The Child

by Pascale Kramer

  THE

  CHILD

  THE

  CHILD

  PASCALE KRAMER

  Translated by Tamsin Black

  BELLEVUE LITERARY PRESS

  NEW YORK

  First Published in the United States in 2013 by Bellevue Literary Press, New York

  FOR INFORMATION CONTACT:

  Bellevue Literary Press

  NYU School of Medicine

  550 First Avenue

  OBV A612

  New York, NY 10016

  Copyright © 2013 by Pascale Kramer.

  Translation Copyright © 2013 by Tamsin Black.

  The Child first appeared in French as Un homme ébranlé,

  Copyright © 2011 by Mercure de France

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Kramer, Pascale, 1961–

  [Un homme ébranlé. English]

  The child/by Pascale Kramer; translated by Tamsin Black.—1st ed.

  p. cm.

  ISBN 978-1-934137-58-1

  I. Black, Tamsin. II. Title.

  PQ2671.R287H6613 2012

  843'.914—dc23

  2012032068

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopy, recording, or any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be invented, without permission in writing from the publisher, except by a reviewer who wishes to quote brief passages in connection with a review written for inclusion in a magazine, newspaper, or broadcast.

  Bellevue Literary Press would like to thank all its generous donors—individuals and foundations—for their support.

  This publication is made possible by the New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew Cuomo and the New York State Legislature

  and with the support of the Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia

  Book design and composition by Mulberry Tree Press, Inc.

  Manufactured in the United States of America.

  FIRST EDITION

  1 3 5 7 9 8 6 4 2

  For Fanny,

  for Charlotte,

  for my nephew Edouard,

  for Christophe,

  for their childhood.

  Contents

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  THE

  CHILD

  SIMONE REALIZED that it was at that same time of year, with the forsythia in bloom, that Claude had first brought her here, to his house in T. The bush was not yet so high that it took up the whole window, but already blackbirds had built a nest among the yellow blooms screening the neighbors’ rough-cast wall. The male was there, clinging to the fence, eyeing her through the gaps in the mesh. Simone could see it jerking its head toward her. She had made a move to close the window but froze at the sound of the bell for fear of missing the child’s voice. But it was still only Jovana, the mother, answering Claude’s terse sentences. They were in the hall, right behind the study door, and Simone stood with her back to it, as though it was not enough to have shut it to show her obedience to the privacy demanded. Jovana might have changed her mind, in which case this plan, which had been so long coming to fruition, then rushed into, in a kind of salutary terror, would have been nothing but pointless torment for everyone. And Claude would have nothing left to salvage before the unimaginable idea of approaching death. Simone hardly dared think that this was what they should hope.

  The blackbird had begun to claw at the fence in anxious anticipation of taking flight. Then it would vanish into the top of the plum trees across the lawn beside the long remote box of balconies and ocher tiles, which Simone had always known to be there but which it still pained Claude to think he had allowed to be built. Like a wall of cages, the block loomed out over the white-and-yellow expanse of the garden, causing her, too, a pang of bitterness on this particular day—this relentless day, she could not help thinking

  The sliding door of a minivan clanged shut in the silence behind the house; then the blackbird was gone and Simone at last heard the child’s clear voice answering Claude. The surprise sent a shudder through her, as though a hand had just yanked at her insides. There, it was done: there could be no turning back. She moved forward to shut the window in the confusion of sudden panic. She could not rid herself of the thought that all this was selfish, selfish and terribly desperate.

  She had imagined a boy on the verge of adolescence, but he was still a child, with a thick mop of auburn hair lopped off summarily above the nape of the neck. He was small for his eleven years and his stomach ducked in abruptly, so that his plump little ribs stuck out. The resemblance to Claude was comical in the soft young flesh. Simone wondered if they, too, could see it.

