The scent in his nostrils became atrociously delicious and the inspector, anesthetized, broke out in a great fit of laughter. The broken bark evoked a myriad of compact wooden teeth, an enormous mouth opened below him whose perfumed breath enthralled his spirit. You couldn’t see the bottom of it. Despérine couldn’t see its hunger. My tree . . . The inspector leaned over to give it a deep kiss, at the height of his pleasure. Unknowingly he put his foot in that wolf trap, and the wooden mouth began a slow and determined chewing, closing a first time. Then a second. The beech crushed his feet little by little, going up the length of his legs. Tears of joy flowed down Despérine’s cheeks, his thundering laughter became painful. He still saw those reddish colors like a young girl’s cheeks. He still felt those brief and inexperienced caresses. And that rare and delicate fragrance, better than a garden of jasmine and roses. Despérine couldn’t help touching, caressing the body within his grasp; or was it the branches which held him by the hands? The beech’s teeth reached his rib cage, which cracked as it pierced his flesh and the torrent of hemoglobin flowed well beyond the bowels of the earth. But that smell of God! easily overcame that of fresh blood. Laughter changed suddenly into a cry of madness, just before Despérine’s reddened head disappeared between the wooden teeth, exploding like the final burst of a fireworks show.
Twenty meters away, in front of the hut on the edge of the park, the little old man was still seated on his chair. He massaged his stomach, looking full. The beech had resumed its initial position; there remained only a piece of shirt, stuck between two sections of bark.
Translated from the French by James D. Jenkins
Flore Hazoumé
Menopause
The daughter of a Beninese father and a Congolese mother, Flore Hazoumé grew up in France but has long lived in Ivory Coast. She is the author of ten books, including one of relevance to the horror genre, a collection of short stories entitled Cauchemars [Nightmares] (1994). The title is appropriate: in Hazoumé’s stories, the everyday quickly takes a turn for the bizarre or nightmarish. ‘Menopause’ is our favorite of her stories, and the author’s favorite as well; she has since adapted it for a play version. The story is set in an unspecified African land not unlike Ivory Coast, in a male-dominated society where marriages between older men and much younger females are the norm. For the narrator, then, her approaching menopause represents more than just a physical alteration in her body; it is also a reminder that as an older, unmarried woman no longer capable of bearing children, she will lack a clear place in society. Hazoumé uses the framework of a horror story both to make a comment on African society and to tell an unsettling tale in which the narrator’s midlife change may be even more terrible than she at first suspected . . .
I’ve only just returned from a two-month vacation to Cape Lake when I rush to the phone and dial Clémence’s number. I need her so much. Only she will be able to comfort me. When a young girl’s voice responds that Clémence no longer lives at that address, I’m gripped by a senseless fear.
‘It’s not possible! No, it’s not possible.’
The voice on the other end hesitates.
‘Wait a moment, I’ll get my husband.’
I hang up. I slip on a jacket and get in my car. I shiver. Could Clémence already have . . . ? No, it’s not possible, she’s only six months older than I am.
Nervously, I bring my hand to my throat. I feel the soft skin flee from my fingers. I park my car in front of Clémence’s house. I ring. The sound of steps on the gravel. Flipper, the dog, barks. The door opens halfway, a young woman smiles at me. She looks like a twenty year younger version of me. She looks like my two daughters too.
‘You’re the one who called just now? My husband was sure you would come. He’s waiting for you in the living room.’
She signals me to follow her. I observe her. Women in our world have always been lively, young, and beautiful. I’ve never seen a woman grow old, but next to this young girl, I feel withered, rough like a piece of burlap. I follow her anxiously down the corridor, Flipper at my heels. Clémence’s favorite paintings are still hanging on the wall. The notes of our theme song, the hard-to-find original version of ‘Afrikan Krystal’ sung by Daya Smith, are coming from the living room. Clémence had promised to give it to me for my birthday in a few days. I look around. I understand everything now, I feel like laughing. Clémence is playing a joke on me. Nothing has happened to her. She hasn’t changed. She’s still the same. She’s waiting for me, smiling, in the living room in front of a cup of tea. I walk with a more assured step.
