One Night Stand

His Story

"Do you remember the night we had a fight and you stormed off in the middle of it? When you returned home the next afternoon looking all beat up and exhausted?" Dianne asked.

André gulped. "What about it?"

"I never asked you where you went. Do you think I don't know?" Dianne said slowly.

André turned to face her, "What do you mean?"

"Don't pretend to not understand!" Dianne screamed, "I'm not blind. You have a mistress, don't you? Who's she? WHO. IS. SHE?"

Ever since that night - the night that had destroyed their marriage, scarred it pergaps forever - ever since that night, it was the fIrst time André saw Dianne loose her cool. She screamed and wailed and clutched at his sleeve, begging, "Answer me, André! Qui est-elle? Je vais la tuer!"

"Dianne! There is no one!" André tried to calm her but she was unconsolable. She was in one of her fits and nothing could bring her out to reason. André ended up holding her hands tightly between his own to prevent her from scratching herself and said, "Stop it, Dianne. I wouldn't stoop that low, you know I wouldn’t. I don't have a mistress."

Perhaps it was his voice that was not convincing enough. Or perhaps it was just feminine intuition but Dianne gave a weak smile and said in a strained voice, "You're going to leave me, aren't you, chéri? You're going to leave me for her just because I couldn't give you a child."

***

André Felix Dufort had been born in the town of Marseilles in France. His father had been a clerk while his mother was a nurse. They never had much but they always had enough. André had grown up in an atmosphere of love and care. Being the only child, he was pampered and spoiled and made to believe he could have anything he wanted. He grew up into a boy with few regards for the feelings of others and feeling superior to everyone. He was selfish and possesive and in lay terms, a complete brat.

From a very young age André had shown an exceptional interest and flair for drama. When his parents enrolled him in St. Claire's School of Arts, he threw a tantrum as to why they didn't admit him into Frances Academy, known for producing exceptional actors. His parents tried in vain to explain that they weren't rich enough to afford such a school.

He berated them for it day and night until on the way to school, he saw HER working in a flower shop with her mother.

Dianne had been the most beautiful child in the family. She had beautiful eyes, soft brown curls that flowed over her shoulder and frail, delicate hands that danced through the flowers like butterflies as she seperated them.

The day André saw her, she was wearing a pale blue frock, her hair lying loose and holding a bouquet of snow white lilies. He knew then and there that this was the girl he was going to marry.

He watched her everyday, never having the courage to approach her until one day, she looked at him...and smiled.

Emboldened, André made his way to the shop and fumbled, "How - how much are these?" He asked pointing at the lilies.

The girl seemed to find his stammering funny and she laughed and said, "I see you standing there everyday. Don't you have anywhere else to be?"

"Not right now," André said and scoffed at himself for being so plain and boring. "I - I'm André."

"Dianne," the girl smiled.

"Don't you go to school?" André asked.

"I'm home schooled."

"Do you spend your entire day in the shop?"

"I like being among flowers. They make the atmosphere really peaceful."

"Will you go out with me?"

"No," Dianne laughed.

"Why?" André asked, heartbroken.

"My parents won't allow me to," she said.

"Then will you wait for me here?" André asked hopefully.

"Everyday," she promised.

From then onwards, he stopped to talk to her everyday. They shared their joy and sorrow, their dreams and tribulations. She would always wait at the counter with a lily in her hand, her eyes constantly scanning the crowd for him.

In the month of June, the rains fell heavy. A chill set into the air and people rarely left their houses unless it was absolutely necessary.

On that day, Dianne still stood at the counter with a lily, though she doubted he would come. She waited for an hour before she finally spotted him rushing through the rain.

"You didn't have to come," she said.

"I had to give you this," he said and laid a single white lily in her hand. The White Lily of the Valley that blossomed only in the rain.

Dianne smiled and that was the day André received his first kiss. It was Dianne who changed him for the better. She was a simple flower girl and her graceful innocence was something André wanted to protect forever. As the years passed, André's flair for acting became evident.

He took part in several plays and dramas and never returned home emptyhanded. In his senior year, he began to make a clean sum by doing small roles in major plays. But André's dreams were bigger than that. At 17, André had his sights firmly set on Hollywood. He joined an English class to learn the language and worked harder than anyone there.

