Vernon Subutex Three

by Virginie Despentes

  Olga has had several different phases with the group – during the first months she threw herself into building work with a passion that was astonishing, and a little worrying when she was heard getting up in the middle of the night to saw timber. She was drinking less, she had become an enthusiastic woodcutter, with plump cheeks that made her look so young she was barely recognisable. She continued to put on weight. Although she worked constantly, tirelessly, she regularly holed up in the storeroom digging into the stock of crisps. And a lot of convergents remember to leave her some crisps.

  Then, though there was no radical change, all this joy and optimism began to wear her out. She started yelling that she wanted better-quality crisps, and more beer. And fights. That she was sick and tired of all this living in harmony. That she was bored. She put down her hammer, her nails and her tools and was never again seen trying to build anything. “It does my head in, this redemption shit, I think it makes people dumber.” But she has never thought of leaving the camp. And no-one wants her to leave. Olga fulfils a crucial role: without her, who would throw out the hangers-on? While she may lack authority with dogs, with humans she never misses an opportunity to win respect.

  The end of every convergence is like the end of a house party: there are always two or three people who don’t want to go home, and you don’t know what to do with them, because you need to clear the place up and go to bed. Olga has an innate talent for getting them to leave. She doesn’t raise her voice. She doesn’t use her fists. Once she has decided that it’s time for them to pack their bags, she always succeeds in her goal. She is a one-woman crowd control unit. She is so unpredictable that she invariably destabilises the audience, especially as she expounds her theories with an implacable seriousness. She can outflank Xavier in his right-wing extremism, or explain to the young female anarchists who complain that dancing is not the answer that they’re right, that all pregnant women should have ultrasounds to detect and abort male embryos. Fewer men, fewer wars. To her, it seems blindingly obvious. She’d like to know why no society has ever tried it. As long as women agree to carry male babies, humanity will be trapped in a disgusting quagmire. Olga is convinced that this is the solution.

  Needless to say, people quickly stop arguing with her. She manages to get inside their heads, almost by force. She also lays into those who show up expecting extraterrestrials, she is categorical: no alien intelligence will ever attempt to contact people. Human language is too rudimentary. They’ll communicate with dolphins, with dogs, with eagles. But not with humans. Who’d want to deal with such a species? Olga’s political fictions are always so extreme, so absurd that they defy common sense. This makes her the only person capable of managing Pamela. Left to her own devices, the poisonous brunette would spend all day wearing a toga and burning sage – she has a problematic relationship with hippy customs that she has rechristened “pagan rites”. Olga channels her energy. She demands so much attention that dancing beneath the full moon has to be postponed. So, although she now refuses to build stools at every opportunity, doesn’t look after the dogs, takes no part in any other chore, she still earns her place at the camp. Without her, they would already be overrun by a horde of undesirables.

  *

  Olga comes over and calms the dogs. Véro scowls – “Can you lock them up somewhere? I was bitten on the face by a spaniel a few years ago, I’ve got a complete phobia about dogs” – and the giant sighs, already exasperated. “By a spaniel? It couldn’t happen to anyone but you.” Vernon clarifies the situation: “This is Véro, Charles’ other half.” “His wife. We were married.” Olga instantly pounces on the past tense, “So you’re separated?” and Véro retorts, “He’s dead.”

  The giant is drained of every atom of strength. All that remains is her carcass and that fixed stare. Her shoulders have slumped. Vernon hunkers down and strokes the dogs one by one. He knows that Olga is going to cry. She’s easily moved to tears. When it happens, it’s heartbreaking. It’s always strange to see a brute crumple. Véro moves away a little, disconcerted by the dogs and the sudden display of emotion she finds disagreeable. Olga grabs Vernon’s arm and asks him what happened. He tells her. But he does not mention the money. He decides it would be better to wait until dinner, when everyone will be gathered around the table.

  The old man worshipped Olga. He always showed up with a bottle of pastis, to make the “electric coffee” she loves. He used to say that he got the recipe from a rock dandy he used to hang out with in the ’90s at Café La Fontaine near Bastille. This heady brew would put them into an unspeakable state and they would throw up all over the camp with the glorious energy of confirmed alcoholics.

