Interference

by Amélie Antoine

  For better or for worse, that will never happen now. If she can’t manage to cry for me, she could at least cry about that.

  My mother and father are standing to Oriane’s left. I can’t believe it: for once in their lives, they’re not fighting. I guess they’ve managed to bury the hatchet for the duration of the funeral. Afterward they’ll go their own ways. My mother will rejoice in the thought that my father is aging poorly: he must have gained twenty-five pounds and lost half his hair since the last time she saw him. “No regrets there.” My father will shake his head as he leaves, relieved to be rid of the disdainful glances from the woman he somehow spent twenty-two years of his life with.

  For now, my father is holding my mother up as she cries conspicuously, since everyone knows nothing is worse than losing a child. I feel bad for my dad because I know he’s keeping it all inside. He’s in much more pain than my mom. I’m sure he’ll miss me more than she will. Of course, since I left Paris, my dad and I haven’t been able to regularly enjoy our favorite activities together: playing tennis and going to garage sales in his old jalopy of a car at seven in the morning because “that’s when you get the best deals, sweetie!” But he comes to visit us in Brittany regularly. He stays two or three days, sometimes a week. He doesn’t mind the drive from Nanterre—he’s always loved to drive. I know that he’ll miss all the time we spent together just the two of us, time that made our father-daughter bond so strong. He’ll miss it just as much as I will.

  I’m sorry, Dad.

  My eyes dart through the rest of the crowd. The friends Gabriel and I made as a couple. My maternal grandparents. My aunt, who’s blowing her nose at regular intervals. Gabriel’s parents, who have come to support their son. His mother keeps glancing at Gabriel, her eyes round with concern. She seems afraid he might suddenly collapse and that no one will be there to catch him. His father, who stands a head taller than most of the people gathered, looks straight ahead, as if the cypress trees at the edge of the cemetery were what he’d come to see. My cousin and her boyfriend du jour, who seem to be wondering how they should behave. My coworkers: Pablo, Mehdi, and Sébastien, who look like triplets in their strikingly similar black suits, and Elise, whom I could have done without. At least she’s not pretending to be inconsolable; she’s just staring at her patent-leather heels. My friend Florence, whom I haven’t seen since high school. Gabriel’s brothers, Grégoire and Laurent, whose eyes are not glued to their smartphone screens for once. My old college roommates, Arthur and Guillaume. We’ve managed to keep in touch since I moved to Saint-Malo, despite the two hundred fifty miles between us, because we work in the same field.

  About forty people total, in this small cemetery on the outskirts of town. A giant dark-green pine towers over my future grave. I smile; at least they found me a spot in the shade.

  And then, of course, there’s Gabriel. In the front row, next to the gaping hole in the ground. He stares at the casket with a distraught look on his face. I can tell that he hasn’t slept in days. He has dark circles under his eyes, and his beard has grown in since he hasn’t bothered to shave. He’s dressed in a black suit he usually wears to work, with yet another white shirt—also part of his uniform. He looks so handsome I want to cry. I wish I could stroke his cheek. I can almost imagine the feel of his stubble on my palm.

  Gabriel . . .

  He clears his throat and the crowd quiets down. Whispers stop. The only sound now is that of sniffling noses, their owners trying to be as discreet as possible. He’s not looking at anyone, and when he starts speaking, I know he’s talking to me and me alone. He doesn’t have any notes, and I can’t tell if he learned his speech by heart or if he’s improvising.

  Chloé, I won’t go on too long; I know that you always hated big speeches. And I’m sure you have better things to do wherever you are than to listen to my monologue. I hope that you’re somewhere you can feel the wind blowing, hear the leaves rustling, and watch the waves wash in and out. I hope you’re free. Free of all physical constraints. I hope you can fly and be everywhere at once.

  I don’t want to tell stories about you or say how much I love you, how much I’ll miss you. I don’t want to say how unfair it is that life has already taken my better half from me. You know all that. And you would roll your eyes if I got all sentimental and poetic. If I let myself go and felt sorry for myself and for you.