The young woman opens the door for me. Clémence is sitting with her back to me in an armchair facing the window. I see only her dark hair where, to my great surprise, some white strands have blended in. My anxiety vanishes. I can confide in her without fear, explain without shame what’s happening inside me.
‘Clémence! I was so worried; you really scared me, it’s really bad of you to . . .’
She turns around slowly, I can see half of her face. The end of my sentence hangs in the air. A cry of horror escapes me. There, in Clémence’s armchair, a middle-aged man looks at me with a calm expression.
‘What’s wrong? Do you feel ill? Why don’t you sit down.’
‘I . . . I’m looking for my friend Clémence, she lives here, she lived here, I . . . I don’t know anymore.’
I collapse into a chair. My head is all muddled. The man puts his hand gently on mine.
‘Your friend no longer lives here. She is gone.’
‘Gone? No, it’s impossible, a person can’t just go without taking anything with them, leave everything behind. The photo of her husband, the one of her wedding, of her daughters, a person can’t just leave like that! No one can change to that extent,’ I say under my breath, scrutinizing for a moment the stranger’s impassive face.
I cast a disoriented glance around the whole room. Flipper has come up to the old man and is licking his hands, how strange! They act as though they’ve known each other forever. A mad thought crosses my mind; but I don’t want to believe it. Could Clémence . . . ? I reject that idea. And yet, that way of running his hands through his hair, of stroking his chin with a dreamy look. So many details remind me of Clémence. I stand up, in the grip of a great agitation. At the doorstep, the man places his hand affectionately on my shoulder and murmurs in a comforting voice:
‘There are many ways of leaving.’
As he says these words, he plunges his clear gaze into mine. For a fleeting moment I have the strange sensation of having always known him, of finding a friend I thought I’d lost.
That evening, Claude and Pascale, my two daughters, Frédéric and Joël, their husbands, as well as my two granddaughters come to my house for dinner. This familial interlude is good for me and forces me to take my mind off things. I have just enough time to fix dinner and get dressed. I choose a skirt that covers my calves, a long-sleeved blouse. I prefer outfits that are lighter and less covering, but for the past few weeks . . . Let’s not think about it any more!
At 8 p.m. the doorbell rings. I assume a calm expression. My two daughters kiss me, my granddaughters Emmanuelle and Paule hop around me. I stroke their curly hair as they pass by. My two sons-in-law, so alike with their timeworn faces, shake my hand. I seem to sense an unusual warmth, a complicity, in the smiles they give me. Claude, my eldest daughter, joins me in the kitchen where I’m arranging some glasses on a tray.
She looks at me insistently. Is it that noticeable?
‘You look tired, Mom!’
My lips pursed, I don’t say anything. She takes a couple steps. I anticipate her gesture. I start to take a step back, too late! She has already run her hands through my hair.
‘You’re losing your hair, Mom! Look!’
Do I need to look? I know that trivial spectacle only too well. Every morning on my pillow I gather up handfuls of hair. Wi
th every passing day my hair grows more and more sparse.
I manage to stammer a response.
‘I . . . I went to the doctor. Apparently it’s menopause; I’m following a treatment. Everything will go back to normal. Come on, it’s late, let’s sit down at the table.’
During the meal only my daughters and I speak. My sons-in-law say almost nothing. Men, in our world, speak little. They look out on existence with an expression that reflects all of mankind’s wisdom.
Is it their function that surrounds them with this indefinable aura? Here, men make up a separate clan, an inaccessible caste. Beneath their idle appearance, they hold power, wisdom, knowledge. The very balance of our society is in their hands. The women, simultaneously the ants and the grasshoppers, are the lifeblood of our world. They are the future and they beget the future. For those aging sphinxes, stuck in the wanderings of their thoughts, women are a kind of short-lived turbulence that barely disrupts the order and functioning of the society they have skillfully built.
