French Lover

by Nasrin, Taslima

  She looked up and into his eyes, they were trembling with concern.

  ‘Do you want to end our relationship? Is that your wish?’

  Tear stood still in the corners of Nila’s eyes. Benoir held up her chin and stared at those tears until they rolled down her cheeks. She sobbed, ‘No, that’s not what I want.’

  Benoir hugged her close and kissed her like a madman. Nila went weak at the knees. He picked up her weightless body, laid her on the bed, rubbed his lips on her breasts and said, ‘Je t’aime, je t’aime.’

  Nila heaved a sigh of relief. Did Anirban ever love Molina like this? Anirban had never hugged Molina to his chest as Benoir was doing to her and never said he loved her. If only Molina could be a bird on the window sill and see how someone was loving her daughter.

  ‘Hey, what are you thinking?’ Benoir held her chin and turned her face towards him.

  She sighed, ‘Nothing.’

  ‘It must be something. Tell me.’

  ‘Benoir, do you really love me?’

  ‘Why are you asking me this? Can’t you tell?’

  ‘Sometimes . . .’

  ‘Sometimes what?’

  ‘Sometimes I find it very strange that you love me. Who am I? I am nothing, nobody. I have no friends, no relatives. My life is a crumpled mess.’

  ‘You have me! I will give you everything, everything.’

  Benoir gave Nila everything, much more than her body needed. Not once, but many times, all night long.

  When the dawn kissed her brow, she said, ‘Don’t you want to sleep? It’s been seven times already.’

  Benoir levered his head on his left hand, lay on his right side and played with his favourite cherries as he said, ‘Nila, you have robbed me of my sleep. You are such a basket of surprises, the deeper I go, the more I want to know. Each time is like the first time. The more I quench my thirst, the thirstier I get. I love it when you writhe in pleasure. When you clench my shoulders in magnificent joy, I feel I am truly a man.’

  In the morning Benoir’s gentle touch woke Nila, ‘Good morning, madame.’ He held a tray in his hands, with croissants and tea in it. His face was tranquil.

  Nila felt she was drinking nectar rather than tea.

  Benoir said, ‘I am sorry, Nila, yesterday I wasn’t myself.’

  He had made his own coffee. Anirban or Kishanlal had never made coffee or tea for themselves. Neither had she ever heard them apologize for their mistakes. Nila gazed at Benoir with wonder in her eyes, she gazed at herself and at her good fortune.

  ‘I looked at you, sleeping, for a long time. You slept like a child. I crept away so that you didn’t wake up, cleared the champagne glass, swept the place clean, had a shower and went to the boulangerie. I bought the croissants, made the tea and woke you up.’

  Benoir counted as he kissed her a hundred times, picked one of the two keys to the house and left for work. Every two hours he called from work and told her that he loved her. He also told her that he’d have to go to the station after work to pick up Pascale and then go home. He would also have to stay at home that night, for Jacqueline and not for Pascale.

  Nila spent her day reading, watching TV, lying down, listening to music. She went into the kitchen, but didn’t feel like cooking; she picked up the phone, but didn’t dial. She stood before the mirror, stripped and stared at herself, made faces and laughed.

  At night she lay in her bed, stared at the black sky and thought of Benoir kissing Pascale, just as he kissed Nila. Pascale came into the bedroom after putting Jacqueline to bed and Benoir hugged her and said je t’aime, je t’aime, je t’aime passionment. Then he stripped her just as he took off Nila’s clothes. If Nila’s nipples were cherries then Pascale’s were lingonberries. He was stroking her white skin and saying, ‘What a lovely colour, how smooth your skin is.’ His penis was erect and impatient to enter Pascale; all night long he pleasured Pascale the way he did Nila.

  The hot breath of Pascale burned Nila all night long.

  From Five to Seven

  The following week, Benoir came to Nila’s at five every evening and left by seven. He had to because he was having dinner with Pascale, playing boogey-man with Jacqueline and some days he had to take them out or they had a dinner invitation.

  Nila stayed at home all day. She had nowhere to go. She spent the whole day waiting for Benoir to come at five o’clock. After he left at seven, she spent the rest of the evening and night guarding his touch, his smell on her body. On Friday evening when he came and tried to kiss her as usual, she moved away.

  ‘What’s the matter, what’s wrong with you?’

  ‘Is this how you kiss Pascale?’

