Interference

by Amélie Antoine

  This is a work of fiction. Names, characters, organizations, places, events, and incidents are either products of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously.

  Text copyright © 2015 Amélie Antoine

  Translation copyright © 2016 Maren Baudet-Lackner

  No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.

  Previously published as Fidèle au poste by Amélie Antoine in 2015 in France. Translated from French by Maren Baudet-Lackner. First published in English by AmazonCrossing in 2016.

  Published by AmazonCrossing, Seattle

  www.apub.com

  Amazon, the Amazon logo, and AmazonCrossing are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc., or its affiliates.

  ISBN-13: 9781503936171

  ISBN-10: 1503936171

  Cover design by Rex Bonomelli

  To Samuel,

  who spent many hours contemplating my face while sucking his thumb as I wrote this story.

  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER 1

  CHAPTER 2

  CHAPTER 3

  CHAPTER 4

  CHAPTER 5

  CHAPTER 6

  CHAPTER 7

  CHAPTER 8

  CHAPTER 9

  CHAPTER 10

  CHAPTER 11

  CHAPTER 12

  CHAPTER 13

  CHAPTER 14

  CHAPTER 15

  CHAPTER 16

  CHAPTER 17

  CHAPTER 18

  CHAPTER 19

  CHAPTER 20

  Not that you…

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR

  ABOUT THE TRANSLATOR

  CHAPTER 1

  MAY 16, 2013

  CHLOÉ

  Gabriel will worry, of course. He’s always worrying about me, wondering if I’m okay, hoping nothing has happened to me. He’s not an anxious kind of person, though. It’s just that I’m his whole world and he’s terrified of losing me. He puts up an aloof exterior to hide his vulnerability, a bottomless pit of anxiety that probably wasn’t there before he met me and came to care about me. I love Gabriel, and I love that he loves me. I love how he makes me feel about myself, and I love knowing that he’s nothing without me.

  Maybe I should be using the past tense? I’m not sure. I feel like I’m in the here and now, as if the future and the past don’t exist anymore. As if this moment could go on indefinitely.

  How will he feel about all this? He’ll be sad, I’m sure. Devastated, even. That’s understandable. Then he’ll be angry. I’ve rarely seen Gabriel mad. He’s such an accommodating person, so quick to forgive others their faults and so easy to get along with. But I know he’ll be angry this time. Angry with me and with himself. He’ll be mad that I let something like this happen to us. And mad that he couldn’t stop it, that he couldn’t control me and protect me from myself.

  In three months, I’ll be thirty. To think that he’ll have to cancel the surprise party he has planned . . . I guess I should say “that he must have planned.” But Gabriel is so predictable that I’m absolutely sure he’s organized a celebration in my honor. Knowing him, he’s probably already taken care of everything months in advance. He’ll have invited all our friends, my family, and my coworkers, back in January, just to make sure everyone will be available, that no one will stand me up on the day I leave my twenties behind. He’s right to plan ahead, since my birthday falls in the middle of August. He knows how often I’ve been disappointed in the past. In elementary school, my classmates were always on vacation when my parents wanted to schedule my birthday party. After a few years, we started inviting everyone to celebrate at the end of June, but it wasn’t the same for me. In middle school and high school, I learned to have my party at the end of the school year, before everyone fled Paris for the summer. So I’ve rarely blown out my candles on my actual birthday.

  He’ll have reserved a venue and hired a caterer for the buffet and a DJ for the music. He’ll have gotten everyone to go in on a group gift, something I’ll absolutely love even though it never would have occurred to me to want it in the first place. Sometimes I think he knows me better than I know myself . . .

  Maybe he’s even planned what kind of cake he’ll spend half a day making, with several layers, shiny icing, and exotic fruit decorations. Thirty candles will sit on top, rather than those lousy “3” and “0” number candles, which I would blow out in a millisecond. Thirty trick candles—the kind that relight themselves—so he can take enough pictures of me blowing them out.

