“Because they wouldn’t dare talk to you about it.”
“I’d rather they said nothing. Personally, I’m opposed to gay marriage, but if I hear a hetero say that, I’d lynch the fucker.”
“You’re against it?
“Marriage? Of course I am.”
“I get you. Our generation, we’re dykes, real dykes, we’ve suffered for it and we don’t want to be like fucking straights.”
“It’s not like that … adoption, test-tube babies, marriage—I’m opposed to everything for everyone. I’m in favor of sterilizing the entire population at puberty. Seven billion of us. You don’t think maybe that’s enough? We need to slow things down and pronto. I see people with strollers, I look at their faces, and I think: But why? What do you think you’re doing by reproducing? Stop being so fucking arrogant, the world doesn’t need your third-rate genes. Take up painting if you need a hobby, but don’t annoy us with your offspring. If I had my way, I’d have them all rounded up in a stadium: vasectomy, hysterectomy, and you can all head home … Seven billion, and still they’re infesting the planet … The day they have a demonstration for the sterilization of humankind, I’ll be there, and I won’t be sitting on a café terrace, I can tell you…”
“Fuck it, you’re right. My girlfriend’s too reformist. I’ve allowed her to influence me. It’s really good to see you, it’s like having a booster shot.”
* * *
Despite the fine drizzle wetting the toes of their boots, they stay out on the terrace smoking cigarettes. They both order glasses of muscatel from Alsace. Gaëlle likes the Marais. The sunlight gilding the ancient stones, the ersatz atmosphere—the shops are so chic, the whole neighborhood looks like a film set. She loves the rich streets, the girls walking hand in hand—although in the past decade the area has become overrun by families and tourists, it’s still the place to see the prettiest dykes in Paris. She likes to see the happy boys—nowhere has she ever seen guys look so happy. And it’s not just because they’re young, rich, and handsome, otherwise they would be just as happy in the sixteenth arrondissement, it’s because they’re queers, and you only have to look at them to know that queers are more fulfilled than other guys.
But she loves all of Paris, from the Porte de la Chapelle all the way to Montmartre. She likes the succession of contradictory layers, the intersections and the brusque shifts. Sometimes, you only have to cross two streets to be in a completely different neighborhood, at other times, you have to cross the no-man’s-land of zones that have no identity. She loves the melting pot of tourists, riffraff, Chinese, hicks, culture vultures, fashionistas, bankers, and checkout girls—they feel at home while at the same time living in a city that is not quite the same yet not quite different. Someday, people will think of the cosmopolitan city of Paris at the dawn of the third millennium as a crazy Babylon, and find it difficult to imagine that so many different people managed to live together in peace. Beardy geeks and right-wing queers, Jewish drug dealers, Sorbonne supermodels, bohemian Americans, and reactionary junkies … All forms of expression are possible, and she is a part of this mosaic. Even if she never stops complaining that everything is changing and always for the worse, she still feels at home in this convoluted city.
Being with the Hyena changes Gaëlle’s mood. As it does whenever they meet up. Not long ago, she had been furious with the Hyena for asking her to track down Vernon, before disappearing into thin air as soon as he’d been found. Gaëlle got into serious shit with Kiko at the time, and was pissed off at getting herself into a sticky situation for nothing. But this is not the first time that the Hyena has gotten her into hot water, nor the last time she will forgive her. Besides, things have changed since. Kiko tracked down Subutex and, instead of smashing his face in, he’s been sucked in just like he was before.
There was a time when the Hyena got mixed up in seriously shady stuff, when she was a real player. She is going downhill. She doesn’t seem to give a shit. Gaëlle has rarely met anyone with such contempt for what other people think. She has always been that way, so arrogant that you can’t help but respect her.
