The Book of Wonders

by Julien Sandrel

  We ordered from a waiter who didn’t speak a word of English, pointing to indecipherable words on the menu. As we made our choices, the waiter sometimes asked questions, sounding surprised – a rather unobtrusive Japanese surprise. Of course, we understood nothing and nodded foolishly while clucking like two impatient hens. I felt as if I was Obelix, waiting for the dishes of Mannekenpix, the chef who cooked meals for the Titans, as I buckled down to one of the many tasks concocted by my son.

  Various fish and shellfish sushi soon appeared on our table: we identified salmon, tuna, eel, fish roe (but what kind?), as well as a type of octopus. We didn’t recognize a slightly sharp-tasting white fish, nor a viscous shellfish. Then came a large noodle soup that we gathered was called udon, with shrimp fritters, mysterious vegetables, fried tofu and seaweed. So far, so good. Then we were served a bowl of plain rice, which on closer inspection turned out to be dotted with tiny whole fried fish, including the eyes. My mother protested, but we ate everything (and crunched, because those little fish were crispy), wincing as we did so.

  The pièce de résistance was served by the chef himself. He came to our table with a live squid in his left hand and a large knife in his right. We stopped laughing like silly geese and the booming chef gratified us with an incomprehensible speech as he laid the creature on a wooden board. Then he calmly sliced it, placing the thin transparent strips in small bowls. Mum looked away; I laughed and pointed out that, since she ate live oysters, she could try the ‘almost live’ squid. Then the chef stood there in front of us. We thanked him, but he didn’t leave. He was obviously waiting for us to try it. We had no option. I grabbed the camera and caught my mother’s grimace and gag reflex as she put a piece of quivering squid in her mouth.

  We washed it all down with some sake, then squandered a few thousand yen (a few tens of euros) in a smoke-filled pachinko – a sort of jam-packed casino, echoing with the sound of jangling, flashing machines, where thousands of workers seeking an adrenaline rush come to forget the emptiness of their lives. To round off our foray into Shinjuku in style, we tried a beer with wasabi at the Robot Restaurant, watching a cabaret show that was a cross between an episode of Bioman on speed, a cardboard cut-out parody of an American musical, and a Bollywood movie with ear-piercing singing, dancing and screeching.

  Back in Shibuya, we joined a bunch of particularly tipsy Japanese for this group karaoke, and competed singing Eurovision songs and wearing absurd costumes.

  I had to support my mother on the way back to the hotel – she could no longer walk straight – and the receptionist welcomed us with a smile in which I could discern a hint of anxiety.

  ‘Everything’s fine, don’t worry. Goodnight.’

  It was four o’clock in the morning. I lay Mum on the bed and removed her socks and the maid’s hat she had forgotten to return with the rest of her costume. I ‘mentally defenestrated’ myself one last time, then I too lay down.

  In seeking to awaken my son, I fell asleep, a little girl snuggled up to her mother.

  Excerpt from the Book of Wonders

  Have a wild day in Tokyo with the person I love more than anyone else in the world (Mum, for the time being).

  – Raid the Pokémon Center in Ikebukuro for super-rare cards

  – See a traditional wedding at the Meiji Jingu (with kimonos and the works)

  – Let myself be swept along by the crowd on the Shibuya Crossing, with my eyes closed

  – Get a tattoo from Tomo, tattooist to the stars (address: Tōkyō-to, Shinjuku-ku, Kabukichō, 1 Chome−12−2)

  – Eat at an izakaya, ask for the menu in Japanese, with no pictures, and order five random dishes. And eat everything! Yum, yum!

  – Press all the buttons on a Japanese toilet

  – Blow my mind at the Robot Restaurant, Shinjuku

  – Have a drink in the Golden Gai

  – Burst my eardrums in a pachinko

  – Sing my heart out in a karaoke bar in Shibuya

  – Gaze at Tokyo’s lights from the top of a skyscraper

  I Dare

  21 to 17 Days

  Charlotte has nicknamed room 405 ‘the room of wonders’, and that’s what everyone calls it now. Since Mum rocked up with her sound system and spent a whole afternoon playing the videos and telling me about everything she filmed with Granny Odette in Tokyo, she’s become a celebrity throughout the hospital.

