It’s not what you think.

In having actual conversations with me about women, you will inevitably hear me mention “the hot French girl”.  Yet for some reason she has yet to grace the pages of this blog.  So since I spent hours last night scouring the internet in vain trying to find a way to contact her, I figured I should relate the story to you, in hopes that someone might be able to help me reconnect with her.

It was July 3rd, 1998.  Melissa Madonna, an old high school sweetheart and good friend of mine had just broken up with me.  I was a mess.  I was working at “El Grecos”, my Godfather’s family’s restaurant and I remember the conversation we had where she told that she never loved me.  I lost it, left work with steam rising from my head.  Her younger brother worked with me, I’m sure he’d never seen me like that.  I was crazy mad.  She was staying with some old high school stoner friends so I raced over there, and we had it out in the street.  Yelling, crying, it wasn’t a pretty sight, for over an hour we carried on.  In the end, there was no solution.  it was over.

Exhausted, I took her brother to meet up with their parents, they tried comforting me, I dealt with it.  For some reason a group of friends I loved spending time with called me up to hang out.  I thought that it would be a good idea considering what I went through and before I knew it I was at Denny’s surrounded by great poeple.  Of course Brian was there, but also, good guys like Anthony Sipsas, Justin Hawley, and of course, Mike Mazarakis.  Now I always thought Mike was a cool guy but I never hung out with him enough.  He was another Greek guy, but different in a way, from the rest of the Greeks, somehow, more my speed.  It turned out he was very much my speed because we ended up getting into an extensive conversation about computers and technology and the Internet, and it turned out he was the tech support manager for a local ISP called Dakotacom.net, which of course is the company that I eventually gave over seven years of my life to in exchange for a lifetime of opportunity, and he was looking to hire a new technician.  At the time I was only working at the restaurant because I had just gotten fired from Bookman’s and I needed an income, so you can see where that was going.  I was feeling much better so after that we stayed up all night playing “You Don’t Know Jack” and passing out on the floor.

The next day was July 4th, 1998, Independence day.  My Mom woke me up to let me know that there was a girl at the door.  That doesn’t ever happen by the way, so I didn’t know what to expect.  It was good old Stacy Bennon, this awesome girl that I met my first year in college, had always been attracted to, but never had the opportunity because I was always with someone at this point, first Tanya, then Melissa.  Since I was now officially single I decided to put myself out there and tell her how I felt about her.  She kissed me, and told me she couldn’t hang out because she had a bunch of stuff to do for the 4th.  I actually had plans myself, though I wanted to cancel them to be with her, but I figured there would be other chances.  There actually never was ever a chance for the two of us, but it was a nice idea.  She’s now married to one over her old sweethearts and they have 2 kids now I think, wow…

Anyways, the reason I couldn’t hang out with her is that Mike had informed me about a party going on Shannon Preator’s parent’s house.  Shannon was an awesome girl, when we were a bit younger there was a night where a bunch of us were driving around, girls in one car, guys in the other.  I remember we even had a boom box in the car blasting the Mortal Kombat soundtrack.  At a stoplight, Brian jumped out of the back seat of our car and jumped through the open window into their car, which was funny enough.  But then, at the next light, Shannon jumped out of the backseat of their car and into the back seat of our car, wrapped her arms around me and said, “I love you!”.  Anthony was driving, and looked at me like “wtf”.  I responded with, “I’ll be right back” and I hoped in the back seat, right on top of her and started making out with her.  Then after a moment, I uttered the most amazing thing a guy could have ever said in that moment. “What’s your name again?”.  Yeah, I know I was a moron, but she didn’t care.  It was totally innocent and fun, and never went anywhere serious, but it was nice to be able to just have fun, it really has been a long while since I have been able to do anything like that.