She cuts her own hair, and it shows, and it’s a domestic dye job too. The teeth are healthy, the eyes disdainful. In fact, she has lost everything except her haughtiness. The Hyena is staring at her glass of wine. She is thinking. Gaëlle leaves her to it. She knows exactly what she wants to talk about, what everyone is talking about this season: Vernon. Has she seen him at Rosa Bonheur recently, has she heard anything, that kind of thing … What Gaëlle doesn’t get is why the Hyena has risen to the bait too. What is Subutex doing to these people to hold them in thrall? He’s a nice enough guy, but he’s in a sorry fucking state … Gaëlle has always hated crust punks. She doesn’t like poor personal hygiene, people who let themselves go, and she refuses on principle to talk to anyone with a beard or a dog on a rope. But the Hyena changes the subject:
“So this girlfriend of yours, when she’s not on protests, what’s she like?”
“Very pretty, a serious babe. She’s twenty-five years younger than me. Broadly speaking, she is looking forward and I’m looking back.”
“And it doesn’t bother her, being with a babushka?”
“I’m a seriously good fuck. That makes up for it.”
The Hyena smiles. This is their kind of humor. They have been coming out with the same jokes for decades now. Gaëlle drains her glass, looks around for the waitress, and says:
“So you wanted to see me to ask about my love life?”
“I wanted to do a general debrief. We haven’t seen each other in an age. I hear you’re spending a lot of time at Rosa Bonheur these days?”
“Yeah, I’m helping out Zoudou when she organizes parties. And there are a lot of them. But I’ve heard you’ve been spending a lot of time in the park too? You should pop in more often…”
“Do you hear much gossip about Vernon at Rosa’s?”
So this is what she wants to know. Gaëlle was right. She doesn’t understand this whole thing about Vernon. For a start, how did he manage to wind up living on the streets? And so quickly. Okay, granted, he got kicked out of his apartment. There’s an economic crisis, the guy’s not as young as he was, he’s not in touch with his family. But for fuck’s sake, twenty years running a record shop leaves you with enough contacts to ensure you don’t have to sleep on the streets for three months at least … and how does a guy who’s likable enough but a bit short of change when it comes to charisma turn himself into the messiah of the Buttes-Chaumont? The guy is homeless, stinks of sweat, and wears trailer trash boots, but everyone treats him like he’s baby Jesus if he’d skipped the part with the cross, he’s surrounded by dozens of Magi who bring him gifts every day. Vernon chooses a tree, sits under it, and people come to see him. Of course she hears about him at Rosa Bonheur. He’s pretty much all anybody talks about. She went and had a look at his merry band. Shallow straight guys out for a good time. Even Kiko has been bitten by the bug. When he found out that Subutex was hanging around in the park, Gaëlle watched him march off with that grim I’m-going-to-rearrange-your-fucking-face-maybe-that’ll-teach-you-to-walk-off-with-my-stash-of-blow look … and he had come back the following day and spent the next three weeks listening to Jethro Tull. No parties, no booty calls, nothing but headphones, music, and drugs. He had not gone to work. Something that was utterly unheard of. He had started seriously raving with a vengeance—about how he believed that God would soon exist, he would be the sum of all logarithms, that he was the only one who could save the planet and humankind—and how it was important to come up with software, the kind that would teach people how to live in a functional community. As far as Gaëlle is concerned, when urban hipsters start dabbling in spirituality, you know shit’s going to get real. Kiko emerged from his three-week retreat with a grand project: traveling around Latin America. Reading between the lines, it sounded like the guy wanted to get his cocaine from the source. And why not, it was possible to imagine that this was his one true passion. But the i
dea of getting photos from Guatemala of Kiko sitting on a llama wearing a Peruvian chullo just depressed Gaëlle. She has decided that if Kiko is found washing his clothes in the rivers of Chiapas, she’s going to rock up at the Buttes-Chaumont and torch the whole place. She’s been living rent-free with this guy for years, he’s always been a rabid neoliberal, it pisses her off to see someone fuck up his whole worldview. Meanwhile, Kiko got a grip, went back to work, and now only talks about Subutex late at night. He says he is planning for his trip. She knows from experience that the more hard-bitten people think they are, the more likely they are to fall for happy-clappy new age shit—a cynic is just a frustrated romantic—but even so, this was a shock. She hopes he’ll forget this shit and go back to how he used to be. In the meantime, he has come to Rosa Bonheur twice to listen to Vernon spin a set. And it really is something. Even Gaëlle is prepared to admit it. It was Mimi who first had the idea. Basically, it was a way of giving him some cash-in-hand work without it looking like charity. But it had been a huge success. He has already done two. Someone needs to get him to shower beforehand, but aside from that, he’s pretty dope. Spinning discs has always been his thing.
