The Awakening

by Allen Johnson

“I do not hear you. Speak up.”

  “I am forty-five.”

  “Yes. You are forty-five. And you have made this sweet child your mistress.”

  “She’s of age.”

  The specter roared: “Shut up, maggot!”

  Anthony cowered into his chair.

  “I think I prefer your silence. Whenever you speak, it hurts my ears. No, I am bored with you. We will pay Monique a visit instead.”

  The journey in time began again. This time Anthony and the specter were transported in a funnel of fog to Monique’s apartment, looking down on it through an open ceiling like crows on a wire.

  The room was dimly lit. The dining table was exquisitely set with white tablecloth, long-stem candles, and salad plates centered perfectly over dinner plates.

  Monique sat morosely in the darkened room, embracing a cushion pressed to her stomach. Even in her misery, she was an extraordinary beauty. Her long blond hair was held back away from her face to accent her high cheekbones. She wore a gypsy skirt and a belted chocolate-brown blouse slit provocatively to her sternum.

  Monique looked at the wall clock. It was eleven o-clock.

  The doorbell rang.

  She waited a moment and then stood, smoothed her dress, and strode to the front door. Before she had reached the entryway, the doorbell sounded again.

  “Oh là, qui est pressé maintenant? Who’s in a hurry now?” she said to herself.

  Monique opened the door. Anthony Rossi was leaning against the door jam, his legs crossed, and a bottle of red wine tucked under one arm. In his dark navy suit and solid silver tie, he cut a handsome figure, and he knew it.

  “You are so full of yourself,” the specter said.

  The prisoner said nothing. He stared sadly at the scene, knowing what was to come.

  Anthony leaned forward, intending to kiss his mistress on the mouth.

  Monique countered by welcoming Antonio, not as a lover, but as a friend: In Parisian fashion, she offered four polite, cheek-to-cheek kisses, making the kissing sound, but never allowing her lips to touch his cheeks. Anthony despised the custom—“air kisses,” he called them; at a French cocktail party it could take ten minutes to greet a half-dozen women.

  Although unamused, Anthony ignored the rebuke for the time being. “Would you like some company, little girl?” he asked, still standing at the threshold.

  “Absolutely not,” Monique said, her warm eyes belying the disdain in her voice. She lightly swung the door closed and walked back into the apartment.

  Anthony stopped the door with his shoulder. “Well, that’s okay,” he said, “because I want your company, and what is good for me is, by definition, good for you.”

  “I know that is what you are thinking, but thinking it does not making it so,” she said, straining her English syntax.

  Monique sat on the couch and patted the cushion next to her, an invitation to Anthony to sit down beside her.

  “Look at that,” the specter said. “She should be furious, and, yet, she still welcomes you. How does that make you feel, cow dung?”

  Anthony spoke coldly. “It disgusts me.”

  “What disgusts you?”

  Anthony turned to the specter. “Her sweetness, her long-sufferance, her compliance. It all disgusts me.”

  “I see. Let me show you what disgusts me.”

  The specter took Anthony’s head in his hands and directed his face to the scene playing out below them.

  “Let’s put some light on the subject,” Anthony said, switching on a table lamp. Then, he swaggered into the kitchen, found a corkscrew, and uncorked the bottle of wine. In a moment, he returned with two goblets of Bordeaux. He sat down beside Monique, offering her a glass.

  “I offer a toast,” he said, lifting his glass. “To the most beautiful woman in the world.”

  Suddenly, Monique was angry. “Beautiful,” she said, “but not important enough for you to be here à l’heure—on time.”

  “I’m sorry, Monique; it could not be helped.”

  “Ça va pas. That’s not good enough, Anthony.”

  Anthony was surprised by this display of defiance, and he didn’t like it. He pulled on his jaw, his eyes unfocused in space. “Don’t do this, Monique.”

  His voice was menacing, the tone saying that there would be a hard price to pay if she continued.

  She ignored the warning. “Do not make what?” she questioned, translating straight from the French.

  “Do not be makING zee trouble,” he said, mocking her French accent.

