The Prince of Paris

Outgrowing superficial love and stepping into deep, soul-aligned relationships

Hello you

Last week I was sitting outside Café du Trocadéro having tea with a beautiful man. We were bathed in winter sun and his hand was placed gently on my knee, eyes fixated. It was the perfect first date really, except we weren’t strangers.

‘Am I still the only person you smoke with?’ He asked. ‘Yes,’ I replied with a smile and downward gaze.

He tucked my hair behind my ear and whispered, ‘still a bad influence?’

‘Yes!’ I said with narrowed eyes and a laugh this time, then I let him light my cigarette and breathed in the view.

It was exactly as I had imagined. The Eiffel Tower was splayed directly in front of us and he was saying all the right things. ‘Come to Costa Rica,’ he said. ‘Why do I feel this way around you?’ We laughed, we talked and we drank; him a hot chocolate which he criticised as not being thick enough in true Parisian style and me a thé noir, an order I didn’t have to remind him of. He remembered.

There would be no Costa Rica and I had no answers for his attempt to stroke my ego questions. I had absolutely no interest in anything other than catching up with someone I once shared a movie like romance with. Someone I cared about, with caution.

I call him the prince of Paris because this is how he is. I’m not one to stereotype, truly I’m not - but let’s say for a novel’s sake I was to cast our prince as the lead so I’m allowed to embellish. He would be of the very particular breed of man that resides in the 16th arrondissement of Paris.

If Paris was Pride and Prejudice the 16th is where Mr Darcy would live, or at least his wicked sisters when they were in town. Apartments are paid for by family money, entitlement to whatever they want runs in the veins of those who live in them and when they’re as handsome as our prince is, they usually get it. The desire that burns brightest is nothing more than to break free of mundane Parisian life constraints and feel alive.

Enter a lonely British writer visiting Paris for one month and our love story can begin.

I’m picking you up at 8:30, dress up.

I’ll be outside at 9, dress casual.

I’ll send a car for you, let me know when you’re ready.

These were the kinds of messages I’d receive on the nights we went out together. He dated exactly as I would date if I was a man, with the entire city at his fingertips or so it seemed as someone new to town. It was like he knew every route, secret corner and how to make it sparkle even brighter. All I had to do was show up and he’d take care of the rest. I admired his confidence and felt completely at ease in his hands often wondering what it must feel like to be him, what I’d do if I was him and how much fun I’d have. He blinded me at times, an almost perfect illusion.

In between our dates he’d send flowers to my apartment, hand delivered by bike. Roses. Red. ‘I just wanted to send you a little something,’ he’d say. I never knew what he was planning but I knew it would be magical. It was the intoxicating beginning of something unknown, free from all attachment and complications. He’d spin me around under the moonlit Marais and kiss me in the rain on our walks home. He worked in property and knew I had a thing for classic Parisian windows so he’d send me photos of the most beautiful apartments I’ve ever seen complete with a detailed description of what he wanted to do me in them, if I was free. His imagination was also admirable. We never got that far.

What did he reflect back to me? Which parts of myself that I felt I was lacking or too afraid to face? This is what they say we fall for in another. The possibilities of a new life I guess. The exotic. The adventurous. We were that to one another though to ourselves we were just ordinary us looking outside for what already lay within. Mirrors.

The prince and I were never in love. We had the makings of a love story but the essence was missing. He didn’t see me for who I was and I didn’t see him. True love can’t exist outside these soul merging terms. Our connection was built on fantasy, ego and attachment with a sprinkling of a desire to be truly known. ‘I’m just another character in your story,’ he said one night, pulling me in for a snuggle on his sofa. I wanted to correct him with an of course you’re not, but it wouldn’t be true. I lay speechless staring at the ceiling and thought, he’s right. I looked at his legs and for the first time noticed the shape of them, the curl of his hairs and how dark they were. I hadn’t seen him at all. I hadn’t even looked.

He wore an impenetrable veil I respected but kept a distance between us. There were flashes of vulnerability like when he told me how he’d written a poem in his own blood to a girl he loved back in primary school but she never loved him back. I think this was the moment I fell for him. He also told me about his ex girlfriend, who I decided he was still in love with, and how she came back every March. I liked the sound of her a lot.

Still, these shares were sparse, lacked any real emotional risk and felt laced with mist. You could never really know what he was thinking or feeling and even his eyes knew how to put on a show. We were sitting outside a cafe one evening and when he slipped away for a bathroom break a girl came over to me and said, ‘oh my god are you guys on a first date or something?’

‘No, why?’ I laughed. ‘It’s just the way he looks at you is incredible, he’s in love with you!’ She was British like me, in Paris on a girl’s trip for the weekend. I laughed again. ‘He’s French with a scorpio moon and that look has been perfected for a long time to get him exactly what he wants’. He came back and walked me to the car. She was seeing exactly what he wanted me to see, but I wasn’t falling for it. If I’m being honest I didn’t want to. The pain he could cause was too great of a risk.

