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 August 8, 1900
Dear Jane,
Life is a mystery. Everyone must stand alone. I hear him call my name, and it feels like home.
But he does not return my feelings. He has no interest in me at all, other than as a friend. Without me, his world would keep on turning.
And I’m left wishing and hoping and thinking and praying, planning and dreaming each night of his charms. But that won’t get me into his arms.
I should probably back up a bit, tell you the whole story. After all, you’re a part of it; you deserve to know.
Since Orlando came crashing into my world, nothing has been the same. Actually, he came crashing through my ceiling, like an angel in the morning. You know what happened when he landed in my room. Orlando told me he wrote to you of it. What he didn’t tell you, what he doesn’t know, is what has happened to me since then.
At the very first, I was shocked. Stunned by the noise, the dust, and the sudden appearance of such a beautiful young man on my floor. I helped him up, made sure he was unharmed, did all I could to make him feel at home. He was reticent, but I urged him to open his heart. Finally, he told me everything. About how he and Toulouse met, and how they became lovers, and about their time together. He showed me the letters Toulouse wrote to you.
And the letters you wrote to him.
You were pushing him to meet with me as much as you were pushing me to approach him. I had no idea you were such a matchmaker. A meddling, devious, matchmaking wench – that’s what Toulouse would have called you, you know.
Then he would have kissed your hand and said you were beautiful and dangerous. (And he would have been right on both counts.)
I don’t know if you had my interests at heart or Orlando’s, but whatever your motives, you’ve done your work well. I’m hopelessly entangled.
You will be pleased to learn that our first decision was to put the ladder back up between our abodes. It’s the neighbourly thing to do, but more than that, it means we are never truly alone. I knock three times on the ceiling if I want him. We visit each other several times a day. I continue my writing, while he has begun to paint. Between bouts of work, we eat our meals together, and then talk late into the night.
As we began to tell each other our tragic tales of lost love, I felt like a fraud. He was baring his soul to me, with a little help from the absinthe, while I was looking for ulterior motives. I kept hearing that logical voice in my head telling me that there was no way a man who looked like this could have been in love with Toulouse, that he must have been after money or fame or something.
How was he paying for the rooms? It was obvious he had some source of money. Had he blackmailed Toulouse? Toulouse’s family? I analysed every sentence, for inconsistencies or for double meanings, looking to catch him in a lie.
I found none, of course. And now that I know him better, I’m shamed that I ever doubted him. So unfair of me to make assumptions about his motives, to question his love for Toulouse. Anyone who ever had a heart would know that he loved him.
Orlando loved Toulouse so much, and is so devastated by his death, it almost hurts to look into Orlando’s eyes. They are still soft and beautiful, but they are no longer full of life, not the way Toulouse described and painted them.
They are deadened, even when he speaks of Toulouse. Eyes that have seen too much. Known too much. Those eyes have seen a lot of love, but they’re never going to see another one like they had with Toulouse.
That first night, after he’d climbed up to his room and I could hear him tossing and turning in the bed he used to share with Toulouse, I lit the oil lamp and looked in the mirror. Were my eyes as dulled by my grief? Was I, too, broken?
What I saw, and anyone who had seen much of me would confirm the diagnosis, was not evidence of loss but of too much drinking. Bloodshot and weary. When did I become so dependent on the absinthe?
Beyond that, I saw guilt. Guilt for the surreptitious lust I feel for him. For urging him to continue speaking, even after he’d finished telling his story, just so I could listen to his voice for a moment longer. I’d even used alcohol to pry Orlando’s confession out of him. Duplicitous.
He, the notorious renter, the subject of so much gossip and untruth, had turned out to be trusting and loyal. And I, the idealistic bohemian poet, had used liquor to get my way.
Not all of my way. There has been nothing more than talk between us. But I do yearn for more, and that fills me with more guilt, more conflict. I tried, and still try to tell myself he is only a friend. We’ve both lost our lovers; we both need comfort. It’s only natural that we would be drawn to one another. But as time goes on, I realise just what he means to me. So much more than a friend. It seems impossible, at first glance, but my life is not what it once was. I must turn and face the strange changes.
