I said no because I’ve never set foot in the land of the dead and have no intention of doing so, not for anything in the world, especially since it’s even further away than Japan and Haiti.
“Yes, but you’re only telling a story, so just imagine you’re going there. That’s not so difficult, is it?”
“I won’t go there. Some places are asking for trouble, and stories about people who go to the land of the dead are not my kind of thing.”
“Fine, all right then, but in these stories of yours have you at least got a great love that takes place in the time of cholera between a poor telegrapher and a young schoolgirl who will end up marrying a doctor later on?”
“What is a telegrapher?” I asked, playing innocent.
“I can see we’re not out of the woods yet! We’re going to have to work on your vocabulary … But in these stories of yours, have you at least got a crime of passion involving an artist who murders a woman he met at an exhibition, even though she admired one of his paintings?”
“Don’t talk to me about art!”
“Really? You don’t like art but you call yourself a writer?”
“Modern art gets up my nose. Back home, I saw a reproduction of a painting at the French Cultural Centre, it was called Les Demoiselles d’Avignon, and it was ugly as a bulldog’s face.”
“So you don’t understand the first thing about painting, which is a major handicap … But in these stories of yours, have you at least got a character with a drum, somebody who from the age of three doesn’t want to grow up, a character who will be interned in a mental hospital later on and who will tell their life story to their keeper through the peep-hole, eh? Now, I’m only saying all this to help you out a bit because you don’t have a clue where you are going or who else has gone before you. It would help if the keeper in the mental hospital had an artistic streak, he might tie knots, for example, which he would show to the patient, do you see where I’m going, eh?”
I let it drop that I’ve got a character who plays the tom-toms, and that I’ve nicknamed him the Hybrid. He’s the guy who’s gone back to the home country with my partner and my daughter.
“Mention drums or tom-toms again and I’m walking out of this bar!” I bellowed. “I’ve had enough! I’m off!”
And I made a swift exit from Jip’s, because Roger the French-Ivorian was getting more and more drunk. I told him I’d never talk to him about any of my projects again, and that he’d be better off forgetting what Paul from the big Congo had said to him.
My parting shot was:
“You don’t understand anything. I write the way I lead my life, one moment it’s one thing and the next I’ve moved on to a whole different kettle of fish, and that’s called living too in case you didn’t know. Buying me a few Pelforts doesn’t give you the right to shit all over me with your white sheep and your old men who like going to sea and reading love stories. I’ve got a real friend who listens to me, he’s called Louis-Philippe and he’s from Haiti. Now that’s what I call a writer, not some loudmouth like you waiting to retire before you produce your masterpiece for all the world to read. Go and find someone else to pick on!”
Just as Paul from the big Congo walked in, I heard Roger the French-Ivorian answer in a metallic voice:
“Down here, Buttologist, everything has already been written! Everything! Take it from me, I’ve read all the great books in the world. So don’t go thinking you can change things. And you’d better make sure I don’t find my name in your diary of a cuckold! Speaking of which, where are your woman and daughter now, eh? You can’t put that into writing because you’re ashamed of people finding out. Call yourself a writer? You’re just vomiting up your anger against your ex and the minstrel who stole her off you. Serves you right!”
I
It’s definitely not me who’s digging the hole in the social security. It was already around when I got here, everybody had been talking about it for decades. Some people even claimed you could fall into it just from walking in the street, because there were no warning signs, so I had nothing to be ashamed of and, to boost my morale, I kept telling myself this hole story was made up by a few opposition politicians who wanted to stop the government from doing its work so it would have a disastrous track record when it came to the elections …
But the people debating it on telly a week ago declared that at this rate we were heading straight for “a spectacular and unprecedented collapse”. They’ve got me feeling very worried again, especially since even Roger the French-Ivorian is making it clear he thinks I am personally making matters worse by only working part-time and spending the rest of my time in front of my typewriter …
From listening to those well-informed people on the telly talking about it, I was led to believe that the situation was worse than serious, it was hopeless. The country had lost the battle and the war. They talked about the deficit, about bad management, about calamitous governance and lots of other things too. I scribbled notes on the labels off the Pelfort bottles I’d bought the day before from our Arab on the corner, who’s very friendly and always starts talking as soon as I walk in:
“‘For too long the West has force-fed us with lies and bloated us with pestilence’ … Do you know which black poet had the courage to say that, eh?”
I couldn’t take my eyes off the screen during that heated debate. Which was an achievement for me. I generally prefer to watch romantic movies or shows that promise me a chance of winning an automatic car if I dial the telephone number at the bottom of the screen. Oh, and I used to like watching those shows with couples who get catapulted to an island in South America where they’re separated and exposed to the temptations of other men and women twenty-four seven, for twelve days. It’s true, back then I never missed an episode, I used to joke with my ex and dare her to set off with me on one of those adventures, because apparently it’s when they’re far away from home that couples realise how unshakeable their love is. You’d keep watching to find out whether the man and the woman would head back home together, arm in arm at the end, or whether they’d be calling each other every name under the sun and never speak again. My partner didn’t find it funny when I suggested going for it, she was convinced I was just dreaming of getting down and dirty with all those blondes, redheads and brunettes with nice curvy backsides like the women from back home, the ones I go wild for. She said that the women we saw on telly weren’t real, it was all down to the make-up, because she’d never met a woman who looked anything like that when she was out shopping in Franprix or Monoprix at the end of our street. She also gave me a hard time because some of the men and women who were stranded on the island gave into the sins of the flesh from day one, and you could see them fornicating in the pool; while others observed a brief period of abstinence before making up for lost time and doing the business in every grove of that paradise. Now according to her, I belonged to the first category of sinners who were in a hurry to take a bite out of the first apple that landed in their lap. It’s been a while since I stopped watching those kinds of shows, because I found out they’ve often got fake couples leading viewers up the tropical garden path. Is that any way to go about things …?
So this time I was watching something else, a debate that was indirectly laying the blame at my door. Up on stage, a fight was about to break out among the guests. They said the words “hole” and “social security” nine hundred and twenty-five times. We watched a report from a health insurance office and one from a chemist. As chance would have it, the reports had been filmed in our neighbourhood, a bit further off, towards the town hall. The men and women featured were openly criticising our social security system, they didn’t realise the place was bugged with tiny microphones and cameras, or that they’d be watched throughout France, including in Corsica and Monaco. They were explaining how they often turned a blind eye to false claims because they couldn’t give a monkey’s, and anyway the money that got squandered in reimbursements for this or that didn’t come out of their own pockets …