For the first time in my life, I find myself admiring them. I feel close to them. I feel like talking to them, learning their opinions, their thoughts, and thus having a foretaste of what perhaps awaits me . . . I turn towards them. Our glances meet. One of them slides his hand towards mine and squeezes it with emotion. I read the profoundest respect in their eyes.
When dinner is finished, we make ourselves comfortable in the little sitting room. My sons-in-law smoke their cigars with a vacant look. My daughters have a discussion, carefree. My granddaughters sit on footstools, playing at my feet. I relax and softly hum ‘Afrikan Krystal’, my favorite song. I think of Clémence. Without noticing, I’ve crossed my legs. My skirt has slid up, revealing my ankles. Paule, my younger granddaughter, caresses my legs. Unsuspecting, I indulge myself in that soft contact.
‘Oh, Granny, your legs, they’re like a cat’s back!’ she yells, pulling on the long, hard hairs.
‘No, more like a black rabbit,’ retorts Emmanuelle.
With a brusque movement, I fold my skirt back over my legs. Instinctively, I turn towards my sons-in-law, as if only they could come to my aid. There’s an awkward silence.
‘It’s getting late,’ they say finally in a single voice. ‘It’s time to leave.’
My daughters, uncomfortable, remain silent. Have they guessed? They won’t say anything, I won’t say anything. It’s the law, this stage of life is lived alone, far from the gaze of others, with courage, with modesty. I had almost forgotten.
Once I’m alone, I go up to my room. Tonight I have the courage to face my own image, this strange body which yet is mine.
I stand before the large mirror, completely naked. I close my eyes, unable to bear this horrible vision, this grotesque reflection of myself. Yet, I must! I open my eyes. I can’t help flinching in repulsion. With horror, I notice the extent of the illness that’s devouring me. My breasts are completely covered in short, bushy hairs. Is this arm mine, this hairy chest? These arms, these legs, made up in a long, hideous down? Is this really me, this hermaphrodite, this unnatural thing?
My eyes wander for a moment over the bedside table where the photo of my husband is. At least he would have helped me to get through this stage of my life. Only today do I realize how I miss his silent presence and what a void his death has left. Exhausted, I swallow two sleeping pills.
For several days I don’t notice anything abnormal. My transformation seems to have stopped, the growth of my body hair seems to have balanced out. Only the forerunner symptoms of menopause persist and reassure me: dizziness, hot flashes, bloating.
On the other hand, my skin worries me. Some already existing wrinkles have become accentuated; others have appeared on my forehead. Bags have formed under my eyes. Now I look like a middle-aged woman. After all, maybe that’s what getting old is, maybe that’s the menopause the medical books talk too briefly about. I suddenly realize I’m the first woman to see herself grow old. In our world, women never reach old age, what becomes of them? I know the answer. I refuse to believe it. But can one struggle against the order of things?
In the street, no one notices me. The couples are all alike: young women in the arms of their middle-aged husbands, families built on the same model: young girls holding the hands of their mother and their worthy father, in the prime of his life. They all pass close by me without noticing anything. Maybe people take me for what I’m not. The other day, coming out of a store, a young woman bumped into me and said: ‘Oh! Sorry, sir!’ It’s true that I was wearing pants.
So I’ve decided to shave my legs and arms and wear dresses again. What a pleasure to see those vile hairs drowned in the bathtub! I’m finally going to put on an elegant dress. Who cares if my face is marked with age, my legs are still respectable. I take a dress from the wardrobe and slip it on. I have the impression that it used to fit a little tighter at the hips. The anxiety of the past few weeks must have made me lose weight. So much the better! There, all done.