  Charlotte (who now has a name, so Mum no longer calls her Sophie Davant) told her that she’d love to see the video and so Mum chose a day when she was off duty. Of course, Charlotte knew all about the trip, because she’d played me loads of excerpts on the iPad, but she said she’d still love to attend the show. During the afternoon, other nurses, auxiliaries and medical secretaries wandered in and out when they were on a break, all of them laughing delightedly and saying thank you. At the end, Charlotte said to Mum, ‘What you’re doing for your son is amazing,’ and I totally agree with her.

  I had a great laugh, all afternoon, and I so wish I could have seen it! On video, but also for real. What I loved best was the unintentional Mum-and-Grandma comedy duo, a sort of female Laurel and Hardy, with cheap gags and old-lady humour. I loved it, and I’m not the only one, judging by the applause from the improvised audience. Grandma was there too, for the screening, and I had the feeling that something had happened between the two of them, over there. They were . . . How can I describe it? Complicit, I think. I’d never heard them like that. Apparently, it’s Grandma who edited the videos, because Mum doesn’t have a clue and Grandma’s an I.T. whizz, but I can tell you she didn’t censor anything. It’s incredible. I want to get up and shout, Guys, that’s my mum and my grandma, and they rock!!!

  Then Mum stayed with me on her own, and she kissed me and kissed me, I think, then turned the next page of my Book of Wonders. She read what was written, and she nearly wet herself. At first, I was a bit ashamed because there were things that were a bit sexual, but Mum told me that she’d find some way of fulfilling my dreams, even if she didn’t entirely approve. It was Sunday, 29 January; she gave herself two days, scout’s honour (though she never was one). Seeing what I was about to make her do, it would be good if I could give her a sign.

  ‘My darling, I love you, I miss you, and so does your grandmother,’ she said. ‘Come back quickly; I’m doing all this for you, to show you how beautiful life is, how much you have to live for.’

  I promise, Mum, I’m going to try. You have no idea how much I want to.

  The next evening, Mum told me about her first escapade. I have to say, I was blown away. I’d never have believed she’d do stuff like that. Best of all, she sounded as if she’d got a real buzz out of it and had a wicked time doing the stupid things I’d written on the page I’d called ‘I dare’ . . . A whole list.

  She started with the easiest one on the list, or, at any rate, the least challenging. It was to get into a taxi and then act totally crazy and yell ‘Follow that car!’ like in spy films. I’ve always thought that sounded super cool and I’ve always fantasized about saying it for real. Well, my mother did it – three times, because the first two were disastrous: she was booted out of the cab within seconds. But the third attempt worked. She had the bright idea of yelling ‘Police!’ first, and of printing and laminating a fake ID which could fool someone who didn’t look too closely, was stressed out by the urgency, or a bit of both. She flung herself into a taxi, brandished her ID and barked the words, totally into the role – eat your heart out, drama school, as she said. The driver shot off. He soon started asking questions, but she was prepared. Who were they following? Dangerous bank robbers. Why was she alone, when police officers always work in pairs? That was odd, wasn’t it? She’d infiltrated the gang, backup was on its way. Then the questions became more precise. Which branch of the police was she in? The fraud squad . . . Robbery prevention. He hadn’t heard of that department. Of course not, it had only recently been set up. Could he have her name and rank? She’d been caught off guard and had repl
ied without thinking: ‘Superintendent Adamsberg.’ The driver was a crime-fiction fan and recognized the name of Fred Vargas’s hero. He slammed the brakes on and ordered her out of his taxi, otherwise he’d call the police – the real police. She obeyed. Even so, she’d had time to take a selfie inside the taxi, holding her ID, to capture the moment for me. I’d see that freaking photo when I could be bothered to open my eyes. I sensed a slight rebuke in that last sentence, which I put down to tiredness.

  On Wednesday, 1 February, Mum came to see me with Grandma, to tell me about their adventures. The previous day, Mum had taken Grandma with her to ‘film the ticking off of two boxes’. At first, I hadn’t understood what she meant, but when she started playing the video on her iPad, I got it, and I felt as if I’d been there. They’d gone to the trouble of commentating on everything that was going on, to avoid leaving things unsaid . . . They were becoming real audio-description pros. To help you understand what follows, let me explain that the dialogue is between Madame Ernest, my maths teacher, and my mother. Grandma was holding the camera. Selected excerpts of what I heard:

  ‘Thank you for seeing me and agreeing to be filmed, Madame Ernest. It means a lot to us.’

