Authors: Richard Blanchard
“You look like a poof⦔
“I look like a dad,” I answer quizzically.
“You smell like a brothel.”
“I might well do, no thanks to you and my spineless chums. Just go back to sleep will you, I need to think.”
I have moved from having one son to almost none, then to two in the space of three days.
I grab my iPhone thirstily as I need an appropriate soundtrack to the darkness lifting into light outside. I want to block the world out to let me process this; my son Ethan is almost a man for Christ sakes. He must know I never had a chance to be his dad.
Pavarotti will make me soar with the song of not sleeping.
My cheek rests heavily on my pillow; my alcohol-laced saliva has dribbled into the collective body fluids festering inside the casing. My watch stares me out from the cabinet; it is annoyed that almost ten hours of the day have already past. Having said that, I was awake for the first four of them. The warm bed tries to pull me back to waste some more. However, it is a ski day and the loss of time provokes instant anxiety in me. Others have been cutting into the groomed slopes for an hour and I probably won't be able to join them for yet another hour myself unless I speed up. From the hallway I hear the distinctive click-clack of ski boots and the rubbing of ski-suit nylon from some over-plump thighs. I roll onto my back, peeling my wet cheek from the soaked pillow; a cobweb of spittle keeps us joined for a few seconds. Alcohol-polluted blood thumps through the nape of my neck, pounding my pillow with its over-exertion. My ears still ring in this noise vacuum after the musical abuse from last night's bars; they have etched their bland symphony of supposed atonal happiness into my head. I have condoned these hapless musical choices by my attendance. A duvet covers my nakedness; today I needed it as Chris turned the heating off. Chris's growling snore hurts my head as well. My penis is gorged with blood and pushes a mini mountain into the duvet. I imagine myself skiing the left-hand edge of the duvet creases, I spy a few ledges that I could rest up on; I could get down that one but there is no chance of surviving the sheer cotton rock face to my right. My legs feel the motion of moving down a slope. The ringing intensifies into a shrillness that wasn't present before, there is nothing natural about it; it is the unnatural call to action that is a telephone.
“Wake up Dan.” The phone clicks off without a chance for reply. Robert has brought me around; I detest you, you creep.
“Fuck me I have got a son,” I utter out loud. I am not one for swearing but fuck me life is different. The noise halts Chris's latest snore, causing it to rip into a grunt.
“What? What's the time Dan?” Chris asks me without having control of his mouth yet. He breathes a putrid cloud of alcohol and decay into the room, which I can't avoid to get past his bed to the bathroom.
“Ten and I need breakfast. Get up, get up, I've got a son!” I shout at him without elaboration. Although this news makes my heart soar, I am dragged back to the events of last night that caused me to find out. I step into the shower, but my right foot slips to remind me that I am still under the influence of alcohol. The sharp light of my new life does battle with the darkness of my old one. With shampoo in my hair I turn around and arch my neck to allow the soapy water to drain away. My stance recalls clichéd advertising images of the next best greatest shampoo ever, which will invigorate your life. I scrub my genitals like I have herpes; I pull my foreskin back to wash inside. At its closest it was probably three feet away from Mirabel, but I feel as if I entered her with my whole body; the potential of the whole act repulses me so much. It would have been a betrayal I could not repair with Sophia, but most of all to me. The image of red-wine vomit sloshing between her cast open naked legs makes my nose twitch. I rub myself down hastily with the corner of my towel that is still dry.
Because Chris slept in his clothes we leave the room as soon as I am dressed. I am an exhilarated semi-drunk; I move with purpose to press the lift call button but miss it all the same. We both lean on the wall while our feet remember how to support us. Chris hasn't questioned my declaration about having a son; he assumes it is some drunken habit that I shout out known parts of my life when I wake up. The lift seems to shake with the thump of my heart. I must have such disrespect for my body to get here; but my so-called friends have shown me even more. Last night's celebration of my marriage was more like a dissection of my life. Chris and I bump shoulders as we exit the lift. We must attract tuts from the tail end of today's skiers, who are fully dressed by the door waiting to depart. We scurry through the lobby with heads down.