  I’ll survive, Chloé. Because I know that if I didn’t, your disappointment would be much greater than the grief I feel today.

  I nod. Gabriel knows me so well. He knew just what to say without making everyone get all weepy. He steps back. They’re about to lower the casket into the concrete hole.

  From the corner of my eye, I notice a dark figure approaching. He’s walking fast, forcing himself not to run, to avoid being noticed by my grieving loved ones as they reflect on Gabriel’s words. Despite his efforts, his labored breathing gives him away and curious heads begin to turn.

  Simon, embarrassed and out of breath, has made quite an entrance.

  He’s late, as usual. I hoped he would come and dreaded it at the same time. A long and ambiguous friendship, ended by a single night when things got out of hand. It was the kind of mistake I should have seen coming from miles away, the climax to months of strange tension with Simon. I had played with fire, fanned it, but I always thought I was in control, that I could put an end to it all at any moment and pretend to be an innocent young woman looking for nothing more than a friend.

  The story is so common it’s pathetic: a one-night stand that wasn’t even worth all those weeks spent secretly fantasizing about it. Barely half an hour of lust. I got dressed right afterward and fled the scene as fast as I could. Because I knew immediately that I had made a mistake—somewhere inside I had always known, but the pull of the unfamiliar and the forbidden had been overpowering. I knew that our easy friendship was about to give way to awkwardness and embarrassment because I had stepped over a line I had promised myself never to cross. I felt guilty even before I put my bra back on.

  I never saw Simon again. I pushed him out of my life without so much as an explanation. Gabriel never suspected anything, but I decided it was better not to be tempted again, not to have to come face-to-face with my mistake. I knew my husband would never have been able to forgive me for my mistake, and I felt that my unrelenting guilt was punishment enough for my stupid lapse in judgement.

  Simon whispers, “Sorry, sorry . . .” as he makes his way through the mourners around my grave. Some of them glare at him in outrage, but they all move out of his way to let him pass.

  He must think a funeral is like a rock concert: best from the front row.

  GABRIEL

  When Gabriel turns around and notices the guy wearing black skinny jeans and a plain white T-shirt and breathing heavily, he wonders if the fatigue from all his sleepless nights is playing tricks on him. He has to be hallucinating. It can’t be him. Not only did he dare to show up, but he couldn’t even be on time?

  What’s his name again?

  Simon. As if Gabriel could forget. With his black Ray-Bans dangling from his collar, all he needs is a leather jacket slung over his shoulder for people to mistake him for James Dean. The ladies’ man. The Don Juan who almost ruined his relationship.

  When Gabriel met Chloé in 2005, she had been living in a shabby two-bedroom apartment in Paris with two college friends—Arthur and Guillaume—for a couple of years. All three of them were sports science majors and shared a passion for everything fitness related. When they first started dating and Chloé would have him over for dinner at her place, Gabriel often felt left out of their conversations about training plans, progress, and performance. But she had an amazing way of answering her roommates while looking directly into Gabriel’s eyes, as if she were really talking to him, daring him to look away or blush, as if he were the only person at the table who mattered to her. In those moments Gabriel suddenly felt like he and Chloé were alone in the world. Though they could still hear her f
riends’ muffled voices, they seemed to be very far away. The way she looked at him was . . . He still can’t find the words to describe her gaze. But every time it made him want to jump out of his chair, grab Chloé by the hand, and leave the table as quickly as possible. He wanted her, of course, but it was more than that: he had an inexplicable feeling that she was made for him, and that, maybe, he was made for her too. When Chloé suggested they move in together just a few months after they met, Gabriel felt like he had won. She had chosen him, yet again.

  Chloé finished school, and they spent most of the summer looking for an affordable one-bedroom in the city. She quickly got a job at a gym; Gabriel had already been working for more than a year in a branch office of a big bank. She had just turned twenty-two and he was twenty-four.

