Would she manage to find a third life, in which, although hardened by the rape, she would still find within herself a fresh inclination to listen to such a boy and look at him?
“You know,” he said, “you can be honest. It’s better that way. If you don’t give a damn about me, then just tell me.”
“What’s gotten into you?”
“I’ve been waiting for you all these days, while you—”
“Hey, let me remind you that in the past it was always me waiting for you!”
The argument hit home, and he bowed his head. “Precisely. When you wait, you have time to think. And I need to know if . . . if I’m right to wait, if you care about me a little.”
She quivered with pleasure. “Of course I do.”
He looked up, delighted. “Do you really?”
“Yes, really.” Albane smiled. This endless, pointless chatter felt so good! She felt alive again.
Quentin grabbed her hand. She was surprised that his palms should be so warm and soft; she felt that her own hands were still cold and clammy, no more pleasant to touch than a goldfish. Well, as long as he didn’t notice . . .
“I’m going away, Albane,” he announced in a measured, serious voice. “I’m going to London.”
It took Albane’s breath away.
“I leave Brussels at the end of June,” he went on. “For two years.”
“Why?”
He looked at her, saw how defeated she looked, how she trembled, and he wavered. Should he tell her the reason? Admit that it was because of her? He chose instead to serve up the official version, the one that had convinced his family. “I want to complete my studies at the International Lycée in London, and get a European Baccalaureate, which is recognized everywhere. And I also need to practice my English.”
“Oh?”
“Plus, I’m finding it harder and harder to get along with my father.”
A few weeks earlier, Albane would have joined in with a sarcastic tirade against parents and said some disparaging things about her own mother, but she remained silent.
“He can’t see what I’m becoming. He insists on treating me like a child.”
Albane glanced at him. His father must not be paying attention, because Quentin, in a way that was both sudden and obvious, had become a man: his body was so much stronger, his eyes were filled with confidence, and his voice had at last broken. She found him quite impressive.
As for Quentin, he was concealing his true motive. He was taking refuge in London because she’d said she wouldn’t make love until she was sixteen and a half. He wouldn’t have the patience to mope around, waiting for her; if he stayed, he would turn hysterical, obnoxious, even violent maybe . . . From a distance, he would be able to bear the situation. It wouldn’t matter if he amused himself with superficial girls or women to assuage his impatience. Only she mattered. He would return when she was ready.
Albane shook her head, staring into space. Why was life snatching away from her the only person who made her glow with happiness?
The parrots were fluttering about energetically, busy taking grains and seeds to their babies, who were opening their eyes to life.
They sat on the bench like two castaways. Sex was tossing them around like corks borne on the swell, and they moved to its rhythm, not according to their own strengths or desires. For Albane, it had gone wrong; for Quentin, it had gone right. Still, they were aspiring to something else, hoping for a different relationship than the one they had had. Even though they had some trouble formulating this hope, they nevertheless felt it deeply and already knew who to place it in: what Quentin was expecting from Albane was that love could merge with pleasure; what Albane was expecting from Quentin was that love should be a consensual encounter.
“Do you have to go away?” she asked in a low voice.
She was revealing a great deal of herself with these words, and Quentin realized it.
“If I leave, Albane, it doesn’t mean we won’t be friends anymore. On the contrary. You’re my best pal. I have every intention of talking to you every day and writing to you every day.”
“Is that true?”
“I can’t see how I could forget you. You’re the only thing I’m going to miss about this place.”
Albane was tempted to run away. So much kindness, so much passion disconcerted her after these bitter days when she had shriveled at the thought that she would never love anybody again, and would never allow anybody to love her. She had imagined that she could protect herself behind a thick wall of indifference, but Quentin had just made two breaches in it, first by making her sad at his departure, and, second, by showing her how much he cared for her. What should she do? Continue to feel, to let her heart beat faster? Or shut herself away from emotion?
He pointed skyward. “Look at those two birds, Albane, there on the edge of the nest, above the street lamp. Can you see them? They’re lovebirds. They’re called that because the male and female get together when they’re young and form a couple that lasts till the end of their lives.”
“Is that possible?”
“Among birds, yes.”
She sighed. So did he.
“Among humans, the love of children and teenagers is downplayed. Adults always put on that clever, superior air, hear you without listening, and look without seeing. ‘It won’t last,’ they say.”
“So?”
“So the parents of lovebirds aren’t like that. Which is why lovebirds form lasting couples.”
“What are you trying to say?”
“That my mother and father aren’t lovebirds. My father has been cheating on my mother forever, my mother has been cheating on my father for a little while, after being hurt by him. What’s stopping them from splitting up is the children and their commonly held property. If I told them . . . ” He broke off. He had turned red, and his heart was pounding. He hesitated to continue: his words committed him so much, they risked making him ridiculous. “If one of their children were to say that he’s met the love of his life, they’d shrug. Because they no longer believe in love. And yet it seems to me that sometimes, being in love isn’t a state but an insight, an intuition about what is going to happen. Even if you’re young, you’re old when you love, because you’ve seen the future, you’ve already experienced it.”
