Philippe Djian
Betty Blue
Translated from the French by Howard Buten
1
They were predicting storms for the end of the day but the sky stayed blue and the wind died down. I went to take a look in the kitchen-make sure things weren’t getting clogged up in the bottom of the pot. Everything was just fine. I went out onto the porch armed with a cold beer and stayed there for a while, my face in the sun. It felt good. It had been a week now that I’d been spending my mornings in the sun, squinting like some happy idiot-a week now since I’d met Betty.
I thanked my lucky stars again and reached for my chaise longue, grinning. I lay down comfortably, like somebody with time on his hands and a beer in his fist. I hadn’t slept more than twenty hours all week and Betty had slept less-maybe not at all, who knows? She was always shaking me, always thinking there was something better we should be doing: Hey, you’re not going to leave me alone here, she’d say. What do you think you’re doing? Wake up! I would open my eyes and smile. Smoke a cigarette. Fuck. Talk. I did my best to keep up with her.
Luckily my job wasn’t too tiring. When everything was going well I’d finish work around noon and have the rest of the day to myself. All I had to do was stay around the complex till seven-be available if somebody needed me. When it was nice out you could just find me in my chaise longue. I stayed glued to it for hours. I thought I’d struck a good balance between life and death-found the only intelligent thing to do, when you stop to think about it. Life doesn’t have much to offer outside of a few things that aren’t for sale. I opened my beer and thought about Betty. “For God’s sake, there you are! I’ve been looking all over for you!”
I opened my eyes. It was the lady from number three, an eighty-pound blonde with a squeaky voice. Her false eyelashes were twinkling like crazy in the light.
“What’s the matter?” I asked.
“How should I know, for God’s sake? There’s this thing overflowing in the bathroom. You better come stop it right away! I’ll never understand how things like this happen…”
I sat up quickly. I was not amused. Look at this woman for three seconds and you can tell she’s nuts. I knew she was going to drive me crazy, too. Her bathrobe was sliding all over her dried-out shoulders. I got wasted just looking at her.
“I was about to eat,” I said. “Can’t this wait live minutes? Be nice and just…”
“Are you kidding? This is a disaster! There’s water all over the place! Hurry up, come with me…”
“Hold on. First tell me exactly what broke. What’s overflowing?”
She giggled in the sunlight, her hands shoved in her pockets.
“Well, you know… it’s the… the white thing that’s overflowing. For God’s sake there are little shreds of paper all over the place!”
I took a swallow of beer and shook my head.
“Look,” I said. “Don’t you understand? I was just sitting down to eat. Can’t you just close your eyes for fifteen minutes? Is that too much to ask?”
“Are you crazy or what? I’m not kidding, you better come right away!”
“Oh, all right. Take it easy,” I said.
I went into the house and turned the fire off under the beans.
They were just getting done. Then I grabbed my toolbox and started off after the madwoman.
I got back an hour later, soaked from head to foot and half-dead from hunger. I lit a match under the saucepan and jumped into the shower and stopped thinking about her. I felt the water run over my skull and the smell of beans slide under my nose.
Sunlight flooded the house. It was nice out. I knew that my problems were over for the day. I’d never seen a toilet clog up in the afternoon. Most of the time it was calm; half the bungalows were empty. I sat down to eat, smiling. My schedule was all fixed: eat, then navigate out onto the porch and wait there till evening. Wait until she came, her hips swaying, to sit on my lap.
I was lifting the lid on the saucepan when the door swung wide open. It was Betty. I put my fork down, smiling, and stood up. “Betty!” I said. “Jesus… you know, I don’t think I’ve ever seen you in broad daylight…”
She sort of struck a pose, one hand in her hair, her curls tumbling down on all sides.
“So what do you think?” she asked.
I sat back down and looked at her, acting detached, one arm slung over the back of the chair.
“Well, the hips aren’t bad, and the legs aren’t bad either… yeah, turn around…”
She turned around. I stood up and pressed myself into her back. I stroked her chest and kissed her neck.
“But this…” I whispered. “This is perfect.”
I wondered what she was doing here at this time of day. I stepped inside, then spotted the two canvas suitcases sitting on the doorstep. I didn’t say anything.
“It smells good in here,” she said.
She leaned over the table to look in the saucepan.
“Oh God, I don’t believe it!”
“What are you talking a-”
“It’s chili! Don’t tell me you were going to eat all this chili by yourself.”
While she was dipping two fingers into the pot I got two beers out of the fridge. I thought about all the hours we had ahead of us-it was like swallowing opium.
“Oh Lord, it’s fabulous. And you made it yourself! I love it, it’s incredible! But in this heat-you must be nuts…”
“I can eat chili in any weather, even with the sweat running onto the plate. Me and chili-we’re like two pieces of bread in a sandwich.”
“Me too. Anyway, I’m so hungry I could…”
The second she’d walked through the door the house had changed. I couldn’t find anything anymore. I walked around in circles looking for silverware, opening up cabinets and smiling. She came and put her arms around my neck. I loved it. I could smell her hair.
“Hey, you happy to see me?” she said.
“Well, let me think it about it…”
“You’re all bastards…I’ll explain later.”
“Betty, is something wrong?”
“Nothing too serious,” she said. “Nothing worth letting the chili get cold over. Kiss me.”
By the time I’d had two or three spoonfuls of those spicy beans I’d forgotten all about it. Betty’s presence had made me euphoric-she laughed all the time, she complimented me on my beans, she made my beer foam, she reached out across the table and caressed my cheek. I didn’t know yet how she could go from one mood to another with the speed of light.
We were just finishing lunch-it was delicious-having a nice time gulping it down, winking at each other and joking around. I was looking at her, Ending her so wonderful, when all of a sudden she changed before my eyes. She turned completely white and her eyes got incredibly hard. It took my breath away.
“Like I was saying… she began. “They’re all bastards. Sooner or later it’s always the same-I find myself with my suitcases in my hands. You get the picture?”
“What are you talking about?” I said.
“What do you mean what am I talking about? Are you listening to me? I’m trying to explain something to you! Why aren’t you listening to me?”
I didn’t answer. I went to touch her arm. She pulled away.
“Let’s get something straight,” she said. “I’m not looking for a guy who just wants to fuck.”
“I see,” I said.
She ran a hand through her hair, sighing, and looked out the window. Nothing moved outside-just a few houses sprinkled with sunlight and the road going straight across the countryside into the hills.
“When I think that I stayed a year in that dump…” she muttered. She stared into space, her hands squeezed between her legs, her shoulders hunched over as if she suddenly felt very tired. I’d never seen her like that. All I knew was her laughter. I’d always thought that she could stand up to anything. I asked myself what this was all about.