  Chloé stayed in touch with her former roommates, running with them two or three times a week. They had a hard time replacing her, especially since they weren’t students anymore and were looking for a roommate in the same situation. Chloé had felt bad, of course, and had even offered to keep paying her part of the rent until they found someone, but the boys refused. In October, they finally found the gem of a roommate they’d been looking for. His name was Simon.

  He was athletic too, but had chosen not to make a career out of it. He was a cook in a small brasserie Gabriel’s uncle owned, and planned on eventually becoming a well-known chef. Right after Gabriel met Simon and then introduced the three, it occurred to the boys that in addition to seeming easy enough to get along with, he would probably be willing to make dinner for them every night (a terrible miscalculation on their part, of course, since Simon was usually working in the evenings).

  Chloé hit it off with Simon right away, and before long he was running with the three of them regularly. Then, as Arthur and Guillaume became less available—and enthusiastic—about exercising early in the morning before heading to their jobs, Chloé started running alone with the budding chef.

  Over the years, Chloé and Simon became close friends. Gabriel didn’t worry about any of it; there was no reason to. Simon was the kind of guy everyone liked as soon as he opened his mouth. His charm worked equally well on men and women. While he jumped from girl to girl without getting attached, Chloé and Gabriel were going strong. The perfect couple.

  And then, in early 2010, just a few months before their wedding, Simon disappeared from Chloé’s life. She started running alone during the week and sometimes met up with Arthur and Guillaume on the weekend. Simon didn’t call anymore or show up unannounced at their apartment with a good bottle of wine. After a few weeks, Gabriel asked Chloé if something had happened to him. She casually answered that he’d gotten a new job in a Michelin-starred restaurant and that he was always working. He hardly even had time to eat between the hundreds of plates he prepared during his shift!

  Gabriel didn’t ask any more questions.

  He did notice, however, that Simon immediately RSVP’d to the wedding invitation Chloé had sent, checking the “unable to attend” box for the April celebration. He also picked up on the fact that while Arthur and Guillaume still came over for dinner regularly, Simon either wasn’t invited or couldn’t make it. And Chloé never hung out at her old apartment with her former roommates anymore.

  Gabriel never asked his fiancée about it, but he knew that Simon’s total disappearance from her life could only mean one thing. They had gone too far. Once, twice, three times—it hardly mattered. And if Chloé had stopped seeing him, she must have regretted her mistake.

  He watched as she planned the wedding, which was getting closer and closer, pulling her hair out over the seating arrangements, choosing the decorations, tasting the dishes that would be served. And he noticed her looking through rental ads for an apartment or small house in Saint-Malo, where they were moving in September. She regularly remarked excitedly, “Can you believe the square footage we’re going to be able to get for what we’re paying for our one-bedroom in Paris?”

  She had agreed to move to Saint-Malo because of the ocean. But she had also agreed to it because once there, Simon would be in the past—definitively. Gabriel figured all this out without saying a single word, without starting a single argument. He decided to suffer in silence and to forgive Chloé, because he could tell that she hadn’t forgiven herself. He let her believe that he didn’t suspect a thing.

  When Gabriel casually asked his uncle about it, he confirmed that Simon had been hired as a sous-chef at a restaurant in the 12th arrondissement. “It’s thanks to me, in part. I used my connections to give him a leg up!” he explained, proud to have a few famous chefs for friends. Gabriel nodded and silently contemplated the spoon he was using to stir his black coffee, a dismal expression on his face. “Is something wrong?” his uncle asked.

  Two weeks later, when he somewhat accidentally came across the famous Michelin-starred restaurant that had hired Simon, he saw a small sign in the front window: “Wanted: Sous-chef. Experience required. Position available immediately.” As he hurried down into the closest metro stop, a smug grin briefly lit up his features.

  Gabriel pushes his memories aside. At the end of the funeral, he walks over to greet Simon. The two men shake hands, and the former lover offers the husband his condolences.