Albane looked at him without understanding. He rummaged through his bag, pulled out a book, and waved it. “Here, look, I found a passage in this book by Baptiste Monier, you know, the local writer?”
“Local writer? You’re joking! According to my teacher, he’s translated all over the world.”
“‘Love at first sight is as mysterious in art as it is in love. It has nothing to do with a first time, because what you find often proves to have been there already. It is not so much a discovery as a revelation. A revelation of what? Neither of the past nor of the present. A revelation of the future . . . Love at first sight is a kind of premonition . . . Time folds and twists, and in a split second the future appears. We travel through time. We access not the memory of yesterday but the memory of tomorrow. “Here’s the great love of my years to come.” That’s love at first sight: discovering that we have something powerful, intense, and wonderful to share with someone. When you sent me your letter, I received the assurance that we would have a long and happy relationship, that for my whole life you would be with me, following me, guiding me, confiding in me, entertaining me, comforting me. Did I get it right? I’m counting on you.’”
Quentin put the book down on his lap. Albane looked at his endlessly long hands respectfully stroking the pages.
There was a moment of hesitation between them. Every word in the text triggered strange echoes. The letter mentioned in the text could have been the unsigned message Quentin thought he had received from Albane. The delayed love at first sight could have been this thunderbolt that had struck these two chi
ldren who had known each other since infancy. The assurance of a joint destiny could have been Albane’s stubbornness, or Quentin’s new decision. They let their thoughts murmur and fell silent, charged with emotion.
Quentin gently closed the book and put it back into his backpack. He started speaking again as if Albane wasn’t there, addressing the tree trunks bursting out of the soil. “Imagine that I’m in love with you . . . That would mean I’ve seen from the start that we’re meant to spend our lives together, that I’ve already seen the children we’ll have, that I’ve guessed what you’ll be like when you’re a bit older, even when you’re elderly, and that I was attracted by that.”
Albane quivered. “You’ve imagined me when I’m older?” She liked the idea because, in the past few days, she had thought a hundred times that she was going to die.
“Yes.”
“And what’s your conclusion?”
“That you’ll always be attractive.”
“Not if I look like my mother.”
“Your mother’s very attractive.”
“She’s fat!”
“It suits her.”
Albane was dumbfounded. Was he another one who thought her mother was presentable? Men were strange!
At that moment, Victor and Oxana crossed the square, their arms around each other. Victor was talking animatedly and Oxana, with joy in her eyes, seemed to be drinking in his every word like nectar. Albane sighed. To be like that one day, maybe . . . You fall in love the way you become a painter or a musician, by imitation. If you see a Renoir, you buy brushes; if you hear Mozart, you learn music; if you glimpse the splendor of love, you want to embody it yourself.
Quentin gave a start. “My bus!”
“Already?”
“Yes, I’m going to miss it.”
He jumped down, closed his bag, and put it on his back. He smiled at Albane, waved at her, and set off at a quick pace. After ten steps, he ran back, looking anxious. “You did say you wouldn’t make love until you’re sixteen and a half, right?”
Sixteen and a half felt too soon to Albane, but she didn’t want to contradict herself. “Yes,” she confirmed, bowing her head.
“So that’s in a year and a half?”
Will I manage it in a year and a half? she thought. Oh, I hope I can. I’ll probably have healed by then.
“Yes, a year and a half.”
“In that case,” he said gently, “will you wait for me?”
14
ENCYCLOPEDIA OF LOVE
by Baptiste Monier
Extracts
Caress. 1. Light touch applied to a person’s skin, sometimes voluntary, sometimes involuntary—the voluntary kind lasts longer, but the involuntary kind may have major repercussions. 2. Problem between two naked people when their two skins do not feel the same thing.
Flirtation. 1. State of indecision between a man and a woman who wonder if they might not to be able to do better elsewhere. 2. Habit of people who are lacking in self-confidence.
Kiss. 1. Exploration of a person’s oral cavity with the intention of undressing him/her. 2. Common practice among homeless bipeds, frequently performed in cars, in doorways, and on benches. 3. Act forbidden in certain professions such as prostitution (or tax auditing).
Love. 1. Problem between human beings that some take for a solution. 2. Selfishness that achieves a temporary balance with another person’s selfishness. 3. Unusual ability to take an interest in another person while losing one’s own self-interest. 4. Subject of novels.
Masturbation. 1. Most common form of human sexuality, making it possible to dispense with other people and their complications. 2. Method of thinking about another person while touching one’s own body. 3. Preparation used by some people in order not to be overexcited when they arrive for a date. 4. Common practice among women making love with men who are in a hurry. 5. Teenage occupation.
Passion. 1. Persistent illusion about another person, accompanied by numerous signs of affection. 2. Mental illness with no known remedy; generally, the victim of passion, once cured, has no idea what happened to him/her.
Penetration. 1. (For a man) Result of several dinners out, a few evenings at the theater, and frequent visits to the florist’s. 2. (For a woman) Way of rewarding a man who has told her repeatedly that she is beautiful. 3. (Medical) Practice entailing many risks (diseases, children, etc.). 4. (Rare) Highest expression of love.
