Flying home

My Dad organizes tickets for me to come home every Christmas. Most years, I fly back to France on Dec 30, arriving the morning of Dec 31. The Boy and I have managed to flee Paris after my arrival by taking trains to Brussels and Amsterdam each year.

This year, I found out that I'll be flying back on Dec 31, arriving in France on Jan 1. It's not a big deal, but I felt a little bad about leaving the Boy all alone with nobody to kiss (I hope!) on New Year's Eve.

When I went in to the living room to tell him, he said, "What? I thought we had a year!"

Confused, I looked at him like he was crazy and he repeated, "You told me that was in a year."

"What are you talking about? I said I'll come back to France on New Year's Day, so we won't get to do New Year's together," I said, trying to clarify in some way or another.

Suddenly he understood. "Ohhhh..." he said, "I thought you were leaving for good."

Beat.

"No," I answered. "That is in a year. I'm just talking about going home for Christmas."

Beat again.

"When you put it that way," I said, "New Year's seems very trivial."

"Yeah," he answered, sort of to himself. "I've started thinking about your leaving a lot... It makes me so unhappy."

My eyes had already started brimming with tears, but I just looked away. Then we hugged and he said, "Hey, can you help me with this? There's something I don't understand..." and he went on to show me some internet problem.

But you know? For some reason that was very touching. He has never said anything that emotional to me, ever.

On another note, do you think they'll hand out champagne on the New Year's Eve flight? What a strange way to bring in 2005.