  “I was so shocked to hear what had happened . . . Chloé told me she went swimming all the time and loved the ocean. I never would have guessed that she was in the slightest danger. I still wonder how something like this could have happened, how she just drowned . . .”

  Gabriel nods. Chloé was still in touch with Simon, apparently. He keeps his mouth shut, but makes a mental note.

  People slowly start heading back to their cars, to their lives. Gabriel’s parents are the last ones to hug him.

  “I want to be alone right now, Mom. I’ll meet up with you in a bit, okay?”

  His mother agrees and strokes his cheek, giving him a supportive look.

  Gabriel is now alone in the deserted cemetery, contemplating the grave covered in flowers. His preoccupied gaze focuses on the golden letters that stand out from the dark-gray marble. Chloé Hamon. 1983–2013.

  So Simon was still in the picture. What else had his wife hidden from him? What other skeletons were destined to come out of the closet now that she was gone?

  EMMA

  I liked Edith Adelstein right away and I think the feeling was mutual. She must be used to having retirees as volunteers and think that a bit of youthful energy will be good for her association. New ideas and some initiative.

  Coping with Bereavement—CWB for those in the know—offers the bereft a chance to share their experience, their pain, and their memories in group sessions led by specially trained volunteers. Edith has agreed to move forward with my idea of helping any interested participants make a memorial album for the loved ones they’ve lost. The process of going back through all the photos, selecting the most important ones, and maybe having me enhance the chosen portraits could be a great way to help the participants get through the mourning process.

  She suggested that I be a part of the next group, which is scheduled to start in about a month and a half. The number of participants is deliberately kept quite small so that they each have a chance to express themselves and foster meaningful relationships with one another as the sessions go on. There will be five or six mourners, of all ages and from all walks of life. Edith will lead the group to keep an eye on me. That’s not how she put it, but that’s what I understood. She’s afraid I’ll put my foot in my mouth since this will be my first experience with bereavement and I haven’t had any special training. I’ll attend the group as an observer only and will work with participants who choose to create the memorial albums outside of the monthly meetings.

  The group’s first meeting is scheduled for July 8. Until then, I have plenty to do given the scope of the project for the Saint-Malo tourism office. They want pictures of every square inch of the city and want me to take advantage of every single minute of sunshine to capture the Breton
town in its best light.

  I decide to get my DSLR ready for a little excursion out on the levee. It’s not particularly nice out, but the light is perfect for photographing the breakwaters. It’s seven in the evening, and I’m hoping that the beach will be deserted this late in the day. There’s nothing more frustrating than having to wait for people to walk out of the frame of the picture you’re trying to take . . .

  My cell phone rings and the sound of “Where Is My Mind?” by the Pixies resonates through my little studio. I glance quickly at the screen: it’s my mother. Again. She has a gift for always calling at the wrong time. I answer with a sigh because this is the third time she’s tried to reach me since I got here, and she’ll worry and maybe even call the Saint-Malo police and local hospitals if I don’t pick up.

  “Hello, Emma? It’s Mom! I was starting to worry! I’ve left you several messages since Friday. You could have called me back, you know. I know you must be very busy, but I can’t imagine you couldn’t find five minutes to pick up the phone . . .”

  My mother emphasizes the “very” to make her sarcasm obvious and let me know I’ve hurt her feelings by not calling.

  “I know, Mom, I’m sorry. I had to clean the studio top to bottom as soon as I arrived, then unpack and meet with the tourism office and bereavement association, so I haven’t had a single minute to myself. I was just about to head out to take a few pictures of the beach.”

  “So, what you’re trying to say is that—as usual—I’m inconveniencing you, right?”

  “No, Mom, don’t flip out on me! You always twist everything I say. I just wanted to tell you what I’ve spent the weekend doing, that’s all . . .”

  I can feel that this is yet another conversation that’s going to turn into a list of grievances: I never call; I chose to move to the other side of the country for no reason; I never take her advice; etc. Why is everything always so hard with my mom?