Elodie's Matchbook

VOICE MEMO: 001 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 2:14 PM LOCATION: Café Les Deux Stations, Paris [Sound of heavy rain hitting an awning. The distant, rhythmic clatter of saucers. A long, shaky exhale.] Julian sits at the corner table, the one where the wood is scarred by a thousand cigarette burns and the ghost of someone’s spilled Pernod. Outside, Paris is a charcoal drawing left out in a storm. The rain isn't just falling; it’s a deliberate assault, a frantic percussion section without a conductor, hammering on the zinc roofs until the world sounds like a broken piano. He presses the ‘record’ button on the handheld Zoom, the same one he uses to capture the way a certain creek back in Nashville sounds after a flash flood. But he isn't recording the rain. Not really. He’s recording the way the air feels like it’s been charged by a downed power line. Then, she walks in. Elodie. He doesn’t know her name yet, but in his head, she’s already a symphony. She shakes a translucent umbrella, sending a spray of diamonds across the checkered floor. She’s wearing a trench coat the color of a bruised plum and a silk slip underneath that catches the dim yellow light of the café. Her hair is the color of a wet cedar fence in July—dark, heavy, and smelling of woodsmoke and something sharper, something like crushed jasmine. She doesn’t look for a seat. She looks for him. It’s theatrical. It’s ruinous. Their eyes lock with the kind of violence usually reserved for car crashes. He feels it in his marrow, a low-frequency hum like the bottom E-string on a hollow-body Gibson vibrating against his ribs. She walks toward him, her heels clicking a staccato rhythm that drowns out the rain. She sits down without an invitation. She smells like the outdoors—cold, ozone-rich, and terrifyingly alive. [Sound of a chair scraping against tile.] “You’re recording the world,” she says. Her voice is a cello played in a small room. Deep, resonant, enough to make the hair on his forearms stand up. “I’m recording the catastrophe,” Julian says, or thinks he says. He’s narrating this into the mic later, or maybe he’s saying it now. The lines are blurring. He watches her hands. They are long-fingered, the hands of a pianist or a thief. She reaches into her pocket and pulls out a small, silver-foiled matchbook. [Click. Whirring of the device.] VOICE MEMO: 002 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 2:48 PM LOCATION: Café Les Deux Stations, Paris [The rain has intensified. The sound is a low roar now. Background chatter is muffled.] They’ve been sitting there for thirty minutes, and they haven’t ordered a thing. The waiter, a man with a face like a crumpled grocery bag, hasn’t even bothered them. It’s as if they’ve been cut out of the scene with a pair of jagged scissors. Elodie is playing with the matchbook. She flips it open, runs a thumb over the red phosphorus strip. Julian watches the movement. It’s a slow, greasy lick of a gesture, reminiscent of the way a slide guitar moves over the frets. He can feel that thumb on his own skin, even though she hasn’t touched him yet. “You look like you’re waiting for something to explode,” she says, her eyes never leaving his. They are a startling, impossible green—the color of the moss that grows on the north side of an oak tree back home, deep and damp. “I think it already did,” Julian says. The melodrama of it should be embarrassing, but in this light, with the rain turning the windows into frosted glass, it’s the only truth that fits. “I think the moment you stepped through that door, the fuse was lit.” She smiles, and it’s a predatory thing. She leans forward, and the plum-colored silk of her slip dips low. He can see the pale, cream-colored swell of her breasts, the way the skin there looks as soft as the underside of a leaf. There’s a single drop of rain caught in the hollow of her throat, trembling there like a secret. He wants to lean across the table and catch it with his tongue. He wants to taste the cold Paris sky on her heat. “I’m Elodie,” she whispers. “Julian.” “Julian,” she repeats, and the way she says his name—dragging out the vowels like she’s tasting a vintage wine—makes his blood thick. “You have the hands of a man who knows how to break things.” “I’m a musician,” he says, his voice cracking just a little. “I build things. Chords. Melodies.” “To build, you must first create a silence,” she says. She reaches out then. Her fingers are cold from the rain, but the moment they touch the back of his hand, it’s like a cigarette burn. He flinches, but he doesn’t pull away. He turns his hand over, interlacing his fingers with hers. Her skin is impossibly smooth, a sharp contrast to the calluses on his fingertips. He feels the pulse in her wrist. It’s fast. Erratic. A frantic 7/8 time signature that matches his own. [Sound of heavy