Penis. 1. Male sexual organ whose size varies depending on the emotional state of the man. 2. True seat of the brain in some males.
Pregnancy. 1. Method by which a woman keeps her husband at a distance by asserting her superiority over him. 2. Pleasant period during which a woman, unusually, is encouraged to put on weight. 3. Means by which a couple can say goodbye to irresponsibility. 4. First sign of joys to come. 5. First sign of problems to come.
Provocation. 1. (In a woman) Discreet way of finding out if a man likes her. 2. (In a man) Indiscreet way of making sure that a woman likes him.
Reproduction. 1. Ulterior motive underlying sexual relations in very religious people. 2. Anxiety in sexually liberated people. 3. (Common) Contraceptive accident.
Sperm. 1. Liquid of which 99.99% has no use. 2. Sign of impending exhaustion in a man. 3. Secretion sometimes accompanied by the use of coarse vocabulary. 4. Compromising stain on material, resulting in disasters at home or at work. 5. (Archaic) Man’s seed, which, by linking up with the ovum, makes it possible to have children: this usage is practically obsolete.
Tenderness. 1. Kind of loving that is neither sexual nor genital. Suitable for friendships and family relationships. 2. Replacement for sex in elderly people. 3. Form of sainthood.
Underwear. 1. (In a woman) Erotic adornment intended to excite the male. 2. (In a man) Anti-erotic adornment designed to be removed quickly. 3. (Gerontological) Hygienic protection.
Vagina. 1. Inner female part, a genuine object of obsession in men. 2. Reward sometimes given to a deserving penis. 3. Area that is mysterious and terrifying to homosexuals. 4. Area of endless play for lesbians.
15
The birds made a contribution to the upkeep of the square by scattering a daily dose of fertilizer on the ground.
Hippolyte loved coming to Place d’Arezzo, not only because he was taking care of a garden threatened by urban pollution, but also because he always felt as if he had gone on a journey; watching the parrots, listening to their hullaballoo, admiring their huge, dark nests made up of modified twigs, as compact, watertight and solidly built as Noah’s Ark, he would escape Brussels, its asphalt and its bricks, and come to a world that was untouched, colorful, lemon-scented, talkative, as young as the Earth and as immutable, showing by its refreshing persistence that it didn’t give a damn for human civilizations. Whenever he caught a glimpse of a parrot’s round head, its dark, startled eye, its lack of interest in the activities of the city, he felt relief; so there were other creatures that lived as he did, absorbed in the present moment, with little concern for what preoccupied sophisticated minds.
He had no interest in the Bidermann affair, for instance. That a man should have forced himself on a woman was, unfortunately, a commonplace act of violence. They should pity the victim, punish the culprit, then stop talking about it. Why couldn’t the media let go of the subject? Why were people clamoring for more details? Anyone would think they had discovered evil for the first time . . . I’m not clever enough, I must be missing something.
Whenever there was something he didn’t understand, Hippolyte would lash out at himself, blaming his own shortcomings; he always lent credibility to his contemporaries, society, the universe. Any stupidity or absurdity could only be coming from him. He lived with the conviction that everything had a meaning, and if the meaning escaped him, then it was because of his wretched head, not because something was meaningless. Naturally, the world was so much more complex than him that
his little mind couldn’t grasp its structure or its details.
“I’m happy.”
The thought of his happiness had emerged all by itself from his mouth. Startled, he propped his chin on the handle of his shovel.
“Strange to be happy when . . . ”
Yes, he had just been rejected by Patricia, Patricia whom he loved, Patricia with whom he had dreamed of spending his days and his nights, and yet this morning, holding his tools, in the process of spreading bird shit, he felt really happy. Was that normal?
He went up to Germain. “Tell me, Germain, are you happy?”
“Of course,” the dwarf replied. He wiped his forehead and looked up at his colleague’s face. “Why do you ask?”
“Because I’m happy too, and I find it strange.”
Germain was amused by this feeling of surprise. “What do you mean?”
“I should be sad, gloomy, downhearted, lacking in appetite. I miss Patricia, you know. All I want is to have her back again but, in spite of that, I feel good. My soul is at peace.”
“Maybe you have no soul!”
Germain had meant it as a joke, but Hippolyte took it seriously. “Maybe . . . Do animals have souls? Do parrots and parakeets have them?”
“Most people say they don’t.”
“That’s what it is, then . . . No wonder animals are my friends. I’m like them. Every morning is a new day.”
He left Germain and went back to work. No wonder Patricia had left him. How could an intelligent woman be crazy about such a boring man?
He had to mow the lawn now. He hesitated, partly because there were lots of people on the sidewalk, drawn here by the Bidermann affair, and partly because he liked to push the machine bare-chested but didn’t want Patricia to see him like this. If it was all over between them, he didn’t want to feel again the way he had felt so many times on this square, knowing that not only was he being warmed by the rays of the sun but also being caressed by her eyes.