The Heart of the Leopard Children

by Wilfried N'Sondé

  You’re quite right officer, life in concrete jungle didn’t really help. I never really learnt to feel my pulse beating in my arteries. I remember the boredom, the everyday mini dramas you get used to despite everything. We would meet up at the train station to hang out together. Everything is so sad and silent around us in fall and winter, and then total boredom in summertime, killing time at the local youth center just to piss off the deejay, smashing up telephone booths at night, putting out street lights with one well-calculated kick, smoking joints, and drinking cheap beer in the vacant lot or in the basement when it was raining. Idle, looking for any reason to pick a fight, insulting the petrified females going by, directing obscenities at them when they refused to talk to us.

  Of course, I had Mireille and her books; she loved our endless discussions, the magic of the words and sentences that allowed us to travel together without it costing a penny. It was a great formula for feeding our dreams that lasted weeks at a time. When she spoke, her face was always beaming. She rarely mentioned her family or talked about herself, only about the cascades of verses and stanzas and pounds of prose that she wanted to share with me, during our walks together, sitting on a bench or sometimes on the ground, hand in hand. When the words were so beautiful and the meaning so infinitely profound, we would kiss each other even with our mouths full. We had always been so close that we were convinced that we’d found each other, as we say, for life. At this point in our adolescence, Drissa had already chosen a different path. Drissa, my brother, my friend, you have to cut it out, stop hitting that girl, she loves you, leave her alone. He sleeps with her as though he were masturbating with a porno magazine in the other hand. He insults her, you’re nothing but a bitch dog, you bitch; he slaps her, kicks her in her sides. And yet she still keeps hanging on, begging him to come back to her. It’s almost like she’s herself again when she’s by his side. She snuggles up right next to him, like a frightened little animal. Be careful, brother, the spirits don’t forgive cruelty. They’re all about benevolence and teaching us how to be generous. Watch out for a heart that turns bitter-homie! Stay alert. Stay attuned. Be on the lookout for vicious winds.

  Shit, he throws his hand above his head, he’s screaming, completely tone deaf. He can only see from one eye, the other eye is fixed on the basement. You’re pissing me off with your whole bullshit about mystical signs, all that nonsense. It’s primitive Banana nonsense that has never helped anyone. Just look around you, nothing has changed! Drissa sells stolen televisions and luxury items he’s accumulated from all the robberies and drug sales. Now, I’m tttrrippping, bro; I’m a huge success, couldn’t give a shit, go back to your yuppie-upper crust university with your little White girl. Who do you think you are? And who does she think she is showing contempt for me, as if she doesn’t know me anymore, didn’t we all grow up together? She can go fuck herself! Drissa, it’s Mireille. Remember when we were kids, we were always hand in hand running around together on the vacant lot.

  Be careful, Drissa, all the cruel words you throw out to hurt other people can wind up poisoning your own blood.

  I’m making money now so I can shit on whatever I want. Please, leave me alone with all your bullshit, you’re so naïve. While he’s going on he’s groping his girlfriend under her skirt and she’s blushing. He pushes her violently to the ground and when she gets up, he grabs her crudely by the hair, get lost, you stupid bitch, hurry up. I know Carole; she’s also from the neighborhood. She’s slept with just about everybody. Her mother took off one day without leaving an address and never came back, tired of the daily beatings from her alcoholic husband. When we saw her everyday wearing her huge black sunglasses, we thought she was showing off. Some of us even called her Deneuve. Carole stayed and took care of her father who became stricken with grief and an even worse drunk. Those rare moments she had to herself she liked to spend them with Drissa whom she’d found so sweet and gentle ever since primary school when he was so cute, looking so lost, like someone who didn’t even have a clue where he lived.

  Now he beats her, hurts her, but never forgets her or leaves her. He’s her one and only love, the only reason she has to keep going. She never ever wants to be without him. Not even madness could separate Drissa from Carole. She’s filled with so much love and incredible tenderness that she radiates tremendous warmth and charm that make her irresistible. She had nothing to do with the ideal woman Drissa used to get all wet-dreamy about, but she had firmly secured her place in his life. She had a power over him that was borderline obsessive. Drissa couldn’t stand next to Carole for more than an hour without getting flooded by a violent desire for her extremely feminine body, its smells and its curves, always ready to welcome him, not to mention her face beaming with pleasure, her lips pursed. He was crazy about her body. All his attempts to humiliate and hurt her only made his love for Carole greater, something he was never ever going to admit.

  Submissive, she kneels before him. Disgusted, I take off. I’m her God, I can do whatever I want. His yelling and crazy laughter followed me all the way into the corridor. It still resonates within me to this day.

  Be patient, captain, let me put things in the right chronological order, then I can give you all the confessions you need for your report and put your conscience to rest.

  Drissa, my brother, my friend, always hanging around in these groups of rowdy young guys, impolite, vulgar, always aggressive among themselves and merciless with people they don’t know. Settling scores, gun shots, one dead, another seriously injured, handicapped for life, gang rapes, barbaric acts, drug trafficking, police beatings in the neighborhood police station, joyrides, damages rising up to tens of thousands of Euros, multiple car thefts. The local schools have become incubators for delinquents, large-scale police operations, who combine merit badges with repeated cases of police misconduct.