breathing, close to the microphone.] She pulls his hand toward her, dragging his knuckles across the rough grain of the table. She doesn’t stop until his hand is resting against her thigh. She’s wearing stockings—real silk, the kind that makes a soft, shushing sound when she moves. The texture under his palm is electric. He can feel the heat of her leg through the thin fabric, a furnace disguised as a woman. He moves his hand upward, just an inch. Her breath hitches. “Is this part of the recording, Julian?” she asks, her voice dropping an octave. “This is the only part that matters,” he says. [Sound of a chair being pushed back. The rustle of fabric.] VOICE MEMO: 003 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 3:12 PM LOCATION: The narrow corridor leading to the restrooms, Café Les Deux Stations [The sound is muffled, echoey. There’s a low hum of plumbing in the background.] The corridor is narrow, smelling of bleach and old wood and the relentless jasmine of her perfume. It’s a stage set for a scene that hasn’t been written yet. Julian has her pinned against the floral wallpaper, his hands buried in the plum-colored wool of her coat. She’s looking up at him, her lips parted, her breath coming in short, ragged gasps. The theatricality is gone now, replaced by a raw, unvarnished hunger that makes his head swim. “You shouldn’t have looked at me like that,” he mutters, his mouth inches from hers. “Back there. Like you were going to eat me alive.” “Maybe I was,” she says. She reaches up, grabbing the front of his shirt, her knuckles digging into his chest. “Maybe I’ve been waiting for a man who looks like he’s haunted by songs he hasn't written yet.” He kisses her then. It’s not a gentle kiss. It’s an extraction. It’s the sound of a string snapping mid-solo. She tastes like espresso and cold rain and something metallic, like the air before a thunderstorm. Her tongue slides against his, bold and demanding. She’s making a small, keening sound in the back of her throat, a note that vibrates through his entire body. His hands move down, finding the hem of that plum coat, sliding underneath to the slick silk of her slip. He finds her hips, the curve of them sharp and elegant. He bunches the silk in his fists, pulling it upward until he can feel the bare skin of her thighs above the lace tops of her stockings. Her skin is hot. Scorching. It’s like putting his hands on a tube amp that’s been running for six hours. “Julian,” she moans into his mouth, her head falling back against the wall. He drops to his knees. The tile is cold, but he doesn’t care. He pulls her coat open, the heavy wool falling away like a curtain. Underneath, she’s all silk and lace and pale, glowing skin. He presses his face into the soft swell of her stomach, breathing her in. She smells like a Tennessee summer—heavy, sweet, and dangerous. He hooks his thumbs into the waistband of her lace panties. They are black, a stark contrast to the cream of her skin. He pulls them down just enough, his nose brushing against the soft, dark hair between her legs. She’s already wet. He can smell it, a musky, salt-sweet scent that makes his mouth water. She’s drenched, the silk of her slip clinging to the moisture. “Please,” she whispers, her fingers clutching his hair, her nails digging into his scalp. “Julian, right here. I don’t care who hears.” He uses his tongue then. A long, slow stroke from the bottom of her slit to the top, finding the small, hard bud that’s hiding there. She screams—a sharp, jagged sound that is immediately swallowed by the roar of the rain outside. Her legs shake, her knees buckling, but he holds her up, his hands locked around her ass, pulling her closer, burying his face in her heat. She tastes like the end of the world. [Sound of heavy fumbling. A zipper being lowered. The frantic sound of skin on skin.] He’s hard, painfully so, the denim of his jeans feeling like sandpaper against his skin. He wants to be inside her. He wants to feel that silk and that heat wrap around him until he forgets his own name. He pulls his jeans down, his cock springing free, dark and pulsing in the dim light of the corridor. He looks up at her. She’s watching him, her eyes wide, her chest heaving. She looks like a saint and a sinner all at once, a masterpiece painted in sweat and desire. “Now,” she gasps, reaching down to guide him. “Now, Julian. Play the rest of the song.” He stands up, lifting her by the thighs. She wraps her legs around his waist, her heels digging into the small of his back. He feels the wetness of her pressed against his stomach, the friction of the silk slip between them. He lines himself up. The tip of him brushes against her opening, and she lets out a sob, a sound of pure, unadulterated need. “Wait,” he whispers, his voice thick and unrecognizable. “Wait. Look at me.” She opens her eyes, and the green is gone, replaced