  ‘Why are you asking me all this? I didn’t hide anything from you. You knew I was married.’

  Nila couldn’t deny that. She couldn’t deny that even after knowing everything, she had surrendered herself. But when he leaned towards her, she moved away and asked, ‘Do you do all this with Pascale?’

  Benoir threw back his arms and lay flat on his back. His blue eyes were shielded by the eyelids. Just the red eye of the penis stared at the sky.

  Nila waited for his answer.

  ‘Don’t you know that I married Pascale for love?’

  ‘I know.’

  ‘Then why are you asking me all this?’

  ‘I hate having to share you with someone.’

  ‘Nila, you are so selfish.’

  Nila was silent.

  ‘Just think of Pascale! She loves me too.’

  ‘You also love her, don’t you?’

  ‘Listen Nila, I don’t lie. Any other married man would tell his lover that he hates his wife and loves only her. But Nila, I have given this a lot of thought, and truly, I love both of you.’

  ‘Is that possible?’

  ‘Why not?’

  ‘I cannot imagine loving another man, sleeping with him.’

  ‘Some truths can’t be visualized until one faces them.’ The red eye leaned towards the window. ‘You wouldn’t understand, Nila. You didn’t marry for love, you don’t have children. It’s not possible for you to understand.’ Benoir got up, naked as he was, and took out his wallet from the pocket of the trousers lying on the floor. He took out four photographs from it: Jacqueline and Pascale, the daughter kissing the mother, Benoir hugging Pascale from behind while Jacqueline sat on her lap, Pascale and Benoir and the last one was of Jacqueline alone, two years ago. Nila saw them, but Benoir took even longer over them. The red eye drooped.

  ‘Isn’t Jacqueline just like me?’

  Nila stared hard, but couldn’t find the slightest similarity.

  ‘Her nose is the exact replica of mine.’

  ‘Is it? Her nose is short.’ Nila spoke softly.

  ‘It is. But it’ll grow as she grows. Just look at her ears.’

  Nila didn’t say anything; surely, Jacqueline’s ears, when she grew up, would be just like Benoir’s.

  ‘Your hair is blonde. Her hair seems to be reddish.’

  ‘That’s because Pascale has red hair. But she says Jacqueline’s hair is not so reddish any more, it is turning blonde gradually.’

  ‘Oh!’

  ‘Isn’t she an amazing child?’

  Nila took the photograph: a few strands of red hair on her head, her face marked by red boils, the gums exposed in a huge smile and two rotten teeth.

  ‘Yes.’ Nila’s voice held no warmth.

  ‘There’s no child in the world prettier than her.’ Benoir held the photo to his heart and smiled contentedly. ‘Jacqueline is my raison d’être. She is the only meaningful part of my life.’

  Suddenly he got up and asked, ‘Don’t you ever feel like seeing her?’

  Nila didn’t know what to say. Jacqueline was like any other child to her. She often saw a bunch of kids going to the museum with their teachers. Jacqueline could be any one of them.

  ‘ Jacqueline is a part of me, Nila. If you love me, you have to love her too.’

  Nila spoke coolly, ‘I have
never seen Jacqueline. Love does not fall from the sky. Any relationship needs some time to grow.’

  ‘Shame on you, Nila, you can’t love an innocent child! It’s easy to love any child and you are actually jealous of Jacqueline.’

  ‘Rubbish! Why would I be jealous of her?’

  ‘That’s what is surprising; she hasn’t done you any harm. You should be able to love a child quite easily, right?’

  ‘I can, if the child is a genius.’

  ‘How do you know Jacqueline isn’t one?’

  ‘I didn’t say she is not. Perhaps she is a brilliant girl and we will be great friends; maybe I will love her a lot. I’ll love her for who she is and not because she is your daughter. That would be false. Love, of all things, can’t be enforced.’

  ‘If you had a daughter, wouldn’t you want me to love her, like my own daughter?’

  ‘I would, but I wouldn’t have forced you.’

  ‘You’d have been pleased if I loved her, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘So then, why don’t you understand that if you love Jacqueline, I will be happy. We should try to do things that’ll please each other. You’ve decorated your house in light green because it’s my favourite colour, right? No one forced you there.’

  Nila left the bed. She felt Benoir’s next wish would be that she love Pascale because she was his wife, and if she didn’t, it’d make her a very selfish, sordid person.

