we left our secrets by the Eiffel Tower

Once upon a time, a Finn, a Mexican-American and a Korean drifted around  the streets of Paris ...

They had spent the last few weeks drifting around a tiny French village, working and trying to learn French, watching TV and playing ping-pong in an attic room, eating fruit straight off the trees in the garden, feeding stray cats and taking long walks along the narrow country lanes between wheat fields and hamlets. There had been adventures as well: entering a field guarded by a hostile stallion, hiding in a ditch one dark night and spying on a crazy stranger, hitch-hiking to the next village which was rumoured to have a crêperie.

These were lazy summer days when the definition of happiness was to find a good plum tree, sit underneath it and eat its fruit while discussing typical dog names in different cultures. The Korean was in love with the Finn, the Finn was in love with life, the Mexican was in love with God.

And then, there was Paris, and their last days together. 

It was miles and miles of walking, giggling in the Louvre, having a picnic by Pont Neuf, trying on the most expensive perfumes on Champs d'Elysées, napping on the lawn at Versailles one hot afternoon, making new friends at the youth hostel, sneaking into government buildings just because they looked like palaces, discussing God at the altar of Sacré-Coeur, listening to jazz in Montmartre ...

The last night, a balmy August midnight, they sat in the darkness underneath the Eiffel tower. "Let's tell each other our darkest secrets," the Mexican said. "Because we will never see each other again."

So they did.