by a dark, shimmering hunger. “I’m looking,” she says. He pushes in, just an inch. She’s tight, so tight he thinks he might break, but she’s also slick, welcoming him with a heat that feels like home and exile all at once. [The recording cuts out abruptly as the device is dropped or bumped. There is only the sound of the rain, louder now, and a single, sharp intake of breath.] VOICE MEMO: 004 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 3:18 PM LOCATION: The narrow corridor, Café Les Deux Stations [The recording starts with a sharp, static pop. The device has been shoved into Julian’s jacket pocket, muffling the sound. There is a heavy, wet sliding noise, followed by a rhythmic thud against wood.] The first full slide into her is a dissonance that resolves into the only chord that matters. She’s so tight it feels like the nut of a guitar being filed too thin, a tension that threatens to snap the string, but then she gives. She opens. She swallows him with a heat that makes the cold Paris rain outside seem like a dream he had years ago. He groans, the sound vibrating from his chest directly into her collarbone. He’s buried to the hilt in her, his cock encased in the scalding, velvet-clench of her body. Every time she breathes, he feels her walls ripple against him, a series of micro-adjustments that make his vision go white at the edges. “Don’t move,” she gasps, her teeth grazing his earlobe. Her hands are flat against the floral wallpaper, her fingers splayed as she anchors herself. “Just… stay there for a second. Let me feel how much of you there is.” Julian can’t stay still. He’s a man built on rhythm, and the pulse between her legs is a kick-drum he has to follow. He pulls back, nearly out, the slick, suctioned release making her hiss. Then he drives back in, a slow, heavy downbeat. The plum coat is a heavy curtain between them and the world, but underneath it, they are a mess of friction. The silk of her slip is trapped between his pelvis and hers, sliding and bunching, creating a layer of electric heat. He can feel the lace of her stockings rubbing against the rough denim of his dropped jeans, a texture that is almost too much to bear. He finds her mouth again. This time, it’s not a kiss; it’s a shared struggle for air. He tastes the salt of her sweat and the lingering, bitter ghost of the espresso. He moves faster, his thrusts becoming shorter, sharper, more frantic. The back of her head hits the wall with a dull, rhythmic thud that keeps time with the rain on the skylight above them. “Julian,” she whimpers, her voice breaking into a thousand jagged pieces. “You’re… you’re ruining me.” “Good,” he mutters, his hands sliding down to her ass, squeezing the firm, pale cheeks, tilting her up so he can go deeper. He wants to reach the very back of her. He wants to leave a bruise on her soul. He feels her clit rubbing against his pubic bone with every surge, a hard, sparking contact. She begins to shake, a fine, high-frequency vibration that he feels in his very marrow. Her internal muscles start to twitch, clamping down on him in a frantic, uncoordinated rhythm. [Sound of a door opening nearby. A muffled voice calling out in French: “Pardon? Il y a quelqu’un?”] Julian freezes. Elodie’s eyes go wide, the pupils swallowed by the green. She clamps her hand over her own mouth, her knuckles white. Julian is pinned inside her, his heart hammering against his ribs like a bird in a chimney. They are two inches away from being a scandal, a headline, a catastrophe. The footsteps outside the door pause. A beat of silence. Then, the footsteps retreat. Elodie lets out the breath she was holding in a long, shuddering sob. The near-miss hasn’t cooled the blood; it’s poured gasoline on it. She unwraps her legs from his waist, her feet hitting the tile with a slap, but she doesn’t let him out. She turns around, shoving her face against the wallpaper, bending over until her forehead is resting against the cold plaster. She reaches back, grabbing his hand and pulling it to her crotch. “From behind,” she commands, her voice a wreckage of itself. “I want to feel you hit the bottom.” VOICE MEMO: 005 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 3:34 PM LOCATION: Rear service area, behind the restrooms [The sound of a heavy metal door creaking. The rain is much louder here, almost deafening. The recording is clearer, the device perched on a stack of plastic crates.] They’ve moved further back, into the shadows where the café stores its empty wine crates and bags of flour. It smells of yeast and damp cardboard and the sharp, ozone tang of the storm leaking through a gap in the ceiling. Elodie is draped over a stack of crates, her plum coat discarded on the floor like a fallen flag. She’s nothing but pale limbs and dark silk now. Julian is behind her, his hands locked on her hips, his thumbs digging