Sophie looked up at the figure in a coat standing in front of her. She gave a muffled “No.”
“Do you want to sleep over?”
When she comes home late, Mme Gervais always offers to let her stay the night, she says no and Mme Gervais pays for a taxi.
In an instant, Sophie replays the footage of her day, the evening they had spent in pained silence, the evasive looks, Léo gravely and patiently listening to the bedtime story, his mind obviously elsewhere. When he reluctantly allowed her to kiss him goodnight, she was surprised to find herself saying:
“It’s alright, poppet, it’s alright. I’m sorry . . .”
Léo gave a little nod. It was as if in that moment the adult world had burst into his little universe and he, too, was exhausted. He fell asleep straightaway.
Last night, Sophie was so exhausted that she accepted the offer to stay over.
*
She cradles the bowl of tea, now cold, in both hands, hardly noticing the tears that fall heavily on the wooden floor. She has a fleeting image of a cat nailed to a wooden door. A black and white cat. Other images bubble up. Corpses. Her past is littered with the dead.
It is time. A glance at the clock on the kitchen wall: 9.20. Without realising, she has lit another cigarette. She stubs it out nervously.
“Léo!”
The sound of her own voice makes her start. She can hear the fear in it, but she does not know where it comes from.
“Léo?”
She rushes into the boy’s room. On the bed, the rumpled blankets look like a rollercoaster. She sighs with relief, even gives a vague smile. As her fear subsides, in spite of herself she feels a surge of grateful tenderness.
She moves to the bed.
“Oh dear me, where can my little man be . . .?”
She turns around.
“Is he in here?”
She gently taps the door of the pine wardrobe, still looking at the bed out of the corner of her eye.
“He’s not in the wardrobe. Maybe in the drawers . . .”
She pulls out a drawer and pushes it home, once, twice, three times.
“Not this one . . . not that one . . . nope, not here. Where could he be?”
She walks to the door and says in a loud voice:
“Well, if he’s not in his bedroom, maybe I should go . . .”
She clacks the door shut without leaving the room, staring at the shape under the blankets. Watching for a movement. Then she feels a knot in the pit of her stomach. The shape is all wrong. She stands frozen, tears start to well again, but they are different now, these are the tears of long ago, the ones that fell, shimmering, on the bloodied body of a man slumped over a steering wheel, the tears she felt as she pressed her hands into an old woman’s back and pushed her down the stairs.
Unconsciously, she walks over to the bed and rips away the blankets.
Léo is there, but he is not asleep. He is naked, huddled, his wrists tied to his ankles, his head between his knees. In profile, his face is a disturbing colour. His pyjamas have been used to bind him. Around his throat, a shoelace is pulled so tightly that it has left a deep groove in the flesh.
She brings her hand to her mouth, but she cannot stop herself from vomiting. She lurches forward, managing at the last minute to avoid steadying herself on the child’s body, then she has no choice but to lean on the bed. And the small body rolls towards her, Léo’s head bumps against her knees. She clutches him so hard that nothing can prevent them falling on top of each other.
And now here she is, slumped on the floor, her back against the wall, hugging Léo’s cold, lifeless body to her . . . Her own screams are so wrenching they might have come from someone else. Despite the tears blurring her vision she can see the extent of the tragedy. She strokes his hair instinctively. His face, pale and mottled, is turned towards her, but his wide eyes stare out at nothing.
2
How long? She does not know. She opens her eyes again. The first thing she notices is the smell of vomit on her T-shirt.
She is still sitting on the ground, her back against the bedroom wall, staring stubbornly at the floor as though willing nothing to move, not her head, not her hands, not her thoughts. Stay here, stock still, merge into the wall. When we stop, surely everything else must stop? But the smell makes her heave. She shakes her head. An infinitesimal movement to the right, towards the door. What time is it? The same small movement, this time to the left. She can see one leg of the bed. It is like a jigsaw: a single piece is enough to reconstruct the whole picture in her mind. Keeping her head still, she moves her fingers slightly, feels a wisp of hair; she feels like a diver coming to the surface knowing the horror that awaits her, but she is instantly paralysed by a jolt of electricity: the telephone has begun to howl.