  *

  Sélim runs across the courtyard towards them, pretending to be an aeroplane. It is a curious sight, a middle-aged man running with his arms outstretched, knees slightly bent, in what is probably supposed to be an impression of a footballer who’s just scored a goal, and when he reaches them, he runs on the spot, wildly kicking his legs backwards in a version of the skank that looks clumsy and potentially dangerous.

  Usually, Sélim is rather solemn. In recent months, his daughter Aïcha has gone into hiding, no-one knows where, no-one really knows for how long, and although he regularly hears from her and knows that she is fine, he is eaten up with worry. But, as it happens, he spoke to her on the phone just last night. This he tells them as he loops-the-loop around the trio; better still, she seemed in good form.

  Sélim rarely talks about Aïcha. It is the Hyena who is taking care of hiding the girl. And, when it comes to secrecy, no-one can accuse the Hyena of doing things by half. She has imposed a strict veto on all online communication, including the idea of setting up a blog and communicating via the comments section.

  According to her, only choirboys, noobs, virgins and morons imagine that it’s possible to exchange messages without being tracked. Sélim proposes using the darknet and gets a tirade: “And how are you going to explain why you’ve got Tor on your computer when the police raid the place? Jesus, you only have to use Linux for them to think you’re hiding something . . . Leave the girl in peace. She’s fine. Stop worrying.”

  Vernon was surprised that the Hyena decided to live with them. It was her idea to completely cut herself off from the online world. To give up her phone, her mobile – anything that could be traced. No-one realised how important it would turn out to be.

  When the school holidays roll around, Sélim shows up at the camp, dragging a twenty-kilo suitcase stuffed with books, photocopies and magazines. He sets himself up in a corner he calls his study and after that no-one hears a word out of him, but he’s happy to be there. He has the disturbing ability to sink into his work the way other people sink into the bottom of a bottle. But today he is euphoric. So he is doing this weird dance and focusing so hard on not falling over that he doesn’t immediately realise that Olga is crying her eyes out while Véro is sulking because the dogs are still there. So, Vernon blurts out, “Charles is dead.” Then he introduces Véro, and gets the distinct impression she has the hots for Sélim. He is beginning to realise that this woman is as randy as a cat.

  All of Sélim’s joy has slipped away. He feels sheepish for playing the fool. To each new person they encounter who asks if things went well in Paris, Vernon repeats: “Charles died a few days ago, this is Véro, you know, his other half.” Vernon announces the news to Antoine who’s listening to Tupac, sitting in a car that recently broke down but whose radio still works. He tells Sylvie as she is hanging out the washing – every time she comes to the camp, she feels the need to do motherly things, when she’s not cooking, she’s cleaning something or other . . . It’s best not to get too close to her, otherwise she will collar you and set you to work. She has a knotted red bandana in her hair, she is wearing no make-up. When she hears the news, she throws her head back, the gesture is histrionic, exaggerated. But sincere. The old man worshipped her. She is the first to put her arms around Véro and say, I’m so sorry. Then he has to give
the news to Xavier: “Fuck. Not Charles, no! God, we’ll miss him . . . He wasn’t even all that old . . .” It is this kind of remark, Vernon thinks, that reminds you that you’re not as young as you were.

  By the time they get to the farmyard, Pamela has already heard the news. She stands for a moment, motionless, but when Sylvie comes back from the store – the building where they pile up all the things the convergents give them when they leave – cradling a couple of bottles of fine wine, she gets up and wanders off. Vernon follows. Behind him, he hears others uncorking bottles and drinking to the health of old Charles.

  Pamela is sitting cross-legged on the mattress in her room. She is listening to “The Hanging Garden” by The Cure and eating thick white prawn crackers. Her chin is covered in crumbs and Vernon instinctively wipes them away. She is not crying. “What about the tooth?” she asks. “Are you fixed?” He sits down next to her and recounts the visit to Paris, the tree uprooted in parc des Buttes-Chaumont, Kiko and his champagne, the people in the city he found most depressing. Then, in a neutral tone, she says, “So, the widow wanted to meet us?” Vernon turns his head towards her, moving only his neck, and hears a few vertebrae crack, as though he has started to rust. “Charles was a millionaire. He won the lottery. He left us half his cash. Well, assuming the widow is prepared to part with it. I’m not really sure what I think about the situation.” Pamela carries on chewing, not taking her eyes off him.