into the hollows of her pelvic bones. He enters her again in one long, devastating stroke. She screams, a high, thin sound that is instantly buried by a clap of thunder. He’s never felt anything like her. Back in Tennessee, the heat is heavy and slow, like molasses. This heat is different. It’s sharp. It’s a blue flame. Every time he thrusts, he feels the way she’s built—the curve of her spine, the way her hips tilt to meet him, the incredible, soaking wetness that makes every movement a slick, sliding symphony. He reaches around her, his fingers finding her breasts through the thin silk. They are heavy and hot, the nipples hard as pebbles. He rolls them between his fingers, and she moans, her head thrashing from side to side. “Harder,” she says, the word catching in her throat. “Don’t be careful with me, Julian. I’m not a song you have to protect.” He takes her at her word. He pulls back until he’s almost entirely out, then hammers home, the impact of their bodies sounding like a hand-clap in an empty hall. He does it again. And again. The rhythm is primal now, stripped of any melody, just the raw, percussive drive of two bodies trying to occupy the same space. He watches the way the dim light catches the sweat on her back. It looks like oil on water, shimmering and dark. He reaches out and traces the line of her spine with his tongue, tasting the salt and the Paris grit. She’s close. He can feel it in the way her breath has turned into a series of short, sharp whistles. She’s tightening around him again, her cunt clamping down on his cock with a strength that is almost painful. “Julian, please,” she gasps, her fingers clawing at the plastic crates. “I’m… I’m right there. I’m right on the edge.” “Look at me,” he says, grabbing her hair and gently pulling her head back so she has to see him over her shoulder. Her face is a mask of pure, unbridled lust. Her lips are swollen, her mascara smudged into dark halos around her eyes. She looks beautiful. She looks like a riot. “I’m going to come,” she whispers, a warning and a plea. “Do it,” he growls, his own climax rising in him like a flood tide, heavy and unstoppable. He speeds up, his movements becoming a blur of friction and heat. He can feel the pressure building at the base of his spine, a low-end hum that is about to explode into feedback. [A sudden, violent crash of thunder. The sound of a glass bottle breaking nearby.] Elodie’s body goes rigid. She lets out a sound that isn't a moan or a scream—it’s a long, low howl of release. Her insides begin to pulse against him in great, rhythmic waves, a series of contractions that feel like they’re trying to wring the very life out of him. Julian holds on, his fingers bruising her hips, his teeth gritted as he rides out her orgasm. He’s so close he can feel the heat of his own blood in his ears. He wants to join her. He wants to pour himself into her until there’s nothing left. But then, he hears it. [Sound of a heavy bolt being thrown. A door opening.] “Qui est là?” a man’s voice barks, much closer now. The light from the main café spills into the back room, a long, yellow finger pointing directly at them. Julian freezes, his cock still buried deep inside her, his heart stopping in his chest. Elodie is still shivering, her eyes half-closed, lost in the aftershock of her climax. They are caught. They are exposed. And Julian is still a second away from breaking. [The audio ends with the sound of heavy, panicked breathing and the shadow of a man falling across the crates.] VOICE MEMO: 006 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 3:45 PM LOCATION: A taxi, somewhere near the Pont Neuf [Sound of a car door slamming. The frantic, high-pitched wipe of windshield wipers. Heavy, rhythmic breathing from two people. The sound of a zipper being yanked up with violent haste.] The light hit us like a spotlight in a dive bar when the cops show up. I saw the waiter’s eyes—wide, wet marbles—and the way his mustache twitched in pure, Gallic indignation. I should have felt shame. I should have felt that cold, Sunday-morning-in-church dread. But I didn't. I felt like a song that had finally found its hook. I didn't pull out. Not at first. I stayed there, anchored in her, staring back at that man with a defiance that felt like a baptism. I felt Elodie’s internal muscles give one last, desperate squeeze, a final rhythmic pulse that sent me over the edge. It wasn't a graceful ending. It was a spill. It was the sound of a glass bottle breaking on concrete—sharp, messy, and permanent. I came into her with a violence that made my knees hit the crates, my forehead pressing into the small of her back as the world turned into a single, blinding note of feedback. Then we ran. We didn't look back. I grabbed her coat, she grabbed her shoes, and we burst through the service door into the alleyway. The rain was a solid wall of