  You frighten everybody, Drissa, your mother, pedestrians, Mireille who used to be your friend. There are times you even dump your rage on me. You have to realize that, for us, you’ve always existed. In fact, we’d recognize you a lot better without this whole performance. We’d understand you so much more without all this freaky brouhaha you put on. All you’re doing is making trouble in the streets, the train station, the RER, your life, your love. We only get a glimpse of you, make out the sound of a distant echo, without really getting to know you. Articulate, take a deep breath, choose your words carefully, one at a time, smile like you used to.

  Drissa makes Carole sleep with other guys so that he can get a new CD player, a car radio, a little bit of hashish, insults, and beatings. Where is the deafness coming from that prevents you from realizing that you’re already an important part of this world?

  I could never truly be disgusted with Drissa or any of my friends from the neighborhood. I cherish the memories I have, the ever-present warmth of days and nights spent just being together, sharing a laugh, kicking back, and chilling. I would love to forget all that I’ve witnessed and learned and go back to the days of laughter, when there were no important decisions that had to be made, no stands that had to be taken. What if we just went over to the vacant lot and ran around till we were all out of breath like back when we were kids, or simply sat around at the entrance, sharing some cigarettes and the latest news about the football championship, talked about the new girl in the neighborhood, her chest, her face, her ass. When our lives started to change, Mireille could no longer tolerate the violence, the harshness, and the unhealthy environment, abominable in fact, into which many had fallen.

  The last time she made an appearance in the neighborhood, she got into an argument with some of the guys who just killed time hanging out on a bench not far from the supermarket. Infuriated, she compared them to a bunch of pigs wallowing in their own shit, only good for terrorizing their own people and disappointing their mothers. Real losers, who had to get stoned to avoid looking each other directly in the face. Only the most brutal anger can let you forget the mistakes you try to hide from yourself because the truth
is that they’re torturing us all the time. You see yourself drifting on the road of no guts, no glory, and you keep on going, and somewhere along the way you just give up.

  One of the guys answered her by making it clear that he doesn’t give a shit and that she can pretty much go fuck herself. Another one burst out laughing to avoid hitting her. That’s good, Mireille, not even your mother puts on airs like that. Maybe we’re not luminaries but she doesn’t seem to care. She has no problem having a good time with us, squealing like a sow the moment your racist father is out there on the road. We take her in twos, sometimes even in threes. What do you think? They crack up, doubling over with laughter, slapping the palms of their hands and high-fiving each other. No surprise that she’s friends with that asshole Drissa. He almost lost it because he thought she was totally obsessed with him, when all she really wanted was to have a little fun. At some point in this cacophony of laughter, with all the salacious comments and insults, Mireille took off, horrified and hurt, harboring thoughts about killing somebody. She didn’t even look at me, standing there, a silent coward in the shadow of the street lamp. I never ever brought up this delicate subject with her.

  Cut it out, guys. It’s not cool to talk to someone like that. Show a little respect! Empty words, pretending, when you don’t know what else to say, trying to save face, staying close to the guys without overreacting, catching up with Mireille and suffering her anger and disappointment, the fear of subjecting myself to yet another gaze of contempt and disgust. I preferred to take a walk in that moment. I regretted never having accompanied my mother to church, where she goes to pray and recharge her batteries with her sisters in sorrow. I understood this need to be purified, to feel oneself cleansed and unburden the load of each day. To go and find the courage to live joyfully in an intangible world, give yourself to God, and free yourself forever from the nausea, our loyal companion from sunrise to sunset.

  I finally understand you, ancestor. You tried and eventually your dreams disappeared with time. All that remains are images and stars from your childhood nights. The socialist lie punctured your youth. Today, Blacks from former allied nations are thrown from trains, and prostitution is commonplace in Cuba. The democratic parody of the Congo has transformed the proud leopards into faithless vultures with an alarming aggression. They are killing each other over a carrion of petrol. Eyes filled with tears no longer know how to cry before the horror they see. Sadly you keep repeating that those improbable black people we used to believe in have all now died. A horrible death. They settled that most cruelly, with a machete and a club, about one million times on the Rwandan hillsides. Black people only ever existed in the sinister holds of slave ships crossing the Atlantic. . . . Ancestor, in the state I’m in today, I understand you much better and I respect your silence.

  . . . And to ensure that I don’t advance, there are steel bars, and most importantly, an eager captain who’s obsessed with me confessing to a murder!

  It was around 5:30 PM, Pascal Froment, a civil servant in the national police force in Paris, was preparing to leave his modest home in the inner suburbs to begin the night shift. While he was putting on his jacket, his concerned young wife advised him to be careful. You could hear in her voice that she was nervous. She understood all too well how important Pascal’s job was for him. It was just that in light of recent events and the escalating hostility toward police officers, her husband’s night shift was making her increasingly anxious. She was trying her best not to annoy him with her worrying, but ever since their little girl was born, the idea of losing him or even just knowing that he might be in danger was making it difficult at times for her to sleep at night. In fact the subject kept coming up and was at the core of many of their discussions, leading to more and more heated arguments.