This time she does not hesitate, her head turns to the door. The ringing is coming from the nearest telephone, the one on the cherrywood table in the hall. Her eyes flicker downward and she is transfixed by the sight of the child’s body, lying on his side, his head in her lap. The scene has the stillness of a painting.
This is the tableau: a dead child lying in her lap, a telephone that refuses to stop ringing and Sophie, who is responsible for this child and for answering the telephone, slumped against the wall, her head nodding gently, breathing the stench of her own vomit. Her head is spinning, she feels another wave of dizziness, she is about to pass out. Her brain is melting, her hand helplessly reaches out like the hand of a drowning woman. It is an illusion brought on by panic, but the ringing seems to be getting louder. It is all she can hear now, it bores into her brain, overloading it, paralysing it. She stretches her hands in front of her, then out to her sides, blindly groping for some form of support. Eventually, on her right, she feels something solid, something to cling to so she will not founder. Still the ringing continues, it refuses to stop. Her hand grips the corner of the nightstand on which sits Léo’s bedside lamp. She squeezes with all her strength, and this muscular reflex briefly causes her dizziness to subside. The ringing seems to have stopped. Long seconds tick past. She holds her breath. Mentally, she counts . . . four, five, six . . . the ringing has stopped.
She slips her arm under Léo’s body. He weighs hardly anything. She manages to lay his head on the floor and, with a superhuman effort, struggles to her knees. The silence is almost palpable. She gasps and pants, like a woman giving birth. A long trail of spittle trickles from the corner of her lips. Without turning her head, she stares into space: she searches for a presence. She thinks: there is someone here, in the apartment, they have killed Léo, they are going to kill me too.
At that moment, another jolt of electricity shudders through her body, the telephone rings out again. Find something, anything, quickly. The bedside lamp. She grasps it and jerks hard. The wire snaps and she gets to her feet and shuffles across the room towards the ringing, one foot in front of the other, holding the lamp like a firebrand, like a weapon, oblivious to the absurdity of the situation. But it is impossible to detect the slightest presence above the telephone, which howls, which shrieks endlessly, a ringing that cleaves the space, mechanical, maddening. She has just reached the door to the bedroom when silence is restored. She steps forward and, suddenly, without knowing why, she is certain that there is no-one in the apartment, that she is alone.
Without thinking, without wavering, she walks to the end of the hallway, to the other rooms, holding the lamp at half-mast, the flex trailing on the ground behind her. She goes back towards the living room, into the kitchen and comes out again, opens doors, all the doors.
Alone.
She collapses on the sofa and eventually drops the bedside lamp. The vomit on her T-shirt seems fresh. She is overcome by a wave of disgust. She pulls it off and throws it to the floor, gets to her feet and walks back to the child’s bedroom. There she stands, leaning against the doorframe, staring at the tiny body, arms folded over her bare breasts, weeping softly . . . She has to call someone. It is too late, but she has to c
all someone. The police, the ambulance service, whom do you call in this sort of situation? Mme Gervais? Fear gnaws at her belly.
She wants to move, but she cannot. Jesus Christ, Sophie, what shit have you got yourself into this time? As though things weren’t bad enough. You should leave now, right now, before the telephone rings again, before his mother panics, jumps into a taxi and turns up here screaming and sobbing, before the police, the questions, the interrogations.
Sophie does not know what to do. Call someone? Leave now? She has to choose between two evils. That has been the story of her life.
At last, she stands up straight. Something inside her has come to a decision. She starts running around the apartment, dashing from room to room, sobbing, but her movements are uncoordinated, the running is futile, she hears her own voice, she is whimpering like a child. She tries to steel herself: “Focus, Sophie, take a deep breath and try to think. You need to get dressed, wash your face, pack your things. Now. You need to get out of here. Get your things, pack your bag, hurry.” She has been running in circles so long she is a little disorientated. As she passes Léo’s room, she cannot help but stop once more. What she sees first is not the boy’s lifeless, waxen face, but his neck, and the brown shoelace that snakes across the floor. She recognises it. It is one of the laces from her walking shoes.