The dining room is long abandoned, scattered with a dusting of breadcrumbs, tea spillage and waste cereal packets. Juliet, Johnny and Steve are sitting on tall chairs near the ceiling-high window at the far end. They stop eating as I arrive; their half-told manipulated reports of last night will have to wait now that I am here. I am struck by the gaping view up the mountainside as I sit at the head of the table. A small wooden slide in the garden outside reminds me of my younger son. I am disgusted by yet more Muzak; a trip-hop beat with some someone rapping “
Je ne regret Rien
.” Why can't people leave these things alone? Keep your ears covered Edith Piaf.
“The pastries were great Dan but they are all gone,” Steve uselessly informs me.
“Just like our jobs at Centurion then.” Steve looks away hastily, unable to hold my gaze after last night's revelations. If it is a quick closure I might never have to work with him again.
“Café, thé, Messieurs?
A young waitress with buckteeth nervously enquires of me; aptly she looks like she is caught in my headlights. She clearly doesn't relish serving us for some reason. I order tea with milk to keep up my English image.
“Where are the other two?” I enquire about the absence of Robert and Max from the group.
“They are over there in the lobby on those bloody awful seats,” Steve replies.
“An interesting night don't you think?” I keep my conversation vague to flush out anything I might have missed.
“You were off your trolley mate,” Johnny reminds me, “I have never seen you so drunk.”
“I suppose it was my stag night.” I am disappointed in him especially; he could have helped more as he is my best man.
I join Chris at the buffet and grab a few slices of cheese and ham before he cleans up. The remaining bread is just baguette ends, all hard rounded edges. I choose some and prize them open to take a bite of the more succulent bread inside. I seem to be the last diner. On my return to the table Juliet and Steve have left to see Robert.
“You seem a bit sharp this morning.” Johnny tries to get eye contact from me to bring his usual Dan back.
“I'm just coming to terms with what happened last night. You know the abuse, the lost friends, the prostitutes, that kind of stuff.” Johnny and Chris stop eating hoping that I am going to explain all this to them.
“But the biggest discovery is that I have a son.”
“You said that when you woke up you dickhead. Of course you have a son, he's two years⦔ Chris chastises me.
“No a second son, he's sixteen actually.” This conversation will be good for Chris's waistline judging by his inability to eat, chewing is at a dead stop now.
“But who told youâ¦?” Johnny hasn't caught up.
“Juliet of course, her son Ethan is mine. She broke up with me so that I wouldn't be trapped or maybe she wouldn't, I can't quite remember the line. Whatever, he wants to meet me, which is great, the sooner the better.” I see an image of me beaming at him as we meet outside arrivals. He will be tall like me I think, although a more confident rounded me having been in Juliet's charge. A third even harder baguette end is too much; I polish off the cheese, which is a cue for Chris to resume eating. I throw my napkin down on my plate and slurp the milky tea I made.
“Let's find out what plan these brilliant mates of mine have in store for today.”
“It's that bloody Valley thing I told you about; I ain't going near it. You can all play silly beggars off-piste if you like but I ain't skiing no glacier. Don't take any more shit from them Dan.” Chris withdraws himself neatly.
“I think I have had enough myself bro.”
Johnny and I walk towards the lobby where I had the meeting with Max and Steve the other evening. The ghosts of our wasted energy still haunt the chairs.
“Here is the sex machine now. He certainly knows how to show a woman a good time. You must be gay after all Dan, one look at a pussy and you throw up.” Robert expects some laughs but this is a private joke.
“Robert my friend, so good to see you. We went a bit off-piste last night didn't we? Did you finish off the evening with the shy and retiring prostitute you picked up? Ladies of the night don't count as girlfriends you know.” No intervention from anyone. I feel elevated.
“So then my faithful stags, remind me what we are doing to add to such an unforgettable trip? Just don't leave me behind like last night hey?” Most are looking chastened.
