Voice Over

by Celine Curiol

  I didn’t go away on a trip. She stood up without a word, shutting the lid of the piano. That day Ange had called him just before he left the office. She had been crying, she felt he’d been distant towards her lately; she couldn’t stop thinking about it. He had tensed up in his chair, his stomach had cramped, but he had tried to reassure her. It was nothing, really; nothing at all, he had a lot of work at the moment, maybe he was a little distracted, but it was nothing to worry about. This was how he had got out of it. I told her as best as I could that I loved her, I’m not even sure that I was lying, you know. She is standing in front of the balcony window, her profile impassive, gazing out at the city. When he turned the corner into the street that led to the café where she was waiting, he was twenty minutes late. Even before he reached the entrance, he spotted her behind the window. Her eyes were glued to the door, she didn’t see him. Her head was resting on a hand with a small spoon in it. All he could see was her profile, her patient mouth, her watchful eye. He was about to cross those few yards between him and the glass door, he was going to walk in and sit down in front of her. I was going to tell you that it’s over, Ange is the one I love. But it did him no good to rehearse the scene in his mind, his feet refused to budge. Through the space between two curtains, she sees a woman sitting on a sofa, smoking pensively, a telephone positioned on her lap. She too is waiting for some poor disembodied voice to tell her that her turn has come; she too is hoping that this voice will give some illusory significance to all that has happened to her previously. On the other side of the café windows, he’d watched her slip her hands between her knees. It struck him he was observing a well-behaved child intent on pleasing an absent adult. Yes, he felt something for her, but was it enough? What was he doing there, unable to go either forwards or backwards? A man who could make decisions, that was how he had always thought of himself. But now, he never would have believed . . . He has slid down beside her, avoiding contact. Out on the street, he had thought back to his conversation with Ange, who senses everything, who misses nothing, who probably knows him better than he thinks. On no account hurt that woman, that was the principle he had to follow. And so he’d turned back from the café and retraced his steps. She recalls the stock scene of the prison visit, where two characters separated by a glass panel can’t touch and press their hands to the same place, on either side of the glass barrier. I don’t know what I should do, you understand. She doesn’t want to listen to another word, she doesn’t care about explanations that brush against reality without managing to contain it. It’s complicated, I can’t leave Ange. She has never asked him to do anything of the sort. She’s not even sure that if she were in his place she would leave Ange for herself. It makes no difference, since she is already with him in her own way. She feels the delicious weight of his hand on her shoulder. I’m not comparing the two of you. Yes you are, and deep down you think that Ange can make you happier than I can. He isn’t sure he has ever thought of the problem in those terms. It’s more a matter of what already exists, of not having the energy to start all over again, with no guarantee of reaching a better result. Our past holds us together. She can’t help letting out a sigh. True, but what a sad platitude masquerading as an escape hatch. Despite all the books he’s read, he’s the one who’s hesitating as if he hasn’t learned a thing. She feels that she knows so much more about the nature of her feelings. You’re the only one, you understand, there won’t be anybody else. She has plunged her words straight into his heart. He tightens his fingers around her arm and pulls her towards him.

  The blinds in the bedroom are drawn, the bed has not been made. He lays her down on the rumpled mounds of the duvet. To give herself up to the inevitable, without hesitation. He lifts her black dress and helps her take it off. Her legs are bare, several brown hairs are sticking out from under the edges of her panties. He takes off his shirt and trousers, lies down beside her, squeezes one of her breasts, his mouth pressed against her cheek. He is there, he wants her. She runs her hands through his hair, kisses his forehead, yet her body holds back, her insides petrified. All these weeks, and now, when all she has to do is to let herself go, this stupid resistance. She hates herself. Stop the commotion in her head, chase away the irrational anger. He isn’t the other one, he’s himself. She feels his hand move down over her stomach, his fingers slipping in under her panties to stroke her crotch. Not to think, not to think about the pink room. He finishes undressing her, there’s the sound of a packet being torn open, she feels his soft hot skin everywhere against hers. She wants him, she has to want him. His lips press against hers, his erect penis is between her legs. He penetrates her. Clasp him to her, push him off, give in to his rhythm, refuse, enjoy, scream. She grits her teeth, struggling not to struggle. He moves gently; a wave of desire rises up in her, from the bottom to the top, as though towards the surface of the sea. Follow the current, leave her brain behind on the shore, plunge, with her bones, her muscles, her flesh, her blood, deep into the other person. No longer to be millions of little selves lost in all the painful minutes of the past; to be one now, at one with oblivion and him. Long moans simultaneously escape from their bodies, one embedded in the other. A terrible weight crushes her chest; she can’t hold back her tears.

  He is stroking her hair; watching her intently with anxious eyes. She sniffles, tries to swallow whatever is stuck in her throat. She wants to shrink from shame. He is waiting for the explanation. This time, she is going to have to talk.

