I nod. In fact, I tried to bring it up a couple of times since, but Louis brushed me off, saying he wasn’t ready to show it to anyone.
“I’m ready now.” He smiles brightly, then bites his bottom lip.
I’m not sure I’ve seen him this excited before.
I need to stretch, have dinner, and get an early night. The only hot date I should be having is with my foam roller. But then I think about the roses. About him watching me from the audience. About his hopeful eyes and devastating smile. I need to be with Louis more.
“You have one hour,” I say, trying to sound like I mean business. Of course, I’m smiling deliriously, so it probably doesn’t work so much.
“Really?” he asks. I’m sure he thought it would be much harder to convince me. But I don’t want to spend my last moments in Paris arguing with Louis about whether or not we should spend time together. I know what I want. I want Louis.
Our ride on his Vespa takes us halfway across Paris, to the outskirts of the city. As the streets and buildings become less familiar and more sparse, I realize that I didn’t even ask where we were going. I’m starting to wonder about this big secret project of his. And when, finally, he stops in an industrial zone in front of what seems to be an abandoned warehouse, more questions swirl in my mind.
This is not the dreamy Paris I fell in love with. In fact, it’s pretty much the opposite. The building is gray, drab, and looks like it might fall apart. There’s trash littered on the ground around it: old tires, boxes of junk, even the skeleton of a car. But, as we remove our helmets, Louis is buzzing with excitement.
“Are we going in there?” I ask. What I really want to say is There’s no way I’m going in there.
Louis takes my hand, a huge smile across his face. “Trust me, Mia.”
I do, even though he didn’t answer my question. Louis stops as we’re about to go around the corner of the building. “I need you to close your eyes,” he says solemnly. I look down and see crushed cans and bits of broken glass. “I’ll watch out for you,” he adds.
“I trust you.” I close my eyes, and we walk slowly, carefully. I focus on the warmth of Louis’s hand in mine, and on the soothing sound of his voice as he tells me that we’re almost there. A minute or so later, he spins me around to face him.
“Open your eyes,” he says.
But it’s only him in front of me.
“Remember when I told you I liked to paint when I was little?”
I nod.
“You inspired me, Mia. I hadn’t touched a brush in years, but seeing your passion, your love for what you do, it really made me question what I was passionate about, what I loved. I saw what you had, and I realized I wanted that, too.”
I hold my breath, waiting for the rest of the story, but this is it.
“Turn around.”
I do what he says and let out a gasp. There’s a ballerina in front of us, over ten feet tall. She’s painted on the wall of the building, straight onto the concrete, wearing a black beaded costume, black feathered headband, and white pointe shoes. Her arms fly up to the sky as she stands on her right leg, the left one raised behind her in arabesque. She looks down with a smile at what would be the end of the Black Swan pas de deux. Her red lips are the only touch of color on the wall.
“You did this,” I say.
Louis searches my eyes. “Do you like it?”
I look back at her in awe. “It’s the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen.”
“Not as amazing as the real one,” Louis responds. I can almost see his heart rising in his chest.
“This must have taken you hours,” I say, still processing that Louis painted the entire side of a building with…me.
A cloud covers his eyes as he nods. “I started it the day after the showcase.”
Just before I broke up with him. I take a deep breath, trying to clear my mind. But all I can do is look back at her. The lines are sharp yet delicate. He’s captured Odile’s essence—my essence—so perfectly that I can’t take my eyes away. Forget Degas. Louis Dabrowski has just become my favorite artist.
Once I can bring myself to look away from this larger-than-life Black Swan, I notice more pieces of art on the adjacent wall, some small and colorful, others more graffiti-like.
“If I was going to paint again,” Louis explains, following my gaze, “I wanted to do something different. And then I discovered this spot, where street artists come to practice, and just have fun experimenting. It’s not the most charming place, but…”