  “What are you saying? Que veux-tu dire? Do not be irritated that you are three hours late and did not bother to call? Or do not be upsetting about a dinner I spent hours to prepare, a dinner that is now garbage? Or maybe you mean I should not be angry when you treat me like a 100-franc prostituée.”

  “Is that what I’m paying you?” Anthony said remotely, settling back into the couch. “Oh, that’s not right. How could I be so stupid?” He leaned forward now, with one hand on his hip, the opposite forearm across his knee, staring her down like a boxer before the opening bell. “That’s not good business. You know why, angel? You are way overpriced.”

  In a split second, Monique flung her wine glass at Anthony, the red droplets drenching his face and splattering across his suit.

  Anthony hardly moved. He slowly withdrew a handkerchief from his inside suit pocket and sopped up the wine from his face and neck. For a long moment, he considered backhanding the woman and then gave in to another thought. He examined the red-stained handkerchief in the palm of his hand and with a half twist shoved the cloth into Monique’s face like pressing an orange into a strainer.

  Monique leapt to her feet. “Fous-moi le camp!” she screamed. “Get out, you arrogant . . . !”

  Anthony rose slowly and edged toward Monique. “What’s the matter, Monique, can’t think of the right word? English vocabulary was never your strong suit, was it? Let me help you. How about ‘you arrogant bore.’ Or perhaps ‘you obnoxious brute.’ Or, for a more literary nuance, why not try ‘cretin’ or ‘prig’ or ‘swine’ or ‘ogre’ or ‘fiend’? You see, ma petite, there is a plethora of words to choose from. Oh, I’m sorry; you don’t know the word ‘plethora,’ do you?”

  “Salaud, fils de pute! You son-of-a-bitch!”

  “Oh, that will never do, angel; that’s much too crude coming from lips as lovely as yours.” Anthony grasped Monique by the shoulders.

  “Do not be touching me,” she said through her teeth.

  “Or what?” Anthony said, pulling her body into him.

  Anthony kissed her hard on the mouth, and Monique bit down on his lower lip. Anthony jerked his head back and wiped the back of his hand across his mouth, revealing a smear of blood.

  “I don’t have to see this,” Anthony said.

  “Oh, I know that, but grant an old soldier his indulgences. You have created a work of art, and now it is time to admire your masterpiece.”

  “What are you trying to prove? There is no beauty here. It is ugly.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “Yes, yes, I’m sure.”

  The specter cocked his head and stared for a moment at his begrudging student. “No,” he finally said, drawing out the word, “I am sorry, cow dung, I do not believe you. I think we need to continue.”

  Anthony glared at Monique, who stood erect, her arms trembling at her side, her eyes livid.

  “Get out,” she said again, this time in a seething whisper.

  “Sure, Angel.” With that, Anthony turned toward the door. Monique relaxed her shoulders a moment and breathed a long, uneven sigh. Then Anthony swung back again, grabbing Monique by the waist and forcing her back against the dining table. With one sweep of his arm, he cleared one-half of the table, sending plates and goblets flying and crashing to the floor. Anthony reached under her skirt and tore off her panties with a single jerk.

  Monique’s face erupted with rage. “Non, non, non!” she screamed. She pushed the heels of
her hands against Anthony’s shoulders, but he was impossible to budge. She was helplessly pinned to the dining table, a rag doll in his hands, and so she suddenly stopped struggling. Her body went limp; she was a lifeless body of meat under him.

  Monique’s strategy rattled Anthony to the core. He stopped cold.

  “You did not like that, did you?” the specter said.

  “No.”

  “And why not?”

  Anthony spoke matter-of-factly. “Because she was in control.”

  “That is right. Submission angers you, but dominance terrifies you, cow dung. You were going to rape her, but suddenly she had the upper hand. You would not have your way with a corpse; that would make Monique the victor. And we both know that you cannot bear losing—not anything. Do you remember what you did next?”

  “Yes.”

  “Good. We will both enjoy seeing it again.”

  Anthony’s hips were wedged between her legs. He propped himself up, his arms locked on either side of Monique’s shoulders. He glared silently at her, while she stared stoically at the ceiling, her chest heaving with tempered fury.

