The Loyalties

by Delphine de Vigan

  He forced down the hot, milky drink. Across the table, Mathis was looking at him helplessly. He was searching for a way to prevent his mother from going with him, but no ideas were coming.

  She indicated that it was time to go and went to get Théo’s jacket from the closet. (At Mathis’s everything is neatly put away. Everything has a place that has to be respected.) As she handed it to him, she expressed surprise that he wasn’t dressed more warmly.

  She didn’t want Mathis to go with them. She knows Théo’s father lives somewhere around the place d’Italie. She looked at the metro map to check how to get there. She told Théo he’d have to show her the way when they came out of the station.

  On the way down in the elevator, he retied his shoelaces so as not to have to look at himself in the mirror or meet this woman’s eye.

  Now she’s walking beside him, authoritative and brisk.

  Théo feels his heart beating in his stomach in the place where the alcohol first warms and then calms him.

  She must not cross the threshold. She must not enter his father’s apartment, let alone talk to him.

  If she crosses the threshold, it’s all over.

  By any means at all, he must keep her away. Prevent her from getting near.

  They’re heading toward the metro. He matches his pace to hers. She senses him following her stride. Then her vigilance relaxes for a few seconds and Théo seizes this brief moment to make a run for it.

  He pelts along the boulevard de Grenelle, runs without looking back, keeps going past the first station on Line 6 in case she catches up with him and runs even faster to the next.

  At Sèvres-Lecourbe he takes the stairs four at a time to get to the elevated train. He’s laughing. At the last moment he leaps into a carriage just as its doors are about to shut.

  That was close!

  Rooted to the spot, she was! Didn’t know what hit her.

  HÉLÈNE

  The other day when I announced that we would start studying reproduction after the holidays, Rose interrupted me.

  “Do you have children, Miss?”

  I said no and went on with the lesson. Usually, with the students I extricate myself from these situations with a little joke. But not this time.

  I took the blows and I kept the secret right to the end. I’m thirty-eight and I don’t have children. I don’t have any photos to show, or names and ages to announce, no anecdotes or funny remarks to relate.

  I’m sheltering within me the child I will never have, though no one knows it. My ruined stomach is inhabited by faces with diaphanous skin, tiny white teeth and silky hair. And when I’m asked the question, asked if I have children—which happens whenever I meet someone new (particularly women), after I’ve been asked what I do (or just before)—each time I have to resign myself to drawing the white chalk line on the ground that divides the world in two (those who have, and those who don’t), I want to say: no, I don’t have any, but look in my belly at all the children I haven’t had; look at them dance to the rhythm of my steps—all they ask is to be cradled; look at this love, which I have retained, transformed into ingots; look at the energy I haven’t expended, which I still have to expend; look at my innocent, wild curiosity and my appetite for everything; look at the child I have remained because I couldn’t become a mother, or by virtue of that.

  A long time ago a man left me because I couldn’t have children. Now every night he lingers in his office and goes home as late as possible to avoid seeing the ones he has.

  When I wake in the night, this question often returns. Why didn’t I say anything? Why did I let the Wheel of Fortune turn without telling anyone, without calling for help? Why did I let my father persist with the quizzes, the traps and the kicks? Why didn’t I cry out? Why didn’t I report him? “Right, Hélène, time to concentrate. A history question next or, rather, psychology. Why did you keep your trap shut? What a pity, Hélène, you could have doubled your stake.”

  But deep down, I know.

  I know that children protect their parents and that the pact of silence sometimes leads to their deaths.

  Today I know something that other people don’t. And I must not close my eyes.

  Sometimes I tell myself that that’s the only point of becoming an adult: to repair what was lost and damaged in the beginning. And to keep the promises of the child we once were.

  I didn’t take Frédéric’s advice. I continue to come to school and watch Théo. Standing by the window, as soon as the students go out into the schoolyard, I try to pick him out. If I manage to spot him among the others—magnetized bodies, brought together by strange alliances—I spend the break spying on his movements, his dodges, looking for an answer.

