by Patrick Bard
And now this latest case.
In truth, the judge doesn’t know exactly what to make of it.
* * *
—
“Weren’t you the least bit uneasy?” he says, tossing the words out to get a reaction in much the same way a poker player bluffs.
“For months I’ve been saying that we should take Lucas to see a professional,” Marie answers defensively as she gives a furtive glance at her husband.
The judge looks at her pensively, then turns to the father.
“Why didn’t you take him?”
This time it’s Sebastian who lowers his face. “I didn’t think it was necessary,” he mumbles.
“Even given your wife’s history with depression?”
Sebastian doesn’t answer, merely shakes his head as tears fog his eyes.
Judge Boulay can tell that the Delveaus aren’t violent parents, that they’ve probably never laid a hand on Lucas. Instinctually, he knows that the tennis player, Benjamin, whom he will summon along with his parents, will confirm the story of the tennis ball, just as the tennis teacher will. The Delveaus aren’t abusive. They’ve just been absent and in denial. They’ve just abandoned their son in front of his computer screen. It isn’t a criminal offense and therefore does not fall under his authority.
28
Lucas remembers nothing. Or rather, he does. He remembers that he was sitting in the back of his mother’s car, a lump growing in his throat. That he started to sweat and that he couldn’t breathe. That his hands started to tremble as an image of a butterfly caught in the curtain of the kitchen window overwhelmed him, a butterfly desperately beating its wings toward the light until it fell to the ground from exhaustion, where it beat its wings feebly one last time before dying. Now Lucas is lying in a hospital bed without knowing why he’s there, his pelvis and right leg in casts, a bandage wound around his head. He’s in pain. He’s in pain, all over. He feels like someone beat him with a crowbar. The door opens and a nurse walks in. She seems pretty in his blurred vision. When he sees her close up, she isn’t as attractive. But she smiles.
“You’ve been in an accident,” she tells him. “A car accident.”
“My parents?” he croaks.
“They’re fine. Totally fine,” she assures him. “They’ll be here later. The doctor too. Now that you’re awake I’m going to give you something for the pain.”
She attaches a clear plastic bag to a stand, connects the drip to the IV catheter in his arm. Lucas grimaces.
“Don’t tell me you’re a wimp?” she says, laughing.
Lucas closes his eyes and tries to conjure images of porn as a bubble of protection.
When he opens his eyes again, his parents are there. Seated on each side of him, they hold his hands. Lucas wonders if he’s uniting them or if his heavy body is separating them.
“Oh my darling boy…,” Marie says as she looks at him and sniffles.
Sebastian tries to tell him something, but the words stay lodged deep in his throat.
Lucas closes his eyes again.
When he regains consciousness, a hospital aide is trying to plump up his pillow and a man in a white coat stands at the foot of the bed like a statue. Lucas reads his name tag: Dr. Frédéric Yzidée. The man smiles.
“Hello, Lucas. I’m your doctor. Your psychiatric physician.”
Lucas stiffens at the word psychiatric.
“Can you tell me what you remember about the accident?”
“Nothing,” Lucas murmurs. “We were on the highway, that’s all.”
“I don’t mean to be blunt but I have to be. You opened the rear door of the moving car and jumped out.”
Lucas doesn’t know why but he is not surprised. Not at all. In fact, if he could, he’d do the same thing again.
“Your parents were taking you to see a specialist in Paris.”
Lucas isn’t about to forget that. Not a chance. He moves his head in a nod, which hurts like crazy.
“Do you know why?”
This time Lucas doesn’t attempt to move. He simply says, “Yes.” Dr. Yzidée sighs and stays silent a moment.
“Lucas, I’m not going to beat around the bush,” he finally says. “I’m going to be frank with you.”
Lucas is trying hard not to listern.