When Vernon gets behind the decks at Rosa Bonheur, they close the bar. They say it’s a private party, that it’s a choir rehearsal, just so they can allow the initiates to commune in private. Even Gaëlle, who is immune to all forms of sentimentality, and especially to mysticism, has to admit that something happens. Vernon has a gift for creating a dynamic set. At the start of the evening, she will be sitting in a corner, listening to him spin, bitching that he’s not exactly on fleek, but by the fifth track, she’s not so high and mighty. She’s out on the floor, she’s pumping. It’s collective, it’s a madness, it would be stupid to deny it. And she’s not dancing to prove that she can still twerk it at her age, her hips are pumping like she’s on an MDMA come-up, except she hasn’t taken anything, she starts to feel the music thrill through her fingers, relax her neck, and all around are bodies in the same state—she’s dancing and she’s checked her brain at the door, it makes her sick to admit it, so next morning, she thinks about something else, but she dances to feel vertical, the soles of her feet connected to the ground, and she is completely out of it, shooting stars tumble through her belly as though they’ve always been there, she dances and thinks about the dead, she dances with them, she dances thinking about everything that has vanished and yet still exists, unscathed, as easy to access as though she had opened a book and images, sounds, smells and every pore of skin poured out, she dances among the others and she acknowledges their presence, there is a bond that connects them all, just being together they are happy with that irrational joy of someone who has only just fallen in love, except that there are thirty of them and, without even paying attention, she is somehow connected to each and every one, they are a single undulating body and are happy simply to be there. It is impossible to say what triggers it. She refuses to go into raptures and claim that Vernon is touched by some kind of genius—she is resistant to such confusion. But she has to accept that she has never danced like this.
The Hyena finally comes to the point:
“So what’s the word down at the bar, I mean, you’re there all the time … about this whole thing with Subutex and the people around him?”
“What do you want to know?”
“I’m just keeping informed.”
“And why should I help you?”
“Because you love me.”
“Sorry, I’ve got nothing for you. He’s done two private parties as DJ, all his friends came. And they were good. I don’t understand what people see in him, but when it comes to spinning a set, he’s the man. He’s the enigma of the decade, that guy. Look, it’s not like it’s the first phenomenon where you’re thinking, how does this work. If you want me to be more specific, I might be able to give you some information … Why are you still so interested in the guy?”
* * *
The Hyena flashes her pirate smile. The one that means she knows things that she cannot talk about. It is a beautiful smile. She would obviously like to ask more questions, but a pretty brunette with a strong chin is heading toward their table sporting a phony look of surprise. She’s a fine specimen, though there is something Plain Jane about her. When she reaches them, she feigns astonishment when it’s obvious she spotted them a hundred yards back. Everything about her exudes that famous joy of femininity, an accretion of details that scream: “It’s such fun playing the airhead!” The fluorescent slimline watch that says she’s quirky, the sausage color nail polish because she read in a magazine that it’s trendy, the overpowering perfume, the threaded eyebrows, this season’s gloss on her pouty lips … “Hey, what are you doing here…?” It goes without saying that as soon as she opens her mouth, she has a shrill, grating, little girl’s voice. The Hyena looks at her and smiles, but doesn’t invite her to sit down. “Anaïs, this is Gaëlle…”
It takes Gaëlle only a second to realize that they are sleeping together. Otherwise, the Hyena would not be coming on all George Clooney.
“I’ve been fired.”
“By Dopalet?”
“Just now. Like a piece of shit. It’s never happened to me before. It’s terrible.”
“Because?”
“I didn’t really understand. He fired me the same way he hired me, I suppose: on a whim. So I’m free for coffee. Mind if I join you?”