  ‘You’re very welcome. I was deeply saddened when I heard about your son. I hope he pulls through.’

  ‘You can speak to him; we’ll be playing the recording to him.’

  ‘Oh . . . fine. My dear Louis, I wish you strength. You have the resources within you. And you got twenty out of twenty on your last test; you can be proud of yourself.’

  Aside from me: Madame Ernest’s encouragement is a bit crap, isn’t it? She sounds like Master Yoda on a bad day.

  ‘Thank you, Madame Ernest. I’m sure Louis will be very touched. But . . . I have a favour to ask you. For Louis and for all the other sick children around the world. I’d be grateful if you would agree.’

  ‘I’ll be delighted to help you if I can.’

  ‘Good. So I’ll explain. This is a bit awkward, so please don’t be angry with me. There’s a new social network challenge, called the boob challenge. It’s for a good cause. It involves touching the breasts of different women to raise money for research into deep comas.’

  ‘You’re joking, I presume?’

  ‘Not at all. I’m sure you’re already seen those campaigns where celebrities pose bare-breasted to raise money for cancer research . . .’

  ‘Yes, I think so . . .’

  ‘Well, it’s the same principle. The faces are pixelated, of course. It’s all anonymous. For my contribution – to do my bit – my I’ve agreed to touch the breasts of everyone who’s important to Louis. I’d very much like to touch your breasts, Madame Ernest.’

  Aside, from me: Mum is almost sobbing as she says all that. She’s amazing, my mother.

  The scene ended in an extraordinary way. After the inevitable objections of my favourite maths teacher, Mum played Madame Ernest a video showing her touching the breasts

  of various women: my grandmother, of course, but also Charlotte, our favourite nurse, and Françoise, our cleaner. Then Madame Ernest finally said yes. Mum’s hand moved towards her breast . . . and stopped a few centimetres from the finishing line. Such a pity.

  Then, Mum straightened up, looked Madame Ernest in the eye and told her the whole truth about my notebook, and her crazy promise. She asked her if she still consented, now that she knew what it was all about. Of course, Madame Ernest said no, because it was her body, her choice, her right, blah, blah, blah. Obviously, what did Mum expect? OK, so it wasn’t very cool to do a thing like that to Madame Ernest without telling her the real reason, but Mum had come up with such a brilliant idea!

  Mum told me that it wasn’t possible to touch the teacher’s breasts without her informed consent. I’m not too sure what that means, but I felt really let down and thought that Mum had bottled out. Just then, she said, ‘Don’t be disappointed; I don’t want you to think that I bottled out,’ and I said to myself, OMG, now she can read my mind – that’s the last straw (as Grandma would say). Mum gave me a bit of lecture explaining that this sort of thing wasn’t acceptable, that she understood schoolboy fantasies, but touching a person’s breasts without their consent was sexual abuse, and that what she had experienced was exactly what would have happened to me had I tried to touch Madame Ernest’s breasts myself: I’d have been met with downright refusal, and a good thing too. I imagined Madame Ernest slapping my face or sending me to see the head, and I told myself that my mother was probably right. Mum ended up laughing and saying no wonder I fantasized about that teacher, she really was very pretty, but she was certain that, very soon, I’d be able to touch the breasts of lots of girls with their informed consent. And I tried not to think anything because I suspected that Mum could read my mind.

  Then Mum and Grandma told me they wandered along the school corridors in search of Madame Grospiron, the English teacher I hate.

  Having identified her, they snuck into her classroom, Grandma turned on the camera and then the light, and Mum stripped off in front of the table of irregular verbs. They laughed themselves silly and then found themselves face to face with the head teacher as they came out of the classroom. Mum was still hysterical, she told me. ‘You should have seen his face . . .’ Then Mum played the sympathy card, saying she had to pick up her son Louis’s exercise book. ‘As you know, Monsieur Farès . . .’ Monsieur Farès melted and offered his sincere condolences. No one found that funny, and Mum told him I was alive, and that ruined the mood. Mum didn’t laugh after that. She told me I had to be strong, that she still believed I could do it, that she loved me more than anything in the world and she missed me so much.