  “The lottery? And he never told us?”

  “I don’t think he ever told anyone. A million, maybe two, I’m not sure.”

  “And that’s why you’ve brought the widow back here? You were afraid that otherwise she’d do a runner with the cash?”

  “No. She was the one who insisted on coming.”

  “But it’s in his will that he wants to leave us half the money?”

  “He left a letter. Just a letter.”

  “That bitch. She’ll never give us our share. You were right not to let her out of your sight.”

  Pamela leans towards Vernon, slides her hand along his neck and strokes the nape with her fingertips, a gentle pressure, then she kisses him on the temple and he has time to notice her scent, she smells a little like grilled almonds, she whispers into his ear: “Charles wouldn’t like to see you with that face. Have you told the others?” “I’m heading there now.” “Are you sad?” “He was a friend.”

  He does not say what he is thinking. He is thinking that no-one is solid. Nothing. No group. That it is the hardest thing to learn. That we are tenants of a situation, not landlords.

  ON DEPARTURE DAYS, STÉPHANIE IS ALWAYS STRESSED. She knows that everything will be fine, that there’s no reason to worry. But she is plagued by an invisible force that makes the most absurd ideas seem entirely plausible. She no longer wants to go on holiday, she was wrong to agree to this plan of going away with friends, she finds the prospect of leaving her apartment overwhelming, she’s not ready, she has to pack the cases, print the tickets, her whole life seems to her to be a huge catastrophe, she has to make a superhuman effort to get a grip on herself and remember that no, suicide is not the only solution. You don’t kill yourself just because you’ve planned to spend a few days in Barcelona. Even if it does mean catching a plane and remembering not to forget the kid’s passport, you don’t top yourself because of a weekend away.

  In the kitchen, laundry is spinning. The frozen beans are simmering while a brief alarm, five shrill notes, reminds her it is time to take them off the stove. It is hot, and not a breath of wind comes through the open windows, she is stifling. The list of things she has to do before she leaves grows longer and, despite her rational sense, she is consumed by panic.

  If it weren’t for Lucas, she would cancel. She’d send a text message: “Got a vicious dose of diarrhoea can’t be away from the toilet sorry”. Anyone would understand that with a serious dose of the shits you can’t go anywhere. She would feel so relieved to be able to weasel out. The tickets were ridiculously cheap, she doesn’t care about wasting them. But it’s a really big deal to Lucas. Disappointing her son is not the worst thing – it’s hardly likely to be his last disappointment in life, he might as well get used to them early on – but she’s worried that his father might make trouble. And when it comes to reprisals, Max is capable of the worst.

  *

  As she was buying the tickets, the voice of reason warned her – careful, you’re always doing this, you launch yourself into things that are easy for other people but difficult for you – but she didn’t listen. Stéphanie is bipolar. She made the diagnosis herself using the internet. During a manic phase, she is incapable of looking out for the person she will be in her other phase: a woman consumed with fear.

  *

  There were four girls in a small two-room apartment – ceiling roses, a small fireplace in the living room, polished parquet floor and a balcony blooming with geraniums overlooking the slate rooftops. They had chugged white wine, dug out the karaoke machine and they were singing “Papa Don’t Preach”, one of their girls’ night classics. Stéphanie had grabbed the mic for “Bitch Better Have My Money”, she loves karaoke. Then the neighbour had buzzed the intercom to ask them to dial it down. He claimed he had knocked at the door but they hadn’t heard. The evening was fucked.

  *

  Pénélope had just had surgery after doctors discovered her fallopian tubes were full of polyps. She had gone in for a routine examination, she and her fiancé Patrice wanted to start trying for a baby. She had three little holes in her belly where they had inserted the endoscopes. Grey sweatpants, purple cashmere top, she pinned up her hair, slipped on a coat and, despite the distance and the fact that she didn’t have a red cent, she caught a taxi to go and meet up with them, she couldn’t stay cooped up in her place a minute longer. Ever since they had met at the Bussang convergence, these evenings had become a ritual for the four.