  On some pretext or other, I consulted the information forms the students filled in at the beginning of the year. I found his mother’s address there.

  I went to his neighborhood several times. I don’t know what I was looking for. Maybe to bump into Théo away from school, seemingly by accident, so that he could talk to me. I kept getting closer to the building, inside an ever-smaller perimeter. One evening I even stood on the sidewalk opposite for several minutes, looking up at the lighted windows.

  The other day, just as I was passing his building, someone tapped in the entry code and went in. I followed him. I found myself inside without intending to. Names and floor numbers were displayed on an information panel in front of the mailboxes. I didn’t stop to think. I took the stairs to the third floor. As I approached, my heart was pounding so hard I could hardly breathe. The apartment was silent; I couldn’t hear any noise. Then suddenly the door opened and I found myself face to face with Théo’s mother. (It would probably be more accurate to say that she found herself face to face with me.) I think our eyes met for the tiniest fraction of a second, and then I hurried down the stairs. I should have come up with some excuse, a reason to justify my presence. I could have pretended to have friends in the same building. Yes, what a coincidence! And claim that I’d gotten the wrong door, but it was too late: I was in the street and running as fast as I could.

  THÉO

  When he got home that Sunday, he found his father lying in his bedroom with the curtains closed. He went gingerly toward him, letting his eyes grow accustomed to the darkness. When he reached the bed, he saw that his father wasn’t asleep. He seemed to be waiting for something, his arms motionless on top of the sheet, his upper body propped up on pillows. He was staring at a point on the wall that only he could see. He looked at Théo for a few seconds, as though he needed time to recognize his son, then a few seconds more to be able to adopt the appropriate response. For a brief moment his face registered that fleeting spark of joy that used to animate it when he collected Théo from elementary school, and then he put his hands beneath the sheet. He asked Théo if he’d had fun. He repeated the question several times. It wasn’t a polite formula, it was a real question, and the answer mattered to him.

  Théo replied that it had all gone really well. There was a short silence during which he couldn’t help wondering if Mathis’s mother might have followed him or might soon find his address and turn up without warning.

  For the first hour, he listened out for the noise of the elevator and froze every time he heard the sound of a voice on the stairs.

  Later, he spent the afternoon picking up and cleaning in case someone came. A sort of intuition told him that that was the most important thing to do, restore some order to his father’s apartment.

  It wasn’t all that complicated. His father had taught him the trick of turning chores into a game, back when he was still capable of laughing and staying out of bed for more than four minutes. To transform the most boring task into a paper chase or a treasure hunt, all you had to do was set a target or a challenge, or invent a story.

  This time Théo imagined he was taking part in a famous reality TV show. He was being tracked by about ten cameras all over the apartment that were broadcasting The Big Clean-Up challenge live. At the very moment h
e was filling the sink with water, more than a million people were following his actions. Because he was the youngest contestant in the whole history of the game and definitely the viewers’ favorite. The day’s challenge was particularly long and tough, but might enable him to claim victory. Like the others, he would be scored at the end of The Big Clean-Up on both his speed and his efficiency. And he is, in both categories, the best.

  An imaginary voice-over eagerly commented on his actions, highlighting their agility and precision. This evening, in the video diary room, he’ll be able to tell the camera how he felt during the task, the moments of doubt, and the determination that nonetheless never left him. And with a bit of luck, he’ll soon be on the cover of all the TV magazines.

  His father hasn’t gotten up since Sunday. For three days he’s been dozing in bed. The door has stayed half-open but he never opens the curtains. He only gets up to go to the bathroom, dragging his feet; Théo hears the sound of his slippers shuffling over the parquet, and then the noise of the flush. He hasn’t taken a shower and has eaten practically nothing. Théo brings him water in a carafe and makes him little sandwiches, which he barely touches.