3
There are things she no longer remembers about that day. The next thing she sees is the clock on the façade of église Sainte-Élisabeth reading 11.15 a.m.
The sun is beating down and her head is pounding fit to burst. And she is utterly shattered. The image of Léo’s body surges up once more. It feels like waking up again. She steadies herself . . . against what? Her hand is pressed against a window. A shop. The glass is cold. She feels beads of sweat trickling from her armpits. Icy cold.
What is she doing here? And where exactly is she? She tries to check the time, but she does not have her watch. Yet she was so sure . . . No, maybe not. She cannot remember. Rue du Temple. Jesus Christ, it cannot have taken her an hour and a half to get here. What did she do with all that time? Where has she been? And more importantly, where are you going now, Sophie? Did you walk here from rue Molière? Or did you take the métro?
A black hole. She knows that she is crazy. No, she just needs time, that’s all, a little time to pull herself together. She must have taken the métro, she decides. She cannot feel her body, only the sweat trickling from her armpits, an icy stream she tries to staunch, pressing her elbows tightly to her body. What is she wearing? Does she look like a madwoman? Her head is teeming, buzzing, whirling with random images. Think. Do something. But what?
She catches her reflection in the shop window and does not recognise herself. At first, she thinks it is not really her. But no, it is her, only there is something about her . . . Something about her, but what?
She looks down the street.
Keep walking, try to think. But her legs refuse to respond. Only her brain seems still to be functioning, somewhat, a whirling maelstrom of words and images she tries to calm by taking a deep breath. Her chest feels tight. As she leans against the window, she tries to collect her thoughts.
You ran away. That’s it, you were scared and you ran. When they find Léo’s body, they will come looking for you. You will be accused of . . . What do they call it? “In loco” something . . . Focus, for God’s sake.
In fact, it is very simple. You were responsible for looking after the child and someone came and killed him. Léo . . .
Right now, she has no idea what is happening to her. She needs to think, but she simply cannot. Her every thought stumbles at the same frantic notion: this cannot be happening.
She looks up. She knows this area. It is close to where she lives. There, that explains it, you ran away and you are going home.
But to go home is surely madness. In her right mind, she would never have come here. They will soon come looking for her. They may already be searching for her. She feels a fresh wave of exhaustion. A café, over there on the right. She walks inside.
She finds a table right at the back. She struggles to think clearly. First, orient herself in the space. She is sitting at the back of the café, feverishly staring at the face of an approaching waiter, she glances around, planning an exit route in case she needs to bolt. But nothing happens. The waiter does not ask any questions, he simply looks at her apathetically. She orders a coffee. The waiter trudges back to the counter.
O.K., first she needs to get her bearings.
Rue du Temple. She is . . . let’s see, three, no four métro stops from home. That’s right, four stops, Temple, République, change trains, and then . . . What’s the name of the fourth station? She gets off there every day, she has taken the same train hundreds of times. She can picture the entrance clearly, the stairs down and the metal ramps, the newspaper stand in the corner with the guy who always says “Fucking weather, eh?” . . . Shit!
The waiter brings her coffee, sets the bill down next to it: €1.10. Do I have any money with me? Her handbag is on the table in front of her. She was not even aware that she was carrying a handbag.
She is acting automatically, her mind a complete blank. That is how she came to be here, that is why she ran away. Something is stirring inside her, as though she were two people. I am two. One quivering with fear in front of a cup of coffee slowly getting cold and the other who walked here, clutching her handbag, forgetting her watch, blithely heading home as though nothing had happened.
She puts her head in her hands and feels tears running down her cheeks. The waiter looks at her as he polishes glasses, pretending to look blasé. I’m insane, and everyone can see it. I have to leave. I have to get up and leave.