  He had been her favorite adult. Ever since she was a child, ever since they all used to go to the country house on weekends. He took the trouble to ask her questions; the others preferred to let her play quietly with the objects they gave her as presents every year. Perhaps she was not an easy child to talk to. She was not cute or cheeky, she possessed no particular talent likely to amuse them. But he would talk to her and, unlike the others, he would listen so as to engage only with her. At first, she had been suspicious of these attentions, which were in such contrast to those of the rest of the clan, then she had come to appreciate them, to seek them out. At meals, she did all she could to be seated next to him. When he went for a stroll in the park with his walking stick, she would skip along beside him. She adored being with him. One day, early in adolescence, she had begun to wish that the first boy who kissed her would look a little like him. After that, the thought never left her. Her first love would be a younger version of this man, since it obviously couldn’t be him because of their family ties. That was what she thought, without anyone ever having explained things to her. The others seemed unaware of the growing affection she started to feel for him. They went on making sure that she ate properly, that her bowels were regular, without worrying about where her newly pubescent heart was leading her. At a certain point, he started coming up to her bedroom, or at least that was what she supposed, since she couldn’t remember an earlier period when he didn’t come to her bedroom while she was there. He would come to the pink room, the one with the piano, when she went up there to practise her music. He would come when she had already started to play. She would turn her head without stopping, would smile at him, delighted to have an audience at last and that the audience consisted only of him. He would motion for her to keep playing and then close the door behind him. The others would be around, busy, in the kitchen, in the living room, in the garden, but never in the room with her when she was playing. Perhaps the music wasn’t to their taste or she didn’t play well enough, they had never said. He must have liked music. She enjoyed thinking that it was above all her way of playing that he liked. He would sit down on the bed. He’d say, that’s lovely, carry on, lowering his voice so that it wouldn’t disturb the bubbling notes that flowed out from under her fingers. She would put her whole self into it; she never played better than when he was there.

  The window was open that day. She could hear their indistinct chatter from the garden where they were finishing lunch. They had given her permission to leave the table, their conversations bored her.
She had gone up to the pink room, eager to feel the docile, tightly sprung keys under her fingers again. She began warming up with a series of arpeggios. He would be there soon, she was expecting him. When he came in, she had noticed red blotches on his cheeks. She assumed they were because of the wine he’d been drinking out in the sun with the others. Without knowing quite why, she blushed when their eyes met. Midway through a Beethoven waltz she had been working on for several weeks, as he was sitting on the bed as usual, she had heard the bedsprings groan. She hadn’t looked in his direction at that moment, but she knew that he had stood up. She sensed him approaching, and that set off a rush of nerves in her, which increased her fear of making a mistake. She didn’t want to stop, though, because she was sure that he wanted to look at her hands more closely, in order to appreciate her dexterity. She was proud of the interest he took in her.

  And then, she felt his lips on her neck. Her entire body quivered. She stopped at once, not daring to move. She wasn’t sure what to make of it; she had never been kissed like that before. Thrown so abruptly, so shocked, her mind struggled to regain its balance. He wanted to show his affection; it was a game. He took hold of her shoulders and made her stand up. She let him guide her, unable to grasp what he was expecting from her. When he turned her around to face him, what she saw in his shining eyes both pleased and terrified her. He told her that she was very pretty. She knew he wasn’t supposed to say that, and it frightened her. She tried to laugh in order to pretend that what was happening wasn’t happening. But instead, she only let out a brief moan, a ridiculous sound of protest. That was when she saw him place a hand on one of her small, growing breasts. She wanted to tell him that he shouldn’t do that, but she was afraid to go against him. He would laugh at her, consider that she was no longer worthy of his affections. She could have stepped back. Making a noise was out of the question, the window was open, she would have risked being noticed. What they were doing was forbidden. If the others had come in, they wouldn’t have believed her and she would have been punished. She could have left the room and escaped. Only she hadn’t. Her guts had contracted so much, she couldn’t move. She was no longer able to act on her own.

  He had guided her over to the bed and told her to lie down. The bedsprings creaked again. She had closed her eyes. Foolishly she told herself that at last she was going to find out what sex was. She had felt his hands on various parts of her body. Later, she heard him groan. Something wet ran over her belly.