  Anthony reached across her body. Monique stiffened.

  “Relax, ma petite. I only want to season the salad.”

  He stretched farther, his face brushing her cheek. Then he had it: a crystal vinegar and oil cruet. He flicked off the stopper with his thumb and slowly, systematically, emptied the vessel over her face and down the length of her body. Monique cringed, but still lay motionless on the dining table, not even lifting her hand to wipe the oil from her eyes—eyes that were now silent pools of dark defiance.

  Anthony polished his hands on the hem of her dress and walked to the door. Then, as a mere afterthought, he said with his back to Monique, “You have forty-eight hours to get the hell out of this apartment.”

  He opened the front door and then turned for one last look. Monique lay perfectly still, her legs dangling from the end of the table. She stared blankly at the ceiling.

  The two visitors silently contemplated the long slack body.

  Finally, the specter asked: “Do you know what she is staring at?”

  “No.”

  “Follow her eyes. She is fixed on the kitchen globe light overhead. She sees the sprinkling of dead gnats at the bottom of the bowl that surrendered to the temptation of the light and ultimately gave in to the heat.”

  The picture of Monique on the kitchen table faded to black, and the two travelers were suspended in a void of black.

  “Yes,” Anthony said blankly.

  “You are the source of that heat.”

  “I don’t want to be.”

  “And, yet, you are.”

  “Can I not change?”

  “I don’t think so, at least not by your own pathetic efforts. If you are to change, it will be by the grace of someone who loves you.”

  “Who would do that for me?”

  The specter shook his head. “No, it is too soon to speak of that. It is too sacred, and you are not ready. You still have much to learn.”

  Anthony was exhausted. “What more can I learn?”

  “Look at these men.”

  A new scene sprang to life. Fifteen men and one woman sat around a long, ornate teak table. A long bank of windows overlooked Paris.

  “You know these men?” the specter asked.

  “They are my executive staff: half French, half Americans.”

  “Do you enjoy working with the French?”

  “The French don’t work; for them work is a bothersome interruption between vacations. I use them mostly as administrators—it’s what they do best.”

  “And the Americans?”

  “The Americans are my construction project managers; they know how to get the work done.”

  “There is one exception, of course: Jean-Pierre. He is a French project manager.”

  Anthony nearly snarled. “Yes.”

  “And the woman?”

  “Her name is Lucy. She is my office manager.”

  The French administrators sat like manikins in their crisp white shirts, waiting in silence for the meeting to begin. In contrast, the American project managers looked ill at ease in their ill-fitted suit jackets and cinched ties, several of the men straining at their collars. One paunchy American with unkempt hair patted a pack of cigarettes in his shirt pocket and, savoring the memory of nicotine, wished for all the world he could light up; he could not, of course.

  Anthony crossed his legs in the high-back captain’s chair at the head of the table, his back to the Tour Eiffel and the Arc de Triomphe beyond. In contrast to the president’s carefree demeanor, his staff leaned forward around the table, ready to respond to the commander’s most offhanded directive. Chief among them was the vice president, Hennessy, who was seated at the opposite end of the boardroom table with his back to the door, his eyes darting about the room.

  “You recognize the setting?” the specter asked

  “Yes, it’s my conference room—the Monday morning staff meeting.”

  “I must say you are looking particularly fresh and self-confident in your custom-made suit.”

  Anthony did not respond.

  “Tell me, cow dung, where is your agenda?”

  “I don’t use an agenda.”

  “Oh?”

  “The agenda is whatever is on my mind at the time.”

  “That must be convenient.”

  “It’s the way it is.”

  The specter shook his head at the depth of Anthony’s self-importance. “Shall we watch, cow dung?”

  “Do I have a choice?”

  The specter laughed one of his hollow laughs. “No, you do not.”

  The room was hushed, everyone’s eyes riveted to the president.

  “Good morning, gentlemen,” Anthony said.

  A chorus of morning greetings rolled out like a wave across the table.

  “I hope you had a pleasant weekend,” Anthony continued.

