A Place I've Never Been by David Leavitt Page B

school. In Paris I’d get postcards from Ibiza, from Barcelona, where he’d had his passport stolen, from Florence (this one showing a close-up of the
David
’s genitalia), and he would talk about Nils, Rutger, and especially Nino, whom he’d met in the men’s room at the train station. I enjoyed his postcards. They provided a much-needed connection with my old life, my pre-Paris self. Things were not going well with Laurent, who, it had taken me only a few days to learn, lived in a state of continuous and deep depression. He would arrive afternoons in my apartment, silent, and land in the armchair, where for hours, his eyes lowered, he would read the Tintin books I kept around to improve my French, and sometimes watch
Les Quatres Fantastiques
on television. The candy-colored cartoon adventures of Tintin, androgynous boy reporter, kept him busy until it was nearly time for him to go to work, at which point I would nudge my way into his lap and say, “
Qu’est-ce que c’est?
I want to help you.” But all he would tell me was that he was depressed because he was losing his car. His aunt, who owned it, was takingit back, and now he would have to ride the train in to work every day, and take a cab back late at night. I suggested he might stay with me, and he shook his head. “
La petite Marianne
,” he reminded me. Of course.
La petite Marianne
.
    I think now that in continually begging Laurent to tell me what was worrying him, it was I who pushed him away. My assumption that “talking about it” or “opening up” was the only way for him to feel better was very American, and probably misguided. And of course, my motives were not, as I imagined, entirely unselfish, for at the heart of all that badgering was a deep fear that he did not love me, and that that was why he held back from me, refused to tell me what was wrong. Now I look back on Laurent’s life in those days, and I see he probably wasn’t hiding things from me. He probably really was depressed because he was losing his car, though that was only the tip of the iceberg. His fragile mother depended on him totally, his father was nowhere to be seen, his future, as a literature student at a second-rate university, was not rosy. It is quite possible, I see now, that in his sadness it was comforting for him simply to be in my presence, my warm apartment on a late afternoon, reading Tintin books, drinking tea. But I wasn’t content to offer him just that. I wanted him to notice me. I wanted to be his cure. I wish I’d known that then; I might not have driven him off.
    In any case, I was very happy when Craig finally came to visit, that summer, because it meant I would have something to occupy my time other than my worrisome thoughts about Laurent. It was late July by then, and the prospect of August, when Paris empties itself of its native population and becomes a desiccated land of closed shops, wandered by aimless foreigners, was almost sufficiently unappealing to send me back to business school. In ten days Laurent would quit his job and take off to the seaside with his mother.There was no mention of my possibly going with him, though I would have gladly done so, and could imagine with relish staying by myself in a little pension near the big, elegant hotel where Laurent and his mother went every year, going for tea and sitting near them on the outdoor promenade, watching them, waiting for Laurent’s wink. There would be secret rendezvous, long walks on beaches—but it was all a dream. Laurent would have been furious if I’d shown up.
    And so I was happily looking forward to Craig, to the stories I knew he’d tell, the sexual exploits he’d so willingly narrate, and in such great detail. I met his train at the Gare de Lyon. There he was, on schedule, in alpine shorts and Harvard T-shirt, the big ubiquitous backpack stooping him over. We embraced, and took the métro back to my