The doorbell rings. I glance at my watch. Getting on for noon. Too soon for Mel and Lucas to be back, they only just took off. Probably Margaux, who forgot her keys. I feel nervous about confronting my daughter. I don’t know how to express my tenderness for her, all my concern at this fragile, difficult moment in her life. I open the door almost fearfully.
But it is not Margaux’s slight figure waiting for me on the doorstep. It is a tall woman wearing a black Perfecto jacket, black jeans, and black boots, holding a helmet against her hip. I quickly gather her into my arms and crush her wildly against me. She smells of leather and musk, an intoxicating combination. I hear Arno’s step on the creaking floorboards behind me, but I don’t care. He has never seen me with any woman apart from his mother. “I thought you could do with a little sexual healing,” she murmurs against my ear.
I draw her into the warmth of the apartment. Arno stands there stupidly. Gone is the impertinent teen. He cannot take his eyes off the Perfecto jacket.
“Hello. I’m Angèle. Your father’s number one fan,” says Angèle slowly, looking him up and down. She holds out her hand and bares her perfect white teeth in a wolfish smile. “I believe we met at the hospital this summer.”
Arno’s face is a perfect mixture of surprise, shock, discomfort, and delight. He shakes Angèle’s hand and scuttles off like a shy bunny.
“Are you okay?” she says to me. “You look—”
“Like hell.” I grimace.
“I’ve seen you look perkier.”
“The past forty-eight hours have been—”
“Interesting?”
I take her in my arms again, nuzzling the top of her glossy head.
“Devastating, is more like it. I don’t know where to begin.”
“Don’t begin,” she says. “Where’s your room?”
“What?”
The slow, greedy grin.
“You heard me. Your room?”
As I lie in bed, her scent still on my skin, I hear the muffled roar of the Harley cut through the Sunday-night silence. She is gone. She stayed for the entire day. But I know she will be back, and the mere thought of that comforts me. Angèle seems to propel a new vitality into me, the way the embalming fluid she pumps into her patients restores their lifelike color. I don’t mean only the sex, which of course is an important and thrilling part of our affair. I also mean the matter-of-fact, down-to-earth manner she has of dealing with the agonizing issues of my life. We had gone over each different issue, in my bed, holding each other.
Margaux. Had she been seeing a grief counselor? Someone she could talk to about her best friend dying in front of her very eyes? That was absolutely necessary. I made a note of it. Angèle went on about the way teenagers dealt with death, how some of them were lost, upset, in shock, and how others, as she had all those years ago, grew up instantly but gained a certain hardness that would never wear off.
Arno. Slapping him probably made me feel better, but it was not going to help us communicate. There would come a time, she said, when I would have to sit down and talk to him, really talk to him. Yes, he needed limits, and yes, I was right to put my foot down, but I would have to stick to this new inflexibility. I had smiled when she said that and stroked the curving softness of her naked hips. What did she know about teenagers? I murmured. Did she have one hidden somewhere that she had forgotten to mention? She had turned around to glare at me in the dim light. What did I know about her life, apart from her job? Nothing much, I admitted. Well, she had a sister, a little older, divorced, who lived in Nantes. Nadège had three unruly teenagers, eighteen, sixteen, and fourteen. Their dad had remarried and was no longer involved enough to give a hand in their upbringing. Angèle was the one who gave a hand. She held them on a tight rein, but she was honest and fair with them. Every week, she spent a night in Nantes at her sister’s house. It was easy, as the Le Loroux-Bottereau hospital was only twenty kilometers away. She loved those kids, even if they were sometimes hell to deal with. So yes, she knew all about teenagers, thank you very much.
