‘No, of course not. Sorry.’
Silence.
He put together a sort of ashtray with a piece of aluminium foil and added, ‘So what about the fridges, then? How’re tricks?’
‘What a jerk you can be . . .’
Said with a lovely smile, which Charles gladly returned to him.
Then they talked about other things. Alexis complained about a crack in the stairwell, and the expert promised to go and take a look.
Lucas came to kiss them goodnight.
‘And the bird?’
‘He’s still sleeping.’
‘When will he wake up?’
Charles turned up his palms to show his ignorance.
‘And will you still be here tomorrow?’
‘Of course he’ll still be here,’ insisted his father. ‘Right . . . off to bed now. Mummy’s waiting.’
‘Will you come and see me in my show at school then?’
‘You have lovely children.’
‘Yes . . . And Marion? Did you see her?’
‘Absolutely . . . I saw her,’ murmured Charles.
Silence.
‘Alexis . . .’
‘No. Don’t say anything. You know, if Corinne behaves that way with you, you mustn’t hold it against her. She’s the one who’s had to do all the dirty work, and . . . And I expect that everything from my past frightens her. Do – d’you understand?’
‘Yes,’ replied Charles, who didn’t understand at all.
‘Without her, I’d never have made it out of there and . . .’
‘And?’
‘It’s hard to explain, but I got the impression that in order to get out of hell, I had to leave the music behind. A sort of pact, or something.’
‘So you never play any more?’
‘I do . . . Bits of rubbish now and again . . . For their show, tomorrow, for example, I’ll accompany them on the guitar, but as for really playing . . . No.’
‘I can’t believe it.’
‘It’s . . . It makes me fragile. I don’t want that feeling of withdrawal, ever again, and music gives me that feeling . . . It sucks me in . . .’
‘Any news from your father?’
‘Never. And you? Tell me . . . Do you have kids?’
‘No.’
‘Are you married?’
‘No.’
Silence.
‘And Claire?’
‘Claire isn’t either.’
Corinne had just come back in with the pudding.
*
‘Will this be okay?’
‘It’s perfect,’ replied Charles. ‘Are you sure I’m not a nuisance?’
‘Hey, c’mon on . . .’
‘I’ll be leaving really early, anyway. May I take a shower?’
‘It’s through there.’
‘You wouldn’t have a T-shirt you could lend me?’
‘Even better.’
Alexis came back holding out an old Lacoste polo shirt.
‘You remember?’
‘No.’
‘And yet I nicked it from you.’
Among other things . . . mused Charles, thanking him.
He was careful not to pull off his plasters and then he felt himself liquefy. And let the water run.
He wiped the mirror with the corner of his towel so he could see himself more clearly.
He pushed his lips forward.
He thought he looked a bit like a llama.
All messed up.
That’s what she’d said.
Leaning outside to close the shutters he saw that Alexis was sitting alone with a glass in his hand on one of the steps to the terrace. He pulled his trousers back on and grabbed his packet of cigarettes.
And the bottle, in passing.
Alexis moved over to make room: ‘Have you seen the sky? All these stars . . .’
Charles didn’t know what to say.
‘And in a few hours, it will be daylight again.’
Silence.
‘Why did you come, Charles?’
‘Grief work.’
‘What was it I used to play for Nana? I don’t remember . . .’
‘It used to depend on how he was disguised . . . When he put on his ridiculous raincoat . . .’
‘I know! The Pink Panther . . . Mancini . . .’
‘When he was taking his shower and you saw him bare his hairy chest, you’d play some sort of arrival of the gladiators in the arena thing.’
‘Do . . . Do-soh,’ trumpeted Alexis.
‘When he wore his lederhosen . . . The ones with the acorns embroidered on the flap in front, God what a laugh, you did this little Bavarian polka.’
‘Lohman.’
‘When he tried to force us to do our homework, you’d get out Bridge on the River Kwai.’
‘He loved that one. He’d put his stick under his arm, and there he’d be, in it completely.’
‘When he managed to tweak a hair out of his ear on the first go, it was Aida . . .’
‘Exactly. The Triumphal March.’
‘When he’d piss us off you’d do an ambulance siren as if to take him off to the hospice. When we’d done something stupid and to punish us he’d lock us in your room until Anouk got home, then you’d wail something by Miles Davis through the keyhole . . .’
‘Elevator to the Gallows?’
‘Exactly. When he chased us into the bath, you’d climb onto the table and it was the Sabre Dance.’
‘That one used to kill me, I remember. Fuck, the number of times I almost passed out . . .’
‘When we wanted some sweets, you’d flog him your Gounod bonbons . . .’
‘Or Schubert . . . It depended on how many sweets we wanted. When he’d do his rotten little act on us, I’d give him the Radetsky March.’
‘I don’t remember that one.’
‘Yes, go on –’
He umpah-pahed some Strauss.
Charles smiled.
‘But the thing he liked best of all –’
‘Was this –’ continued Alexis, whistling.
‘Yes! Then we could get whatever we wanted. He’d even imitate my dad’s signature.’
‘La Strada.’
‘You remember . . . He took us to see it, on the Rue de Rennes.’
