People don’t take trips, trips take people - Antoine 01

“Lily, I’m back”, Antoine called out to no reply, returning back home with the coffees. He dropped his keys in the bowl next to the door and tried again, “Lily? I’ve got the coffees, where are you”?

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“Come and find me, lover boy”, came a sultry voice, from somewhere in the apartment.

A smile crept across Antoine’s lips, as he knew what was about to come. He thought about how great life was and how lucky he was to have found a girl as amazing as Lily, It hadn’t always been that way, growing up in the French capital had been tough for his single-parent mother who had worked tirelessly to put food on the table for him and his sister.

Growing up poor had impacted his ability to make friends, the other kids so judgemental, belittling anyone who didn’t have the latest smartphone, this led him to become a quiet and introverted child, more content to sit at home and read a book, rather than playing football out in the park with the other kids his age. It had been a lonely childhood, but things got better when Lily came into his life, meeting her under the most unlikely of circumstances. People laughed when they told the story of how they had been stuck in a lift together, but it had been a stroke of luck for Antoine, who would have never normally built up the courage to speak to a girl like Lily, he often thought about how lucky he was, and that if fate hadn’t forced them together that day, completely isolated from the outside world, he would probably still be a miserable virgin living at home with his mother.

Antoine and Lily were vastly different people in terms of upbringing, and personality, Lily was from Avignon but had moved to Paris to study fashion design in university, Antoine had no interest in fashion or most of the other things Lily liked to do but having been given four interrupted hours to talk and get to know each other, they had clicked and made a connection. After the incident in the lift, they had exchanged numbers and agreed to meet up, but with Antoine fearing rejection, he had been reluctant to call, luckily for him Lily, as she often did in their relationship took the initiative sending him a friend request on his social media account and sending him a message. In the following weeks, the pair went on several dates as the connection between the pair grew, it wasn’t long before Antoine was moving into Lily’s apartment and the pair couldn’t be happier.

Antoine being a worrier often thought about and felt bad about not contributing any money towards the rent, he tried to contribute half of the bills but being a website designer, and most of his money coming from temporary contracts, his income was very unpredictable. Lily didn’t seem to mind, she would just tell him, that her mother was paying for the place while she was studying and not to worry, reminding him that him being there with her, was taking the burden off his mother not having to cloth and feed him.

Back in the living room of the 4th-floor apartment, Antoine placed down the cups of coffee he was carrying, “Ok where could you be”, he said playfully, “are you in the bathroom”? He said loudly, playing along with Lily’s game.

“Cold, try again”, came the reply.

“How about the living room”? Antoine said cheerfully.

“Getting warmer, so close”, lily replied.