His parents, proud of their son, encouraged him in every possible way.

In the spring that André graduated, he asked Dianne's parents for her hand in marriage. They refused stating that his dreams were wild and he had no stable income.

For the first time in her life Dianne opposed her parents and said she would marry him and no other and she was willing to wait if that's what it took.

When André asked her to go to the US with her, Dianne hesitated.

"I can't leave here, Andy. Marseilles is my home," she said.

"We can make any place our home as long as we're together," André said. But he himself knew he was asking something impossible of her. Dianne was a simple girl, born and bred in a small town. She had seen nothing of the world. She had no big dreams or ambitions; she didn't care for riches or fame. Her only dream was to continue working in her mother's flower shop, be a good wife and eventually a good mother.

"Andy, America is a completely different place with a different culture. It is a place for the rich and famous, the sophisticated and glamorous. Someone like me could never fit in," she said.

"That is why I need you there," André said, "I need simplicity in my life when I'm there. I need to be reminded of Marseilles and its rain and the woman it gave me."

Eventually, Dianne agreed. They both came to the US in the fall next year and got married in a small church in Susexx. But it soon became evident that the US was nothing like France. Glam and glitter lived side by side with poverty. They struggled to make ends meet and Dianne balanced 3 jobs to fuel André's dreams. Sometimes she wondered if she made the right choice, if she chose the right man. But when André returned home and took her in his arms, it all felt worth it.

For the first 4 years, André had to beg for jobs from directors. They spent several nights on the streets, even being mugged once. Everytime Dianne wanted to curl up and cry at the normal life in the France that they could have had, André assured her he would try even harder.

Finally his hardwork paid off and he was offered a role in a Broadway musical. His exceptional talent was instantly recognized and he became a star almost overnight. Things changed drastically for the couple as André grabbed every oppurtunity to climb higher and higher the success ladder.

In the 6th year of their marriage, Dianne announced that she was pregnant. André's happiness knew no bounds and he threw a lavish party for all his friends, even inviting their parents from France who were now proud of their famous son-in-law.

In her sixth month, André returned home to find Dianne crying over the sink.

"Dianne! What happened?" He asked worrriedly. Her eyes were red and puffy and her beautiful face seemed to have aged years.

"I - I, oh André, promise me you won't hate me!" She hugged him close and wailed into his chest.

"Chéri, I could never hate you. What's the matter?" He asked.

"I - the doctor said I had a miscarriage," she sobbed. André stiffened. No, he kept thinking. This can't be happening.

But he pulled her close and said, "That's okay. We can try again."

Dianne slowly shook her head and said, "André, I - I can't get pregnant."

And in that one statement, André felt his world crumble to pieces.

"Do you hate me now?" Dianne asked. "I'm a disgrace as a woman." André hushed her with a kiss and told her that if anyone could ever embody feminity, it was her.

In the coming months, André resigned himself to the fact that it would be just the two of them forever, unless they decided to adopt. But nothing changed the fact that he loved Dianne.

Until she began to change.

It was slow and steady. Slow enough for André to not notice at first.

It began with her buying expensive dresses, insisting on holding parties and gatherings, spending thousands on beauty treatments, spas and saunas. Dianne had always been a simple girl. Simply beautiful, simply elegant. In a world coated over with layers of facades, it was her frankness and sincerity that André had fallen in love with. But as a woman, her inability to have kids was something that would haunt her forever.

She began to think of herself as less than other woman. She began to think that André no longer wanted her now that she could not fulfill her maritial duty. She began to believe that the women of New York with their glossy skin and flat stomachs was what André would soon turn to, and she couldn't bear the thought of losing him.

So she tried her best to imitate them, their stance, their voice, their drawl. She spent more and more on herself, turning herself into exactly what André didn't want - a plastic girl.

She insisted on having a seperate bedroom, tried mixing with all sorts of high class women and attended all the exclusive parties. André wanted Dianne to be the reminder of all the beautiful things he had left behind in France. He didn't want her to change. But she did.

Slowly, as a night darkening, a rift came into their blissful marriage. They spoke less and barely of anything deeper than the weather. They rarely made love anymore and André found the woman he loved lost in the crowd of New York City. He would forever regret his decision of moving to the States.