‘And we were in a foul mood all day long.’
‘That’s right. We didn’t get it. The way he’d described it, it should have been Rookies Run Amok.’
‘We were so disappointed.’
‘We were so clueless.’
‘You seemed surprised earlier on . . . but who else can I talk to about him? Who have you talked to about him?’
‘No one.’
‘You see . . . Someone like Nana . . . it’s not something you can begin to describe,’ added Alexis, clearing his throat, ‘you had to – you had to be there.’
An owl protested. What’s going on? We can’t hear ourselves out here in the dark!
‘You know why I didn’t let you know?’
Charles said nothing.
‘The funeral . . .’
‘Because you’re a piece of shit.’
‘No. Yes . . . No. Because I wanted to have her all to myself for once.’
Charles was silent.
‘From day one, Charles, I . . . I was so jealous I thought I’d die . . . And in fact I –’
‘Go on, tell me. I’d be interested to know why you became such a fucked-up junkie because of me. Good excuses based on bad faith have always fascinated me.’
‘That’s just how I remember you. You and your high-sounding words.’
‘That’s funny, I’d always got the impression that you didn’t really see all that much of your mother . . . That she’d felt somewhat alone towards the end . . .’
‘I phoned her.’
‘Great. Right . . . I’m going to bed. I’m so tired I’m not even sure I’ll be able to fall asleep.’
‘You only saw her good side. When we were kids, she used to make you laugh, but I’m the
one who had to clean the bog and carry her to bed . . .’
‘Sometimes we cleaned it together . . .’ murmured Charles.
‘She was always on about you. How you were so clever, so talented, so interesting . . .’
Charles stood up.
‘See what a good mate I am, Alexis Le Men . . . What a marvellous little boy I was – and I’m going to the trouble to remind you, so that some day you’ll move up a gear and tell your kids how an old trannie made us piss our pants laughing when he’d imitate Fred Astaire drunk in the gutters at school – this marvellous little boy dropped her a hell of a lot sooner than you did, dropped her like a piece of shit, without a single telephone call, not one . . . And he probably wouldn’t have come to her funeral even if you’d been magnanimous enough to let him know, because all that cleverness and talent and hard work made him very very busy and bloody fucking stupid. On that note, goodnight.’
Alexis followed him in: ‘So you know what it’s like.’
‘What what’s like?’
‘To leave things behind when you hit bottom.’
Charles looked at him questioningly.
‘To sacrifice bits of people’s lives so you can climb back up again.’
‘Sacrifice . . . bits of people’s lives . . . You’re not too bad at rhetoric for an ice-lolly vendor,’ scoffed Charles, ‘but we didn’t sacrifice a thing! We were just cowards . . . Oh, I know, it doesn’t sound as smart, does it, coward? Not as high-sounding, is it?’ He placed his thumb close to his index finger: ‘A really narrow mouthpiece, is that it? Teeny, tiny, narrow . . .’
Alexis shook his head.
‘Flagellation. You’ve always gone in for that stuff. Well, you did spend time with the Brothers, didn’t you. I’d forgotten about that. You know the big difference between the two of us?’
‘Yes,’ said Charles emphatically, ‘I do know. It’s Ssssufffering. With a capital S as in syringe, make a note, it could come in handy. What do you expect me to say to that?’
‘The difference is that you were brought up by people who believed in a whole lot of things, whereas I grew up with a woman who believed in nothing.’
‘She believe in li—’
Charles immediately regretted what he’d been about to say. Too late:
‘Sure. Just look what she made of it.’
‘Alex. I understand. I understand that you need to talk about it. And for sure, the scene’s been rehearsed over and over. I even wonder if that isn’t why you sent me that friendly announcement last winter . . . To offload on me everything you can’t go and leave in the basement any more . . .
‘But I’m the wrong person, don’t you see? I have . . . I’ve got too much invested in this business. I can’t help you. It’s not that I don’t want to, it’s that I can’t. At least you’ve had kids, at least – whereas I, I . . . I’m going to bed. Please give my regards to madame your redeemer.’
He opened the door to his room. ‘One last thing . . . Why didn’t you donate her body to science the way she made you promise you would?’
‘That bloody hospital? Don’t you think she gave them –’ The machine jammed.
Alexis fell backwards and slid to the floor.
‘What have I done, Charlie?’ He burst into tears. ‘Tell me what I’ve done.’
Charles couldn’t bend over, let alone get down on his knees.
He touched his shoulder.
‘Stop it . . . I’m full of shit too . . . If she had really wanted to, she would have left you a letter.’
‘She did.’
Pain, signal, survival, promise. Charles withdrew his hand.
Alexis moved to one side, dug around for his wallet, took out a white sheet folded in four, shook it out, and cleared his throat: ‘My love,’ he began.
He had started weeping again, and handed the letter to Charles.
Charles, who didn’t have his glasses, took a step back into the light from the bedroom.
It was pointless.
There was nothing else.
He let out a very long, very deep sigh.
To shift his pain.
‘You see, she did believe in something . . . You know,’ he said in a more cheerful tone of voice, ‘I’d like to be able to give you my hand to pull you up, but the thing is, I got run over this morning, would you believe.’