How is it that I have become so smitten with another man?
He is beautiful, Jane, but is that enough to explain my inappropriate feelings? I’ve never found any man beautiful before. Not like this. But then, Orlando is not like any other man. I now understand what Toulouse was talking about when we spent that night on the roof. To say he is striking would be an understatement. Stunning is closer to the mark. And I find myself drawn to him. Irresistably.
Is it a mere infatuation? I almost hope so, because that would mean that it is bound to pass, sooner or later. But that doesn’t solve my immediate problem.
Which is his beauty. Not only the way he looks, but his gentle soul, his quiet intelligence, his kind nature. But, inner or outer, his beauty is not the problem so much as the way I’m utterly enchanted by it. Ensnared. Enraptured. Whenever he is near I hear a symphony.
The strangest part of all is that he’s so beautiful in his sadness. It is not something I have ever been attracted to before… before my own sorrow. My heart aches for him even more than it aches for me. It is as if his grief has lifted me out of my own.
Or maybe that was inevitable. It would be impoosible to go on like that forever. Every now and then I get a little bit tired of listening to the sound of my tears. It was long past time for me to move on when Orlando came into my world.
It was intimidating at first. I felt like I used to with Satine. Out of place. Lost in time. Lost in space. Caught up in his whirlwind. With time, I’ve become more used to his presence. I can control myself most of the time. But the yearning is always there. A constant craving.
Last week, my control slipped. We had one of those humid evenings in which the sky hangs low over the city, threatening to suffocate us all. Outside was stifling, but inside it was unbearable. The pressure mounted, and we escaped the heat of our rooms by climbing up on the roof, eagerly anticipating the long-overdue downpour.
“Christian,” Orlando said, and I felt that warmth that always blooms inside me whenever he speaks my name. “Thank you for being a friend.”
I told him it was the least I could do. I can clearly remember when Satine died. At first I was afraid; I was petrified. Kept thinking I could never live without her by my side. But I grew strong. I learned how to get along.
“I can’t imagine how horrible it must have been for you, being all alone, for all this time,” Orlando said.
Frankly, what made me felt horrible was that while he was gazing mournfully past the abandoned moulin to the hulk of the elephant in the courtyard, I was watching the muted light from the setting sun turn his skin to polished bronze, and his long, loose curls to a fiery reddish-brown. And feeling a deep stirring inside.
“No one knows what it’s like,” I said. To be the bad man, I thought to myself. “To be the sad man,” I said aloud, “behind blue eyes.”
Orlando looked at me then, head tilted to the side curiously, like some inquisitive animal. He looked right at me. “No,” he said. “You’ve got green eyes.” He squinted at me in the half-light. “Oh, you’ve got blue eyes.” I tilted my head so what remained of the sunlight hit me straight on. “Oh, you’ve got grey eyes,” he said, as if he’d never looked at them before.
Perhaps he hadn’t. I’m sure he’s had better things to worry about than the colour of my eyes.
I, on the other hand, had noticed the exquisite, rich brown of his eyes from the start.
The way he looked at me gave me goose bumps. Every second made the ache in me grow, and it shamed me that it was a yearning for him, not pain for the loss of Satine. I couldn’t look away, so I had to think of some way to make him look away, to break contact and let me breathe freely again.
“I was referring to Satine’s eyes,” I whispered.
That did the trick. As curious as he is about my grief, he always gives me my privacy. He seems unwilling to hear certain details. I dare to hope it is because he doesn’t want to hear about me being with another, but it’s more likely he doesn’t want to hear about anyone being with a woman.
For whatever the reason, he turned his face away. It was a close call. When he looks at me like that, I feel as if he’s reading my soul.
Orlando, I wanted so much to ask him, do you still feel the pain, of the scars that won't heal? Your eyes have died, but you see more than I.
And I want so badly to be the one to bring the life back to those beautiful eyes.
He sat, motionless, for a time, watching the sky turn dark and the clouds sink lower. He turned his face up to catch the first drops of rain.
