“So I guess you don’t keep up with what’s going on in the world, my dear Claire!” he replied. “If my country ever fights Germany again I know that I will give up my wife and son. Nothing could stop me from leaving, nothing.”
He remained quiet for a while, then, throwing his cigarette out the window, he seemed to make a visible effort to control his emotions.
“Well, let’s set aside that wretched conversation and take care of this little cherub. As they say so well here, God is good, and there will be no war.”
He tried to feed Jean-Claude. Two little hands greedily closed around his.
“My little guy! My little guy!” he said, happy.
They belong so much to me that I feel like crying with joy No one will ever take them from me.
Sentiment rules the world. Cynics swear otherwise until one day it finally catches them. We are all in search of that “grain of sand” that will reconcile us with ourselves. Even those who are jaded end up dragging their boredom all over the world in the same hope. I have even forgotten about Caledu and his people. Jean-Claude and his father are healing me. I have recklessly broken the dikes. I’ve cupped a hand over my own “grain of sand.” I have transferred to these two beings all the love that was in my heart. Hatred has left me. I keep out everything that could distract me from this wonderful feeling.
Yesterday while Annette was there, Jean Luze needed a book in order to discuss it at greater length with Joel Marti. He looked for it in the library to no avail and called me over to ask about it.
“I can’t find that
“That book is in my room,” I felt obliged to admit.
“In your room?” he said, surprised. “Are you reading it?”
“I’m rereading it.”
He looked at me skeptically.
“No.”
“You’re surprised I read-do you think I’m an idiot?”
My tone was so bitter for once that he looked at me as if he didn’t know me.
“Here’s your book,” I said, giving it to him. “In one piece.”
“Come now, Claire. It’s not a reproach.”
There was so much gentleness in his voice and eyes that I felt ashamed I was so defensive.
He held me by the shoulder and leaned in to give me a friendly kiss, but I quickly pushed him away.
“What a chip on your shoulder!” he said, and pinched my cheek.
“Nice, Claire,” Annette cried out with a burst of laughter. “You play mommy to his son and wifey with him! …”
Fortunately, she didn’t see the look of hatred I gave her. No, you imbecile, I’m not playing. I am mother and wife in everything but name. Might you be jealous of me for once? You took the ground out from under me once without my being able to say even a word in self-defense. I pushed you into Jean Luze’s arms on purpose only to test my power. He will never love you. Do you get it? Never. Keep telling yourself that my role seems merely secondary. I exist only for him, anyone can see that. Or would you like me to prove it to you by making advances to him too? I am still superior to you in that respect. Our intimacy often invites me into scenarios worthy of you, but I decline. I don’t wish to seduce him like some manipulative sex kitten. I want more than his body. I am demanding and picky. I know that certain kinds of conduct would be unforgivable in a woman my age. At forty you can persevere, but it’s too late to make your debut. At least, that’s true more or less. I know this and I am patiently biding my time.
Honesty is a truly difficult thing to learn! Besides, where does honesty begin and where does it end? In obvious bad faith, I refuse to see myself clearly. Certain thoughts, once born, are to be regretted as much as certain words. Sometimes, in my feverishly imagined love scenes, I get panic attacks. This panic is often triggered by the sudden memory of my father, who is whipping me with his belt. If Jean Luze were to burst into my room just then and take me in his arms, I would struggle, cry out and defend myself as if my life were threatened. Do I just like the idea of love? Have I not willingly chosen this unreal situation because I feel unable to go all the way? This is my challenge. I am going to belong to Jean Luze. He alone can help me. I have to know what I am made of.
More and more I have the feeling that my imaginary affair with Jean Luze is an ersatz substitute I have chosen on purpose because of its power and corrosiveness. How much longer will I be able to fool myself?
He’s mine, this kid I didn’t carry in my womb! I have made his first pants. He crawls around on all fours and stands with some help. He has eight teeth that came in without too much trouble. He is a stout little guy, very lively, and welcomes his father by holding his arms out to him. Although I keep whispering it to him, he hasn’t managed to say “mama” yet. I want to be the first he calls by that name. His presence in my room seems to soothe my feelings. His innocence is so disarming and his purity so contagious that I even feel shame when I am naked in front of him. That is why yesterday I burned everything that reminded me of the past, the doll, the pornographic postcards, etc. I am done with these old substitutes. I am nothing but mother and wife. I have moved up a notch.
“Call Jean for me,” Felicia sometimes asks. “I am so sick I don’t have the strength to love him.”
Without jealousy I watch him sit beside her and kiss her hand or stroke her hair. I have never caught him touching her as if he were in love with her. Despite himself, he treats her like a sick child. He pities her, not me.
“It’s the pregnancy,” he says to comfort her, “you have to wait a bit. It will be over soon. You’re already four months along…”
Such tenderness!
“Jean is nothing but an ethereal being,” Annette told me yesterday. “I bet he’s a shabby lover. I would definitely cheat on him if I were his wife. And I am grateful that life has worked out the way it has.”
I don’t believe a word of what Mme Audier and Father Paul say about Jane. Even though Felicia frowns on it, I visit her and Dora regularly. Dora and those crazed eyes of hers! Jane, stooping over her sewing machine, working late into the night, and seeing no one but me! I will never abandon them again. Jane’s son often talks to Pierrilus, the one-armed beggar who sleeps under our veranda, the only one beaten by Caledu for complaining-he dared ask for his wages-but probably not the only one to hate him for his smug indifference to their plight. Does he think it’s enough to arm them against us, is he so stupid as to believe this will comfort them as they starve?…
Felicia keeps getting worse. She is skin and bones. I forbid myself to think of her death; but she looks too much like a woman condemned. How often I have done away with her in my mind! I did so to give flight to my dreams, to stuff myself with illusions. What perfect crimes, what unmitigated betrayals we store up in ourselves! Only deep within do we have the courage to really live, and that’s a good thing. I am the one who dresses Felicia, the one who feeds her. She has been handed over to her worst enemy. Today, Felicia threw up her soup. She can’t keep anything down. Jean Luze came home just as she suffered a mild fainting spell, during the course of which she lost blood. Jean Luze left to get Audier and came back alone.
“What do we do?” he asks. “Audier’s not home.”
Felicia is pale as a corpse. Jean Luze is kneeling by her. He calls her name, then runs off again. Felicia seizes on this as an opportunity to faint again. I rush to the medicine cabinet to get a bottle of alcohol. I return to find Felicia moaning. Where is Jean Luze? I don’t want to be alone with her. Finally, the door opens and Jean Luze walks in with Dr. Audier.
He leans over Felicia to examine her.
“Do you recognize me?” he asks.
She opens her eyes and nods.
The examination is unpleasant, even painful. Dr. Audier takes Jean Luze aside and says to him:
“I recommend a few injections to give her enough strength to withstand an abortion.”
“An abortion!”
“It’s better that way, trust me. Your wife has a fibroma and has lost a lot of blood…”
“I’m putting her in your hands,” Jean Luze answered, completely unstrung, “or maybe it would be better if I left for Port-au-Prince with her? Your hospital is so poorly equipped, and I don’t want to reproach myself should anything go wrong.”
“The sooner the better,” Dr. Audier advises, only too happy to get rid of a new victim.
He hands a prescription to Jean Luze and turns to me:
