How's the Pain? (10 page)

God existed, but He did not look like the pissed-off Father Christmas character people usually imagined. For starters, He was a She, and She was black. She wore a madras cotton turban, two big hoop earrings, and a huge smile. She had created rum in her own image and the little creatures rejoiced at this revelation, breaking out in a frenzied Caribbean
biguine
around Anaïs.

She stood up almost effortlessly. Now if that wasn’t a miracle! She took another good swig to buck herself up for her first steps into this brave new world. Then she screwed the lid back on tightly and placed the bottle on the draining board; that way she no longer ran the risk of confusing God with a common cleaning product. Thinking of cleaning, she frowned, taking in just how filthy her kitchen had become; two weeks’ washing up was stacked in a perilous pyramid, the cooker was caked with grease and the lino stuck to the soles of her slippers.
Feeling in great shape, she armed herself with a scourer and a floor cloth and rolled up her sleeves.

The clattering of pans roused Fanny from her sleep. She rubbed her eyes. Anaïs was not on the sofa.

‘Anaïs …? What on earth are you doing?’

‘The housework, obviously. Don’t come in, I’m washing the floor!’

‘But what about the doctor?’

‘Yes, what about the doctor?’

‘You were …’

‘Well, I’m not any more – I’m on top of the world! And it’s not down to that stupid so-and-so, it’s thanks to God. I’ve just seen Him, clear as I see you now. That’s right, dear, it doesn’t just happen at Lourdes, you know. Now listen, Fanny, I’m very grateful for everything you’ve done but, as you can see, I’ve got my work cut out here. It’s getting late and I know Georges doesn’t like to be on his own at night, so please, go back and keep him company.’

‘Are you sure …?’

‘Positive. Off you go.’

Fanny took herself off, shaking her head, and Anaïs turned on the radio. As luck would have it, Jean Ferrat was singing ‘La Montagne’.

The kitchen was now gleaming but Anaïs wasn’t done yet. She tackled the bedroom next, then the sitting room. Untouched for decades, the vacuum cleaner seemed to be enjoying its own second wind, sucking up so much dust she had to change the bag three times. She saved the Negress lamp until last, polishing every nook and cranny with a soft cloth.

‘Oh, Negrita, dearest Negrita! We should bow down before you!’

It was two in the morning when Anaïs finally sank back onto the sofa, basking in the glow of her hard work.

‘My God, I’m hungry. I could eat a raw elephant!’

Anaïs unearthed a tin of sardines and began devouring them, mopping up the sauce with a crust of stale bread. She had patched things up with life now; the last mouthful of rum sealed the deal. Afterwards she let out a loud burp, a delicate combination of oily fish and alcohol. She scrupulously washed her plate, glass and cutlery, brushed her teeth and went to her room, put on a pair of Japanese pyjamas she had never worn before, and slipped between the clean sheets of the freshly made bed. She was not ready to sleep, not with this feeling of serenity bathing her like amniotic fluid. In the warm glow of the bedside lamp, whose shade was draped in a pink scarf, she lay with her hands behind her head and closed her eyes, smiling like a baby.

‘Now all I need is a project I can get my teeth into …’

The pavement of Boulevard du Front-de-Mer was drying in patches. The sky looked off-colour and the sea was the shade of a dodgy oyster. The wind was doing its utmost to get inside the shawl wrapped tightly around Rose’s chest.

‘It’s almost like being back home. The weather’s always like this in Belgium, even on a good day. We’re used to it, but you still get sick of it sometimes. You’ve travelled a lot, haven’t you, Simon?’

‘A fair amount.’

‘To hot countries?’

‘Yes. You can get sick of blue sky too.’

‘What are you going to do, now you’re retired?’

‘Nothing, like everyone else.’

‘Oh, you mustn’t! You need to make plans. You could come and see me in Namur?’

‘Why not …’

Yes, why not? Rose’s house was bound to be cosy. He
could sit warming his feet in front of the stove, flicking through an atlas in search of an imaginary island. Rose would cook him chicory
à la cassonade
or
au jambon.
And then he’d die and she would stuff him, putting glass eyes in his empty sockets to make him look alive. That was as good a plan as any. He was smiling to himself at the thought of it when a searing pain shot through him like a bolt of lightning. It took his breath away. All he could see were streaks and bubbles, like film melting under the heat of a projector.

‘Are you OK, Simon? … Simon!’

Luckily since the promenade was used mainly by the elderly, there was a bench every five metres. Rose sat him down, patting his hand and cheeks and saying words he could not understand.

‘I’m going to get my car. We’ll go back to the bungalow and I’ll call a doctor. Stay where you are, I’ll be right back.’

The pain had gone, leaving nothing behind but the tail of a comet thrashing in empty space. ‘I’m sitting on a bench … I’m sitting on a bench …’ was all he managed to think.

‘So what does your mother sell in her shop?’

‘Uh, nothing. She’s had a go at selling loads of things but it never worked out. Now she just lives there, if you can call it a life. Have you seen this? Violette loves ketchup!’

The baby was greedily suckling Bernard’s
sauce-covered
finger.

‘Well done, you’ve got it all over her. She looks like Dracula or something.’

The snack bar where they had stopped for sausage and chips was empty apart from the owner and a guy clinging to the bar like a mussel to its bed.

‘What’s the point in a shop that doesn’t sell anything?’

‘There isn’t one.’

‘What’s Vals like?’

‘Small. It’s quite smart on one side of the Volane, with the baths, casino, hotels and gardens for the old and rich. It’s completely dead across the river, where the old and skint live.’

‘Sounds like paradise … you really know how to treat a girl!’

‘I never said we had to stay there. It’s where my mother lives, that’s all.’

‘Have you never thought of doing something with the shop?’

‘No, like what?’

‘Well, I don’t know … But in a touristy town like that, you can always sell something. Tourists get bored, so they buy stuff.’

‘Hmm … if that was true, my mother would be a millionaire by now.’

‘Maybe she just hasn’t found the right thing yet.’

‘Maybe.’

On the other side of the steamed-up window, cars were driving up and down the road like grey ghosts. On their plates, the few leftover crooked chips were returning to the frozen state the cook had briefly released them from, floating in a swamp of ketchup. Fiona was puffing on a cigarette and daydreaming, resting her cheek on her hand. Bernard was cradling the little monster snoring through her wrinkled-up nose.

‘How big’s this shop?’

‘About half the size of this place, I’d say, maybe a bit smaller. And it’s a bit of a mess. Well, it’s falling apart.’

‘But you said it’s on the main road, didn’t you?’

‘Yes, but in the poor bit, so it might as well be a dead end. Every day except market day, it’s: “Move along, nothing to see here!” Don’t start getting ideas, that’s what wrecked my mother’s life. We can go back to Bron; there’s
a job waiting for me up there. The streets aren’t exactly paved in gold, but it’s steady money.’

‘I’m not getting ideas. I’m just interested, that’s all.’

‘Anyway, once you’ve seen it you’ll know exactly what I mean. Shall we get going?’

Violette agreed to be strapped in without protest, one eye open, the other shut, her lips pursed in resignation. Fiona joined Bernard in the front, which made him happy. Once he had put a bit of money aside, he would buy himself a car. Nothing as flashy as Monsieur Marechall’s, but his own set of wheels all the same. He already had the child seat, which was a start. Fiona put her hand on his thigh and turned on the radio. Before setting off, they kissed like kids, their mouths tasting of warm Coke and ketchup.

‘Men are always the first to go, whether they run off with a tart or kick the bucket,’ thought Rose. ‘Marike’s right, you have to get them young, at least then you have a chance of holding on to them. Not that she has it much better herself; she’s still a widow with gold-diggers sniffing around her. “Stormy weather, brightening up later on,” they said on the radio this morning. Fat chance!’

She was absently plaiting together the tassels of her shawl, sitting on the edge of the bed where Simon lay fully clothed but for his shoes. He had categorically refused to let her call a doctor. A handful of pills and he had fallen asleep, ashen-faced with two great purple bags under his eyes. Rose had never been married, at first because she did not believe in it – or to avoid being ditched like her mother was – and later out of habit. It was only in the last four or five years that she had begun to think about ending her days with someone – with a man, that is. She was healthy,
comfortably off, had plenty to keep herself busy, but she was unable to shake off a growing sense of sadness. She had even thought about taking out a lonely hearts ad or signing up to a dating agency, but her pride had stopped her; she wanted a real love affair, the kind that comes along when you least expect it. In a sense she was already in love, but did not yet know with whom. Then this Simon chap had turned up out of nowhere! Despite having known him only twenty-four hours, she had realised straight away he was the one. And seeing him like this now, lying stiff with his hands crossed over his stomach, his nostrils pinched and skin waxy – it was too much to take in. The tricks life plays on us …

‘Shoot, Simon! Just shoot, damn it! It hurts too much, I’m finished …’

The weapon trembled in Simon’s hand, the barrel pointing at his friend Antoine’s forehead. Simon had killed men before, but on the battlefield you were never quite sure – the enemy was too far away, hidden by branches and rocks. This time it was different, standing inches away from his friend’s
pain-racked
face.

‘We’re all born to die … Shoot, please!’

Simon had shut his eyes. He was a little boy, crawling under the table where his mother was shelling peas and chatting with her friends. It was dark underneath their dresses. His finger had pulled the trigger. Not him, his finger. Ever since, each time he killed a man, he saw himself back under that table, amid a forest of grey woollen-stockinged legs.

What was Rose doing? It looked like she was knitting. Those podgy little hands … He held out his open palm. Rose turned to him, the lashes of her owl-like eyes caked in lumpy mascara, a weak smile on her lips.

‘How are you feeling?’

‘So, what did he say?’

‘Nothing. He didn’t even seem surprised. He just looked at me.’

After dropping Fiona and Violette at their caravan, Bernard had parked the car outside Monsieur Marechall’s. He was out. Bernard had immediately thought of Rose. All the way to her bungalow, he kept running over the speech he had prepared in the car. But he got muddled, jumbling his words. By the time he knocked at the door, his mind was utterly blank. Rose let him in. Her
make-up
was smeared, but she was smiling. Monsieur Marechall was sitting on the edge of the bed, his hands cupping a mug of hot tea. His shoelaces were undone, his skin sallow and almost translucent, the rim of his eyes the dull pink of ham that’s past its best. He looked like one of those antique Chinese ivory figurines. There was no movement to his face, no trace of emotion in his expression. Bernard
felt dizzy looking at him. Eventually he managed to prise his tongue from his palate and speak.

‘It’s me, Monsieur Marechall. I came back. I brought the car …’

No reaction. Total silence.

‘I’m sorry, I …’

Rose came to his rescue, placing her hand on his shoulder.

‘It’s OK, Bernard, leave it. Simon had a funny turn earlier on, but he’s a lot better now. Don’t worry. Are Fiona and the baby with you?’

‘Yes.’

‘Good, good. Go back and see them. I’ll be along in a little while.’

As he allowed himself to be ushered out, Bernard thought he saw a smile hovering over Monsieur Marechall’s lips, but perhaps that was just what he wanted to see.

‘He didn’t say anything at all? He didn’t even call you an idiot?’

‘Not a word, I swear. He was just staring at me, but at the same time I’m not sure he really saw me at all.’

‘He must have been seriously shaken. I once saw a guy get an electric shock while he was fixing a meter. Christ, he looked like he’d come back from the dead! What if he pops his clogs tonight, or tomorrow? What’ll we do then?’

‘I don’t know. Let’s not think about it.’

‘You really hit the jackpot with that one, I’m telling you. Anyway, we’re out of milk for Violette – do you want to go and get some?’

‘Anaïs? You’re up?’

‘Of course I am. I’m not exactly going to do my shopping on all fours!’

‘I heard you were ill …’

‘Well, you heard wrong. Where’s the grated Gruyère?’

‘At the back, in the dairy section.’

Anaïs’s bulk filled the narrow aisles as she moved up and down the shelves of the Petit Casino. Her wellingtons squeaked and her umbrella dripped, leaving a snail trail on the tiled floor. She had such good memories of the previous evening’s sardines that she picked up three cans, followed by pasta, rice, flour, chocolate, biscuits, peas, eggs … Other than the three bottles of Negrita, she grabbed products at random, not even bothering to look at what she was throwing into her basket. The truth was she couldn’t care less. She just wanted to fill her cupboards, as though preparing for a siege. She only stopped stuffing
things into her basket when the handle began to dig into her arm. She barely managed to haul it up to the till. After putting through all her purchases, the grocer looked less than pleased to be told she would pay him tomorrow.

‘Don’t you believe me?’

‘Yes, but—’

‘Bernard’s coming back this evening, or tomorrow. He’ll drop by and settle the bill.’

It was still raining, the water glazing the road and fringing the gutters. Faceless, stooped figures scurried along, keeping close to the walls. It was this rotten weather that had made Anaïs stock up, because it was going to carry on like this for ages, perhaps even until the end of the world. It made no difference to her since she was already dead, but eternity was a long time and she needed to be ready for it.

Back home, she put down her umbrella and took off her raincoat with a sigh and swapped the oversized wellington boots for her good old slippers.

‘The sky can fall in if it wants. We’ve got everything we need, haven’t we, princess?’

The Negress lamp smiled back at her. She went into the kitchen to put away her supplies, poured herself a good glass of rum and stood back to admire the cans lined up like ornaments on the shelves.

‘Now, give me one good reason why I should go out. Just one!’

She started to laugh, the same laugh as the woman on the Negrita bottle.