‘Bloody idiot,’ said Alexis with a smile, ‘you’ve always got to be better than everyone else.’ He caught hold of Charles’s jacket and hoisted himself up, folded his letter and went off imitating Nana’s shrill voice: ‘C’mon, ducks! Shoo! Bedtime!’
Charles staggered to his bed, fell onto it in a heap, ouch, and thought that he had just lived the longest day of his . . .
And was already asleep.
4
NOW WHERE WAS he?
Whose sheets were these? Which hotel?
The truly scary leafy design of the curtains roused him with a start. Ah, yes. The Clos des Ormes . . .
Not a sound. He looked at his watch and at first he thought he was holding it upside down.
Eleven fifteen.
The first lie-in of the century.
There was a note outside the bedroom door: ‘We didn’t dare wake you. If you don’t have time to come by the school (opposite the church), leave the key with the neighbour (green gate). Hugs.’
He admired the wallpaper in the bathroom and the loo paper which matched the flowers on the Liberty print, heated up some coffee, and groaned at his reflection in the bathroom mirror.
The llama had taken on some colour during the night . . . A pretty shade of mauve tending towards a greenish hue . . . He didn’t have the courage to spit in his own face, and he borrowed some blades from Alexis.
He shaved what could be shaved, and instantly regretted it. He’d made it even worse.
His shirt stank of rotting flesh. So he put back on his young man’s old crocodile and it made him feel oddly happy. Even though it had lost its shape and was very worn, not to mention the fact that the croc’s tail had come unstitched and was fairly washed-out, no, not to mention it, he had recognized his shirt. It had been a gift from Edith. From a time when they still gave each other gifts. She had said, I got you a white one, you are so conventional, and, almost thirty years later, he was grateful for her bloody-minded principles. The way he looked today, any other colour would have been . . . less becoming.
*
He rang several times at the neighbour’s, the one with the green gate, no answer. He didn’t dare leave the set of keys with anyone else (fearing Corinne’s wrath), so he resigned himself to making a detour past the school.
He was actually somewhat sorry to see Alexis in broad daylight. He would have preferred to leave things on the parting note of the night before, and carry on his way without him . . . But he took consolation in the fact that he’d be able to give Lucas a hug, and little maid Marion too, before losing sight of them altogether.
Opposite the church, well, perhaps, but it was the most secular school you’ve ever seen.
A typical country school, probably built in the 1930s, the boys symmetrical to the girls, or so it was decreed and carved in stone under the intertwined letters R and F of the République Française with a real covered playground whose walls had been repainted wagon green to the height any scuff marks might reach, the height of the white chalk marks round the chestnut trees. Permanent hopscotch grids (surely not nearly as much fun) and bulges in the asphalt, which must have been the delight of kids shooting marbles . . .
A very fine building, with brick trim: tall, stern, and républicain, despite all the balloons and other lanterns with which it had been decked out that day.
Charles elbowed his way through the crowd, arms raised to avoid the swarms of children running every which way. After the chocolate cake and the smell of a wood fire, he was rediscovering the atmosphere of Mathilde’s school fairs. With a rather more rural touch . . . Little old grandpas in caps and grannies in thick stockings had replaced the eleg
ant ladies of Paris’s 5th arrondissement, and gone was the organic sandwich stand, replaced by a real suckling pig roasting on a spit.
The weather was fine, he had slept over ten hours, the music was lively and his mobile battery was dead. He put it back into his pocket, leaned against a wall and, snuggled between the aroma of candy floss and roasting piglet, he let himself be dazzled by the show.
It was Tati’s Jour de fête . . .
All that was missing was the postman.
A woman was handing him a cup. He thanked her with a simple nod of his head, as if he were a stranger, too disoriented to recall the very basics of the language; he took a swallow of the potion . . . hard to say what it was, a dry, rough drink; he turned his sores towards the sun, closed his eyes, and silently thanked Alexis’s neighbour for having vanished the way she did.
The heat, the alcohol, the sugar, the local accent, the children’s cries, his head beginning to nod gent—
‘Are you asleep again?’
No need to open his eyes to recognize the voice of his superpower team mate.
‘No. I’m getting a suntan.’
‘Well, if y’ask me you’d better stop, because you’re all red already!’
He looked down: ‘What’s this? You’re disguised as a pirate?’
A nod from beneath the black headband.
‘And you haven’t got a parrot on your shoulder?’
Lucas lowered his hook: ‘Uh, no . . .’
‘Would you like us to go and get my bird?’
‘But what if it wakes up?’
Although he owed part of his upbringing to Nana – or perhaps for that very reason – Charles had always thought it was simpler to tell children the truth. He didn’t have many principles where child-raising was concerned, but where the truth was concerned, he did. Telling the truth had never restrained the imagination. Quite the opposite.
‘You know something. He can’t wake up, because he’s stuffed.’
Lucas’s moustache stretched from one earring to the other. ‘I knew it! But I didn’t want to tell you. I was afraid you might be sad . . .’
Whose great idea was it to invent children? Whose? He melted, wedging his cup behind a tile.