“You’ll be staying here a while. We’re going to take care of your body and your mind as well as we can. Your body isn’t in great shape. Not only because of the fractures you sustained, but because of your weight. I hope you’re listening. You’re diabetic, type two. We’re going to treat you for that and put you on a special balanced diet, with no added sugars.”
Lucas knows what this means. It means vegetables. And he hates vegetables. All vegetables. Except for potatoes, which is what he tells the doctor.
“It won’t only be vegetables,” Dr. Yzidée answers. “When you leave the hospital, you’ll be going to a rehabilitation center in Granville. Then you’ll be sent to another center in Saint-Brieuc. All of this will take time, Lucas. But we are going to help you.”
MAKE THE HEART POUND
29
Afterward, a haze set in. Afterward, Lucas’s memories drowned in a magma, an amorphous mush, a goop of marshmallow.
Afterward, a very long tunnel formed in his mind.
After Dr. Yzidée explained to him that he had tried to commit suicide, Lucas fell into a deeper depression.
After came the antidepressant. He felt that it messed with his brain and turned him into a vegetable with a dribbling chin.
Afterward, he no longer thought about dying because he was no longer thinking at all.
Little by little, the doses were reduced so he could begin the rehabilitation phase.
In rehabilitation, he had a really rough time.
At least he had lost a good deal of weight during his stay in the hospital, which was helpful. They kept him on a strict diet for diabetes and weight loss.
Then in Granville, there is the ocean.
Perched atop a cliff, the rehabilitation center is windswept and misted with salt spray. Lucas encounters lots of people there, all of them shattered by life, all of them suffering from multiple traumas. Like Ahmed, who hit the bottom of a pool when he dove into the shallow end—which Lucas thinks was the world’s dumbest mistake—and broke his cervical spine. It’s supposedly a frequent occurrence. Ahmed is in a wheelchair. He probably won’t ever walk again without assistance.
If he walks at all.
There’s also Moussa. Especially Moussa. All bashed up from a scooter accident. He’d been at Granville for three years. One night when Lucas was feeling particularly blue, Moussa spent half the night trying to cheer him up, telling him how beautiful life is, even though he hadn’t been able to hoist himself out of his wheelchair for the last thirty-six months.
Moussa, who was found dead the next day in his room. From an embolism.
Without Moussa, Lucas would have continued to feel sorry for himself. But Moussa’s death rattled him. That morning he finally realized that he was far from being the worst one off; he just had to open his eyes and look around him to see the truth of that. He halfheartedly decided to apply himself, whatever the cost. In memory of Moussa. Still, on certain days, he can’t help but envy Moussa.
Moussa isn’t hurting anymore. Moussa is sleeping quietly. Moussa, at least, is rid of his burden.
On other days, Lucas feels ashamed of these thoughts.
It takes six months for Lucas to complete his rehabilitation, but he finally reaches the end.
Until his last living days, he will have a slight limp, but nothing that will prevent him, for example, from playing tennis. Except that he doesn’t ever dream of tennis, not now that he’s discovered the pool. The pool is completely different. At least if you don’t dive into the shallow end like Ahmed did, Lucas th
ought.
It’s easy to lose yourself in a pool. No need to concentrate. Like most kids of his generation, Lucas learned to swim in preschool. But he hadn’t set foot in a pool for such a long time that he had forgotten the smell of the chlorine and how it stings the eyes, how the water caresses the skin, the noises that echo off the glass partitions and high ceilings. And the showers. Because a swimming pool goes hand in hand with showers. His long-neglected body found pleasure in the drops of water that splashed onto him and in the scent of the shampoo that reminded him of his childhood.
Above all, though, there is the ocean. The ocean—which he dipped into as soon as the weather warmed up, even as it made him shiver. The ocean, which makes everything lighter, especially his bruised body. And the salt on his lips, and the goose bumps on his skin when he gets out of the water—all of it brings back memories of a more innocent time, a time before all the porn videos. Swimming laps is like a form of meditation for Lucas, something rhythmic and hypnotic that allows his mind a chance to escape.