Clarisse. I had shown Angèle the photographs. “What a beautiful woman!” she exclaimed. “The spitting image of your sister.” Then I told her why Mélanie lost control of the car. Her face sobered up instantly. I could tell she was trying to find the right words. She knew how to deal with death, she knew how to deal with teenagers, but this particular issue was a tough one to cope with. She remained silent for a couple of minutes. I tried to describe my mother, her straightforward simplicity, her rural upbringing we knew nothing about, the contrast between the prosperous Rey family and her country girl childhood, but I found myself faltering, powerless to summon her back, to explain to Angèle who my mother really was. Yes, that was it, that was the heart of it, the dark heart of it. Our mother was a stranger. And even more so since Mélanie’s flashback.
“What are you going to do about this?” Angèle had asked.
“When I am ready, and I think I will be quite soon, after the funeral, after Christmas, I want to go see my grandmother, with Mélanie.”
“Why?”
“Because I’m sure she knows something about my mother and this woman.”
“Why can’t you talk to your father?”
The question was so simple, so easy. I was taken aback.
“My father?”
“Yes, why not? Don’t you think he knows about this? He was her husband after all.”
My father. His aging face, his shrunken silhouette. His rigidity. His authority. The Commendatore’s marble statue.
“I don’t talk to my father.”
“Oh well, I didn’t speak to my dad either,” she drawled. “But that’s because he died.”
I had to smile.
“You mean you had a fight and you’re no longer on speaking terms?” she asked.
“No,” I said, knowing full well how odd this would sound. “I have never talked to my father. I have never had a real conversation with him.”
“But why?” she asked, baffled.
“Because that’s the way it is. My father is not the kind of person you can have a conversation with. He never shows love, never shows affection. He wants to be the boss, every time.”
“And do you let him?”
“Yes,” I admitted, “I did let him, because it was the easy way out. Because he left me alone. Sometimes I admire my son’s outbursts because I never dared confront my own father. No one talks to each other in my family. It’s something we were not taught to do.”
She kissed the side of my neck.
“Hmm, don’t let that happen with your own kids, buddy.”
It had been interesting watching her with Mélanie, Lucas, Arno, and Margaux, who finally came home later on. They could have been cold to her, could have resented her presence, especially at this thorny moment, where so many different, destabilizing events had sandwiched us with pain, fear, and anger. But Angèle’s shrewd sense of humor, her directness, her warmth appealed to them, I could tell. When she said to Mélanie, “I’m the famous Morticia, and I’m very happy to meet you,” there was a split second of awkwardness, but then Mélanie laughed outright and seemed genuinely pleased to lay eyes on her. Over a cup of coffee, Margaux had asked her about her job. I slipped out of the kitchen discreetly. The only person who did not seem seduced by Angèle was Lucas. I found him sulking in his room. I didn’t need to ask him what was wrong, I sensed it intuitively. He was being loyal to his mother, and the sight of another woman in our house, a woman I was obviously smitten with, offended him. I didn’t have the heart to talk to him about it straightaway. There was too much on my plate right now. I’d find a way. I’d talk to him. No, I would not be like my own father, putting a lid on everything.
When I came back into the kitchen, Margaux was crying silently and Angèle was holding her hand. I hovered at the door, unsure of what to do. Angèle’s eyes met mine. Her golden eyes were sad and wise, almost like an elderly person’s. I drew away again. In the living room, Mélanie was readin
g. I went to sit next to her.
“I’m glad she is here,” said my sister after a while.
I was glad too. But I knew she would be leaving later on that night. The long and cold drive home to Vendée. And me counting the days until I’d be seeing her again.
On Monday morning, the day before Pauline’s funeral, I meet Xavier Parimbert, the boss of a renowned feng shui Internet site, at his office near the avenue Montaigne. This meeting has been scheduled for a while. I don’t know the man personally, although I have heard of him. He is small and wiry, probably in his early sixties, with dyed hair like that of Aschenbach from Death in Venice and the spruce figure of one who watches his weight with an eagle eye. The same kind of man as my father-in-law—a kind I find I have waning patience with. He leads me into his vast silver and white office, waves off an obsequious assistant, sits me down, and gets straight to the point.
“I’ve seen your work, in particular the day-care center you designed for Régis Rabagny.”