  Pascal had chosen his line of work out of conviction. He had a mission to help the weakest in society, an almost chivalrous vision of law enforcement, one of the few in the police force who believed in what he was doing in the face of the reigning disillusionment among his colleagues. He wanted to present a positive image of his profession, one in which it was possible to have a dialogue and show respect toward both the victims and wrongdoers. He was very much appreciated for his sense of fairness, his honesty, and his kindness. Some, on the other hand, made fun of him and criticized him for always trying to understand, when as far as they could tell, all that was needed was a show of strength and determination. It’s us against them. Pascal Froment had developed his own idea about compromise. He was always focused on keeping the peace and tried to act more like a mediator, especially between the different communities. That said, he was well aware of the fact that the police department had the reputation for being deeply racist.

  His wife was not concerned with these issues. She just wanted her husband for her and their newborn baby, rather than have him fully devote his time to these ungrateful people who were, moreover, dangerous. She reckoned that their marriage and family life shouldn’t come at such great cost, the ridiculously long hours, nights, weekends. . . . His superiors seemed to have no heart whatsoever. At least his salary should reflect the enormous sacrifices they had to make in their home life.

  Only too aware of all this, Pascal Froment did his best to stay cheerful most of the time, took the time to talk with his wife before leaving for work, showing her a lot of attention and love, reassuring her, being funny and affectionate. From the steering wheel of his new car, he would blow kisses as he drove away. He was always making her laugh, playing the drunk driver having a hard time getting out of the driveway and then he would gradually disappear.

  It was always the same scene, heavy traffic on the roads going in the other direction from Paris to the suburbs, aggressive drivers, gripped to the wheel, rushing to get back home after an interminably long workday. But for him, it was sheer freedom, the roads were wide open, empty both in front of him and behind him, which made it easy for him to concentrate calmly and prepare for his shift. He drove, relaxed, peacefully, comforted in the fact that he had a loving wife and a job he was passionate about.

  He felt a deep and sincere love for his wife. In the last six months, their marriage had been crowned with the birth of their little girl Marie. It was now ten years since he had become a police officer. He still had the same freshness, the same desire to get out onto the streets of Paris, at the wheel of his car, to track down the criminals and resolve violent conflicts. Arbitrating fights among drunkards gave him a real feeling of satisfaction of being in charge of an important mission because it was highly rewarding. It gave him a real sense of purpose. After two years of patrolling, his colleague, a few years younger than him, was already expressing his disillusionment about the profession. All of this doesn’t change anything! His frustration and consumption of alcohol were on the rise. It took a lot of effort and some serious threats from Pascal to get him to stop concealing his habit of drinking on their shift.

  Once Pascal arrived at the station, he was basically with his second family. First, he went and changed. He had a few polite exchanges in the locker room and caught up on how things had gone down from those coming in from the previous shift. One police officer was especially amazed by Pascal’s unwaveringly good mood. He responded with a huge smile. This was exactly what he was proud of. He waited around a little bit. His partner had mastered the art of being systemically late for his shift, but Pascal didn’t hold that against him. After a good fifteen minutes, he finally showed up and had to listen to a good dressing down from the police commissioner. Cranky as usual, he said a quick hello to Pascal. Once they were both ready and seated in car number 357, the security controls turned on and the beat assignment in hand, they left the grounds of the police station.

  As usual, Pascal, happy to get into action, never failed to find a reason to go on about how great the profession was. His partner kept sinking further into resentment. He was sick of all the Black and Arab pests, all these people that had to come into the world in such great numbers, just so
that they could piss off the rest of us, and worst of all everyone hates us, you would think that we were the bad guys in this crazy scenario. They had a relatively calm evening and night, mostly identity checks, conflicts between minors, a routine patrol. About half an hour toward the end of their shift, late in the evening while they were taking a break at a stop sign to get their last wind, a male individual, Black, by all appearances very intoxicated came staggering up to the patrol car and started urinating on the front of the hood. Realizing that his partner was already out of control, Pascal Froment immediately got out of the car to defuse the situation. He knew all too well how situations like these could escalate pretty fast into something truly fatal. He had better take charge of the situation and not waste a second.

  You’ll soon be going before the judge. Don’t even think you can get out of this with your bullshit African nonsense about sorcerers and God knows what. Your parents, your tragic childhood, your neighborhood, and all that crap. We’ve heard it all before and no one gives a shit! You’re getting the maximum. Delinquents like you always wind up caving in and confessing.

  Before leaving, the lady officer, even more beautiful than during the interrogation, held a towel out to me. I can finally wash up. She also managed to get me some clean clothes. I need to stay calm. She’s smiling. I plan to do exactly as she says. She has my word. I almost burst into tears when she helped me to clean away all that filth in the prison. I had one hand holding up my pants with no belt and the other scrubbing the prison floor, all under the watchful gaze and mockery of the other officers. My fairy came with a floor cloth, a bucket, and a pair of rubber gloves, as a real gesture of humanity.