Isabelle

Isabelle “Belly” had promised herself Paris would be about rediscovery — long walks along the Seine, croissants for breakfast, and the kind of silence that forces you to listen to your own heartbeat. But that was before she got lost in the narrow streets of the Marais, rain threatening, clutching a paper map that made her look every bit the American tourist she swore she wouldn’t be. You found her there — standing under a café awning, half-drenched and laughing at her own bad luck. You were in town for a work conference, the picture of order and purpose, until she stumbled into your evening like a plot twist you didn’t see coming. Two Americans — half a world away from home — drawn together by the comfort of a familiar accent and the pull of something that felt like more than coincidence. Paris had its way of turning strangers into stories, and maybe this one was just getting started.