I turn towards the large mirror. I look at myself, I burst out laughing. I laugh until it hurts, no, it’s not me, this miserable clown. I laugh harder and harder, no, it’s not me, this grotesque creature, this transvestite, this weirdly attired caricature in a dress that hangs everywhere, this woman with no breasts, no hips, no curves. And I laugh over and over without realizing that my laughter ends in tears.
I got up early this morning. A sort of intuition forced me to get out of bed. I feel that something irreversible happened last night. I avoid the large mirror. I run my hand over my face. Under my fingers my skin is as rough as that of a man who hasn’t shaved in several days. The mirror behind me mocks me. I won’t look at myself. I already know what I’ll see.
I take off my nightgown unhurriedly. All the hairs have grown back, my breasts have totally disappeared. I hold my breath. My heart beats harder and harder, faster and faster. Gently, slowly, I lower my eyes towards the only feminine symbol I have left. I can hardly breathe, my vision goes blurry, I put my hand between my thighs, I’m reeling, I’m losing my mind. Under my fingers, an unambiguous growth. In a final cry of horror I lose consciousness.
It’s dark, I must have slept a long time. My memories are confused. I have the impression of living a second life, in a new skin. I’m sitting in the living room, in an armchair. An appetizing smell is coming from the kitchen. I get up, I light my pipe. I am very elegant tonight in my three-piece suit. Dominique told me that we’ll be receiving guests. An old friend, it seems. Here she is. She smiles at me, young and radiant.
‘Did you sleep well, darling? Clément and his wife won’t be long.’
A ring at the door. They’re here. Standing on the doorstep are the young woman and the man who are living in Clémence’s house. He looks at me in silence and hands me a record: ‘Afrikan Krystal’.
‘Happy birthday,’ he says to me, with an attitude of complicity.
Translated from the French by James D. Jenkins
Christien Boomsma
The Bones in Her Eyes
It’s commonly claimed – even by the Dutch – that the Netherlands has no real tradition of horror fiction, but Dutch literature does contain some hidden gems in the genre, like the often horror-tinged ‘fantastic’ tales of Ferdinand Bordewijk and Belcampo, Kathinka Lannoy’s volumes of ghost stories, and the bizarre and unsettling stories of Jacques Hamelink. And in more recent years, the Dutch horror scene has shown increasing signs of life. The works of Paul van Loon and Christien Boomsma have proven extremely popular with younger audiences, while Thomas Olde Heuvelt scored an international success with his 2016 novel Hex. Both Olde Heuvelt and Boomsma were featured alongside a number of other emerging horror writers in a pioneering 2016 anthology of new Dutch horror fiction, from which the following tale, ‘The Bones in Her Eyes’, is taken. The story came to Boomsma after she accidentally hit a cat with her car: the look in the animal’s eyes
haunted her in her dreams, though we doubt those dreams were quite as nightmarish as this tale they inspired.
It’s the eyes I just can’t get out of my system, glowing yellow-green in the darkness when they were caught in the glare of my headlights. Some people would call such a sight demonic, but they’re haters, and why should I pay any attention to what they say? No, to me they were mirrors that showed with an unsettling sharpness a truth that I didn’t seem to grasp. I knew it was important for me to see it, to understand it. But it eluded me, and it eludes me still.
Matt – my boyfriend – always said there was nothing you could do about it when it happens, but I never believed him. I considered those rural roads full of carelessly murdered hedgehogs, flattened frogs, squashed rabbits, and bleeding ducks to be a typical expression of human inability to treat the world with respect. Getting home in time to watch Farmer Wants a Wife is more important than a creature that breathes, that feels. That dies.
But that evening I discovered that things could be different. I had had a long day because I go – no, went – once a month to the drawing academy in Rotterdam. Quite a drive if you live as far north as I do. So when I drove back into the village I could already taste the night in the day. It was the time when animals leave their holes and lairs and slip into the world. A dangerous time.
The Valancourt Book of World Horror Stories Page 18