In truth, the worst moment during his time at the center was when he found himself in the library, smack in front of a computer screen. His mouth went dry. He started to sweat, just like he used to when he was forty pounds heavier and he struggled to move on the tennis court. He had to force his fingers, which were automatically composing his favorite web address, to do something else. But what? He didn’t know anymore. Suddenly, he couldn’t remember why he was there, what the purpose of his research on the internet was. So he simply sent an email to his parents.
His parents visit him every other weekend. His mother is unwell again. Dr. Ducros put her on sick leave. She plunged into another bout of depression as if she had glommed onto Lucas’s inner being, and each visit with her son ends in silence.
His father doesn’t know what to say to him either. He and Marie exchange small talk with Lucas, ask about the progress of his rehabilitation, then descend into awkward silence. The only time the visit went well was when his father had the idea to bring Cuddles along in the cat carrier. Instead of heading to the beach the way they usually did, Sebastian led all three of them to the parking lot. As soon as Lucas heard Cuddles’s meowing, he broke down in tears. The cat leaped out of the carrier to rub himself against Lucas, purring and lifting his head toward his master, eyes stretched out in slits, and Lucas scooped him into his arms and buried his face in the ball of fur.
“My little Cuddles, my little Cuddles,” he repeated over and over.
Saying good-bye was all the harder, and afterward Lucas sank into an especially dark period. But before he parted with his parents, he told them:
“I’d like to come home.”
“We’ll talk to Dr. Yzidée,” his father promised.
* * *
• • •
Although Lucas’s general condition has improved—he’s walking again, and his diabetes and cholesterol levels are normal since a dietician helped him to lose weight and get his body under control—his internal state remains tattered. That’s what the psychiatrist explains to Lucas’s parents a few days later. Lucas is still fragile and he sleeps poorly unless he pops the sleeping pills he’s allowed to take.
If the medical report that the staff at the center forwarded to Dr. Yzidée at the hospital in Chartres is to be believed, Lucas alternates between periods of aphasia and overexcitement. The erratic ups and downs in Lucas’s morale worry Dr. Yzidée, who fears that Lucas might have a relapse. At the end of his stay at the rehabilitation center, Lucas is supposed to go home for a brief period before spending three months at a specialized center for teenagers, but given Marie’s latest depression, Dr. Yzidée feels it would be best for Lucas to go directly there. He also suggests that Marie and Sebastian enter therapy as well.
Sebastian and Marie both nod in agreement, without so much as looking at one another.
30
SAINT-BRIEUC, ONE MONTH LATER
The Poseidon looks nothing like what Lucas imagined. It isn’t a prison where crazy teenagers get locked up. He can’t see the ocean from his bedroom window the way he could at Granville, but when he goes out onto the terrace where teens hooked on cigarettes cluster to smoke, he can smell the sea because it’s not too far away. He can also go there on foot as often as he wants. Everyone is free to come and go, at least during the day. And when he takes the path that runs alongside the river below, it doesn’t take Lucas more than half an hour at a swift pace to reach the marina.
There aren’t a lot of kids at the center, less than forty boys and girls. Each with their own bedroom. No one talks much. At least, that’s the impression Lucas has. He’s only just arrived, but aside from polite exchanges like “Please pass the bread,” or “Pass me the salt,” or “Thanks,” no one has really spoken to him. The building dates back to 2000 and is clean and quiet, except when a resident blows a fuse, something that happens about once a week. The cafeteria doesn’t really look like a cafeteria. It resembles what he imagines the cafeteria of a corporation looks like. More of a dining hall. It’s on an upper floor and there are even flower beds. In addition to the small garden, there is a nice view of the ocean, as well as a pool. Lucas looks forward to swimming every day. He told the psychiatrist he met when he arrived the previous day that he didn’t know how he would manage without a pool when he went back to Lèves. She pointed out that he had just voiced the possibility of returning home.
