BILL PART DEUX

Le Francais saw Bill off at the airport.

"I was never so sure I was going to see a grown man cry," le Francais explained. "He begged to stay in China and I did everything I could but they insisted that he has to go to India now. However, I’m going to try to create a training so he has a reason to come back. I had no idea he loved China so much."

As the situation was explained to me upon my return, I thought about a brief moment Bill and I had together.

"It is my dream to live in China." Bill told me in the cab on the way to Tang Paradise.

"You could live with me," I reflexively thought but found myself only capable of a la Jaconda smile because I had the inkling that he might not object to such a notion. Normally, I reflexively say things like that in an "I dare you to realize it" gesture but I wasn't so sure he wouldn't shy away from my dare and I suddenly found myself wanting a relationship predicated on more than a dare "to catch me if you can." In the lessons I've learned in China, I wanted to take the time to get to know him instead of the cowardly, backdoor, "Give me your irrefutable 'yes' before I take any serious emotional risk."

Bill’s great passion for China is something he shared with me and the thought of him moved to welling up at the airport, while primarily about leaving China, seems to have the faint air of us around it. We compared notes about China (among a great many other things) and through his eyes my love of China further deepened. With me, he was incredibly comfortable confessing profound intimacies and I found myself in the same space. His openness inspired not only better French from me but a certain healing as well. In China, I’ve learned to let men take care of me and my time with Bill was the greatest gift from my new ability.

And, upon recounting stories of our shenanigans together (the thing about boys who like to explore is that you can talk about your time together under the pretext of explaining new locations), I found myself wondering what the hell I was thinking, imagining that he wasn’t interested in me. I would be talking about something I had been doing in the company of my Brazilian Angel, le Francais and Bill and found myself having to consistently interrupt the story with something to the effect of, "Oh, and at that point [Bill] came over to talk to me" or "Oh, and at this point [Bill] showed me this."

Upon the conscious realization that he was irrefutably interested in my company, Bill cemented himself in my psyche. In fact, when a handsome, New York-based screenwriter picked me up in a Starbucks while I was home, I knew instantly that Bill was the reason I wouldn’t actually ever hook up with a man I would have killed to be with mere weeks before. I was quite sure I would never see Bill again but I wasn’t ready to let go and the idea of another man (perfect though he may be) was simply not appealing in real time. My whole trip home, Bill was consistently in my thoughts and the day he left China, I took a moment to just sit and be depressed.

"Mom, [Bill]’s left China. He leaves today." I called out to the Jude, in spite of myself. It was the first time I allowed myself to speak of my kindred spirit beyond anecdotes. I had thought of him constantly but it felt foolishly childish to entertain notions and it was certainly nothing I want to confess in broad daylight. Nonetheless, the words were out of my mouth and I couldn’t take them back.

"Don’t be surprised if this isn’t the last you hear of him," she hollered back. "No one has a good time like that alone."

I tried to block out what she said because it just seemed like screaming into the wind to invest in a man who, in the real world, wouldn’t be in China when I returned. I didn’t want to have to deal with the inevitable disappointment when I returned to a Bill-free China.

At the airport, one of the last things I said to the Jude was, "[Bill] won’t be there when I get back. I don’t want a [Bill]-free China."

"No, he won’t but I think you’ll see him again," the Jude provided me with some real-world comfort as I headed off to my [Bill]-free China.

"It seemed a bit much but he comes from a small town in France and perhaps Xi’An is just such a lovely city. He really loved living here. Perhaps it’s just an easier world," my Brazilian Angel tried to analyze the world-traveler that is Bill. Bill has been all over the world and in all sorts of cities his whole life. He loves his country home in France and he loves the quiet Sunday exploration of the forest and abandoned homes. There’s something different about China, something special, and maybe we’re a small piece of that.