffel Tower in the night sky. I worked out the exact spot I would need to take the photograph from to get the angles perfect and the city framed symmetrically in the background.

I had a lot of time on my hands, because I never kissed anyone in college.

You see, when you think about the universe it feels like chaos. All the separate objects spinning and orbiting at different speeds and angles. Hurtling around each other like ice hockey players. It makes me feel sick, the violence of it all.

When you break it down though, it’s just maths. It’s predictable, and it’s beautiful.

Kissing people doesn’t work like that; not at all.

The perfect moment for the photograph turned out to be the year after college ended, just towards the end of summer. This sat in my brain until I became obsessed with the idea of making it real. I worked two jobs between studying. I bought myself the right camera. I learned to use it, I practised every night. My hard drive makes it look like I’m stalking the moon.

I bought a ticket to Europe. I didn’t want to take any risks and I had time to travel so I flew out as soon as college ended and took myself, my camera, and my backpack on a solo expedition. I saw Berlin, Amsterdam, London, Edinburgh, Dublin, Barcelona, Rome, Athens, Prague, Lisbon, Budapest, Vienna, Dubrovnik. I ate schnitzel, brudet, souvlaki, sauerkraut, currywurst, moussaka, stew, goulash, bacalhau, raclette, borscht, and battered fish with chips. I drank gin, whiskey, whisky, ouzo, absinthe, raki, schnapps, port, Guinness, sangria, and so much beer.

I arrived in Paris about a week before the moment. Each night, I took myself to the spot and practised the shot. Each night, the alignments and angles got closer and closer, just as I knew they would.

It was four days before the moment that I met them. I was drinking red wine alone in a dark bar where the music felt appropriately Parisian and they sat at the table beside me. We made eye contact and exchanged smiles as they waited for their date who arrived shortly after. I didn’t understand all the French but I recognised an uncomfortable scene when I saw one; I’d been involved in enough over the years. As the evening passed, I seemed to become an outlet for their… how do I say this? Looks to camera? Whenever their date did or said something they needed to react to but couldn’t, I got the benefit of a look over their shoulder. Like a TV audience, in on the joke, if only I could have understood the details.

Eventually, their date left and they shared a word with the bartender as they ordered another drink. Actually, they ordered another two drinks and brought one over to me. We talked. I told them all about my trip. They told me about life, and dating, in Paris. We shared stories of growing up in small towns. About not fitting in. About how they overcame it by projecting confidence and I hid from it in textbooks. They didn’t seem to judge me, even though I did, more and more with every admission they coaxed out of my mouth.

I didn’t tell them why I was in Paris. I don’t know why. It felt too personal to share, somehow.

The next morning, we met for breakfast. Then for dinner and drinks in the evening. And that’s the pattern we fell into. We talked and we learned and I felt safer. I’d had an amazing adventure all summer and now, in this strange city of lights and traffic and crowds and endless expense and a language I could barely grasp, I almost felt I’d come home.

On the day of the shot, we met for breakfast as usual. They suggested a place for dinner but the timing and the location were off so I asked if we could meet for drinks later instead. They didn’t seem hurt and they didn’t question why I couldn’t make it but they wouldn’t hear of missing a dinner when I was so close to the end of my stay. They said they would leave work early and we could eat before dark ‘like the British do’ before I went off to do my thing.

I was nervous about getting my shot but the timing all worked and I figured it might be good to have a distraction in the build-up to the big moment, rather than obsessively cleaning my camera until the lens cracked, or attracting the attention of the Gendarmerie by loitering at the spot far too long. I agreed, and we met.

It was like any other meal we’d shared except for the first time they seemed… nervous, perhaps? But that wasn’t a trait I believed they could have. That was me, not them.

I watched the clock over their shoulder until the time came, made my genuinely sorrowful apologies, and stood to leave.

That’s when they kissed me.

I learned that week, if you take the perfect photograph one day late then most people who see it will never know the difference.

I do though, and I see it every time I look.