  Théo could tell his grandma, but he doesn’t know her number. And anyway, she doesn’t come over anymore. The last time, which is already several months ago, she had an argument with his father. As she was leaving, she turned to Théo with a fake look of surprise and said, “You’re so like your mother.”

  A plastic bag on the kitchen counter with the logo of the local pharmacy contains the medicine his father takes every day. During the night, Théo takes the boxes out of the bag and reads the instructions.

  In biology, Ms. Destrée told them about molecules that have an effect on the brain. She explained how doping in sports works and why it’s banned. Then she talked about medicines that can change a person’s mood, help them to be less sad, less anxious, and sometimes even restore the reason of people who do and say crazy things. But these are dangerous medicines that only a psychiatrist or a doctor can prescribe.

  But Théo’s father has a heap of medicines, boxes and boxes, though he never leaves the apartment. It’s as if he’s stockpiled them for months.

  Perhaps Théo could go and see Ms. Destrée and talk to her about his father.

  Sometimes when she’s drawing on the board with chalk or explaining all the things that go on inside an organism, he has the impression that she’s talking to him. Perhaps she knows. And can keep a secret.

  CÉCILE

  Now I’m scared. Scared that something will happen to us. I’m imagining horrors, I can’t help it. I construct catastrophic scenarios, gruesome sequences of events, tragic coincidences. Every night when I go to bed, it occurs to me that I may not wake up. A mass presses down on the left side of my chest and stops me from breathing. Or else I notice a diffuse pain in the pit of my stomach and suddenly feel afraid that my body’s damaged flesh is host to one of those invasive cancers that’s about to declare its presence.

  My children are too young to lose their mother. That’s what I’m thinking just as I close my eyes.

  Dr. Felsenberg calls these “morbid thoughts. ”

  They reveal, he says, an old sense of guilt.

  It’s grueling. It’s a spiral that sucks me in, absorbs me, and against which I’m powerless. The morbid thoughts can crop up at any time, as images or words. When I try to describe them, they lose their texture, their heat, they no longer seem so tangible. They appear as what they are: constructs produced by anxiety, distant, hypothetical threats. But in the moment, they stop me from breathing.

  The temperature has suddenly plummeted. There’s been a frost for several nights in a row. Sand trucks criss-cross the city before dawn to keep ice from forming. At first I thought that the cold might cleanse everything, eliminate the germs, bacteria, vermin, eradicate all the invisible filth we’re surrounded by, and then the cold itself became a sly, insidious danger, another distinct threat in my hideous night thoughts.

  I didn’t say anything to William about Mathis. Probably because I’m sure this comes from me. Perhaps more generally the problem comes from me. I’m the defective cog hidden within a middle-class machine that has worked since the dawn of time. I’m the grain of sand that jams the mechanism, the drop of water that inadvertently falls into the fuel tank, the black sheep dressed up as a homemaker. My deception is at the root of this disaster. I dreamed of a cozy family apartment that I could go into raptures about. I dreamed of bright-eyed children raised in an atmosphere of kindness and comfort. I dreamed of a peaceful life centered around their education and my husband’s well-being. I didn’t ask for more than that and I stuck with it. I thought that would be enough. Keep a low profile, do the vacuuming and make the snacks. Let there be no misunderstanding: I am where I wanted to be. Nonetheless, I’ve veered off course. Perhaps I used to be a seagull trapped in an oil slick, but now I’m strangely like the crow in the story my grandmother used to tell me, the coarse bird with the jet-black plumage who dreamed of being a white bird. Because this is how the fable goes: the bird first rolls in talcum powder, then flour, but the trick doesn’t last long and soon it’s gone. So then he dunks himself in a pot of white paint, in which he gets trapped. I am that black bird who wanted to become white and who betrayed his own kind. I thought I was smarter than that. I thought I could imitate the call of the turtle doves. But I too have lost the use of my wings, and where I am now, struggling is useless.

  I can’t speak to William anymore. I just can’t.

  The longer I spend looking at what he writes on the internet—traces that will never be erased, lasting imprints that someday will reveal the deformity of the monster—the less I’m able to talk to him. My husband has become a stranger.

