by Karine Tuil
* * *
When dinner is over, he asks her to come for one last drink at his hotel bar. He has hopes of getting her up to his room. He is desperate for her now. They sit opposite each other this time and drink tequila. He looks at her and finally says what he feels. God, you turn me on, Nina. You’re incredible. But she immediately changes the subject, asks him to tell her about his wife. All right, he gets the idea. He shuts up. He doesn’t feel like bringing Ruth into it, or his kids: he’s alone and free in Paris, and he wants Nina: Come upstairs with me. This is not a suggestion or a request, it’s an order. He wants her to obey—Come—to let herself be led, Come! but she rears up at this, digs her heels in: No means no, don’t ask me again or I’ll leave and you’ll never see me again. Tell me you don’t want me, then. Tell me that and I’ll stop. They look at each other for a long moment with an intensity that rekindles old memories. Tell me, and I’ll stop.
* * *
Can’t you understand? I’m scared.
8
It is nearly eleven p.m. when she comes home, slightly tipsy, hair mussed. Samuel is awake: he is waiting for her, his face closed like a fist, standing in front of the bookcase. He looks like he’s about to fall over. A cigarette trembles in his hand. The ashtray is heaped with butts and a smell of nicotine pervades the room. Nina does not say a word. She walks over to the window and opens it. A cold wind stirs the wreaths of smoke, clears the air. “So, did he fuck you?” Samuel asks while Nina closes the window. He is brutal with her, excessive in his black/white vision of the world. For Samuel, everything has to be true/false, good/evil, right/wrong; he has never been able to hold a more sophisticated view of things. His lack of ambiguity makes her despair; it’s ridiculous, the idea that she should obey this desire for moral probity. You’re going to leave me aren’t you tell me you’re going to leave me and go back to him it’s true isn’t it admit it. Look at him: cigarette trembling between his lips, bottle of beer in his hand, his body braced for the crushing blow.
I’m a loser.
I’m a failure.
I never even gave you a child.
The fatal trilogy.
* * *
So it happened . . . you saw him again, you were impressed, you were turned on, all the old feelings came back, I get it. You know what? I arranged this because I wanted to test you, and you failed! You’re just like him—an opportunist! A social climber! The two of you are pure products of a society that’s rotten to the core. Succeed, succeed—that monstrous social ideal, that grotesque ambition. You gave in to it just like all the others! Not me . . . I’ve never been like you. I was raised by people for whom success meant nothing; people who placed faith, study, and neighborly love above all; people who were never obsessed by material objects. So what did you want me to do? Go over to the other side, with nothing but my own virtues, with the education that my parents gave me? But if you want to go over to the other side, you have to prove you are capable. It’s a rite of initiation. You have to bite back if you’re bitten, betray others if you’re betrayed, be brutal if you’ve been brutalized—it’s social, it’s political—don’t look so surprised—it’s a struggle, a combat. To go over to the other side, you need luck, power, money, or all three. You can’t wait for it to be given to you—you have to take it by force, with your head, your hands, your ass—am I shocking you? Yes, if you really want to succeed, you have to be ready to offer your ass up on a plate . . . The place you want, you have to take it from someone else. And who cares if they feel robbed, betrayed, hurt? Who cares, because you can be sure they’ll do the same thing to someone else in turn, and that someone else—you can be certain of this—will take someone else’s place through their greed for success, for power, for money. I thought I could, that I might be able to win without cheating, without lying. But that’s as unrealistic, as absurd as thinking you can butcher a man without getting your hands bloody. It’s as Utopian as thinking you can wage war without killing civilians. If you want to wage war, you have to kill . . . and you have to like it. If you want a foreign land, you have to conquer it, kill whoever it belongs to, have no qualms about wiping them out, one by one, bang bang bang! You have to eliminate them, see? But I’m one of those soldiers who never had the courage to desert nor the strength to shoot. I was never anything more than a lookout, sitting safely in the rear base, expressing my indignation at the horrors of war, whining from the comfort of my armchair. And you want me to feel proud of myself? Yeah, right—all I feel is shame. Shame! Resentment! Jealousy! Bitterness! Yes, I’ve become a jealous man, a bad man, a failure. I am the shit of society! A parasite! I’m telling you—I’m nothing!
