I feel as though I’m another woman, that I’ve switched lives. That I’m in someone else’s. Like Irène, when she swapped her beige for brightly colored clothes and sandals in Cap d’Antibes.
Nathan and I finally unearth the last pot of “steel-strong” hair gel, which had ended up beside two razors, three toothbrushes, and a packet of wet wipes. We let out a triumphant cheer. I burst out laughing for the third time.
Nathan is delighted and goes off to do his hair in the toilets. He emerges with his hair sticking out in all directions, he must have slapped the whole pot on his head. Julien looks dubiously at his son, but says nothing.
“Do I look handsome?”
Julien and I say yes at the same time.
73.
No express train will take me towards bliss,
No old banger reach it, no Concorde have
your wingspan, no ship sail, except you.
SEPTEMBER 1996
Philippe’s days had always followed the same pattern. Get up at around 9 A.M. Breakfast made by Violette. White coffee, toast, unsalted butter, cherry jam with no bits. Shower and shave. Ride bike until 1 P.M. Take country roads, dice with death daily by accelerating where he knew there was never a cop or speed trap. Lunch with Violette.
Mortal Kombat, his video game, on the Mega Drive until 4 or 5 P.M. Bike ride until 7 P.M. Supper with Violette. Then he’d set off on foot for the Grand-Rue, saying he needed a walk, to meet up with a mistress, or join some debauched gathering at L’Adresse. In that case, he’d go by bike and not return before one or two in the morning. If he didn’t feel like doing a thing, due to a rainy forecast or extreme lethargy, he watched the television. Violette remained near him, reading or watching his chosen film.
Since he had caught her with the cemetery keeper, a fortnight ago, Philippe didn’t see Violette the same way anymore, he watched her out of the corner of his eye. He wondered whether she was thinking about that old man, whether she phoned him in his absence, whether she wrote to him.
For the past week, when Philippe came home, he pressed the phone’s “last call” button, but always fell on the unpleasant voice of his mother, whom he’d phoned the day before, or the day before that, and hung up on it.
He had to phone her every other day. It was a ritual. And the words were always the same: “How are you, son? Eating well? Sleeping enough? Health O.K.? Take care on the road. Don’t ruin your eyes on your video games. And your wife? Work O.K.? Is the house clean? Does she wash the sheets every week? I’m keeping an eye on your accounts. Don’t worry, you’re not short. Your father transferred money into your life insurance last week. My pains are troubling me again. Really, we’ve never had any luck, oh no, we really haven’t. People are so disappointing. Watch out. Your father is trying less and less. Thank goodness I’m here to watch over you two. Bye for now, son.” Every time he hung up, Philippe felt bad. His mother was a razor blade causing him increasing irritation. Sometimes he wondered if she had any news of her brother, Luc. He missed his uncle. And Françoise’s absence killed him. But his mother would reply, with annoyance, or sadness if she wanted to make him feel guilty: “Don’t speak to me of those people anymore, please.” His mother threw Françoise and Luc into the same trash bag.
Apart from these conversations, which irritated him, Philippe’s life was, seemingly, a well-oiled machine. He had remained the boy Françoise had accompanied that last time to the station at Antibes in 1983: a capricious child. An unhappy child.
But two pieces of news arrived, within five minutes of each other, to bring his seamless days to a halt. The first came by mail.
Just as he was tucking into one of his pieces of toast, hot and crusty just as he liked it, Violette announced to him that the barrier was going to be automated in May of 1997. They had eight months to find new jobs. She placed the letter addressed to them both on the table, between the pot of jam and the melted butter, and went off to lower the barrier for the 9:07.
I’m going to lose Violette. That was Philippe’s first thought upon reading the letter. There would be nothing left to keep her now. Their roof and their work still linked them, he wasn’t even sure why. Linked them by a thread so fine, it was almost invisible. Apart from Léonine’s bedroom, with its permanently closed door, they had nothing left in common. Once she lost the barrier, she would leave forever, to be with the old man at the cemetery.
He saw a woman talking to Violette through the kitchen window. He didn’t recognize her immediately. His first thought was that it was one of his mistresses, come to grass on him, but it was fleeting: the women he frequented weren’t the sort to be jealous. He took no risks. He sullied himself, sullied Violette, but took no risks.
In the meantime, he saw that Violette was growing paler as the woman spoke to her.
He went straight outside and found himself face to face with Léonine’s teacher. What was her name again?
“Hello, Mr. Toussaint.”
“Hello.”
She, too, was pale. She seemed distraught. She turned her back on him and quickly walked away.
The 9:07 went by. Philippe saw a few faces at the carriage windows and thought of when Léonine would wave at them. Silently, as if on automatic pilot, Violette