And I’d thought he’d been beautiful with the sun on his face.
“Please, Christian, give me more poetry,” he said. He loves my poetry. Loves to sit in the rain and hear sad poems.
And what can I do but oblige him? It might be my own personal hell, to sit next to this man who fills me with such longing, unable to touch, only to look, only look and crave more with every gaze, but it’s a sweet, sweet hell. And if it soothes him to hear a little poetry, I will do what I can.
In fact, for him, I’d do anything. I would give everything I own. I would walk five hundred miles and I would walk five hundred more just to be the man who walked a thousand miles to fall down at his door.
“The sky is crying,” I said. “Look at the tears roll down on me.”
He kept his face tilted to the rain. “More,” he murmured.
“I’m laughing at clouds so high up above. The sun’s in my heart and I’m ready for… love.”
But I wasn’t ready. And neither was he.
He turned to face me again, and it was plain that not all the wetness on his face had come from above. “Why do you stay here?” he asked in that voice, smooth as silk but even softer than down. “Why torture yourself with the memories?”
“For the same reason you do,” I told him. “To feel nearer to your lost love. To be able to remember every look, every word you spoke, with every move you make, every breath you take. I suppose it is torture of a sort, but it is the way of grief.”
I was speaking more of him than of me, of course. I no longer need the presence of the Moulin Rouge to remind me of Satine. She will be with me always, and now that my misery has begun to subside, my fear of forgetting the details has also ebbed.
In reality, I still stay at the hotel so I can be nearer to Orlando.
I reached out to touch his cheek. “See the man with the lonely eyes. Oh, take his hand, you’ll be surprised.”
He pulled away, suddenly shy, saying we should go inside.
“Wait,” I said rashly. “You are as full of love as you are of sadness.” To speak aloud of love was premature, especially when I did not even know what it is that draws me to him so. True love? Or was I seeking a new kind of comfort? Or was I simply blinded by the light.
But I had to try. “Give a little bit,” I invited him. “Give a little bit of your love to me.”
Orlando shook his head. “Christian… you don’t know what you’re asking.”
I did, of course. I know exactly what I was asking, what I still want. But he’s not ready; I let him go. I did not follow him. He doesn’t need me to hounding him. He probably thinks I’m after him only for his body.
To be honest, my thoughts haven’t gone that far. My desires haven’t managed to get past his eyes and his lips. A loving look, a tender kiss, is all my poor imagination can muster. Some great romantic I am. More like a blundering, tongue-tied schoolboy.
Is this what it’s like to fall in love again? Perhaps love is like a window, perhaps an open door. It invites you to come closer; it wants to show you more. He certainly beckons me.
And I become flustered and awkward. Impulsive. All my attempts, like the one on the roof, are so clumsy and juvenile. I know that I love him so, but I’m afraid that he’ll never know, because I get so timid and shy, each time that I look him in the eye.
He has forgiven me for my indiscretion. I feared for a little while he would leave me. He was gone when I went inside. I lay awake in my bed, waiting to hear his step above me. Midnight. One more night without sleeping. Watching ‘til the morning comes creeping. He returned near dawn, and later came down the ladder for breakfast as if nothing untoward had happened.
I was beginning to thing it might have been a bad dream. I certainly hoped that I had not really made such a fool of myself. Silly infatuation. He would let it pass, ignore it until it faded, and we would be the best of friends. I could live with that.
But then he looked at me.
It must be love. I’m sure of it. And I don't know if I'm being foolish, don't know if I'm being wise, but it's something that I must believe in, and it's there when I look in his eyes.
I swear to you, Jane, there was a spark of life there.
I don’t know how to love him. But I’ll learn. I promise you that, Jane.
And the lovely boy you wrote to me about, the beautiful young man Toulouse wrote about and fell in love with, the exquisite man who cared so much for his lover and is so shattered by his loss, will never walk alone again.
I will find a way to take a sad song and make it better.
But I will have to be patient, because you can’t hurry love. No, you just have to wait. You‘ve got to trust, give it time. No matter how long it takes.
Christian
Next: Eleven - Freedom
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