“I’m so sorry for you, Anaïs, we’ll talk about it later. I was just about to leave.”
Anaïs swallows hard. She takes it like a slap in the face, but feels obliged to put up a good show. She surreptitiously glances at Gaëlle, wondering whether she is the reason for this chilly welcome. The Hyena insists:
“I’m already running late for a meeting. But if you’re free tonight, I’ll give you a call and you can tell me all about it.”
“You’ll deign to use your phone for me now?”
The pretty brunette is suddenly brittle. She could not hold it in. It suits her better than being nice, Gaëlle thinks, and suddenly finds her more interesting. It has to be said that the Hyena went too far—though she knows nothing about their relationship, you don’t sleep with a girl and then tell her you’re late for a meeting when she says she’s just been fired … Gaëlle feels the whole situation is unfair, she gives Anaïs a wink and gestures to the empty chair next to her:
“Take a seat anyway. I’m not in any rush.”
* * *
The Hyena looks daggers at her. They have already stolen or borrowed each other’s girlfriends once or twice. Hardly surprising, given how long they’ve known each other … Gaëlle gives her sunniest, sluttiest smile—get over it, girlfriend, it’s one of the unwritten rules everyone agrees on—if you treat your lover like dirt, I’ve got every right to look out for her … Besides, there was no mention of leaving before the girl showed up. And she has every intention of ordering a second glass.
Exasperated, the Hyena grabs her cigarette her lighter and her notes from the table, her fingers are long and slender, her gestures efficient, she fumbles in the pocket of her jacket for money—she is bothered by the idea of leaving the two of them alone.
“I’m heading toward République if you want to walk with me?”
“Not if you’re really in a hurry. I haven’t finished my drink and mademoiselle hasn’t had a chance to order yet.”
The Hyena is incandescent. Before she walks away, she says: “Anaïs, can I come by and see you this evening?” and Gaëlle cannot help thinking—I think she’ll be in my bed, darling. Just for fun. Nor does she feel that this would generate too much tension. When you really care about a girl, you don’t treat her like that. Gaëlle has never been monogamous. That sort of thing is reserved for ugly people.
* * *
Anaïs sits down. She is shattered. She has abandoned any attempt to feign good humor. Gaëlle offers a little compassion, she has always been a sucker for victims:
“She’s always been uncouth. I
t’s part of her persona. Don’t take it personally.”
“Who are you talking about?”
“The Hyena, who did you think I meant? You’re white as a sheet. Do you want me to order a whiskey for you?”
“We hardly know each other … I just ran into her here by accident. If I’m pale it’s probably low blood sugar … Actually, yes, thank you, I would like a drink.”
“Honey, I’ve got eyes in my eyes, she’s your lover and she behaved atrociously. Don’t hold it against her, she’s a bit touched. What do you do for a living?”
“I was a talent scout for a production company.”
“Did you enjoy it?”
“Not really, no.”
“Maybe it’s not such a bad day after all, then.”
Anaïs is on the verge of tears, she smiles as best she can.
“I’m sorry. I was fine until just now, I think it’s talking about it, I’ve only just realized … I’m sorry, but…”
Gaëlle orders; she has always been attracted to a woman in tears. She can’t help it, it’s her nature. She is a Scorpio. You can’t argue with astrology. Anaïs downs the whiskey with a certain panache, then heaves a deep sigh.
“Better now?” Gaëlle says.
“Getting there. So do you know the Hyena well?”
“We served in Vietnam together … in a manner of speaking. But I can’t see what a girl like you sees in her.”
“A girl like me?”
“You know what I mean. Is she your first girlfriend, or have you been bi for a while?”
No point using kid gloves, otherwise her chances of reeling the girl in by tonight are slim. She needs to steer the conversation around to Anaïs and forget all about the Hyena. But Anaïs is more determined than she seems at first glance. She is not easily flustered. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she says again and begins to talk about the job from which she has just been fired. Gaëlle has little patience for conversations about work. It occurs to her to bring Anaïs along to Rosa Bonheur. That way, if she doesn’t get anywhere with her, there will still be time to have cocktails with her girlfriends.
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