  I’d like to be able to forget what I’ve read. To ignore the swamp surrounding us, which will soon invade our living room. Not to turn on the computer. But I can’t.

  Yet every day that goes by, I create a new lie, much bigger than the ones that made me and William second-class crooks who were never unmasked. I keep quiet and continue to fight the dust and carefully turn the dial on the washing machine, plug in the blender and the iron, change the sheets and wash the windows, leaving no smear visible, even in bright sunlight.

  Which is the real William? The one who disseminates his bitter prose under the cloak of anonymity or the one who goes around with his face visible in a dark-gray suit, suavely tailored at the waist? The one who wallows in the mire or the one who wears immaculate white shirts carefully ironed by his wife?

  I must tell my husband that I know.

  Maybe these two parts of him will join to make just one? Perhaps I could establish a link between the two entities? Perhaps then I’d understand something that’s eluding me?

  Sometimes I think of that ball of crumpled paper, abandoned in the trash can. I wonder if, without realizing, William was hoping that his double would be discovered, thwarted and jeered at, and at last someone would send him to the dungeon in handcuffs.

  I need to find a solution for Mathis. I don’t want him hanging out with Théo. Yes, I say “hanging out with,” like my mother did, so there you go. I don’t want him coming home from school with him or sitting beside him in class. I’m sure that boy is having a harmful, unhealthy influence on our son, apart from the fact that he’s leading him to drink.

  I’ve requested a meeting with their head teacher, Ms. Destrée, through the school’s website.

  I’ll talk to her. I’ll explain.

  And then at the end of the academic year, we’ll send Mathis to a new school if we have to.

  THÉO

  Don’t tell your mother that Sylvie has gone. Don’t tell your mother that Dad no longer has a job. Don’t tell your mother that Grandma Françoise is angry. Don’t tell your mother the sink is leaking. Don’t tell your mother I’ve sold the car. Don’t tell your mother we can’t find that sweatshirt. Tell your mother we’re not sure yet what we’re going to do. Tell your mother I’
m waiting for a rebate and I’ll be able to pay for your lunches soon. Don’t tell your mother we didn’t go out. Tell your mother we couldn’t have a meeting. Don’t tell her that…

  When he shuts his eyes, he sometimes sees their faces the way they used to be, like in the photo where they’re together, smiling. His mother has long hair. She’s turning toward his father, who’s looking at the lens. He’s wearing a short-sleeved polo shirt. He has his arm around her waist. This photo used to comfort him. Now he knows that photos are just another sort of hoax.

  MATHIS

  He’d like to go back. Back to when he was small, when he spent hours building things with little pieces of plastic, when all he had to do was make houses and cars and planes, and all sorts of creatures with moving limbs and amazing powers. He remembers a time that doesn’t seem so long ago—almost close enough to touch, yet definitely gone—a time when he played Guess Who? and Whack-a-Mole with Sonia on the living-room carpet.

  It all seemed simpler to him back then. Perhaps because beyond the walls of the apartment and the school, the world was abstract: a huge place meant for adults that didn’t concern him.

  Access to the place under the cafeteria staircase has been blocked. They don’t have anywhere to hide anymore. This gave Mathis a feeling of relief that he couldn’t have explained, but Théo very soon began looking for another safe place away from all supervision. Hugo told them about a garden near the Esplanade des Invalides that you could get into easily even when it was closed.

  This morning, while they’re waiting for the first bell, Hugo comes over to them looking conspiratorial. If he were a bit taller and stronger, Mathis would have told him to get lost even before he opened his mouth, but he’s known for a long time that he doesn’t have the sort of physique that makes sudden outbursts possible. Of course, Hugo still didn’t have the bottle that Théo ordered. But he did have some good news: his brother Baptiste was organizing a party on Saturday. There would be quite a few of them, outdoors, and there would be plenty to drink. Excitedly he kept repeating, “Enough to get really trashed!”