  So, this is Gaël. We’ve already gotten to know each other a bit, Claude observed stiffly. The child squirmed slightly, then stepped forward, as though to see where the light was coming from on the somber wood and leather furniture of the study, where the only signs of life were a row of books and a steel mug with pens sticking out of it. His lips were sucked in, in a kind of expression of sympathy, creating long dimples in his round red cheeks. Simone introduced herself and tried to smile, unsure whether she should kiss a child of his age. He’s a brave kid, she caught herself thinking, seeing him hold in his breath and his stomach, his arms thrust like posts deep into his pants pockets. There was something arrestingly sweet and grown-up about his shy eleven-year-old gallantry. Simone could not believe how completely determined he was to be here.

  Claude had insisted the visit last at least a few hours, with no thought for how awkward it would be. Gaël had gone over to the trophies and wanted to know who had won them; then he backed away and blushed inexplicably. Claude asked him if he wanted to have a look around, see the photos. The question did not call for an answer, just the assent of them both. His left arm swung beside his body with the twitch that had become almost constant, to disperse or dispel the pain. His eyes sought her out, anxious at what was afoot and that, with the guilt, was having an impact he had not foreseen. Simone raised her eyebrows and stared back with an air of finality, surprise, and annoyance. For he need not think there was anything she could do to counter the crazy decision he had made without her but with so much pointless deliberation. Gaël now knew that his father was not the man he had always thought, but this sports coach with a broad, bony face, his features drawn by the cancer that masked the once probably trusting man who had conceived him and the troubled man she had met not long after. She had been thirty-five at the time. That was ten years ago now. Ten years of a happiness that had been genuine for having been willed, agreed—ten years for nothing, she had thought, to her shame but also her salvation, when the diagnosis was announced.

  If Claude died, she had thought, too, it would no longer be she who had been the last person to matter, but this son born of an illicit love that had never fully healed, while she had quite simply never been able to bear it. Jealousy had placed her pain and revolt on hold. Being beside the point suddenly relieved her of the weight of resentment, and sorrow rose to her face. Claude had already disappeared along the corridor, but Gaël saw her eyes cloud with tears and seemed not to know how to turn away from this adult emotion. I never thought you and I would meet, she said to him a little too loudly, embarrassing him for no reason.

  It had quickly gotten tempting to suggest going for a drive, so they would not have to look at one another and to pass the time. Claude insisted on taking the wheel, although the pain was shooting down to his fingers—a kind of throbbing, he said, that pulsed right into his bones from his shoulde
r blades. Gaël spread his arms and grasped the back of the two seats in front, as though to get a better view. Simone was aware of his face close to hers, of his sugary breath and the soft squelch of his teeth pulling on a sticky toffee. They had left the leafy neighborhood with gardens all identically sunny and blossoming hedges that rose halfway up the dingy white of the houses. Claude wanted to show the child the sports ground and the stream that now flowed straight between the concrete banks of the estate. Simone had never known him to fill the silence like this. His peremptory manner and the constant exercises of his left hand, restless with pain, were making her tense. Let’s just look for a bit, she suggested as gently as she could. But Claude wanted Gaël to see how the suburb was sprouting dirty big buildings that were being flung up one after another with less and less space between them, just these patches of grass, and where no effort or respect mattered anymore. Rancor had set in well before the sickness, or perhaps with the despondency that had preceded it, and he took a perverse pleasure in it, because he was going to take early leave of a nonsensical era from which he had somehow divorced.

  You’re boring him, Simone said, trying to joke, frustrated by her inability to alleviate the excruciating torture of these moments. There was a moist crunch of candy, then a cheerful voice as Gaël assured her that, no, Claude was not boring him. He seemed to hesitate about which of the two to oppose. He was resting his strangely full and unmoving face on his chin in the worn fabric of the seat back. Simone noticed that he was looking at Claude—not at the father, but at the sick man—and that he was trying to see what the cancer looked like. He seemed serenely intrigued by it.

  They had reached the big reservoir, under assault for the past two months from the metal palisades of a future building site. Claude turned his head briefly to the side to ask Gaël to sit back in the seat. The child complied with unpredictable bad grace. His head bumped against the seat and his knee jammed into Simone’s back. She turned to smile at him. Already his mood mattered to her and also his opinion of them, although the last half hour had been a struggle and was bringing Claude nothing he had wanted—yet, what had he wanted?—just mounting intolerance to his pain and lost illusions.

