Unrequited Love

Earlier this month I took the train to San Francisco for the Romance Writers of America’s annual conference. I love the train. It’s a laid back and relaxing way to travel, and I always meet the most interesting people.

At dinnertime on the trip home, I was seated in the dining car with a man from the UK. He was nearing the end of a seven-week trip around the world and had just spent a few days in San Francisco, celebrating a friend’s 60th birthday.

We chatted about various things and eventually the conversation turned to our occupations. He told me he works for a marine salvage company. I told him I was a romance author.

He smiled at that and said, “I have an interesting story to tell you about romance.”

I get this a lot. People offer to share personal stories because they feel they’d make great books. What they don’t seem to realize is that it would be almost impossible for me to capture the emotional connection they have with their stories. Still, out of politeness, I listened while this man told me his.

Forty years ago he had dated a young woman and fell madly in love with her. He had to go sea for several months and when he returned, she broke the bad news—she was seeing someone else.

He was devastated, and he never saw her again. Not until he attended his best friend’s birthday party. The woman he’d fallen in love with all those years ago was his best friend’s twin sister. Yes, the same friend who had just celebrated his sixtieth birthday, which meant it was also the old girlfriend’s birthday, and yes, she was at the party in San Francisco, along with her husband of thirty-five years.

My dinner companion’s his face flushed red as he looked down at his plate and confessed, “After all those years, I discovered I still have feelings for her. Deep feelings.”

At that point I knew he wasn’t telling me this because he thought his story would make a great book. He was sharing the details because he had to, because it was all still so new and he hadn’t had a chance to talk about it with anyone, and because he assumed that a romance author would be a sympathetic listener.

I asked if he told her how he felt.

That question shocked him a little. “No!” he said. “It wouldn’t have been appropriate.”

I’m sure it wouldn’t have been. And although he had done the honorable and truly heroic thing, it was obvious that he’d considered the alternative, and perhaps regretted his decision.

Our conversation soon shifted to other topics, but after dinner I found myself thinking that his story of unrequited love just might make a great book after all. But would it be okay to rewrite history? I'd definitely want to write a happy ending for this particular hero.

Until next time,
Lee
http://thewritersideoflife.blogspot.com/
http://www.leemckenzie.com/