PLAYING WITH FIRE

Ataboy... me voici avec ma première nouvelle en anglais... Bon, si je dois être 100% honnête, ce n'est pas ma première vraiment, mais ma deuxième. La première marine dans son jus, et je n'ai vraiment pas l'impression qu'il va en sortir quelque chose de bien. Mais celle-ci, je l'ai pensée en anglais (ce qui n'était pas le cas de la première). Probablement la raison pourquoi elle fut si facile à écrire (mettons) et pourquoi le résultat est plus satisfaisant... So there goes nothing!!

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Do you think I am a bad person?

Of course, you wouldn’t know. You don't know me!

To be perfectly honest, I do not consider myself as being a bad man, even after what’s happened.

What happened, do you ask?

Telling you how it ended before I give you the details would certainly put me in the villain’s role. This is not something I would like to see happen.

I am not a bad man, that’s all you need to know for now.

Like every tale, mine has a beginning, even though I cannot really put a specific date or time on it. I think the beginning, without really starting, more or less grew on me.

Like fungus…

Well, that’s not the right imagery… to say that it grew like a vine would be more exact. It grew all around me and I became entangled in it. It suffocated me.

I had been working with Celia for more than a year. Nice little Celia, as small and quiet as a mouse. But, luckily, not as furry…

I couldn’t say for how long she had been doing this, but one morning, I noticed her staring at me.

When I say noticed, the truth would be that I felt her stare in my back. I knew she was looking at me, her eyes as warm as would be her hands on my skin.

And it felt good. Not because it was Celia, but only because I felt empowered by a woman’s attention.

Had been a married man for several years, had never thought of another woman could be liking me as much as my wife did.

But Celia changed all that. I could feel a much greater love coming from her. Or, you could say I chose to believe it was.

Since that morning, I had started to pay more attention to Celia. I took time to talk with her everyday, giving her what I thought she wanted.

I could see the results of my attention towards her growing stronger everyday. Every morning, the twinkle in her eye was brighter, the smile was wider, the clothes were sexier.

To make sure I wasn’t imagining her infatuation with me, I did a little experiment.

One day, I didn’t stop to her desk to chat, made sure I didn’t make eye contact in the hallway and sat as far as possible from her in the cafeteria. Kept that attitude for a while.

As I was suspecting, the twinkle, the smile and the sexy clothes graduatly disappeared. She was back to being the quiet mouse again.

I then went back to paying attention to her as I did before.

Like magic, I was the center of her universe again.

I know, playing with her like that was pretty childish, but I had to know. It was either that or asking her if she had a thing for me.

Well, that would just be teasing, wouldn’t it?

So this is how it was for some months. Me nicely offering myself to star in her not-so-secret love dreams. I guess that could be considered as a sacrifice on my part.

And one Monday morning, without warning, I saw that Celia had changed.

I was so blinded by my little “office romance” that I didn’t see it right away. But when I finally noticed what was going on, I feared it was too late.

Something was off. Even with my undying attention to her, she was dangerously reverting to being that little mouse.

She must have realised that my little chit-chatting was not going anywhere, I wouldn’t make a move, would not declare my love, would not get a divorce… She just felt it.

The thought of loosing this rejuvinating love frightened me. I could not let her stop loving me, it was now the reason I got up in the morning. It was my energy, my drive, my own little viagra pill… just ask my wife!

I had to work a little harder to keep that flame alive in her eyes.

I took her to lunch that very Monday, and every Monday after that. It was our little rendez-vous, my clever way to nourrish the fire she had in her belly.

And again, it worked wonders.

I knew that everytime the flame was low, I just had to find the right thing to make her love red hot again.

Sometimes, I’d bring a little gift. Nothing fancy, but just something cute that would make her believe that I thought of her.

Other times, it would be made-up stories that would make her believe she was my confident, that my marriage was on the rocks.

I was getting very good at keeping her love warm. And then she changed. Again.

But this time, the change was different. The twinkle, the smile and the clothes, they were all there. But I felt they were not for me.

None of my little attentions, nor any of my heartfelt (but still untrue) stories, were getting through to her.

I thought I had lost her forever when she told me, at the end of our Monday lunch date, that this was our last meal together.

Had she discovered my little game?

Luckily for me, she hadn’t. It was more simple than that.

It was something I could easily deal with… She had found herself a boyfriend.

I was truly surprised, but only for a short period time.

There was no way a budding relationship could be stronger than her long-lasting pining over me. I just had to find the right way to make her mine (sort of speak) again.

And I instantly knew just how to do that.

I had a thought for my wife. How she would never know how far I was ready to go to keep our love going strong. I wish I could tell her, I wish she would realise how much I loved her.

But she never would. Just like Celia would never know the very purpose of my asking her out the next Friday.

She was so sweet, a joy to watch, hesitating between her new boyfriend and her deepest desire (that would be me). Touching, really!

I was so good at making her believe I wanted her, so flirtatious, so unlike my old self. If I hadn’t known any better, I could have thought I’d always been that way. A player, that’s what I had become.

Celia said yes. I called my wife and told her I was going out with friends from work. Which was, when you think about it, pretty much the truth.

I took Celia out to a nice dinner. Treated her to some nice wine, nice food, compliments, chocolate cake, and a kiss.

The kiss, without being planned, was still a card I had in my sleeve, in case it wasn’t going as good as I had thought.

I used the card, even though it wasn’t needed. She was back on the horse, she loved me again… And I was alive again.

She had enjoyed the kiss, I could tell, but the boyfriend’s shadow was still hovering over us.

He had to disappear… completely.

That last card I had, the one I didn’t want to use, I decided it was time to play it.

Celia followed me to my car. We drove to the nearest motel and I made love to her.

If I wanted to bring back the fire, I certainly didn’t expect the blaze that resutlted from our one and only night.

I had unleashed a monster.

From that moment on, the love she had kept locked-in was set free. Not only for me, but for the whole world to see.

I was in trouble.

It wouldn’t take long before my wife was told about my “relationship” with Celia. And it would probably be by Celia herself.

I could not let this happen.

The next day, I told Celia it was over. Or that it actually never started. She didn’t believe me.

She threw back at me my words, gifts and lunches.

I said we were friends.

She reminded me of the kiss.

I said I had made a mistake.

She spoke of our night together.

I said I was drunk.

She cried.

I left…

Now… about the ending of that story. What I was refering to, about what happened.

To be frank, nobody really knows what happened.

All that is certain, it’s that Celia died that night, after our last conversation.

We were told that she had a car accident.

Not everyone believed it.

When I say that, I really mean me… I don’t believe it.

Indeed, the roads were icy, and it was dark, and she could have been tired or drunk or just distracted.

But I know, deep in my heart, that she killed herself. That was her last gift to me. Her eternal love.

Now let me ask you again, now that I told you the whole story.

I am not a bad man… am I?