She feels a sudden rush of adrenalin: if I am crazy, then maybe these images in my head are made up. Maybe this is simply a waking nightmare. One she is only now shaking off. That’s it, just a nightmare. She dreamed that she killed the child. This morning, why did she panic and run? I was frightened by my own dream, that’s all.
Bonne-Nouvelle! That’s the name of the métro station, Bonne-Nouvelle. But there is another that comes before. This time she has no problem remembering: Strasbourg-Saint-Denis.
Her stop is Bonne-Nouvelle. She is sure of that, she can picture it.
The waiter is staring at her oddly. She is laughing. She was sobbing and suddenly she burst out laughing.
Is any of this real? She needs to know. To be clear in her own mind. She could telephone. Today is . . . Friday. Léo is not at school. He is at home. Léo must be at home.
Alone.
I ran away and left the child on his own.
I have to call.
She grabs her bag, rummages inside. The number is on her mobile. She wipes her eyes so that she can read the names. It rings. Once, twice, three times . . . It rings and no-one answers. Léo doesn’t have school today, he is alone in the apartment, the telephone is ringing, but nobody is answering . . . She feels sweat begin to trickle again, this time down her back. “Pick up, for fuck sake!” She counts the rings: four, five, six. There is a click and finally she hears a voice she was not expecting. She wanted to speak to Léo, but it is his mother’s voice that answers: “Hello. You’ve reached the voice-mail of Christine and Alain Gervais . . .” That calm, determined voice chills her to the marrow. What is she waiting for? Why has she not hung up? Every word nails her to her chair. “We’re not here at the moment . . .” Sophie jabs at the “END CALL” button.
It is incredible, the effort it takes to string two simple thoughts together . . . Reflect. Understand. Léo knows how to answer the phone, in fact he loves racing to get there, picking up the phone, asking who it is. It is perfectly simple: if Léo were there, he would answer; if he does not answer, it means he is not there.
Shit, where can the little bastard be if he is not at home? He is not able to open the front door by himself. His mother had a childproof lock installed when he was starting to get around everywhere and into everything, an
d she was worried about him. He is not answering, he cannot have gone out: it is like squaring the circle. Where can the damn boy be?
Think. It is . . . what? 11.30 a.m.
The table is scattered with items from her handbag, there is even a tampon in the pile. What must she look like? At the bar counter, the waiter is talking to two men. Regulars, she guesses. They are probably talking about her. They glance over at her. She cannot stay here. She has to leave. She quickly scoops up everything on the table, shoves it into her bag and runs for the door.
“One euro ten!”
She turns back, the three men are looking at her strangely. She fumbles in her bag, takes out two coins, sets them on the counter and leaves.
The day is beautiful. Unthinkingly she notes the movement on the street, the strolling pedestrians, the passing cars, the roaring motorcycles. Walk. Keep walking and think. This time, the image of Léo is very precise. She can picture every tiny detail. It was not a dream. The boy is dead and she is on the run.
The cleaner will arrive at noon. There is no reason for anyone to be in the apartment before midday. But at that point, the child’s body will be discovered.
So she has to get away. She must be vigilant. Danger could come from anywhere, at any moment. She cannot stand still, she has to keep moving, to keep walking. Collect her belongings and get away before they find her. Get away until she has had time to think. To understand. When she is calmer, she will be able to figure things out. Then she can come back and explain. Right now, she has to go. But where to?
She stops dead. Somebody bumps into her from behind. She stammers an apology. She is in the middle of the pavement, she looks around. There are a lot of people on the boulevard. The sun is sweltering. Life loses a little of its madness.
There is the florist, the furniture shop. She needs to move swiftly. She catches sight of a clock in the furniture shop: 11.35. She rushes into the entrance of her building, hunts for her keys. There are letters in her mailbox. No time to waste. Third floor. More keys, first the mortice lock, then the Yale. Her hands are trembling, she sets down her handbag, it takes her two attempts, she tries to calm her breathing, the second key turns, the door swings open.
Blood Wedding Page 2