* * *
He is lying. He does feel proud of himself. Being a loser, being perceived in that way by society, is a victory over the system, over compromised principles, over corruption. It is the proof that he has not given in to ambition and money, the assurance that he has remained a good man, a true man, faithful to the people and to social concerns—finding decent housing, a job, feeding the kids, paying your debts—not one of those champagne socialists who write newspaper columns defending the rights of illegal immigrants but send their children to the kind of exclusive private schools where you have to be nominated by someone more powerful than yourself, select establishments where, thank God, their progeny will not have to fraternize with sons of immigrants or sons of concierges who bring down the level and damage the schooling of their precocious, spoiled brats. He wants to be a magnificent loser, an obscure writer, a social failure—a pure concentrate of violence, he thinks. Contrary to what he tells Nina, he is hugely proud (arrogant, even—a feeling of superiority) of having resisted—this is the word he uses, this man who never even participated in a social struggle—whereas (so he says) Tahar has become the symbol of the worst of society’s excesses: a smooth, aseptic lawyer; while he wants to be a writer of harsh truths, even if it means never being published, never being read.
He has never obeyed social codes. Showing his disgust, he was always against. He imagined himself a free man, but in truth there was never anyone so attached to company and comfort; he imagined himself a rebel, spitting on the class system and on capitalism, whereas he was actually spitting on himself. He disqualified himself, gave himself a red card. All of his pain is self-inflicted. In which case, he has no right to cry about it, but all the same he can feel the tears now, welling up inside like a river overflowing its banks, pearling on his lower eyelids, pouring down his cheeks. Look at you, blubbering like a little kid! You’re pathetic. Let’s not forget that this was all your idea—you wanted me to call him! Nina speaks but does not move, offers no consolation, and he sinks, slowly, like a body dragged down to the depths of a murky river by the lead weights tied to his ankles.
Samir’s return has contaminated their life. They are sick now, and beginning to regret (without daring to admit it) ever having gotten in touch with him, ever having seen him again. He is so successful, so rich, and they have nothing.
“I don’t want to see him anymore. Let’s stop this now.”
“Out of the question.”
“Why are you doing this? You’ll destroy everything.”
“Maybe.”
Finally, it is stronger than her, and she throws herself at him, kisses him, weeps, shaking, but he pushes her away.
“I want a child.”
“No.”
“I want to stay here with you!”
“No.”
“I love you. I’m forty. I want a child—it’s now or never.”
“Never.”
When she hears these words, she walks to the bathroom and does not come out again until an hour later. By then, a metamorphosis has taken place: she is wearing so much makeup, she looks like a geisha—or a whore.
* * *
I’m going out.
* * *
He’s been drinking—drinking a lot—and his eyes are filled with hatred and violence as he asks Nina if she’s going back to meet Samir at his hotel. Wh
ere are you going dolled up like that, you slut? Back to see him? Not had enough, eh? He is sitting on the couch in the living room—an IKEA sofa in faded colors that he found in the business section—and he’s smoking: the ash falls onto the stained cloth and burns a hole in it. Be careful. No—he takes another drag on his cigarette. I don’t give a fuck. Bluish clouds of smoke veil his darkly lined face. Nina no longer recognizes him: Is this really the man whose child she wanted to bear only an hour earlier? She says she doesn’t need him, that she’s not afraid anymore, and as she is about to leave the apartment, she hears him shout: Going back to see your rich boyfriend? Go ahead, get the hell out of here. And that is just what she does: she gets the hell out of there.
* * *
In the suburban train, some kids1 are talking loudly. She wears headphones so she doesn’t have to hear them. Samuel calls her cell phone three or four times to find out where she is, where she’s going, Why are you doing this to me? She doesn’t answer.
* * *
She arrives at Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré, enters the hotel lobby—hello, madame—not feeling very sure of herself. In the bathroom, she stands in front of a large mirror and reapplies her makeup: gray eye shadow, crimson lips, hair loose, a little perfume, and she leaves. The scent radiates from her, impregnating the atmosphere. All eyes converge on her, as usual: men, women, children, everyone is attracted to her. Finally, she goes up to reception and asks to speak to Mr. Tahar. Just one moment, please. And the receptionist moves away from the desk, whispers a few words to a man who appears to be his boss.
He thinks I’m a whore.
He thinks I’m a whore.
He thinks I’m a whore.
