Whatever

by Michel Houellebecq

  Maybe, I tell myself, this tour of the provinces is going to alter my ideas. Doubtless in a negative sense, but it's going to alter my ideas; at least there will be a change of direction, a shake-up.

  Part Two

  1

  At the approaches to the narrows of Bab-el-Mandel, beneath the ambiguous and immutable surface of the sea, huge and irregularly spaced coral reefs are hidden which represent a real danger to navigation. They are barely perceptible except for a reddish bloom, a slightly different tinge to the water. And if the occasional traveller should call to mind the extraordinary density of the shark population which characterizes this area of the Red Sea (it has some two thousand sharks per square kilometre, if my memory serves me correct), then it will be readily understood if, despite the overwhelming and almost unreal heat that makes the surrounding air quiver with a viscous bubbling, he feels a slight shudder at the approaches to the narrows of Bab-el-Mandel.

  Fortunately, because of the odd way the sky reacts, the weather is always fine, excessively fine, and the horizon never deviates from an overheated and blinding whiteness which can also be observed in metal foundries during the third phase of treating the iron ore (I am speaking of that moment when there blossoms forth, as if suspended in the atmosphere and bizarrely at one with its intrinsic nature, the newly-formed flow of molten steel). That is why most pilots clear this obstacle without let or hindrance and are soon sailing in silence through the calm, iridescent and limpid waters of the Gulf of Aden.

  Sometimes, though, such things happen, occur for real. It's Monday morning, the first of December; it's cold and I am waiting for Tisserand by the departure gate of the train for Rouen; we're in the Gare Saint-Lazare; I'm getting more and more cold and more and more pissed off. Tisserand arrives at the last minute; we're going to have difficulty finding seats. Unless he's got himself a first-class ticket; that would be quite his style.

  I might have formed a tandem with four or five other people from my company, and in the end it's come down to Tisserand. I'm not wildly excited about it. He, on the other hand, declares himself delighted. `We make a terrific team you and me,' he promptly declares, Ì reckon things'll work out just great.' He describes a sort of rotating movement with his hands, as if to symbolize our future mutual understanding.

  I already know this young man; we've chatted many a time around the hot drinks machine. He generally told dirty stories; I have the feeling this tour of the provinces is going to be grim.

  Moments later the train is moving. We install ourselves in the midst of a group of garrulous students who seem to belong to a business school. I settle myself near the window to escape the surrounding noise, at least a bit. From his briefcase Tisserand extracts various coloured brochures dealing with accounting software; these have nothing to do with the training we're going to give. I hazard the remark. He interjects vaguely, 'Ah yes, Maple, that's good too,' then goes back to his monologue. Where the technical aspects are concerned I've the impression he's counting on me one hundred per cent.

  He's wearing a splendid suit with a red, yellow and green pattern - a bit medieval tapestry, you'd say. He also has a fancy handkerchief which sticks out of his jacket pocket, `Trip to the Planet Mars' style, and a matching tie. His whole outfit evokes the ultra-dynamic business management type, not without humour. As for me, I'm dressed in a quilted parka and `Weekend in the Hebrides' chunky pullover. I imagine that in the play of roles that's gradually falling into place I represent the `systems man', the competent but slightly oafish technician who doesn't have the time to worry about his appearance and is completely incapable of dialoguing with the user. That suits me fine. He's right, we make a good team.

  In getting all his brochures out, I ask myself if he isn't trying to attract the attention of the young girl sitting on his left - a student at the business school, and very pretty. His discourse would only seem, then, superficially directed at me. I permit myself a glance or two at the landscape. Day is beginning to break. The sun appears, blood red, terribly red above the dark green grass, above the mist-shrouded ponds. Small clusters of houses smoke far away in the valley. The sight is magnificent, a little scary. Tisserand isn't interested by it. Instead, he's trying to catch the glance of the student on his left. The problem with Raphaël Tisserand - the foundation of his personality, indeed - is that he is extremely ugly. So ugly that his appearance repels women, and he never gets to sleep with them. He tries though, he tries with all his might, but it doesn't work. They simply want nothing to do with him.