At another time in my life my heart would have sunk at such a sentence. Rabagny and I did not end our business collaboration in a happy fashion. I feel certain he has not spread good publicity for me. But since then, Pauline has died and is to be buried tomorrow, and a hard truth concerning my mother has come boomeranging back, not to mention Arno’s little foray into insurgence. So I now find that Rabagny’s name brushes off me like water off a duck’s back, and I also find that I don’t really care if this dapper sexagenarian is about to bad-mouth me.
However, he doesn’t. He graces me with an astonishingly mellifluous smile.
“Not only is the day-care center impressive, but there’s another point that is, in my opinion, most attractive.”
“And what would that be? That it is feng shui?”
My irony triggers a polite chuckle.
“I am referring to the way you dealt with Monsieur Rabagny.”
“Could you be more specific?”
“You are the only person I know, apart from me, who has told him to go to hell.”
It is my turn to chuckle, as the memory of that day comes back. There had been a final, brutal onslaught on his part, once again about a matter that did not concern me or my men. Sickened by the sound of his voice, I had said very clearly into the phone, to Florence’s amazement, “Now fuck off.”
How Xavier Parimbert has any inkling of this escapes me.
He smiles again, as if to offer an explanation.
“Régis Rabagny happens to be my son-in-law.”
“How unfortunate,” I remark.
He nods. “I’ve often thought so myself. But my daughter loves him. And where love is concerned—”
The phone on his desk rings, and he reaches out an elegant manicured hand.
“Yes? No, not now. Where? I see.”
As the conversation continues, I turn my eyes to the deceptively simple surroundings. I know nothing about feng shui, only that it is an ancient Chinese art about wind and water affecting our well-being. Something to do with how our surroundings influence us. This must be the tidiest office I have ever seen, no clutter, no paperwork, nothing to upset the eye. On one side, an aquarium takes up an entire wall. Strange, squiggly black fish languidly swim up and down among the bubbles. Luxuriant exotic plants stand in another corner. A cluster of burning incense sticks gives off a subtle, soothing aroma. On the board behind his desk, I see photograph after photograph of Parimbert with celebrities.
He at last puts the phone down and turns all his attention to me.
“Would you care for some green tea and bran scones?” he says cheerfully, as if proposing a special treat to a reluctant child.
“Sure,” I reply, sensing that a refusal might not go down so well.
He rings a special buzzer on his desk, and a sleek Asian woman dressed in white comes in holding a tray. She bows, eyes downcast, and with practiced, graceful movements ceremoniously pours out the tea from a heavy, ornate pot. Parimbert watches with a placid expression. I am offered a stodgy-looking piece of pastry, which I assume is the bran scone. There is a moment of stillness while he eats and drinks in almost ecclesiastical silence. I bite into the scone and instantly regret it. It has the rubbery consistency of chewing gum. Parimbert takes great, swooping sips of his tea, smacking his lips with relish. I find the beverage far too hot to swallow with such enthusiasm.
“Now,” he says with one last smack, “let’s get to business.”
A Cheshire cat smile. The tea has left an unfortunate green residue speckled across his teeth, as if a lush mini-jungle had suddenly sprouted from his gums. I want to burst out laughing, and I realize in the same aching moment that this is the first time I have felt like laughing since Pauline died. Culpability takes over. The laughing fit subsides.
“I have a plan,” says Parimbert mysteriously. “And I honestly believe that you are the one who is going to carry out this plan.”
He waits sententiously. I nod. He goes on.
“I want you to imagine a Think Dome.”
He pronounces the last two words with tremulous awe, as if he had said “Holy Grail” or “Dalai Lama.” I wait and nod, trying to understand what a Think Dome is and praying I don’t look too dim-witted.
Parimbert gets up, hands thrust into his impeccably pressed gray trouser pockets, and paces across the polished floorboards. He pauses theatrically in the middle of the room.
“A Think Dome is a place where I would take only a handful of people—people selected very carefully—in order for us to gather and reflect in harmony. This place would be here, in these premises. I want it to resemble an Igloo of Intelligence. Do you understand?”