cold, but it felt like a reprieve. We were laughing—that jagged, hysterical laughter that only comes after you’ve nearly been arrested or killed. Now, we’re in the back of a Citroën that smells of cheap tobacco and damp upholstery. Elodie is sitting next to me, her hair a wild, dark thicket over her face. She’s not wearing her panties. I have them in my pocket, a damp, lace knot of a souvenir. Her legs are bare, the silk slip hiked up to her hips, and her skin is still steaming in the cool air of the cab. She looks at me, and there’s no theater left. Just the raw, red-rimmed reality of what we just did. “Where are we going?” she asks. Her voice is frayed at the edges, like an old blues record. “My hotel,” I say. “Rue des Beaux-Arts. It’s small. It’s quiet.” “Good,” she says, reaching over and putting her hand on my thigh. She doesn’t just rest it there; she grips me, her nails digging through the denim. “I want to see you in the light, Julian. I want to see every scar, every callus. I want to see the man who records catastrophes.” I look out the window at the Seine. The water is the color of an old nickel. I think about home—about the way the humidity in Nashville makes the air feel like a wet wool blanket, and how this Paris rain is so much sharper, so much more surgical. I feel like I’ve been skinned alive and put back together with different parts. [Sound of the taxi idling. The click-clack of the meter.] I’m still recording. I don’t know why. Maybe because if I stop, this whole thing will turn into a ghost story. I need the evidence. I need the sound of her breath against the window. VOICE MEMO: 007 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 4:22 PM LOCATION: Hotel room, 4th floor, Rue des Beaux-Arts [Sound of a heavy skeleton key turning in a lock. The door opening and shutting with a solid thud. The roar of the rain is distant here, muffled by thick stone walls and velvet curtains.] The room is small, a jewel box of red wallpaper and dark wood. It smells of dust and the lavender soap the maid uses. The bed is a high, iron-framed thing with white linens that look like a fresh sheet of stationery waiting for a poem. Elodie doesn’t wait. The moment the door is locked, she’s on me. She doesn’t use her hands this time; she uses her whole body, slamming me back against the door. The plum coat hits the floor. The silk slip follows it, a whisper of fabric that pools around her ankles like a shadow. She’s entirely bare now. In the gray light filtering through the curtains, her skin is the color of skimmed milk. She’s leaner than I thought—all long, elegant lines and sharp angles. There’s a smudge of dirt on her knee from the service room floor, and her nipples are dark and prominent, reacting to the sudden chill of the room. I reach out and touch her, my hand shaking just a little. I trace the line of her collarbone, the way it juts out like the bridge of a violin. She’s beautiful in a way that hurts to look at—not a polished, magazine beauty, but something frantic and temporary. “Take your clothes off,” she says. It’s not a request. I strip. My shirt, my boots, my jeans. I feel clumsy under her gaze. I’m a man of wires and wood, all knuckles and scars and the lingering scent of old bars. When I’m finally naked, she steps into me, her chest brushing against mine. The contact is electric. My cock, which I thought was spent, stirs and hardens instantly, a blind, heavy weight between us. She reaches down and wraps her fingers around it. Her hand is small but her grip is firm, her thumb tracing the ridge of the head. She looks down, watching herself stroke me, her eyes tracking the movement with a clinical, hungry intensity. “You’re so much bigger than I thought,” she whispers. “Back there, in the dark… I couldn’t see. I could only feel.” She drops to her knees on the threadbare rug. She doesn’t look up at me. She just takes me into her mouth. [Sound of a deep, guttural groan. The rustle of bedsheets.] It’s not like the café. This is slow. Deliberate. She uses her tongue to map every vein, every inch of the underside. She’s got one hand wrapped around the base, and the other is reaching back, her fingers finding the sensitive skin between my legs. She’s exploring me like she’s trying to learn a new language by heart. I reach down and grab the brass rail of the bed to keep from falling. My head is tilted back, my eyes closed. I can hear the rain, but it’s a million miles away. All I can feel is the wet, sliding heat of her mouth, the way her hair brushes against my thighs, the soft, rhythmic sound of her swallowing. She pulls off, leaving me glistening and pulsing in the dim light. She stands up, her face flushed, her lips shining. “The bed,” she says. I crawl onto the mattress, the white sheets cold against my skin. She follows me, climbing over me like a cat, her knees on either side of my