  The band of men waggled their heads. “Oh, yeah.” “You bet.” “Absolument.” And then there was silence, as all heads turned to the president again.

  “Good. I’m happy to hear that. It’s important to relax over the weekend, because on this Monday morning, we’ve got our work cut out for us.”

  The staff straightened up in their chairs.

  “How was your weekend?” Anthony asked, speaking to Jean-Pierre Badeau, a thirty-eight-year-old project manager with thinning brown hair and a neck that seemed a little too long for the rest of his body.

  The specter interrupted the scene. “Now, Señor Badeau is an interesting fellow, is he not?”

  “He is a French fuckup.”

  “That is harsh. True, he is a fidgety man, but he is also very kind.”

  “I don’t care about kindness. Watch him. He has a nervous stomach. Whenever he’s stressed, which is most of the time, he has the disgusting habit of leaning to his left and farting.”

  “That seems a small price to pay for a good manager.”

  “It is more than that. Hennessy hired him five years ago, and he has been a disaster from the start. He’s too nervous, too unstable. He’s in charge of the construction of a seven-story parking lot in the tenth arronndissement, and the job is a complete screw-up.”

  When the president had targeted Badeau, a collective sigh of relief wafted from the other managers. Their shoulders relaxed, a few falling back into their chairs, gently rocking away whatever anxiety remained in their craws. All eyes were now on the president’s victim. Only Lucy looked at Jean-Pierre with compassion—truly distraught that she could do nothing to protect her friend.

  Fully focused on Anthony, Badeau raised his eyebrows and pointed to himself, as if to say, “Moi?”

  Anthony tipped his head in one sweeping diagonal motion.

  Looking decidedly queasy, Badeau pressed his fingers into the side of his stomach. He tried to moisten the inside of his mouth with his tongue. “Très bien, merci,” he said softly.

&n
bsp; “I’m sorry, Badeau, I didn’t quite get that.”

  “Very nice, thank you,” Badeau repeated in English, scarcely louder.

  “Ah, ‘very nice.’”

  Badeau nodded.

  “What was ‘very nice’ about it?”

  “Pas grand-chose,” Badeau said. “Just a weekend typique.”

  “No, no, I’d really like to know. You said it was ‘very nice.’ I believe you; it must have been nice.” And then slowly, with space between each word: “Just how was it very nice?”

  Badeau’s jaw tightened. He leaned over the left side of his chair and raised his cheek; the fourteen managers pulled back and turned their heads away from Badeau; it was a false alarm, and Badeau rested back in his seat. “My wife and I went sailing on the Mediterranean.”

  “Ah, you went sailing. Splendid.” Anthony paused a beat. “Your boat is ten meters, right?”

  “Eleven meters.”

  “Ah, eleven meters. Tell me, Badeau, is it paid for?”

  “Non. Pas encore.”

  “Would you like to pay for it?”

  Silence. Badeau stared into empty space. He leaned to the left again, and the managers prepared themselves for the inevitable, to which Badeau did not disappoint.

  “I said ‘would you like to pay for it’?”

  Badeau woke up from what was a near-death trance. “Oui, bien sûr, I would like to pay for it.”

  “Of course you would. And so would I. And so would the company. It’s simple: You make money for us, and we make money for you. You see how that works now?”

  “Oui, monsieur.”

  “Don’t ‘oui-monsieur’ me. Just get the goddamn work done. Your job is three weeks over schedule, Badeau. Do you know what that is costing this company daily?”

  “I . . . eh bien, je ne sais pas; I do not know exactly.”

  “Well, I do know exactly: It’s 12,000 francs a day, and it’s killing me.” Anthony readjusted himself in his chair and then sat back and brushed imaginary dust off his pant leg. “Now, you tell me what the hell the problem is, and I don’t want to hear ‘je ne sais pas.’”

  “Non, monsieur. C’est à dire, oui, monsieur. I mean the problem is testing the tensile strength of the support pillars. We send that work out to a subcontractor. And their temps d’exécution—how do you say, their ‘turnaround time’ is slow, very slow. I have been waiting ten days for a report on the last order. And without those numbers we cannot move ahead.”