  Later, he’ll choose the best picture of me—one where my eyes are open and I’m blowing out the candles with a happy yet concentrated look on my face—have it printed, and lovingly add it to our photo album.

  Or rather, that’s how it should have happened. But what good are regrets—what’s done is done. I’m not the kind of person to sit around and bemoan my fate.

  Right now, Gabriel is still in the shower. Soon he’ll grab his towel, wrap it around his hips, and take his toothbrush out of the cup on the right side of the bathroom sink. He’ll wipe away just enough steam from the mirror to catch a glimpse of his face and quickly do his hair. After stepping into a pair of crisp black pants, he’ll iron a white shirt, then put it on and button it as he heads down the stairs. He’ll check the time on his phone, realize he’s running late, throw on his suit jacket, grab his wallet and car keys, and accidentally slam the door behind himself. He’ll think about the fact that he didn’t have any breakfast and console himself with the thought of the cup of coffee he’ll have with his nine o’clock client when he gets to the bank.

  Just like every morning.

  I feel like I can predict all of Gabriel’s actions, both because they hardly ever change and because after eight years of living together—three of which as a married couple—I know everything about him. Though I can hardly believe it, I almost miss all his little habits now, the same ones that used to seem so boring and even obnoxious.

  I can already imagine the hurt face he’ll make when he finds out. The way he’ll retreat into himself, how he’ll want to be left alone. I feel for him, but at the same time, life is full of challenges. I believe in Gabriel enough to be sure he’ll get through what’s about to happen. If there’s a man on earth who can, it’s him.

  I vacantly twirl my wedding ring around my finger with my thumb and notice the thin line of white skin beneath the band. I love how it contrasts with the rest of my hand, which gets plenty of sun. And then I realize that from this moment forward, I’m no longer running the show.

  GABRIEL

  The front door slams behind him and he heads quickly toward the car. He sits down behind the wheel and turns on the radio out of habit. Late yet again. He’s never been a morning person. When he was little, his mother had to shake him awake four or five times before he would deign to get out of bed for school. He would try to cover his head with his pillow to drown her out, but in the end she would always drag him out from under the covers and open the blinds all the way, so he had no choice but to get up, with his bed head and heavy eyelids.

  His mother was neither gentle nor patient. She was, however, efficient and organized. In her defense, taking care of three children with a husband who was away much too often had to have been beyond exhausting. She coped by implementing military-style schedules for weekday mornings, with exact times for each person’s turn in the bathroom and endless lists of chores they all had to do.

  Despite all that, at thirty-one, Gabriel is almost always late for work. Well, not exactly late—he cuts it close. If he has a meeting with a client at 9:15, he gets in at 9:14. That’s early in somebo
dy’s book.

  So, yes, he’s in a rush every morning. As soon as he turns off the beeping alarm clock on his nightstand, he falls back asleep. He always thinks he’s going to let himself wake up nice and slowly. But in the end, he always falls back into a deep sleep before starting awake again at the time when he should already be out the door. He jumps out of bed, makes a mad dash for the shower, perfunctorily irons his shirt, rushes downstairs, grabs the bare minimum (car keys, wallet, phone), and leaves. And yet, he’s not the least bit stressed—if he were, he’d handle things differently. He simply prefers to enjoy his bed as long as possible, even if that means he has to hurry later.

  Chloé was already gone when he’d finally gotten up that morning. She had planned to go for a swim before starting her day. When she works ten to seven, she always swims early in the morning. Depending on the time of year, of course. And the tide schedule. She got into that habit when they moved to Saint-Malo three years ago, just after they got married. He knows that if it weren’t for the ocean, Chloé never would have agreed to leave Paris for Brittany. Of course, they left because the bank had offered Gabriel a position he couldn’t refuse, and because he’d been dying to move back to his hometown for years. He knows it was a sacrifice for her to leave her friends, find a new job as a trainer in a gym, and—most of all—give up the big, bustling city, where there’s always something to do. He knows all that.

  She loves swimming in the waves.