“Do you want to go back?” she asked.
Lucas shrugged. “Well, yes, I suppose so.”
“Do you miss your parents?”
Lucas avoided the question. “I miss my cat a lot, the house, and…”
Clara Desnoyers, the clinical psychologist at Poseidon, didn’t push it. In her notes she underlined the fact that Lucas had expressed interest in returning home, which she deemed encouraging. She explained that his time at Poseidon was in no way a punishment. On the contrary, the purpose was to put an end to his addiction using a targeted cognitive and behavioral treatment. Lucas didn’t understand a word of her mumbo jumbo, but he was nonetheless glad to learn that although he was meant to stay for three months, he could decide to leave at any time. They talked some more and Dr. Desnoyers confided that she was familiar with his former hometown, Bagneux, because she had lived there when she was a student.
Lucas’s rough estimate is that the doctor is around thirty-something. She’s rather pretty, with freckles that spread over a large, flat face further enhanced by red eyeglass frames. Lucas takes in the wool dress that clings to her shapely body, and the black opaque tights that cover her legs. She isn’t fooled; he knows it. She’s just crossed her legs in a defensive way and placed her folded hands on her knees. A few months ago such an encounter might have aroused him. But not now. Nothing happens. Nothing at all.
31
Luc Flohic, the child psychiatrist who runs the Poseidon, encourages Lucas to join some activities. He’s a fan of poetry and knows Dr. Yzidée well. As he explained to Lucas, he and Dr. Yzidée both studied together during their grad work.
The thing is that Lucas isn’t interested in much. Poetry? He knows nothing about poetry. Shop class? Nope. Culinary class? Nope. Gardening class? Double nope. Boxing class and what else? As for the information technology class, well, it’s probably a good idea to forget computers for now. The last time he came face to face with a computer in Granville, it didn’t go too well. He doesn’t have any sexual desires, anyway. Maybe it’s because of his wretched medications.
He doesn’t see what he can possibly do to occupy himself. He feels the onset of boredom looming on the horizon. The only thing he wants is to swim laps in the pool, hour after hour. At least there, he doesn’t dwell on things. His thinner body from his time in the hospital and in rehabilitation has become muscular. Whenever he sees his reflection in a mirror he hardly recognizes the lean young man he’s become. He hardly recognizes the boy the guys at the tennis club called Fatso. La
st night, he heard someone crying in the room next to his. It woke him up. Whoever it was banged their fist on their common wall, which made him jump. This morning he saw a guy dressed in a tracksuit, head covered by a hoodie, coming out of the room. The person looked as thin as Cuddles was when he first found the kitten on the street.
“Is everything okay?” he called out.
The guy turned around and it took a moment for Lucas to register that the scarecrow was in fact a girl. He could barely make out her dark crew cut under the hood when she raised her head. What really caught his attention was the purplish mark under her left eye; it left him wondering if someone had punched her in the face. She isn’t tall, and she’s so slender that he’s reminded of a tree branch in winter. Her watery ice-blue eyes focused on him long enough for him to observe her thin lips, her high cheekbones, her minuscule pupils, and for him to think: She looks just like a guy! She didn’t answer his question. She just turned around again and disappeared down the hallway, the soles of her red sneakers squeaking with every step on the green linoleum.
32
It’s been a week, a week of going round in circles. Lucas attends the weekly Friday gathering at noon, where the culinary class serves a nonalcoholic beverage to accompany some tapas, but it’s not enough to fill a week. Not by a long shot. So when Dr. Flohic pounces on him about giving the writing class a try, Lucas finally agrees to go. The doctor invited a poet-in-residence to lead the workshop. Lucas had gone to see Dr. Flohic with the intention of announcing that he wanted to leave Poseidon, but he didn’t get the chance. The doctor caught him off guard. Lucas looks around the light-gray-walled office as if searching for a way out. His animal-caught-in-a-trap look doesn’t escape Dr. Flohic.