what is essential is invisible to the eye

antoine de saint exupery followed me around the train station in lyon, france. he has been dead for many years, but that day, he fell in love with me and told me so. he insisted upon it, he wouldnt let me convince him otherwise. our time together was brief- he followed me through the train station and to the ticket booth. he never offered to carry my bags, and i had many of them, one exploding with chocolates and a small plastic garden gnome named sham that i had bought in geneva.

i met antoine in the unisex bathroom. you have to pay a small woman sitting behind a desk in order to get in, see, and i had no francs. i was terribly hot, wearing my jacket and my scarf and my hat, and i was flustered, and uncomfortable from holding it. he came in after me and grabbed my arm as i rooted around my purse.

it is you, he said, his accent thick but detailed, like a doilie.

i didnt know what he meant, so i didnt say anything back.

he handed the woman enough francs for me and i ran into a stall. he stood outside of it, and i found this awkward. i heard him saying, to every person who walked by,

its jessica!

no one understood him; no one cared. he could have said it in french and more people would have responded im sure, but i dont think he wanted that. i especially dont think he needed it.

when i walked out of the stall i looked at him curiously and asked his name. his voice did sound familiar, maybe we had known each other before. he told me that his name was antoine de saint exupery, and i understood then that he was the antoine de saint exupery who had written my favorite book, the book that made me look forward to growing up, and that his plane, the one he was flying because he was a pilot, was shot down exactly 60 years ago. i was flattered that he recognized me, but i still had a train to catch.

you are the queen of my life, he said, his eyes pleading, like two balloons wanting their ribbons cut so they can drift upwards.

i probably blushed but i dont quite remember. we were still standing in the white tiled unisex bathroom that cost francs to use.

thank you! i replied.

no, no. you do not understand, you mustnt leave, i need you to stay here with me.

i wondered if here meant literally here, if he lived within the confines of this train station, or even this unisex bathroom. i weighed the options.

well, i have a train and then a plane to catch, see. its really not practical for me to stay here.

it pained me to say this, considering that his imgaination had allowed me to dream about queens and foxes floating in space, and that what i felt for him lived in a place much deeper than love. i began walking to the ticket booth. he sidestepped so that he could be always facing me.

i am desparately in love with you, he said once i had put my bags down to wait in line for a ticket agent. do you have any idea what that feels like?

i thought for a moment about his question, without looking at him. i wanted him to understand that i was really untying the knot of it in my head, that i wasnt going to placate him with an easy answer. i wanted him to see snow in london when being in love had, so far, only meant waiting. i wanted him to see how it looked like flaky skin. i wanted him to see subway cars passing as quickly and violently as memories did, knocking me out with the force of them, flattening me with their weight, their momentum. i wanted him to see mornings that were carried out as if by wrote, as if it was a scene in a movie being shot over and over, the scene where the sad girl with the half full heart gets out of bed and turns the stereo on goes to the bathroom turns the light on looks in the mirror and doesnt cry gets in the shower and does washes all of her with soap and nice smelling things puts on clothes and walks with one foot in front of the other to school where she writes the alphabet in his geometric handwriting in the margins of her paper.

yes. i do.

ive always known you would, he said, and walked back into the gossamer layers from whence he came.