  His body is nonetheless close to normal. Vaguely Mediterranean in type, he is certainly rather fat; `stocky', as they say; added to which his baldness is coming along nicely. Fine, all this could still be arranged; but what isn't fine is his face. He has the exact appearance of a buffalo toad - thick, gross, heavy, deformed features, the very opposite of handsome. His shiny acned skin seems to permanently exude a greasy fluid. He wears bifocal glasses, because he's extremely short-sighted to boot

  - yet if he had contact lenses it wouldn't change anything, I'm afraid. What's more, his conversation lacks finesse, fantasy, humour; he has absolutely no charm (charm is a quality which can sometimes substitute for physical beauty - at least in men; anyway, one often says `He has loads of charm', or `The most important thing is charm'; that's what one says). Given all this, he is obviously terribly frustrated; but what can I do about it? So I gaze out at the landscape.

  A bit later he engages the student in conversation. We skirt the Seine, scarlet, completely drowned in the rays of the rising sun - one would really think the river gorged with blood.

  Around nine we arrive in Rouen. The student says her goodbyes to Tisserand - she refuses to give him her telephone number of course. For a few minutes he will feel a certain despondency; it's going to be me who has to find a bus.

  The Departmental Headquarters for Agriculture building is evil-looking and we are late. Here, work begins at eight - this, I will learn, is often the case in the provinces. The training session gets going immediately. Tisserand is first to speak; he introduces himself, introduces me, introduces our company. After that I assume he'll introduce the computer, the integrated software, their advantages. He could also introduce the course, the work method we are going to follow, lots of things. All this should take us to around midday, no problem, especially if there's a good oldfashioned coffee-break. I take off my parka, place a few sheets of paper before me.

  The audience is made up of fifteen or so people; there are some secretaries and middle management, some technicians I imagine - they have the look of technicians. They don't seem particularly hostile, or particularly interested in computers either - and yet, I say to myself, computers are going to change their lives.

  I spot straightaway where the danger lies: an extremely young guy in glasses, tall, lanky and lithe. He has installed himself at the back so he can watch everybody; I silently dub him `the Serpent', but in actual fact he will introduce himself to us after the coffee-break by the name of Schnäbele. Here in the making is the future boss of the computer service, and he has a very satisfied air about it. Sitting at his side is a guy of fifty-odd, extremely well-built, unpleasant-looking, with a fringe of red beard. He must be an ex-sergeant-major, or something of the sort. He has a beady eye - Indochina, I imagine - which he will keep trained on me for ages, as if summoning me to explain the reason for my presence. He seems devoted body and soul to the Serpent, his boss. He has something of the mastiff about him - the kind of dog which never lets go its bite, in any event.

  All too soon the Serpent will fire off various questions whose object is to throw Tisserand, make him look incompetent. Tisserand is incompetent, this is a fact, but he's come across such types before. He's a professional. He will have no difficulty in parrying the various attacks, now dodging with grace, now promising to return to them at some later point in the course. He will sometimes even succeed in suggesting that the question might indeed have had a point at an earlier period in the developm
ent of computers, but that it has now been rendered meaningless.

  At midday we are interrupted by the strident and disagreeable ringing of a bell. Schnäbele sidles up to us: `Do we eat together?' The question admits of no reply.

  He tells us that, sorry, he has a few little things to do before lunch. But we can go with him, like that he can `show us round the place'. He leads us down the corridors; his acolyte follows, two paces behind. Tisserand manages to get it across to me that he'd have `preferred to eat with the two cuties in the third row'. He's already spotted the female prey in the audience, then; it was almost inevitable, but all the same I find it a little disturbing.

