“How’s Antoine?”
He hadn’t been to see him, usually he went every week.
“I haven’t heard from him. Listen, I’m in a hurry, see you soon.”
The weather was nice now, people went out with colorful umbrellas, there were showers almost every day. On those days, it was as if people were off to discover the world in the morning, and then, how beautiful the world is, when they’re on their lunch break. As soon as I got his invoice, I took it to accounts myself to make sure he’d be paid quickly. I insisted, he’d done us a great service, I called him to tell him. It looked like there might be a storm, the windows in my apartment were open. He picked up after the second ring, as if he’d been waiting all day by the phone, and in his case that wasn’t just a figure of speech. Yes, he’d spoken with Marco. He’d tell me if he had the slightest problem. When I hung up, I felt like shaking him from afar. But after all, who was I to get irritated by his attitude? He didn’t always seem to be all there, that was all. I felt very tired, I remember. I closed the windows. I looked at myself in the closet mirror, full face, then profile, then three-quarters, that belly I couldn’t completely pull in, because I was fifty-four. I felt sorry about how things had gone for him, but that was it. He might have a job again thanks to Marc-André’s intervention. On Friday night, I took Marie out to dinner, I’d gone home beforehand to take a shower and change. I’d hesitated like a young man, she didn’t like guys from offices dressed like penguins. So I was in a real fix. I put on a pair of jeans and looked at myself in the closet mirror. I could have spent three whole days of my life looking at myself in the closet mirror, trying to decide if it was OK, or if it wasn’t OK, and it still wouldn’t have given me the right answer.
We talked for a long time, she and I. We had time to drink a bottle and I saw her home. She lived not far from Brochant, in a little three-room apartment she’d had for a long time. She’d paid next to nothing for it at the time. Sometimes she seemed lost in thought. I looked at her without knowing. We made love, we’d both been wanting it for a long time, since the e-mails and the last few weeks. We’d simply waited a while, we’d needed time. Do you mind if I switch off the light? We did it gently, for a long time, I didn’t have any difficulty in getting an erection. I liked the way we both lay there afterwards, without moving, holding each other tight. There was more noise at her place than in my building in Levallois, and besides, it was Saturday. I went to buy some croissants from the bakery on the corner. When I went back upstairs, Marie was already dressed, I didn’t know what to expect.
“Are you OK? I’ve brought some croissants.”
“Yes, I’m fine, how about you?”
We kept looking at each other, on the sly, I’d say. We sometimes smiled at each other without saying anything.
“Marie, are you sure you’re OK?”
“Yes, I’m fine. Would you like tea or coffee?”
She had to go to work in the afternoon, she was the nurse on duty. She wanted to be alone for a while before that, we’ll speak on the phone tonight, OK? I felt pleased to be going home, I went down the boulevard as far as Porte de Clichy. I knew the area quite well, I looked at the people curiously, eyes wide open. I walked to the Cité des Fleurs, I’d spent some time not far from there in the ’80s in connection with a job, it was a private street, with houses on either side, a well-preserved place, with birds in the trees and very clear clouds in the blue sky. Marie. I had no regrets this time. Maybe in the life of a guy like me, there was still room for a few good years? I hadn’t had my fair share, to be honest. I’d screwed up without realizing it. I crossed the Maréchaux and found myself in Clichy, after the Lycée Balzac, the service stations, and the entrance ramp to the northern beltway. For almost a quarter of a mile, there are Arab shops and used car lots, and then, as if I was a prince or something, I raised my hand to hail a passing taxi. It took me home in less than ten minutes and
I was happy about all that. Another life. Again. I only had to wait until tonight to talk to her. Another life. For free. Yet another life. It’s a gift. She often looked worried, I thought. I wondered why. After all, she was very popular. I went to the library in Levallois, and then I changed my mind, I decided I’d rather buy F. Scott Fitzgerald’s other books. I did a bit of shopping at the Monoprix near the town hall, surrounded by other guys like me. I went back home and waited for her to call me.
“I know almost nothing about him,” I said to Marco.
We were both sitting in his living room, the picture window wide open at the end of April. It was as if the trees had spread the word, the ones beside the Seine seemed incredibly green, as if they weren’t yet used to it. I remembered how when my father, who I hadn’t known very well, died, I was twenty-four at the time, the sun came through a stained glass window in the transept of the church of Notre Dame de la Croix in Ménilmontant and hit my forehead.
“I remember a bit,” Marco replied. “Don’t you remember how friendly he was to us?”
“Yes, it’s true.”
We were sitting side by side, with the sun facing us. He told me you couldn’t see anything when the sun shone, that he’d been wanting to put in blinds for a long time, but his sadness had nothing to do with that, when it came down to it.
“What time are we supposed to be there, shall we go?”
“We have time, you’ve already asked me twice,” he said.
We drank another coffee.
“I hadn’t seen him for about a year, I think. I didn’t know it was so serious, what he had.”
“He never said, he didn’t want anybody to know,” Marc-André murmured. “He didn’t want it, you know. Did you tell the people in Asnières?”
“Yes, everybody I could remember.”
We talked some more about guys, old friends we’d lost touch with, after a while it became painful to live with too many of these memories, it’s age, Marco said. And time. You can’t do anything against time. Finally we left for the ceremony.
Jean hadn’t arrived yet. He’d found a little job thanks to Marc-André. We went along a row of seats that wasn’t too far back. A woman in front, much younger than him, I wondered if it could be his wife, or else his sister. He had a daughter the same age as Benjamin, Élise, I think, I saw her when I went for a meal at his house, many years earlier. She had very white skin, like him, her tears were flowing, by themselves, should I kiss her and give her my condolences? There were also a few guys from the last place where he’d worked, I recognized some of them from the branch I’d been fired from nearly ten years ago. I couldn’t put names to the faces. Sometimes it’s the other way around, Marc-André and I had talked about that. Sometimes you search for a face to match the name.
Marie wouldn’t be at my place in the evening, and I probably wouldn’t be going to Brochant, unless during our phone call I felt like she was asking me to, without saying anything, the way she did most of the time. I’d figure it out without wanting to, already. I don’t like that word: already. It was cold in the church, April never comes in churches. Jean arrived five minutes after us, which let the light in through the left door, I turned around in the direction of the noise. He was moving forward on tiptoe, as if, even in the anonymity of a funeral, he didn’t want to disturb anyone. The priest started droning on about this guy, who’d never even set foot in a church, I turned to Marco and saw that he was crying and making no at-tempt to hide it. We took each other’s hands, I wanted to wait outside for the priest to finish his stupid speech. But actually, no, he was looking around, with his blue eyes and his weary air, as if he was on a visit somewhere. There weren’t thirty people in all. Maybe other people would be coming to the cemetery, I held out that hope for him, and for all the guys like him, I made a few promises to myself at that moment. We stood in line behind, and waited for the family to pass. He ended up in front of me, he said something I didn’t hear. I approached in turn and put my hand on the coffin, that was the way it was now, we saw each other in church, I didn’t like to think about it.