  I don’t recognize my mother. It’s her, of course, but she’s more open, cheerful and relaxed, and funnier. And she’s also more sincere and more affectionate.

  She’s my mother, only better.

  Excerpt from the Book of Wonders

  I dare!!!

  – Touch Madame Ernest’s boobs!

  – Get into a taxi and yell, ‘Follow that car!’

  – Strip off in Madame Grospiron’s class

  12

  17 Days

  Charlotte Forever

  When I left Louis’s room after telling him, with much forced laughter, about the lewd antics of his mother and grandmother at the Paul Éluard High School, I was exhausted.

  I needed to sit down, right there in the corridor, on the fourth floor. Just for a moment. That morning, I’d become aware of a detail which, as the day went by, had taken on a growing importance in my mind. Louis had seen almost nothing of the month of January 2017. He’d spent it in this room – room 405 – the decor of which made me feel ill.

  I was sick of the sight of that window that afforded nothing but a dismal vista of geometric concrete blocks overlooking a greyish boulevard. Sick, too, of the green lino floor, of those walls, where stickers of laughing birds, weird spaceships and delicate flowers were supposed to distract from the suffocating smell of disinfectant. I’d had enough of the forced poetry, the feigned cheerfulness with which I filled the room, those smiling photos that contrasted painfully with the cries and moans that could sometimes be heard coming from the other end of the corridor. I’d had enough of all those tubes preventing me from touching my beautiful son. And I couldn’t bear the thought that Louis might never see the spring again.

  I found all these thoughts agonizing. Most of the time, I managed to keep them at bay, but the closer we were to 18 February – in other words, one month to the day from Dr Beaugrand’s grim ultimatum – the heavier my sense of dread. Louis had to wake up now. Later would be too late. The crushing coldness of his absence would gradually kill me. I would not survive the arrival of a spring without him. Spring would be my physical and emotional limit.

  Slumped in that uncomfortable hospital chair, lost in my thoughts, I’d adopted a position that, at first sight, looked like one of despair. My bowed head was cupped in my palms, and my fingers were making slow ci
rcular movements over my scalp. I gave myself a massage to stop myself from sinking into hopelessness. This was only the beginning of February. I had seventeen days left to rouse my son; I had to keep going.

  I hadn’t heard Charlotte approach and I jumped when she softly broke into my thoughts.

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘You gave me a fright . . . Yes, thank you, Charlotte, everything’s fine. Feeling a bit down, that’s all.’

  ‘I’m off duty now; would you like me to give you a ride home? I believe you live near the Saint-Martin canal – it’s on my way.’

  ‘Thank you, that’s very kind, but I don’t want to trouble you. I’ll walk – the fresh air will do me good.’

  ‘If you want fresh air, you’ll get plenty with me. I’m on a scooter. Come on, I’ll give you a lift, and I won’t take no for an answer.’

  I didn’t say yes, but I followed her out, anyway.

  I’d realized a few days earlier that I’d developed a fondness for this young woman. Unlike some of her colleagues, she had always been very considerate with Louis, extremely respectful. Whereas some of the others had no hesitation in continuing their private conversations in front of my son, as if he wasn’t there or was invisible, Charlotte spoke to him. Whereas others spoke to him as if he had learning difficulties, using honeyed tones and baby language, Charlotte described to him what she was doing, precisely and in a normal voice.

  Charlotte did a difficult job, always with a smile. There was something luminous about her fair hair and radiant complexion, a hint of sunshine in her azure gaze. She had a huge, almost fierce joie de vivre that was infectious. All five foot one of her was impressive, with her self-assurance, composure and kindness. She was brave, and never complained in front of the patients or their families. I had started to look up to her, in a way. In any case, I respected her for what she was, what she exuded, what she did. And yet she must have had her own problems too. A leaky pipe to deal with, an overdraft to pay off, a cold she couldn’t shake off, a boyfriend who wasn’t phoning back, her scooter breaking down.