“Absolutely,” I say. Once again, the impulse to snigger is irresistible.
“I have not spoken to anyone about this. I want you to have carte blanche. I know you are the perfect man for this. That is why you have been chosen. And you will be paid very well.”
He mentions a sum that is on the generous side, although I still have no idea how large the Think Dome is supposed to be and in what material it should be completed.
“I want you to come up with thoughts. Just get them down on paper and come back to me with them. Let your positive energy flow. Be creative. Be daring. Go with your inner force. No need to be timorous here. The Think Dome has to be near my office. You will be sent a layout of this floor.”
I take my leave and head down the avenue Montaigne. The luxury shops are in overdrive for Christmas. Elegant women laden with designer shopping bags totter past on high heels. The traffic roars. The sky is dark gray. As I make my way to the Left Bank, I think of Pauline. The funeral. Her family. I think of Astrid, on her way home right now, landing later on today. I think of how, despite the death of a teenager, Christmas still approaches, inexorable, women still shop on the avenue Montaigne, and men like Parimbert take themselves seriously.
I am at the wheel, Astrid on my right, the boys and Margaux in the back. This is one of the first times since the divorce that we are all together in the Audi. Like the family we used to be. Ten o’clock in the morning, and the sky is as overcast as it was yesterday. Astrid is fighting jet lag. She has not spoken much. I went to pick her up at Malakoff earlier on. I had asked if Serge was coming and she said he was not.
It is a one-hour drive to Tilly, the small town where Suzanne’s family owns a house. Pauline’s entire class will be there. Lucas has decided he wants to come. His first funeral. What was my first after my mother’s? Probably Robert’s, my grandfather. Later on, a close friend who died in a car crash. Another who had cancer. I realize that this is also Margaux’s first funeral, and Arno’s. I glance at their faces in the rearview mirror. No iPods, I notice. Their faces are drawn and pale. They will remember today. They will remember today for the rest of their lives.
Since Saturday, Arno has been withdrawn. I still have not had my father-son talk with him. I know I need to schedule this, that there is no point avoiding it. Astrid does not know about Arno yet. It’s my job to te
ll her. After the funeral.
After the funeral. Will it bring closure? How will Suzanne and Patrick ever recover? Will Margaux be able to heal slowly? The country roads are empty and silent. Monotonous winter scenery. Leafless, lifeless trees. If only the sun could come out and light up the gloominess. I find myself craving that first morning sunlight, the warm touch of the rays on my skin, closing my eyes to it, basking in it. Please God, or whoever it is up there, please send some sun for Pauline’s funeral. I don’t believe in God, Margaux had said fiercely at the morgue. God wouldn’t let a fourteen-year-old die. I think of my religious upbringing, Mass every Sunday at Saint-Pierre de Chaillot, my first Communion, Mélanie’s. When my mother died, did I question God’s existence? Did I resent Him for letting my mother die? When I think of those dark years, I find myself remembering so little. Only pain and sorrow come back. And yes, incomprehension. Maybe I did feel, as my daughter does today, that God had let me down. But the difference is that Margaux can say this to me. There was no way I could ever have voiced this to my own father. I would never have dared.
The little church is packed. The entire class is here, all Pauline’s friends, all her teachers. But also her friends from other classes, from other schools. I have never seen such a young assembly at a funeral. Rows and rows of teenagers dressed in black, each holding a white rose. Suzanne and Patrick, standing at the door, greet every person coming in. Their bravery impresses me. I cannot help imagining Astrid and me in the same circumstances. I can tell that Astrid is thinking the same thing. She hugs Suzanne desperately. Patrick kisses her. Astrid is already in tears.
We sit just behind the first row. The noise of chairs grating the floor slowly abates. Then a woman’s voice singing the purest and saddest hymn I have ever heard rises from somewhere. I cannot see the singer. The coffin comes in, carried by Patrick, his brothers, his father.