She smiles. Stay calm. Wait. At last, the man comes back to the desk, dials Samir’s room number, informs him that there is a young lady downstairs wishing to speak to Mr. Tahar. Then he hands her the receiver. At the other end of the line, she hears Samir’s voice: Who’s this? (even though he knows it’s her: he was expecting her) and she says simply: “I’m here.” She hears him breathe into her ear. Finally his voice orders her: “Come up. Suite 503.”2
* * *
1. Kamel, Léon, and Dylan, sixth-graders from the collège in Sevran. On the first day of school, in response to the question, “What job would you like to do when you are older?” Kamel replied: “President of the Republic”; Léon said: “Video game designer”; and Dylan announced that he wanted to be “the most famous armed robber of all time.” Everybody laughed.
2. Suite 503 has been the venue for many adulterous liaisons—in particular an affair, which remained secret, between a famous French actress and a male French politician (whose only personal ambition was to have an affair with this actress in Suite 503).
9
Samuel calls her ten, twenty times, but she doesn’t pick up. What is she doing? What have I done? And then it comes, rising up inside him: he was mad to let her go, he’s filled with regret, calls her again, screams, MADNESS, what got into me, how could I think that I (the master of SELF-DESTRUCTION) could ever hope to hold her back, I could never keep her, I am a FUCKHEAD, an IDIOT, a piece of SHIT, that’s what I am, I deserve to DIE, I don’t deserve a girl like that, she left me, that BITCH, that WHORE, and I did everything for her, I was always there to listen, always there when she was SICK, with her all I did was SUFFER, with her I could never feel confident, could never EVOLVE, she RUINED my life, and all for what? So she can go back to HIM, that JERK
that MAGGOT
it’s too late
it’s too late
TOO LATE
you’ve lost her
How could I ever believe I could KEEP her? The only way I was ever able to POSSESS her was through threats, through COERCION, no surprise, a girl as BEAUTIFUL as that, she’s TOO good for you, TOO beautiful for you, you never did anything to HELP her, put her FIRST, help her SUCCEED.
SUCCEED
SUCCEED
What was IMPORTANT for her (you think): being known/recognized/loved/valued/seen in the papers/loved for what she represented, for her BEAUTY, you never did anything to make her HAPPY, and look at her now:
DULL
SAD
UPSET
BITTER
Wait
Hang on a minute
she
is
going
to
BETRAY YOU
She’s probably betraying you right now in fact, she’s with him, in his bed, he’s fucking her while you mope about, she is NOT coming back, she will NEVER come back because you were never in her league, you only managed to keep her because she PITIED you, because you have nothing to offer her, it’s over, it’s OVER, you’ve
LOST HER
10
“Come in.” Nina stands in front of Samir. She occupies the space and she is all he can see. Her beauty is shocking. He pulls her toward him, kisses her without a word, his eyes closed. He moves closer and breathes in her perfume, the smell of her skin, touches his face to her neck, breathing in/out, intoxicated by her, suddenly feverish, burning with the desire to undress her and see her flesh again at last, that perfect body, designed to make you gape, make you yearn, designed for love, and Samir senses that he will not be able to take the time to seduce her, to coax her from her shell, slowly soften her up, because she is here for that. There’s no need to go through that bland, pointless social phase—asking her to sit down for a chat, ordering something to drink, questioning her, asking her why and how she came. No, he has no intention of listening to her—not now anyway, there’ll be time for that later—because right now he wants to touch her, feel her, take her. This is all that matters, all that means anything to him, this intimacy that the years have kept from them, this bodily familiarity. But she’s about to say something, and he puts a finger to her lips. Shh, quiet. Come. She lets his fingers stroke her chin, her neck, the top of her breasts. “Samir, I . . .” She says his name, and it’s a liberation for him, a man living under another identity for so long. It’s a recognition. What does it awaken in him? What desire? “Say it again. Say my name. Say it.” Samir, Samir. Holding her face in his hands, smoothing her hair, he kisses her, his tongue in her mouth, and once again the feeling takes hold of him: he is filled with her, crazy for her. Slowly, he leads her toward the bed. Say my name. He undresses her and stops for a moment to look at her. He is in her thrall, and he knows it. He could try to be cunning, to not focus on her appearance, but such ruses would be in vain. Her beauty is central to everything: he can’t simply bypass it, evade it. He knows he must come to terms with this feeling of vertiginous panic that grips him when he sees her naked, and he calms down, or pretends to, watching/breathing her in until he is sure he can take her without losing control. The intensity of the instant: he is inside her, with her—it’s overwhelming—and when she lies back, her hair stuck to her face by sweat, eyes closed, half drifting into sleep, he finally gets up and orders champagne, wine, and food.