  He’d tried going with her at first, but he gave up before long, especially since she prefers to go in the morning when he would rather enjoy those last minutes of sleep. Besides, he tells himself, she likes going alone; that’s part of the appeal. Swimming alone, without a single person around, with nothing but the waves and the sounds of her breath. It’s her quiet time before facing all her clients at the gym, waiting in orderly lines for their cardio or step classes. And he respects her need for solitude. He’s always liked—and even admired—her independence. Her self-confidence. He feels like she can handle anything, with or without him. Like she’s with him by choice and not out of obligation.

  It’s 9:02 a.m. when Gabriel arrives at the bank. His first client had called his secretary to cancel his appointment, so he has half an hour of freedom to enjoy his coffee and go through his inbox. He texts Chloé to make sure they’re still meeting downtown at one o’clock for a quick lunch. They’d talked about it last night, but sometimes she’s surprised with last-minute changes to her schedule when she gets to work at ten.

  The morning goes by quickly. From nine thirty on, he has back-to-back appointments with clients and hardly has a minute to check the time. He loves his job. When people ask what he does for a living, Chloé always says he’s a banker, but he doesn’t much care for the image the term conjures up of a bald, paunchy old man sitting behind an imposing wooden desk enjoying a cigar. He refers to himself as a “financial advisor.” After all, that’s what he does. He advises wealthy clients on their investments, from life insurance plans to high-yield savings accounts and stocks. His clients’ considerable assets afford him more room to maneuver and better options than he had with his middle-class clients in Paris. He can suggest a wide range of investments with higher yields, as long as they’re willing to accept a bit of risk.

  Yet Gabriel is nothing like the traders who get high on risk and are addicted to the adrenaline rush they get every time the market jumps. The thing that has always motivated him, ever since he started his job, is the chance to help his clients manage their savings by finding the investments that will earn them the most money. He likes spending his days developing relationships built on trust. His goal is also to get the people he meets—the little old lady who doesn’t know a thing about numbers, the family man who’s worried about the future, and the golden boy who’s never had to lift a finger and thinks money falls from the sky—to like him, to trust him with their savings so that he can make the most of them. For his clients, of course.

  He makes it a point of honor to explain the risks they’re running and what they can hope to gain as honestly as possible. He keeps them up to date concerning changes in their accounts and never hesitates to suggest a more attractive investment. He also likes the math behind it all and the resulting predictability of his job. He likes numbers, graphs, calculations, and projections. He finds them reassuring, especially compared with human reactions, which can be so unexpected. Numbers are never irrational. They never act unpredictably—unlike the people who walk into his office.

  He can still remember the old man—he was about eighty—who suddenly decided to close all his accounts because his son-in-law had told him he’d found much more profitable investments for him. Gabriel tried to reason with him, to explain that the investments he was considering, though more lucrative, were also much riskier, and to suggest that given his age, putting his savings on the line might not be the best strategy. The man refused to listen and transferred every last cent. Gabriel wasn’t surprised when he learned a few months later that his former client had lost more than half his savings.

  At noon, Gabriel realizes he still hasn’t heard back from Chloé, despite the fact that she must have arrived at the gym two hours earlier. Between appointments, he sends another text: a simple question mark to remind her to answer him about lunch. No need for words; she’ll understand. Gabriel believes in minimalism when it comes to texting.

  At a quarter to one, he can’t decide whether to head downtown to wait for Chloé or—since he still hasn’t heard back—stay at the office and order in sushi. He dials her number. It rings several times. “You’ve reached Chloé. Leave me a message!” Gabriel sighs and hangs up, then changes his mind. He taps “Call” on the touch screen a second time and listens to it ring. Her message starts playing again. After the beep, he clears his throat. He hates talking to machines.

  “Hey, Chloé, it’s me. I guess you forgot about lunch, or maybe I misunderstood? Just wanted to let you know I’m gonna eat at the office, okay? Call me back when you get this. Talk to you later.”

