Alex’s parents arrived in Grenoble during the last week of her program, four days before she was set to leave. Everything in her bubbled up when she saw them standing on the fourth platform of the train station: the heartbreak, the broken spirit. They saw it on her face, too. As soon as her exam was done on that final Friday, the family caught a train out of Grenoble within two hours of the program’s completion. “Are you sure you don’t want to stay the last night to say goodbye to your friends and host mom? Do you really wanna rush out like this?” Her mother had questioned. Yes, she did want to rush out of Grenoble in this manner– she'd been waiting weeks for that very moment: departure. 

The departure from Grenoble has led to something even more glorious– a departure from France. A one-way flight back to the United States. Tomorrow, June 26th. One of the first burdens that fell off her shoulders after breaking up with Jones was the fact that she no longer had plans the night of June 26th. Rather than playing pretend a second longer, when she got back to the United States, she could just be. Broken, exhausted, confused, alone. Alone, alone, alone. Nothing about it felt scary, and everything about it felt promising. For girls like Alex, there’s a certain clinical satisfaction in seeing just how bad things can get. The rigid floor of rock bottom feels oddly comforting beneath her head– it feels like a place she could get used to. 

On her final day in France, she and her family rose at an unreasonably late time, borne from jet lag and mental exhaustion, and took the Metro to the busily populated Seventh Arrondissement. On Rue de l’Université, Alex and her younger sister took pictures in front of the Eiffel Tower, posing and smiling like she couldn’t be happier to be in the most beautiful, most romantic place in the world—the City of Love, they say. 

The day drags on with the same velocity her time in Grenoble did, limping and bleeding from internal blisters all the way home. She wonders how many steps and miles it takes to turn it all off, finally and indefinitely. Past Champs de Mars, Alex walks ahead of her family, leading the way down streets branded into her mind. Crossing the river on Pont d’Iena, human traffic packs people body to body on the sidewalk, vendors crying for money and attention, telling them they look so beautiful, and would they like to get their picture taken? Eventually, they make it to Love Lock Bridge, where all the lover girls go to mourn. Amazement and romance encapsulate Alex’s sister as she draws up optimistic, promising prophecies for each of the heart-shaped, paint-faded padlocks chained forever to Pont des Arts. Mentally, Alex decides only about 40% of these relationships are still together, the lock they left behind nothing but a delusional half-commitment. Neither of them knows it yet, but in September, the City of Paris will remove the locks due to the sheer weight of metal put on the bridge. Today, stainless steel promises lie in a wicker basket belonging to the River Seine, not unlike a diamond ring sitting in a pawn shop.

Though, on June 25, 2023, the world spins despite Alex’s reluctance to move on, move forward, move away. Street artists sit, their minds so encapsulated in the present moment that Alex’s contagious melancholy floats above them like a ghost with no one to haunt. 

That day on the Love Lock Bridge, Alex took off the ring Jones gave her for their one-year anniversary, promising to trade it for an engagement ring when the time was right because she was the love of his life, he claimed. She took off the necklace he gave her for their first Christmas together. The wind blowing in her hair, fatal promises feeling like a two-year manic episode, she threw them both off the side of the bridge, watching commitments fade into lies. “I’ll never leave,” she told him. Never mind, she thought. The ring and the necklace fade into the smooth waters of the Seine, gone before she could even catch a glint of the London Blue Topaz dip its toes into the lukewarm June water. 

After the nightmare of Grenoble, and the fallout of that night at the Mako Disco, Jones isn’t more than a second thought anymore. Alex’s life became so intertwined with the atrocities she couldn't escape, and that she’ll never forget, that not even a second could be spared on grieving the heartbreak. Hey, she thinks to herself, here’s a part of my life he’ll never get to know about. I’ve become a person he no longer recognizes. People always told her, “study abroad– it’ll change your life!” And she’s changed, for better or for worse. It’ll take time to figure out which side of it she’s landed on.