  The girls met up every Wednesday night. Pénélope, having had her operation three days earlier, drank several beers, each time announcing, “This one’s the last.” She was anxious. She needed to talk. She was afraid that she wouldn’t be able to get pregnant. “Patrice better have commando sperm, because getting as far as the eggs is an obstacle course, my tubes are a bloody maze.”

  Stéphanie found it difficult to work out exactly what the doctors had said to her, since Pénélope changed her story several times during the evening. Marie-Ange and Sylvie reassured her – given her age and all the modern technology they have these days, there was bound to be a way to help the little spermatozoids to reach their target. Stéphanie was honest: “And if you can’t get pregnant, well, you need to remember that you don’t have to be a mummy to be happy in life . . . it’s not all fun and games, let me tell you.”

  Stéphanie loves her son. He is full of the joys of life, he has lots of friends, he tries his best at school. He’s a filthy little pig, but aside from that he’s a good kid, she’s lucky. Even so, if she had her time over again, she wouldn’t have a child. When you weigh up what it’s cost her against what it’s brought her it’s simple. As a single woman, paying the bills every month was tough – add a kid to the equation and it’s a disaster. Ever since he hit his teens, she’s been a robot that says no. No to a tablet, no to a smartphone, no to tickets to see Maître Gims, no to the official Barça shirt . . . He treats her like a money tree. She sees friends who don’t have children living amazing lives. Long lie-ins, going out whenever you feel like it, if you want to spend all day lying on the sofa in your socks, munching Haribo Strawberry Softies and binge-watching “Gilmore Girls”, it’s nobody’s business but yours . . . When you’ve got a kid, you spend your days peeling vegetables only for him to tell you that he hates them, tidying up after him, making sure he does his homework, going to see his teachers, washing and ironing his clothes, taking him to football practice . . . Lucas is fourteen. He can empty the fridge in a day. He’s constantly hungry. What can you do? He is growing so fast that it costs her a fortune in shoes. She
can’t complain when they’re too tight, even though they’re still wearable. The kid is growing in every direction. Since he hit puberty, she can’t tell what he’ll look like when he shows up for breakfast. One day, it’s his nose that grows – bam – he used to have a cherubic little face and suddenly he’s Quasimodo, another day, it’s acne . . . What are you supposed to do? You survey the disaster, the suppurating pustules, you break open the piggybank and take him to the dermatologist and when she prescribes creams that are more expensive than La Prairie anti-ageing serum, you fork out. Then you have the orthodontist telling you your kid’s teeth are growing crooked and he needs braces. The things cost a bloody fortune, but all the kids have them. You can hardly leave him with his teeth in that state just because you need to replace the old washing machine that stalls at the spin cycle. Then he needs glasses. You haggle over the frames, but in the end, you can’t let your kid be ridiculed by the whole class for wearing cheap, nasty glasses, so you fork out . . . Meanwhile, you haven’t had a new pair of shoes since 1997. But anyway, you call up the bank and ask for a loan. Doesn’t matter whether you’ve got the means or not, the bill is the same. Recently, it’s his voice that has been changing. When he phones her, she doesn’t recognise him. When he talks she has to stop herself from giggling. Jesus – they don’t call it the awkward age for nothing.

  She works at a rehab centre where people are remanded by the courts. When someone is caught with drugs and the judge orders mandatory rehab, they wind up in her office. She sees all sorts, from the posh boy who’s been caught snorting a line to a cocksure dealer who managed to get his charges knocked down to simple possession. But no, she can never spend an extra two hours at the office if there’s an emergency, and no, she doesn’t have time to have dinner with the therapeutic team, and no, she can’t apply for an administrative role that would mean she had to travel, or work overtime. No-one has ever thought of her when it comes to promotion. Single mother, everyone knows what that means. Unless you live next door to your parents and you can dump your kid on them all the time. Which is not the case with her. From the day she became a mother, it was settled – no promotion. When she talks about this, there’s always some mother insisting, not at all, it’s just a question of getting yourself organised. This is bullshit. Stéphanie is super-organised. But a kid is a good twenty hours’ extra work a week, work you can’t wriggle out of. And she can’t imagine being so organised she has no time to sleep.