  Forgetful of his dejection or to dismiss it, Gaël did not sulk for very long. He said that he had come here once before, well, not here exactly, but to the shopping center, and that he had liked it a lot. At home, there was nothing to do, or at least it was a long way away, he insisted with surprising conviction. Then he was silent and they could hear the stealthy rustle as he unwrapped a toffee. Claude shot a swift glance in the rearview mirror. That’s enough candy for today, he snapped, like someone forced to repeat himself. Simone observed his flat, almost hollow profile heightened by the tension on his forehead. She could not believe that he was making no effort to win the child’s affection, not even him, not even now. Gaël did not flinch. He rolled the toffee noiselessly between his fingers and continued to pull at the paper. Claude was eyeing him but didn’t have the strength to put up a fight. He was riled so quickly now but so soon disheartened, and with such weary bitterness. You’re too fat for your age, he grunted, as though to himself. Simone looked at him in horror and asked him in an undertone what he was trying to do—teach the boy manners? But Claude took no notice, too intent on watching the little face distorted by chewing the sticky toffee. You’re not saying anything, he insisted again, almost triumphant. Gaël turned to the window. I know I’m too fat, he agreed, sucking the syrupy saliva that lapped between his words. His abdication was not enough to satisfy Claude, who went on: Then spit it out. His voice was unbearably pedantic. He’s disappointed in the child, thought Simone. People always ended up disappointing him, she realized, with an exultant urge to give in; he only ever loved anyone as a favor.

  The sun lit up pearly smears on the windshield where a sponge had been wiped through the pollen dust. Simone shifted her thighs to unstick her dress from the crackling electricity of the seat. The first hot days of spring were making her feel dry and prickly. In the little mirror in front of her, two deep lines formed bitter parentheses in the long, sagging slope of her face. She slipped off the band she had been wearing around her wrist and put her hair up in a ponytail that pulled her features taut. Since the cancer had been diagnosed, she had not dared to go to the hairdresser, and the blond tint was disappearing in her streaky brown-and-gray hair. The idea that there would never again be time to care for her appearance struck her as cruel with the sight in the mirror of this child, who was doing his best to fight off his growing dejection at being with them.

  Does your mom still compete? she asked, hugging the headrest under her arm, as though clasping someone familiarly around the neck. The child puffed out his cheeks in a face of astonishment that burst into a smile. It was the first time she had seen him smile, and it pulled his lips right back over his gums, revealing long, wide incisors. She even drives to the bakery, he announced, knocking his head gently against the seat back, his eyes sparkling with fun. His remark sounded like a ritual, a joke that must in some way define her. Repeating it seemed suddenly to reconcile him to his decision to meet them.

  They came out opposite the swimming pool, its wall blackened by the swirling shadows of half-erased graffiti. A group of teenagers in track-suits was hanging around the barriers, propped against scooters. They must have been Claude’s former pupils, and one of them gave him a little wave, to which Claude responded by raising his chin without taking his eyes off the street. The four heads turned to follow the car and try to catch a glimpse of their strict, condemned teacher, who had said when he left (not that they had reacted, Claude said afterward) that he felt bad about his cancer, like an abdication of responsibility. Simone tried vainly to smile at him, but his expression remained etched on his waxen face. She could not get used to seeing him clam up and not know what to say or do to allay the inevitable terror he still managed to hide, apart from his body’s impatience, which guilt and a sudden sense of impotence and humiliation were now exacerbating. Suddenly, for no reason, he announced that he wanted to go home.

  Gaël was playing with the seat belt, muffling the clicks in the palm of his hand. No familiarity had been established between them; indeed, his presence in the car seemed increasingly unforgivable. Still toying with the clasp and without looking up, he asked when his mother had said she was coming to pick him up. Simone drew an agonizing breath: That he should lose heart so quickly seemed to her the saddest thing they had had to endure so far.