“All sorted, we are going to the Vallée Blanche. The guide is meeting us at the lift at twelve so let's meet here in half an hour.” Max says his first words to me since revealing his great lie about ByeFly.
“Bring it on I say. It will be interesting to see how you all ski with such sore heads and heavy hearts.” No one reacts again; they all have their reasons to feel as if they have let me down.
“Hi Jules, did you sleep okay?” I question her willingness and ability to sleep, but she just grimaces.
“I was woken by someone falling over a tray outside my room.” I lie to her in front of the group. “It's beautiful days like this that make you proud to be alive don't you think?”
“I don't like your tone Dan,” she protests.
“I'm sorry, I'm just a bit shaken.” I leave the group with no explanation of events. Twenty minutes to get out and show them what I am made of.
The automatic glass doors rip apart, withdrawing the multi-lingual plastic Welcome sign hung in reverse. I stand on the steps of the hotel with only Chris for company. If they were that interested in welcoming you someone could be on the door to do it. It's not the worst hotel in the world, but like so many others it offers plastic gestures to cover up its lack of genuine warmth and civility. I pick up my skis from the dank concrete locker room under the front steps. “You must leave the locker key at reception; you must not take skis into the hotel.” In other words you must act and behave exactly as I say. Rules and curt practices spill from the walls trying to keep their guests in line. We are manageable units in a cost-efficient low-service environment. When did the world get so bloody bossy? My inner ski boot instantly wets my freshly laundered sock, but the warmth from my legs is bringing it up to an acceptable temperature. I throw my skis onto my shoulder. I am almost sad to feel the biting metallic weight of the ski binding on this, the last ski day of our trip.
Max, Steve and Robert burst through the door as I try to exit. As they get past me I allow the flat side of my ski to whack Max on the head.
“Sorry, I must be more careful.” Max cannot detect sarcasm from me, as he never usually receives it.
The ten steps up to the front of the hotel are tortuous. After what I have put them through my muscles just don't want to stretch.
“Okay, I will come up the ski lift with you but that's it.” A reluctant Chris has been persuaded to take a ride in the lift by Juliet.
“Dan, will you wait here while I get my stuff?” Juliet is the last to descend into the ski room. My over-riding feeling of being cheated is competing with my enduring affection for her.
“Let's all wait for Juliet please,” I command the group to wait and set off together. We pass our favoured bar with the almost midday sun stroking our necks. We go past the bookshop torn asunder by the runaway crate; it seems to have fully recovered its charm.
“What did you do with that soiled jacket?” Juliet is right to be unconvinced I got rid of it.
“I dumped it like you asked.” At about three this morning when I got back to my room something compelled me to wash it in the bath. It is now hanging over a wooden chair on my balcony, drying out with its price ticket chattering in the breeze. However misguided, it was the first act of kindness I was able to do for Ethan. I am not sure if I will give it to him yet, but it just felt real to do it. He will really appreciate the “Tracks of My Years”; but what if he is into this trip-hop nonsense or even worse some plastic cover band? How can I help him recover from that fate, having had no real dad to put him on the straight and narrow? Maybe he will need some more intelligent fatherly words of wisdom? But what can I offer yet? My brain is not prepared for adult advice, as I am a generation away from having to give it.
As we pass under the railway bridge my inattention causes a man walking towards us to step into the road. A driver beeps a warning at him. It feels great that it is some other man for a change. We pass through the short flag-lined avenue that leads to the grandly named
Telepherique de l'Aiguille du Midi
cable car. An improbable cable soars out of the station into the sky above. I cover my eyes to try to see the end of it but it fades into the snow line on the mountain in front of us. The atmosphere in front of the ticket office seems very serious; people are breathing heavily down here but even more effort will be needed when the air thins out at the top. There is a mixture of climbers, skiers and viewers. The climbers are encumbered, they break the silence with the metallic clinking of ice picks and crampons strapped onto backpacks. The skiers have their usual gear but most have additional rucksacks as well; what are they carrying? The viewers however are a mixed bag of ski tourists and fur-coated Russians. “Wow. That's some climb hey?” Johnny shares my awe.