Twelve Red Roses (a Tom Hiddleston fanfic)

Chapter 18- One Last Dance

"Then let's just stroll around downtown. Go into the first interesting store or building we see," he suggests.

I smile. "Sounds like a plan."

~

So that's exactly what we do. We take a small, leisurely walk down the streets, just chatting and seeing and acting like normal tourists. But I felt like more than just a normal tourist. With Tom, I felt like those couples in movies who just walk around in towns, getting to know each other and slowly falling in love, until the sun went down, and the talking gets more intense, and they kiss, and happily ever after. Okay, maybe I didn't feel like we were even relatively close to couples in movies. We weren't a couple. I can't say that I can throw a witty joke like Tom can. And instead of being on the streets of Paris at Midnight, we're just in Missouri at about two in the afternoon. There were plenty of faults in this reality.

"Have you ever been to Paris?" I ask.

"I actually have, for a bit of filming. Why do you ask?"

"I don't know," I answer with a light shrug. "It just seems like a fun place to be. I mean, I hear plenty of people say Paris isn't as cool as films and books make it seem, but I hear even more people say it's a wonderful place. I'd like to go there someday. Just to see it with my own eyes."

"Let me take you."

"What?"

"We can go together," he says, smiling as he looks at me. "Our adventure doesn't have to end here, Cass. I'll even pay for you ticket."

"No, my ticket isn't the problem, Thomas, I can pay for my own ticket. The problem here is that I can't travel with you any more after this. You're not my 'travel buddy'. I'm sorry. I just... I can't rely on you to do that when you have such an important career to go to. You're too busy to take a stranger to Paris."

He's frowning now. "I've told you before, you're more than that to me. It would be an honor to get to travel to Paris with you. Can't you just imagine it, Cass? There's dancing, and lights, and... and beautiful places and people. It's a fantastic place. It's a place I'd want to go with you. Only you."

"That's incredibly sweet of you, and I'm very honored, but I cannot accept your offer," I say.

He licks his lips lightly, as if choosing his next words carefully. "Okay," he finally says. "I respect your choice."

"Thank you... I respect you for respecting my choice."

He just smiles, already attempting to put it behind us

"But, before we move on from the subject completely... How much dancing? And how is the food there?"

He smiles even wider. "Tons of dancing. Every night if you visit a bar, there's dancing. And it's not always modern dancing. You'd have fun there, Cass. And the food is incredible. Some of it is spendy, but it is so worth it. The trick is to go to some of the older bars, where sometimes on certain nights, the waitresses still dress as if it's the twenties again. Some customers even dress like that, too. They even have parties that are themed in the twenties."

"I have a feeling part of that city still wishes to live in the golden ages," I say lightly, grinning.

"Oh, yeah. But can you blame them, really? I would have loved to go back to the twenties, even just for one night."

"Me, too," I say with a sigh. A longing sort of sigh, thinking about Paris is the twenties. When Ernest Hemingway and Scott Fitzgerald and Pablo Picasso could pass you on the streets at any moment. Oh, what a time to be alive. A time when dancing and drinking and kissing was welcome, but women were still much more modest than they are now. A time when instead of sending a girl a picture of you shirtless in a bathroom mirror, you asked her to dance, and then out to dinner. A time when writers and artists from all over came to Paris, thinking all would be better and they could find their muse and talent and inspiration in the City of Lights.