Dommage…

I have a story to tell you.

You may have heard it before.

It was one of the first warm, sunny days in Paris this year. I’ve been waiting for it, desperately, since moving here in January. I wasn’t about to waste it. I spent the day wandering the streets of my new neighborhood, coffee and croissant in hand, passing quaint little shops and tripping on uneven cobblestones. It’s the kind of day you dream about when you picture life in Paris.

I came home to a glowing, sun-filled apartment, cranked up my old playlist from college and started getting ready for a party later that evening. I planned my outfit carefully - girls night was ‘Coachella’ themed. I pulled on my most boho white skirt, an embellished belt and my favorite boots. After a few minutes on Pinterest, I tied a scarf through my hair, slipped in my AirPods, and headed out.

It wasn’t a long metro ride but it was a Saturday night in Paris so the cars filled up fast. I claimed a seat just inside the door, pulled my purse in close and started scrolling on my phone. At the next stop, I was jostled by the usual pushes and pulls of people filing in and out. A man with a carry-on suitcase squished onto the seat next to me.

As the metro lurched forward, he slid in his seat, pinning me against the arm rest. He looked at me in apology and shifted in his seat again. I waved it off. He rested his hand on his thigh so that the back of it grazed my knee. I kept my eyes on my phone. The metro lurched again, the back of his hand pressed into my thigh. I crossed one knee over the other, angling myself away, trying to carve out space that wasn’t there. He caught the eye of a man standing across from us and they laughed, shrugging. He slid his hand up his own thigh, dragging the hem of my skirt along with it.

I cleared my throat and switched my legs. He looked at me again and apologized. But his hand didn’t move. He and his friend carried on a conversation that I couldn’t follow. He didn’t look at me again, he never flipped his hand. But the back of it stayed glued to my thigh, my skirt pinned under it.

As the metro pulled into Châtelet, he spoke to me.

“C’est Châtelet?” [is this Châtelet?] 

I nodded.

“Tu descends ici?” [Are you getting off here?]

I shook my head.

He stood, and bent down until he was at eye level, leaning in towards me, “Dommage…” [A shame...]

And he and his friend carried their suitcase off the metro.

Is this really a story?

There’s no real narrative arc, no action, no suspense, no climax. Unless you have the same story. And every woman I know does.

I wanted to share this story for a few reasons. Partly because writing is how I make sense of things. Even as it was happening, I struggled to fully register it, to understand it. It felt so subtle, so easy to question, to excuse, to wonder if it was really happening. But that’s part of it. This is how it happens. These experiences are common, almost expected. It’s a way of behaving that men have learned is normal, or at least excusable.

I hope that sharing a story like this, ordinary as it may seem, can make other stories like it a little more difficult to ignore.