  Claude went upstairs to lie down until the pills took effect, and Gaël took the opportunity to wander off to the bathroom. He came out after some time with dripping bangs and soapy hands, and went to sit down in the living room, wiping damp handprints on his pants. Simone did not know how to ease his embarrassment at finding himself in this intimacy with strangers. Tenderness awoke in her distant and painful inhibitions.

  She opened the sliding door to the garden. The insistent roar of a stationary car at the corner of the street drowned out the sounds of spring. Gaël looked around for the television but felt he should not ask to turn it on. Yet the silence was making him uncomfortable. Why had he wanted to meet this father he had known nothing about, who had given him nothing, and why was he anxious to make a good impression? After a moment’s hesitation, Simone ventured to ask the question. Gaël limply raised his arms, not because the subject troubled him, but because he must have found it too vast. Then he twisted his mouth to the side before blurting out, in a halfhearted attempt at an explanation, that his mother had always talked about Claude. Simone quietly shrank into her chair to hide the hurt she felt. That was not how things had been presented to her or how she had imagined them. Jovana was a young newlywed when Claude had met and loved her at the tournament abroad. There was no question of a divorce or an abortion. They had decided never to see each other again, to break off all contact and to say no more, and that this was what was best for the child. Claude had lived the whole time with the idea of having done the right th
ing.

  Gaël kicked the thick-cushioned heel of his sneaker against the wood floor as he listened. His pursed lips gave him a strangely sullen air. Claude already told me, he said at last, but anyway, my mother thought it best to tell me when I was little. Simone could sense his eyes darting to and fro behind his lowered lids. She was angry with herself for making him betray Jovana, and she apologized for upsetting him, but he shrugged and smiled with that broad, sudden smile that showed his red gums. He was blessed with a kind of generosity that came out all at once. Simone hated herself for being jealous of a woman who had managed to bring that out in a child. Resentment seldom lasts when you know people, she thought with a pang of sadness. She still wanted to know if Jovana was sorry not to have stayed with Claude, but the question made Gaël skeptical and silent.

  You look a lot like him, do you know that? The observation again elicited the wonderful smile. He did not really think so, he said in a pouting voice, his elbows sliding slowly along his thighs. Claude would have thought he should sit up straight, thought Simone a bit pityingly. From the living room, they could see nothing of the houses or of life going on outside, just the lawn and the fragrant snow of the seringas. Gaël no longer knew what to do with himself. He stretched and ran his fingers through his bangs, which had dried stiffly on his forehead; then he scratched his shins through his pants. Mom told me he wouldn’t have any hair left, he said at last. His disappointment was thinly masked. Simone stared at him gratefully. She told him that Claude had refused treatment because he didn’t want the unnecessary humiliation, since the sickness was so far advanced, and for the first time, his decision struck her as violent disdain for them. Gaël hunched lower and hesitated, then asked if she was sad. He knew from his mother that Claude had been a big smoker. He said it with an air of indulgent reproach and blushed almost as soon as the words were out. Simone tried to change the subject, but Gaël still had things to ask: Why was it Claude’s arm that hurt? Did he cry sometimes? Was it true that he was going to die? He let silences open up between his questions, his eyes traveling around the room, looking for something to light on. His hands lay inert between his thighs; they had the glorious plumpness of the rest of his body. Simone could not get enough of watching him, incredulous that it was possible to tell him these things and that he seemed concerned or at least interested. She wished she could have buried her mouth in his extraordinary thick mane of brown hair—the lovely color of a fawn, she told him. Another question was bothering him, but there was the sound of a door upstairs—Claude was coming down. Since he had begun to be in pain and to worry about it, Simone searched his face nervously for his expression whenever he looked at her. Gaël turned sharply toward the hall, as though he, too, were alert to possible fear. His long lashes had stopped beating against his plump cheeks. Simone always kept a box of chocolates in the library; she was sorry she had not given him one when Claude was not looking. She laid a hand on his knee and said she had something to show him in the garden.