Everyone who has graduated from their college education, or any other kind for that matter, can remember the feelings that come with that day. Rashness, overconfident feelings, you’re ready to take on the world without fear. With your degree behind glass on your wall and the tassel from your hat hanging from the rearview mirror of your car, you wonder what comes next. You cannot sit still, always planning, applying, taking care of this and that and idleness becomes uncomfortable. Your free time is spent usually on the move somewhere; out for a semi-drunken drive perhaps with a friend-- it was in this situation that I planned the rest of my days.

The aforementioned friend I have known since my first year at the University in Paris. I had come from a small rural village, the last of my family just passed away, and I knew not a soul in the entire city. Whilst attending a class on anatomy toward the end of another vigorous yet lonely day, during a particularly boring lecture, the girl assigned to sit next to me struck up a low conversation. It lasted; after class we continued our talk until we were forced to part ways, yet we thought to exchange information before we left, and it paid off. She called me that evening and since, we have been inseparable. You may be thinking to yourself that we had a romantic connection of some sort, yet this is not the case.

My friend, Josaine Simoneau, a rather fiery, independent blonde-headed woman, was already engaged in any case, to a man in the Business academy who she had met years before me. I would not have been interested in her even had she been available; women are not of my romantic taste. And after our graduation, followed within days by her wedding, we began to put into action a plan that we’d toyed with for all our college years: to start our own veterinary clinic.

We’d both graduated with honors with degrees in veterinary medicine, and the pay and availability for jobs in our field was at a low. We did not lose hope, however, as a particular town struck us as more than perfect. A costal town in the process of rebuilding, since its abandonment during the War, called Lorient.

After doing the necessary paperwork and obtaining our permission to practice medicine independently, we gathered loans to buy the building (placing it under Josaine’s name, as she could obtain higher tax deductions for having a family as well). It was a definite renovation project, a former diner near the main street intersection in the town. We were to be the only veterinarians in town, and many thanked us in advance, weary of driving for even up to an hour to take their animal to seek medical care.

So we picked up our lives and moved to Lorient, setting up our new workplace when we began to wonder where we would obtain employees. Still scrounging by on odd-end jobs such as retail, I formulated our plan-- she would return to Paris to begin a recruiting operation, and I would go to a highly regarded technical school in Belgium.

That’s how I fell in love.

At the time, I was twenty-four years of age, an overconfident medical school graduate with nothing on his mind but the best possible ways to achieve success in Josaine’s and my undertakings. And he was only fourteen, a painfully shy first-year veterinary assistance student at this large school, by the name of Alden le Vella.

I sense you pulling away from me at the difference of our ages. Dear reader, I assure you I am not a pedophile of any sort, I was not attracted to Alden because he was so young. It was something else.

When I first saw him, he was shuffling through the lobby where my recruitment table was set up, staring at a piece of paper in his hand and occasionally lifting his head only to look at the guiding signs on the walls-- no doubt searching for his classroom. Hair the color of wheat somewhat concealed his eyes when his head was lowered enough, the ends of his locks just at his ears. And when I saw his eyes, they were so brilliant, so emerald, so like those of an immortal angel that he could have been fourteen or forty, and I would not have known or cared the difference. He was small, smaller than most of the others around his age. And beyond beautiful.

I prayed, oh I prayed so deeply in my mind that he was French, for not only could we communicate, we could understand each other on a level that foreigners cannot comprehend. My mind also begged my heart to restrain itself, for of course, I have my limits when it comes to morals. In hopes of gaining his attention somehow, I tapped my pen loudly on the clipboard at the opposite end of the table when the lobby area was momentarily low in traffic, and my tactic paid off. The young man startled, looking about him in a discombobulated fashion before his beautiful eyes read over the sign just above my head, “Post-Graduation Opportunities for Veterinary Assistants”.

Here I discovered the most fortunate thing about him in relation to me, his field of study. Immediately he came to my table, in a half-prancing manner, a friendly yet timid smile on his face. I felt my body tense, but my heart soared.

“Bonjour, Monsieur,” the blonde said to me, his voice soft and trembling with shyness.

“Bonjour,” I replied, my hand tightening on the edge of the table, attempting to repress these instincts I felt toward him-- the wish to hold him in my arms, kiss his youthful hand, and plead with him to be mine. “Are you interested in our program?”