I might have appeared to be playing hard to get, but what lay underneath was a need for reassurance. He’d complain I never messaged him first or suggested dates thinking it was a sign of disinterest. I needed him to prove himself before I could open my heart and that would take time.

Waiting at the open door of his apartment for me as always, he picked me up as soon as I reached the top of the stairs. This was our routine but tonight would be different in more ways than one. Mid marathon kissing session, I can’t remember how it came up but I told him it was his job to seduce me. What came next I’ll never forget.

‘I ordered the car. I made you dinner. Now it’s your job!’

That was it. Everything inside my body shut down. Lockdown. I froze. My core wound had been triggered. I felt used, bought and unseen. We had reached the point of reality, humanity and our foundation was nowhere near strong enough to survive what would be one of many conflicts if we were ever to blossom into something with roots.

I didn’t feel able to speak openly in the moment but eventually he messaged to ask what was wrong and I told him that I’d felt hurt by what he said and paid for. He said it was a joke. I didn’t find it funny and I didn’t feel I could unsee what I’d seen. His switch felt too real. Too sharp. And I felt too afraid. Our true selves had been revealed as is always the case sooner or later.

Maybe I was using him too. How could I expect him to show his true self when I wasn’t willing to show mine?

From here he disappeared. So much for all his begging for me to tell him how I really felt and if there was something wrong I should say. Even though we weren’t in love I still I felt rejected and struggled to let go of our connection. He returned a few months later but was very clear it would ‘only be fun’ between us now and he didn’t want to ‘do the restaurant thing.’ This felt worse than him not coming back at all. It was as if I’d been demoted and I found myself questioning if he ever really cared. I was just as clear that he’d hurt me once again and I didn’t want to see him in that way. We both moved on and our business remained unfinished somehow without any closure.

When I reflected on our relationship in his absence I’d think of the highs and glamourised romance of it all. Courtseying before I got in his smart car to make him laugh. Our drives all over Paris with him feeding me cigarettes and singing to me. We once circled the Place de la Bastille three times as he recited Justin Timberlake’s Señorita word for word. I laughed and he sang. I’d laugh more and he’d sing louder. It was pure movie romance, but it was also hollow. Once the high was over, I remembered how I’d stare out of the window and watch the lights of Paris blur, dissociating and feeling the loneliness you can’t escape when there’s a lack of true intimacy and vulnerability. I realised I’d been running, but we can only run from ourselves for so long. Eventually I would have to admit to myself what I really wanted and process the feelings I’d been too afraid to so I could set myself free, because only I could.

We shared an odd messaged over the next year or so and eventually reconnected but there had been a shift. I’d let go. I was no longer available for anything less than soulful, transformational love. I was living from a place of receiving, trusting and knowing my worth. To be in this kind of alignment is to know wholeness. There’s no lack. No need. I never chased him but I wasn’t about to start now either, nor was I going to settle for less than what I wanted and knew I deserved. A man who chose me, fully and consciously. It was a quiet but powerful realisation that there’s no going back to what once was. We can only move forwards, either together or apart.

My relationship with the prince felt so different now. I still cared for him deeply, but I didn’t need him to massage my not good enough without him wound or provide any kind of validation. I wasn’t the same person I was when I first arrived in Paris and I had no intention of ressurecting her. Superficial love wasn’t an option anymore. It didn’t excite me or interest me at all. Our energies were no longer aligned. There was no glue.

And what happened? Everything I’d previously wanted to happen, simply because I no longer needed it. This was when he became his most available to me, once I’d already let go. This was a test though, not a gift. The universe was showing me I’d broken the pattern from the inside out. I saw him so clearly now, not as a prince or the one but as part of my growth.

Our conversation was the most honest and open it had ever been. This last meeting was my favourite memory of us because we were so transparent and free. He wanted to tell me about the feedback he’d had from girls he’d dated after me. He said they’d all said he was too reactive. I asked him if his ex had come back on time in March again and he confirmed she had. He went on to say he felt overwhelmed when I decided to move to Paris and this was why he created distance. I told him he wasn’t the only person I was seeing so he needn’t have and he said the same. We laughed again. It was effortless, present and free from past hurts. Most importantly it was pure. This felt the closest to a real kind of love we’d ever been. There were no false pretenses.

When he asked me to come back to his place, I politely declined knowing there was nothing waiting for me there. It was easy to honour what we shared without resentment this way. Compassion was neatly tied up in closure. I’d always respected his path and choices without feeling the need to change them, even when it hurt. He was who he was and I accepted him for that. Still, this acceptance didn’t mean I was going to sacrifice my values or desires. Those I was entitled to and I knew that fully. I left feeling grateful; for the experience, the growth and the lesson.

Walking home to what I now consider my part of town, a little kingdom of my own, I felt lighter. Unbound. There’s no more waiting I thought, no wishing - just trust and openness that what is right will find me at exactly the right time. As cliche as it felt for a writer, all I could think as I walked away from him was I’d outgrown my prince - and I was ready for my king.

What patterns are you ready to release? What version of love do you refuse to settle for?

Lots of love

Jessica xxx

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