hips. She sits back on her heels, her pussy hovering just inches from my face. It’s a dark, swollen flower, still wet from the cafe, the scent of it filling my lungs. It smells of us—of rain and espresso and the raw, salt-tang of sex. I reach up and spread her, my fingers sinking into the soft, plush folds. She’s incredibly open, the pink inner skin glistening with her own moisture. I use my thumbs to circle the small, hard pearl of her clit, and she lets out a sharp, jagged breath, her back arching. “Eat me, Julian,” she gasps. “I want to taste myself on your tongue.” I lean forward and bury my face in her. I don’t hold back. I use my tongue in long, broad strokes, licking the nectar from her, tasting the metallic edge of her desire. I find her center and I stay there, my tongue flicking with a rhythm I learned from a metronome, fast and steady. She’s crying out now, her hands tangled in the bedsheets, her hips bucking against my face. She’s a storm of her own, a chaotic, beautiful mess of sensation. I can feel her coming again—that high-voltage shudder that starts in her toes and ends in her throat. She collapses onto my chest, her body heavy and limp, her skin slick with sweat. We stay like that for a long time, the only sound the ticking of a clock on the mantelpiece and the distant rumble of a bus on the street below. “I’m not going to see you again after today, am I?” she asks, her voice muffled against my shoulder. “I don’t know,” I say. “Does it matter?” “No,” she says, lifting her head. Her eyes are clear now, the green deep and steady. “That’s what makes it perfect. It’s a song with no bridge. Just a verse and a chorus and a sudden, sharp silence.” She moves then, shifting her weight until she’s straddling my lap. She guides me to her opening, the tip of my cock resting against the hot, wet entrance. She looks me dead in the eye, her hands resting on my shoulders. “Finish it, Julian,” she says. “Play the last note.” I lift my hips, and she sinks down. [Sound of a long, slow, joint exhale from both of them. The creak of the bed springs.] VOICE MEMO: 008 TIMESTAMP: October 14, 5:14 PM LOCATION: Hotel room, 4th floor, Rue des Beaux-Arts [The voice is lower now, more intimate. There’s the sound of a match being struck. A long, slow puff of smoke.] She’s gone. The room feels cavernous now, despite its size. The sheets are a wreckage of white linen, stained with our sweat and the ghost of that plum-colored silk. The rain has finally stopped, leaving the city in a bruised, violet twilight. I’m sitting on the edge of the bed, wrapped in a thin hotel robe. On the nightstand is the silver-foiled matchbook. She left it there, right next to the Zoom recorder. I pick it up. It’s empty. Every match has been struck. I think about the way she looked when I was inside her for the last time. It wasn’t like the back room of the café. It wasn't a desperate, frantic thing. It was a slow, agonizing crawl toward an ending. We moved together with a precision that was terrifying. I felt every ripple of her, every clench, every tiny vibration of her voice as she whispered things in French I didn't understand but felt in my blood. When I came, I felt like I was being emptied out—like everything I’d ever written, every song I’d ever bled for, was being poured into her. I felt lighter. I felt hollow. I felt like a vessel that had finally been drained. She didn't stay for coffee. She didn't ask for my number. She just got up, dressed in a silence that was almost holy, and kissed me once on the forehead. She tasted like salt and woodsmoke. “Don’t write a song about me, Julian,” she said at the door. “Just remember the sound of the rain.” I open the matchbook again. Inside, in a neat, cramped script, there’s a single word written on the white cardboard: *Considéré.* Considered. I don’t know if she meant the catastrophe, or the sex, or me. Maybe she meant the whole damn world. I look at the recorder. The little red light is still blinking, a tiny, pulsing heart in the dim room. I’ve caught it. I’ve caught the sound of the end of the world. I’ve caught the way a woman’s voice breaks when she’s being taken apart by a stranger. I’ve caught the silence that comes after the music stops. I reach out and press 'stop'. Back home, in Tennessee, the cicadas will be starting up soon. A different kind of noise. A different kind of heat. I’ll go back there, and I’ll sit on my porch, and I’ll listen to these tapes, and I’ll try to remember if any of this actually happened, or if I just dreamt up a woman named Elodie because the Paris rain was too loud and I was too lonely. But then I’ll smell it. That lingering scent on my skin. Jasmine and woodsmoke. And I’ll know. The match is struck. The fire is gone. But the burn? The burn stays. [Sound of the recorder clicking off. Total silence.]

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