“Oui.” he brought his hands in front of him, holding his books securely to his chest. “I’m a first-year, and I’m studying to be a veterinary assistant.”

Suddenly remembering my lines, I stood up, putting my hand out in a friendly gesture. The blonde fervidly took it, his hand was so small in comparison to mine I was almost shaking his arm. “Then you’re already qualified, Monsieur...” I trailed, waiting for the angel before me to complete my statement.

“Le Vella, Alden le Vella. You can just call me Alden.”

A name constructed from words in some divine language, I have no doubt. “Enchanté, bien sûr. Doctor Jean-Jácques D’Auteuil.” At length, I released his hand, ending the lovely contact we were sharing, to my heart’s dismay. “I’m recruiting people just like you for a new clinic opening up in France, in a town called Lorient, on the coast.”

Alden’s eyes lit up, and I felt my heart nearly skip a beat whilst I witnessed his excitement. “That sounds like a great place to work. As much as I like it here in Belgium, I don’t think I want to pursue my career here. I want to return to France as soon as I graduate anyway.”

“You are from France natively, then?” I asked, hopeful.

He gave a nod. “Born in Chamonix. My parents just moved to Tibet this year, and I didn’t want to go with them. As much as I feel devotion to Buddha and His Holiness the Dalai Lama, France is my home. But this school was offering the best program, so my stay here in Antwerp is only temporary.”

“Fascinating,” I honestly remarked. “You seem like just the type we’re looking for. My colleague, the clinic owner, is recruiting in Paris right now. It’s just going to be a small clinic, we’re running it ourselves, and in a small town, so we don’t need very many people. In truth, we’re just getting two each...” I nudged my clipboard towards him. “S’il te plaît, just sign up and give me your contact information, and we’ll be able to schedule advisement sessions and get you on the right track to work for us.”

Setting down his heavy books, Alden cheerfully took up the clipboard and pen, filling out a line on the form. He was honestly the first person to show interest in the clinic that day, and my heart continued to hope he would remain interested.

“The only thing I’m worried about is the city itself, Jean-Jácques,” Alden told me in his more relaxed tone, “It was abandoned during the war, no?”

“It was,” I confirmed.

“Is it, well... a very safe place now? I’ve heard some things about Lorient.”

Don’t worry, I wanted to say. No matter what’s there, I will protect you from it. I won’t ever let anything happen to you, my divine one. “Oh, it’s not true, whatever they’re saying. My colleague is going to raise her family there. Things have calmed down since the war, all those unsavory types have gone somewhere else. It’s a quiet place now, very restful.”

And I’d have to be dead to let anyone bring you to harm.

“Okay.” Alden seemed reassured. Yet as he set the clipboard down, I noticed a strange mark, a scarring of sorts on his right hand-- several of them in fact, mainly on the back of his hand and the thumb.

I gestured to it. “What happened to your hand... if you do not mind my asking.”

“This?” he asked, pulling up his sleeve to reveal the scars were partially down his wrist as well. “Well, when I was young, I had some cheese in my hand, or something, and a stray dog jumped into our family’s backyard and attacked me.” The blonde’s voice was almost disturbing, telling me his traumatic story as calmly as the time of day.

I lowered my eyebrows slightly. “You’re sure you want to become a veterinary assistant?”

Alden gave a low bemused laughing. “Of course I am sure. It wasn’t entirely the dog’s fault, you know. Instinct and hunger, it’s common among animals to fight food away from those weaker than them when they’re desperate. If you’re asking if I’m traumatized or something from it, I’m not. I was too young to remember it very well anyway.”

“Well, if you’re sure,” I conceded, looking over the information he’d written out for me, in handwriting more beautiful than illuminated manuscript. “This is all I need. I’ll be sure to call you within a week to set up an appointment, and if you stick with us in a month or so, you’ll be meeting my colleague. You’ll like her, she’s a very headstrong woman and I guarantee she’ll take good care of her employees, but she’ll expect a lot from you.”

“That’s the kind of employer I look for,” he said, gathering his books into his arms once more and glancing over his schedule. “I’d best be going, I have to get to Biochemistry. It was good to meet you, Jean-Jácques!”

“I look forward to our next meeting,” I called back, as the blonde trotted away, looking not unlike a spirit defying gravity.

Once he was far enough away I gave a low heartsick sound, sinking into my chair with a strange quivering feeling all about my body and heart. “More than you can know... at least now.”