  Gabriel is neither upset nor angry. He’s used to Chloé forgetting about their little dates and not taking the time to reply to his messages. She’s somewhat disorganized and scatterbrained, so he doesn’t take it personally. He knows that when she finally calls him back, she’ll apologize—sincerely—for the mix-up and have so many things to tell him that he’ll forget all about their missed lunch. She’ll say, “Oh no, I totally forgot! I’m so, so, so sorry. You forgive me, though, right?” He can almost hear the distress in her voice. There’s no way he could be upset with her; Chloé’s like a tornado racing across the plains at top speed, a force of nature nothing can stop. He’s happy to try and keep up with her unbridled pace, her desires and whims. He’s always found her energy inspiring, exciting even. She never has time to slow down, and is always saying that she doesn’t know how a single lifetime will be enough to accomplish everything she wants to do. Their close friends and family think that Gabriel is finally getting her to let up, but he knows all too well that Chloé is just catching her breath and restoring her energy in the safe space created by her calm, reliable husband. They balance each other out: Chloé keeps Gabriel from getting bored, and he keeps her from burning out.

  He absentmindedly orders some sushi online and steps out onto the sidewalk for some fresh air while he waits for the delivery guy. He didn’t have time for breakfast this morning, and he’s starting to get really hungry.

  EMMA

  “Could you tilt your head a bit more to the left, please? Yes, just like that, on his shoulder! Look straight ahead, not at the camera, okay?”

  The young bride rests her head on her husband’s shoulder and tries to look angelic—probably like a model she must have seen in some women’s magazine. She actually looks kind of constipated, with a stiff smile she’s trying to pass off as natural.

  I don’t say anything, but I’m about to implode. We’ve been taking these corny couples pictures for two hours now: wife looking lov
ingly at husband; wife innocently standing with her back against a tree while husband leans his arm against the trunk in a protective and dominating stance; husband sitting on a bench with wife lying down, her head on his lap as he gazes affectionately into her eyes; etc., etc.

  Honestly, what could be more clichéd? Why do couples always insist on such sappy poses? When I try to suggest a more unique approach, they refuse. The future bride always says, “Couldn’t we take some more romantic pictures?” She purrs “romantic,” but I hear “corny.” I suggest working with an atypical setting, like a café or a train station, but the groom steers us back to the ramparts and parks “for a natural touch.” I bring up funny poses and they say, “No, that doesn’t really suit our personality . . .”

  And this despite the fact that I only put pictures I’m at least a little proud of up on my website. The photos you don’t see everywhere—unique, unusual shots. Guests running after the groom as he flees the scene. The couple in their wedding-day finest doing their grocery shopping, hailing a cab, taking the metro, or riding a Ferris wheel or roller coaster. The father of the bride’s sweaty palms and rapid breathing as he walks his daughter to the altar. The best man and maid of honor practicing their speeches in a corner. Guests touching up their makeup in the restroom during the reception.

  But none of that works. When people call to hire me, they inevitably check to make sure I also take “more, um, traditional pictures.” Then they soften the blow: “Your work is beautiful, but we’re looking for something classic . . .”

  To sum things up, taking wedding pictures drives me nuts. Sure, it pays the bills, but sometimes I think that being a cleaning lady would be less monotonous. They all want the same pictures. They don’t even know the word “creativity.” For them, I’m not an artist; I’m a walking photo booth.

  To think that the season has just started and that I’ll be doing this till the end of September at least. All my Saturdays have been reserved for months. I know I shouldn’t complain. It pays pretty well and doesn’t require a lot of deep thought. Plus, I’m so used to shooting the same pictures over and over that it doesn’t take me long to touch them up. But, man, does it bug me . . . I have nothing but disdain for all the honeys, sweethearts, babies, my loves, sweetie pies, baby dolls, sugars, pumpkins, lambs, sweet peas, Prince Charmings, and princesses. I just can’t take any more “I do’s,” first dances, and flower-covered layer cakes. It’s almost enough to put me off love altogether.