Again, But Better(34)
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We spent forty-five minutes walking from the Louvre to the Eiffel Tower. Now it looms over us, dark and daunting. While the four of us are gazing up in awe, a man wearing a winter hat and puffy jacket walks up to us with a giant metal ring threaded with oodles of tiny Eiffel Tower replicas.
“Five, one Euro?” he asks anxiously. We just stare for a moment. “Five for one Euro?” he repeats.
“No, thanks,” Babe answers. The man hurries away to a new group of tourists.
“Ready to scale this thing?” Pilot beams.
“Let’s do it!” I cheer. After climbing the Vatican, I want to climb all the things.
“Yo, heights freak me out, but I guess I’m down to climb, ’cause how often am I in freaking Paris,” Chad comments.
Babe looks from Chad (who’s paler than usual) to Pilot to me. “I don’t think I really want to—Chad, I thought you’d want to take the elevator. I’d really rather take the elevator,” Babe says, turning to him.
“Come on, Babe, let’s do the steps. When do you get to climb the Eiffel Tower?” he whines.
Babe frowns and stares upward for a moment before her gaze drops to me. I nod at her encouragingly. She heaves a giant sigh and mildly rolls her eyes.
“Fine.”
“Yay! To the stairs!” I exclaim.
Minutes later, we’re at the base of another never-ending staircase. I hurl myself upward, taking the steps two at a time, leading the way, Pilot climbing at my heels. Three hundred and twenty-eight steps later, we make it to the first tier of the tower. We spend a few minutes snapping pictures, leaning against the wire fencing, and admiring the view.
Babe heaves a sigh. “Okay, guys, I’m going to take the elevator the rest of the way.” She looks at Chad expectantly.
“Okay,” he answers, oblivious to her obvious hinting that she wants him to come with her.
“Chad, can you come with me, please?” Babe asks pointedly.
“Oh, um.” He sighs. “Yeah, sure.”
“Thanks.” Babe looks at us. “We’ll meet you guys at the bottom!” They walk off into an indoor area.
I look over at Pilot and raise my eyebrows.
“And then there were two.” He smiles at me again.
“Ready to head for the top?” I squeak.
“Am I ready? Please, Shane.” He smirks, striding toward the next set of stairs.
A sign lets us know we have 341 steps till the next tier. We climb in silence for a few minutes, our feet against the metal providing the soundtrack to our ascent.
“So, I’ve been pondering that back-in-time question,” Pilot says out of nowhere.
I grin in surprise. “Oh yeah? And?”
“And I like your Constitution idea. I think I’ll hit that one up with you and sit in on that meeting.”
“Oh cool, I’ll have a buddy to back up my I’m-a-man charade. You can jump in and be like, ‘No, I grew up in his town, he’s legit. Listen to all his genius, forward-thinking ideas,’ when they accuse me of female-ery!”
Pilot smiles at the ground, and we continue up. “Have you cemented a second choice?” he asks.
“Uh.” I look anywhere but his face because I’m blushing. “Yeah, I think I’ll hit up that Beatles concert with you.”
He looses a breathy laugh. “Damn, when we find this time machine, it’s on.” I laugh too, releasing some of my pent-up giddiness.
The wind whips at my cheeks, throwing my hair around as we step up onto the second tier. Pilot and I find a spot and lean against the protective grating that encases the area. In New York City, I’ve looked out from the windows of tall buildings at an endless sea of gray skyscrapers. Rome was a chaotic explosion of reds and burgundies. Paris … Paris looks like a painting. A work of art that was carefully laid out and organized to look beautiful from every angle.
“This … is so cool.” The words fall softly from Pilot’s mouth. The wind is loud; I only hear him because we’re standing shoulder to shoulder. Chills run over my arms. Pilot pivots around, and I bounce nervously on my heels as he stops the first person who walks by. “Hey, could you take a picture of us?”
He wants a picture of us? A white-haired woman takes the camera from my outstretched hand, and we pose, smiling next to each other, his arm at my back, against the edge of the Eiffel Tower.
As the woman returns the camera, Pilot turns to me, excited again. “To the top?”
“To the top!” I cheer, new energy zipping through me. Who knows what will happen when we reach the top—it’s just the two of us and I don’t know. I feel good about getting to the top together. It feels like things are … possible.
We circle the tier, eager for the next set of steps, but end up back where we started.
My smile wilts. “Is there no other staircase?”
“What the heck?” Pilot’s expression falls.
We venture inside to ask someone. It turns out you can only take the elevator to the very top, and today even that route is closed due to high winds. As if to prove a point, an aggressive spool of freezing air rams into us as we exit back out through the doors. My mental list of romantic reaching-the-top-of-the-Eiffel-Tower-together fantasies spins away on the breeze.