  The room is dark and hushed. She realizes that she has told it all in one go, as if her voice had been the instrument of a consciousness much freer than her own. She wonders if she’ll have the strength to lift her body when the moment comes. But then again, perhaps the brother will refuse to leave the Balearic Islands and she will be allowed to remain lying on that bed for the rest of her days. People will come and care for her, like a sick patient, they will feed her and wash her, they will be far more concerned about her fate than back when she was willing to walk on her own two legs without any help. She won’t have to go anywhere, she won’t have to make any more decisions, a horizontal existence in which her eyes will always be able to rest on the same white ceiling or close whenever she chooses, without having to get ready for bed at fixed times or to twist and turn in search of a comfortable position, which she would have to abandon reluctantly on waking. When she turns her head, she is surprised not to detect in him a calm similar to her own. Tight-lipped and frowning, he studies her face, then shakes his head and pulls up the duvet to cover her nakedness, a mirror of her exploited vulnerability. He slips his boxer shorts and shirt back on then lies down beside her. She feels like telling him it doesn’t matter, that it’s all water under the bridge. His look of pained compassion is starting to worry her. Perhaps he has seen in her account something she could have missed after all these years. Or worse, he could be undergoing the same transformation that Marion went through after the confession on the school bench. And then he’d never be able to separate her from what she has just confided in him; his every look would bear the trace of what he had experienced through her words and her words alone. Forget what I said. He stares back at her as if she’s just gone beyond the limits that each person sets in order to reach an understanding of the world around him. Forget, how can anyone forget something like that? You mustn’t feel guilty. Between anger and pity, he hadn’t noticed guilt. She grabs the edge of the duvet and pushes it aside, comfortable in her nakedness. Don’t you find it strange that we have hair down here? He doesn’t seem to want to think about it. He puts his hands on her arm as if he’s about to shake her, you don’t seem to realize how perverse . . . He doesn’t finish his sentence and hugs her as tightly as he can. Let’s go away; I’ll take you somewhere. She’s not sure she follows. Somewhere? I don’t know, London, have you ever been there? She shakes her head. Well then, London it is. London. The name bounces around in her head, sparking small jets of joy. At last her turn has come. Like all the others she has seen so often getting on trains, she is the one who will be going away, with him. And not just anywhere, but abroad, to the place where she imagines the gare du Nord’s longest rails come to an end.

  They’ll leave the following weekend. When he announces it to her the next evening, there is no mistaking his change of heart. His voice is firmer, more cheerful than usual. Making up his mind to go away with her appears to have temporarily settled the matter for him, whereas previously his only response was to avoid her. Your ticket will come through the post. He arranges to meet her by the entrance to customs on Saturday morning at 8.30, half an hour before departure. Will that be OK? I don’t have a passport. He reminds her that she only needs her identity card, because of the EU. She knew about the existence of the European Union, but she hadn’t been aware of the passport thing. The free movement of goods and people, young lady; but that doesn’t mean you can forget your card. He tells her that it’s going to be good, really good, she’ll see. She gets a sudden, overwhelming urge to touch him through the receiver. See you Saturday, then.

  She didn’t dare ask him what he’s going to tell Ange to justify his absence. Probably a lie similar to the one he told her. A business trip. But Ange won’t be waiting, at least not in the way she had, because when all is said and done Ange is the one he’ll go back to. Or maybe not. She smiles to herself. There is a mirror next to her, and she sees herself in it. Not quite the same face, at least different from the one she saw that day in the toilets at the bar. A somewhat troubling discovery. Not that she finds herself more beautiful or younger, feature by feature her face hasn’t changed at all. Yet she is more herself, closer to the ideal image of who she thinks she is. She shuts her eyes, opens them again, the impression persists. She wants to say hello, as if she were meeting herself for the first time, a bit nervous but fully intent on getting to know this new version of herself in the mirror. It didn’t occur to her to ask him how long they will be gone. To play it safe, she’ll ask for four days off.

  She finds a nylon sports bag buried in a back corner of the hallway closet. With broad red and white stripes, a single zip, an adjustable strap, and tiny fluff balls of dust clinging to its edges. She doesn’t remember buying it. Or receiving it as a present. Or having put it away there, or ever having used it. It probably belonged to the previous tenant, who mislaid it or just left it there to get rid of it, too lazy or too guilty to throw it away. The presence of an abandoned bag in her apartment strikes her as an excellent omen. A bit on the small side maybe, yet without any visible defects. But if they are only going away for two days, which seems likely given the circumstances, she doesn’t need to take too much. And if by luck they were to prolong the adventure, she considers it equally sensible not to overburden herself.

  She has laid out two piles of clothes on her bed. The essentials and the optionals. Panties, bras and socks are separate. In the pile of essential items is her talismanic black dress, worn the previous day at the brother’s apartment. She looks over the two mounds, trying to im
agine herself in the streets of London wearing each outfit, like a model at an open-air fashion show. She would walk confidently, smiling as if she loved strutting about, and the delirious spectators would be applauding. She wonders if the English sulk as much as the French. She seems to remember that they have a reputation for being quite pale, because of the bad climate, that the men are blond and the women aren’t admired for any special physical traits. She decides to remove the red dress from the pile of optionals and stuffs it into a drawer. No point in carrying the memory of Maxime all the way to another country. She still has to eliminate a sweater and a pair of trousers before her travel wardrobe can fit inside the orphaned bag, which she has trouble calling her own. One hour later, the bag is ready. There was no need, of course, to get her things ready so soon. But this way she doesn’t run the risk of leaving something behind in the rush, which she would later regret having forgotten. She makes sure that her identity card is in her handbag. She puts the sports bag on the floor in the hallway so she can say to herself every evening on returning home from work, this is the proof that we’re going away. Two days later, the tickets are in her mailbox, satin-smooth, stiff, flawless. One Paris-London ticket, one London-Paris ticket. She reads everything that is printed on them, from the top left to the bottom right. There’s her name, the name of the two cities, the departure and arrival times, her carriage and seat number, the price, and all those figures whose meaning she has never understood. She counts on her fingers, happily realizing that she was right: they aren’t going away for two days but four. She carefully puts the tickets in her bag for safekeeping.