  We go into Schnäbele's office. The acolyte remains rooted on the threshold in an attitude of expectancy; he is mounting guard to some extent. The room is big, even very big for such a young executive, and I instantly surmise that it's only to show us it that he's brought us here, since he does nothing - he contents himself with tapping nervously on his telephone. I sink down into an armchair in front of the desk, Tisserand immediately following suit. The other jerk chimes in with `Sure, take a seat. The same second a secretary comes through a door off to one side. She approaches the desk respectfully. She is a rather old woman with glasses. In her open hands she holds a file of letters awaiting signature. Here at last, I say to myself, is the reason for this whole performance.

  Schnäbele performs his role most impressively. Before signing the first document he goes through it at length, with tremendous gravity. He singles out a phrase which is

  `somewhat unfortunate at the syntactical level. The secretary, confused: Ì can do it again, Sir'; and he, the great lord: `No, no, it'll be fine.'

  The fastidious ceremony is repeated for a second document, then for a third. I start to feel hungry. I get up to examine the photos hanging on the wall. They are amateur photos, printed and framed with care. They appear to represent geysers, ice formations, things of the sort. I imagine he's printed them himself after his holidays in Iceland - a Nouvelles Frontières tour, in all likelihood. But he has been prodigal with the solarizations , star-filter effects and I don't know what else besides, to such an extent that one recognizes practically nothing and the general effect is exceedingly ugly.

  Seeing my interest, he approaches and says:

  -It's Iceland ... It's really pretty, I find.

  -Ah, I reply.

  We're finally going to eat. Schnäbele goes on ahead of us down the corridors, commenting on the organization of the offices and the `spatial layout', exactly as if he'd just acquired the whole place. Now and again, at the moment of making a righthand turn, he circles my shoulder with his arm - yet without, happily, touching me. He walks quickly and Tisserand, with his little legs, is hard pressed to keep up - I hear him puffing at my side. Two paces behind us the acolyte brings up the rear, as if to forestall an eventual surprise attack.

  The meal will prove interminable. To begin with all goes well, Schnäbele talks about himself. He informs us once more that at twenty-five he is already head of the computer service, or at least on the way to being so in the near future. He will remind us of his age three times between the hors-d'oeuvre and the main course: twenty-five.

  Next he wants to know about our `training', probably to assure himself that it's inferior to his own. (He himself is an IGREF, and has the air of being proud of it; I don't know what this is but will subsequently learn that IGREFs are a particular kind of higher civil servant who are only to be found in organizations depending on the Ministry of Agriculture - a bit like the graduates of the École Nationale d'Administration, but less qualified all the same.) In this respect Tisserand gives him complete satisfaction: he claims to have been to the École Supérieure de Commerce in Bastia, or something of the kind, which is scarcely believable. I chew on my steak béarnaise, pretending not to have heard the question. The sergeant-major fixes me with his beady eye, and for a moment I wonder if he isn't going to start screaming Ànswer when you're spoken to!'; I turn my head squarely in the other direction. Finally Tisserand replies in my place. He presents me as a `systems engineer'. As if to give credence to the idea I utter a few phrases about Scandinavian norms and network changeovers; Schnäbele, on the defensive, twists in his seat; I go to get myself a crème caramel.

  The afternoon will be devoted to practical work on the computer. It's then that I move into action: while Tisserand continues with his explanations I pass among the groups to check that everybody is managing to follow, to accomplish the set exercises. I handle it very well; but then that's my job.

  I am often called upon by the two cuties; they are secretaries, and apparently this is the first time they've been in front of a computer console. So they're a bit panicky and, what's more, rightly so. But each time I go over to them Tisserand intervenes, without hesitating to interrupt his explanation. It's mainly one of the two who attracts him, I get the feeling; and it's true that she is ravishing, fleshy, very sexy; she wears a bustier of black lace and her breasts move slightly beneath the material. Alas, each time he goes up to the poor little secretary her face contorts in an expression of involuntary repulsion, of disgust, one might almost say. It was bound to happen.