However, that was not “the hot French girl” that this ridiculously long blog entry is supposed to be about so I’ll get back to the main story.  I show up at the party, expecting to have a decent time with friends, just chilling.  I was actually looking forward to just relaxing with the absence of drama for a night and just enjoying the holiday.  Just then Mike shows up with the most amazing girl I have ever seen.  I really can’t use words to describe this girl’s beauty but it was beyond belief.  She was tall, but not too tall, dark, but not too dark.  Had amazing long, thick, beautiful brown hair, gorgeous face and green eyes.  And then her body… she was wearing this one piece white button up dress skirt thing, that I’m pretty sure was translucent, although it could have just been my imagination, but either way, she was a strong 10, by any standard.

I was standing there with Justin, and once I got my bearings back, I finally said “Who the fuck is Mike with??”, because lets face it, Mike was a computer geek, in a time where computer geeks weren’t sexy to women. I mean, Windows 98 had just come out, 512MB was considered a RAM upgrade, the hot topic was that you could overclock the Intel Celeron 300a to 450mHz.  it was practically the dark ages of computing.  It was very unlikely that any of us would have been able to interest a girl like that to hang out with us.  So naturally I was curious what her story was.  We went over and said hello, and Mike introduced us.  Her name was Emilie Berthou and she was 18 years old.  It turns out that she was visiting her family in Flagstaff from Lyon, France.  Though there was no one her age up there, but she happened to have an aunt in Tucson who was friends with Mike’s mother, and so they sent her down to Tucson.  Wow….. and as we went inside I thought that I already knew how the night was going to go, and she was going to be just another amazing girl that I would have no chance with.

So we all sat down outside to eat the usual 4th of July fare, hot dogs, hamburgers, etc, and somehow Emilie happened to sit next to me, I really didn’t think about it much.  Everyone was asking her questions about France and if she liked it in the States, you know, generic questions like that, which eventually subsided and they broke off into conversations of their own.  Then something amazing happened, I started having a conversation with her.  We talked about a lot of different things, and she really seemed interested in talking to me…. more so then the others.  We talked about music and I found out that she sometimes works as a Go-Go Dancer in night clubs back in Lyon, which was actually no surprise to me.  Finally I asked if she wanted to go listen to some music in my car and she quickly said yes, almost is if she was relieved that I asked.

So we spent the next couple of hours sitting in my car listening to music and talking, just talking and getting to know each other.  it was nice.  And I started to realize that I really liked this girl.  She was smart, beautiful, and really had a great personality.  All of a sudden I didn’t care about the fireworks, or the bullshit of the week, or anything else.  And at that point, while we were sitting on the trunk of my car having another cigarette, I kissed her.  And she liked it so I kissed her again…

I’m just taking a moment to remember that kiss…

Well, she ended up spending the next 10 days, and nights, with me.  And while I’d like to say that it was just about the circumstances or whatever, it was a whole lot more.  I grew as a person that week, I became something more, something greater.  Not to mention there was something amazing about coming home from working in a hot kitchen to find this amazing beautiful girl waiting for me in my bath robe.  I mean, that only happens in movies right??  We did all kinds of stuff together, had amazing conversations for hours.  I admit, at times I had to pinch myself, because it really was like a dream.  My Godfather told me once that I was going to collapse once she left, and I knew it, but I didn’t care.  I really was having the time of my life.

And then it happened.  She had to leave.

So I took her to the bus station.  The old Greyhound station, which is actually torn down now.  But I remember clearly, the process of driving to the station, the silence in the car.  And once I finally let her go, and she walked away to board the bus, this wave washed over me, and I started to cry.  I think I knew that she was a once in a lifetime chance, and I would have to continue knowing that no one would ever make me happier then this girl.

The whole time I was with her, I never took a photo of her.  Maybe I felt like it would be too painful to have an image to look at.  Maybe I felt like it would cheapen the experience, that I preferred instead to remember the feelings.  And I do very much so, even now, over 10 years later.  She wrote me a couple of times that month after she left.  I wrote her back a couple of times, each time was farther and farther apart.  And then nothing, from either of us.

A couple of times since I have tried writing letters, but I’m sure she’s moved, and married by now.  But sometimes I wonder if somehow, we are still connected and that perhaps one day we will be reunited.  Maybe that’s exactly what I’m waiting for.  Maybe I’m just fooling myself.  But it really would be nice to be able to sit and have coffee with her again, just one more time…