“Shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up, shut up . . . ”
His parents froze. Philippe stammered a few more inaudible words, and then left the house as he had entered it, in silence.
When he got back on his bike, he knew he wouldn’t be taking the road back to the Brancion cemetery. He knew that he no longer had a home. Not tonight, not tomorrow. He had known it ever since he had asked Eloïse Petit to phone Violette and tell her that he hadn’t come to their meeting. Violette, who had stopped waiting for him long ago.
That morning, when he had announced to her that he wanted to start afresh, settle in the Midi, he had seen in her eyes that she was pretending to believe him. Today, he could no longer face her. He never wanted to look her in the eye again.
Chantal Toussaint ran out after him, in just her dressing gown, to reason with him. It was dangerous to be on the road in that state. He was too tired, done in, he must rest, she would get his bed ready, she hadn’t touched a thing in his room, not even his posters, she would cook him a beef stroganoff and the crème caramel he loved, tomorrow he’d be able to think more clearly and . . .
“I wish you had died at my birth, Mom. It would have been the luckiest thing in my life.”
He started his bike and, without thinking, went in the direction of Bron. In his rearview mirror, he saw his mother collapsing onto the pavement. He knew that his words had signed her death warrant. Today or tomorrow. And his father would follow. He always followed.
He felt nothing but the desire to be with Luc and Françoise and tell them everything. They would know what to do, they would find the right words, they would be able to keep him close, so he no longer had to explain himself to anyone. Return to being the child he had wanted to be: Luc’s. This life was done with.
91.
And when, taking my burial mound for a pillow,
A water nymph comes gently to doze,
clad in the skimpiest of costumes,
I apologize in advance to Jesus
if my cross’s shadow falls over her a touch
for a little posthumous happiness.
IRÈNE FAYOLLE’S JOURNAL
2013
I went into the cemetery lady’s house. She looked at me as one does a person one knows by sight but can’t place. She was alone, sitting at her table. She was leafing through a gardening catalogue.
“I’m just selecting my spring bulbs. Do you prefer narcissi, or croci? I love these yellow tulips.”
Her fingers fell on photos of clusters of flowers. So many varieties.
“Narcissi, I think I prefer narcissi. I also love flowers, I had a rose nursery, before.”
“Where was that?”
“In Marseilles.”
“Oh . . . I go to Marseilles every year, to the Calanque de Sormiou.”
“I used to go there with my son, Julien, when he was little. A long time ago.”
The cemetery lady smiled at me as though we shared a secret.
“Would you like something to drink?”
“I’d love a green tea.”
She got up to make my tea. I thought she must be around Julien’s age. She could have been my daughter. I don’t think I would have liked having a daughter. I don’t know what I could have told her, how I would have advised her, directed her. A boy’s a bit like a wild flower, a hawthorn, he grows on his own, as long as he has enough to eat, to drink, to wear. As long as you tell him he’s handsome, strong. A boy grows well when he has a father. A girl is more complicated.
The cemetery lady is beautiful. She was wearing a straight black skirt and a fine, gray polo-neck sweater. I thought her elegant. Delicate. She almost made me regret not having had a daughter. She put loose tea into a teapot and strained it. Then she put some honey on the table. It felt good in her home. It smelled good. She told me that she loved roses. Their scent.
“You live alone?”
“Yes.”
“At this cemetery, I come to visit Gabriel Prudent.”
“He’s buried in avenue 19, in the Cedars section. Is that right?”
“Yes. Do you know all the locations of the deceased?”
“Most of them. And he was a great lawyer, there was a crowd at his funeral. Which year was it, again?”
“2009.”
The cemetery lady got up to fetch a register, the one for 2009, and she looked up Gabriel’s name. So it’s true, she does write everything down in books. She read it out loud to me: “February 18th, 2009, funeral of Gabriel Prudent, torrential rain. There were a hundred and twenty-eight people at the burial. His ex-wife was present, as were his two daughters, Marthe Dubreuil and Cloé Prudent. No flowers or wreaths, at the request of the deceased. The family had a plaque engraved, saying: ‘In homage to Gabriel Prudent, a courageous lawyer. “Courage, for a lawyer, is essential, without which the rest counts for nothing; talent, culture, knowledge of the law, all is of use to the lawyer. But without courage, at the decisive moment, there remain merely words, a succession of sentences that shine brightly and then die.” (Robert Badinter)’ No priest. No cross. The cortege only stayed for half an hour. When the two funeral directors had finished lowering the coffin into the vault, everyone left. Still raining very heavily.”
The cemetery lady poured me another cup of tea. I asked her to read her notes on Gabriel’s funeral again. She did so, willingly.
I imagined the people surrounding Gabriel’s coffin. I imagined the umbrellas, the warm, dark clothes. The scarves and the tears.
I told the cemetery lady that Gabriel got angry when people said he was courageous. That there was no courage involved in telling a magistrate that