  At five another bell rings out. The students gather up their things, prepare to leave; but Schnäbele makes for us: the venomous soul has, it seems, another card up his sleeve. He immediately tries to buttonhole me with an opening remark: Ìf anything, this is a question, I'd say, for a systems man like you.' Then he explains his problem to me: should he or shouldn't he buy a thyratron inverter to stabilize the incoming voltage of the current feeding the server network? He's heard conflicting opinions on the subject. I know absolutely nothing about it and am about to tell him so. But Tisserand, clearly in top form, beats me to it: a study has just been published on the subject, he audaciously affirms; the conclusions are obvious: above a certain ratio of work to machine the inverter rapidly pays its way, in less than three years in any event. Unfortunately he doesn't have the study on him, or even the reference; but he promises to send him a photocopy on returning to Paris.

  A palpable hit. Schnäbele backs away, completely brow-beaten; he even goes so far as to wish us a pleasant evening.

  The evening will firstly consist in finding a hotel. On Tisserand's initiative we book into the 'Armes Cauchoises'. A nice hotel, a very nice hotel; and anyway our expenses are reimbursed, right?

  Next he wants to have an apéritif. By all means! In the café he chooses a table not far from two girls. He sits down, the girls get up and go. No doubt about it, the plan is perfectly synchronized. Bravo girls, bravo!

  In desperation he orders a Martini; I content myself with a beer. I feel rather nervous; I don't stop smoking, I literally light one cigarette after another. He tells me he's just signed on with a gym to lose a bit of weight, ànd also to score, of course.' An excellent idea, I'm not against it.

  I realize I'm smoking more and more; I must be on at least four packs a day. Smoking cigarettes has become the only element of real freedom in my life. The only act to which I tenaciously cling with my whole being. My one ambition.

  Tisserand next broaches a favourite theme of his, namely that Ìt's us guys, the computer experts, we're the kings.' I suppose by that he means a high salary, a certain professional status, a great facility for changing jobs. And OK, within these limits he isn't wrong. We are the kings.

  He expands on his idea; I open my fifth pack of Camels. Shortly afterwards he finishes his Martini; he wants to return to the hotel to change for dinner. Right then, fine, let's go for it.

  I wait for him in the lounge while watching television. There's something on about student demonstrations. One of these, in Paris, has assumed enormous proportions: according to the journalists there were at least three hundred thousand people on the streets. It was supposed to be a non-violent demonstration, more like a big party. And like all non-violent demonstrations it turned nasty, a student has lost an eye, a CRS policeman has had a hand torn off, etc.


  The day after this huge demonstration a march has taken place in Paris to protest against `police brutality'. It has passed off in an atmosphere òf overwhelming dignity' reports the commentator, who is clearly on the students' side. All this dignity gets on my nerves; I change channel and chance on a sexy pop promo. Finally I switch off.

  Tisserand returns; he's put on a sort of evening shell-suit, black and gold, which makes him look rather like a scarab beetle. Right then, let's go for it.

  As to the restaurant, we go at my insistence to The Flunch. It's a place where you can eat chips with an unlimited quantity of mayonnaise (all you do is scoop as much mayonnaise as you want from a giant bucket); I'll be happy, come to that, with a plate of chips drowned in mayonnaise, and a beer. Tisserand himself immediately orders a couscous royal and a bottle of Sidi Brahim. After the second glass of wine he begins eyeing up the waitresses, the customers, anybody. Sad young man. Sad, sad young man. I'm well aware of why he basically likes my company so much: it's because I never speak of my girlfriends. I never make a big thing of my female conquests. And so he feels justified in supposing (rightly, as it happens) that for one reason or another I don't have a sex life; and for him that's one less burden, a slight easing of his own martyrdom. I remember being present at a distressing scene the day Tisserand was introduced to Thomassen, who'd just joined our firm. Thomassen is Swedish in origin; he is extremely tall (a bit over six foot three, I reckon), superbly well-proportioned, and his face is incredibly handsome, sunny and radiant; you really have the impression of being in the presence of a superman, a demigod.