  Benoir reached out and drew her close. He placed her head on his chest, took in the smell of her long dark hair and said, ‘Don’t you want a child, Nila? A baby who’ll play in this room and we’ll watch, pretty, lively? Your life would be complete, giving birth to a child, an innocent child.’

  Nila closed her eyes. A pretty, doll-like, golden-haired, white baby came running to her calling, ‘Ma, Ma.’ She picked up the child and Benoir hugged the two of them. Nila wanted to lie on his chest like that forever as he whispered about children in her ears, weave dreams around her.

  ‘Do you want a son?’

  Benoir said, ‘Either one, girl or boy.’ He kissed her.

  ‘But what will be the child’s identity?’

  ‘The child of our love—isn’t that enough?’

  Nila looked at the window. ‘We are not married.’ There was just bright daylight outside the window.

  ‘You said one day that you didn’t believe in marriage, only in love. Why are you suddenly leaning towards marriage today?’ Benoir turned her around to face him, ‘You said that you hate Indian orthodoxy. And now you are angling for that?’

  Nila’s voice broke. ‘Why do you love me, Benoir? You have a wife, a child, a happy family; what’s the point . . .’

  ‘I thought I loved only Pascale. But something happened deep inside. You appeared in my life like a flash of lightning. Now I need you, I have no choice, I love you. I think of you all day. At night I wake up suddenly, dreaming of you. This morning Pascale said I called out your name in my sleep.’

  ‘So she knows all about me?’

  Benoir sighed, ‘Yes, she knows. She finds it very difficult to accept, though she doesn’t say anything to me. She never asked me a second time about you. I feel for her too. But what can I do? I can’t do without her, she is the mother of my Jacqueline. And I can’t do without you, because you are my unbridled passion. Without you I am a dead soul.’

  Nila got up and went into the kitchen.

  The wilted, crinkled red eye hung limply at his thighs when Benoir came and stood behind her in the kitchen. ‘What’s the matter? Why did you come away?’

  ‘To make some tea.’

  ‘Don’t you have anything to say?’

  ‘Benoir, I feel our relationship is becoming very complicated. I really cannot understand whom you love, who you want to spend the rest of your life with. Of course, you say you love both of us, you need both of us. Tomorrow if another woman comes into your life, what will you do? You would want her in your life as well, won’t you?’

  Benoir’s tone was listless. ‘I won’t ever love anyone else.’

  ‘But you said that to Pascale before you met me, didn’t you? You must have said she would always be your only love. But what happened? You said you love me. I don’t know if this is true love or you don’t want to let go the chance to enjoy another body. By hook or by crook . . . fooling a stupid girl . . .’

  ‘For shame, Nila!’

  Benoir shrank back from her, went into the bedroom and got dressed. When Nila came in with the tea, he was tying his shoelaces.

  ‘Are you leaving? I have cooked for you—Bengali food. I bought some good wine too, the kind you like.’

  ‘You have it.’

  ‘Won’t you eat? You must be hungry. Did you have lunch?’

  ‘Sandwiches.’

  ‘That’s all? Come and eat.’ Nila pulled him by the hand.

  Benoir pulled his hand away and said, ‘Eating is no big deal to me, it may be to you. There’s nothing more valuable to you than rice because half your country starves to death.’

  After he left, Nila took a chair into the balcony and sat there. She felt the joy that had come into her life was receding, going out of her reach.

  At night she picked up a huge book and sat on the sofa. She didn’t want to think about Benoir that night. She had no answers to the complex questions in her life. Homer Wells was a far better alternative. He began his life in an orphanage, the strange and curious Homer. Nila felt she was like him, an orphan, no one wanted her and no one took her in.

  Late in the night the phone rang and Nila leapt up. The book rolled to the floor.

  ‘Je t’aime, Nila.’

  Nila arrested the ‘Moi aussi,’ on her tongue.

  ‘What were you doing?’

  ‘Reading.’

  ‘Reading what?’

  ‘Nothing much; just some strange things happening in a house where they make apple cider—’

  ‘Do you know what happened tonight?’ Benoir sounded as if he’d announce that he had left Pascale.

  ‘What happened?’ Nila was excited.

  ‘I didn’t eat dinner.’

  ‘Oh.’

  ‘I wanted to have it with you.’

  Nila picked up the book from the floor. She glanced through the last page and shut the book.

  ‘Do you love me, Nila?’ Benoir asked.

  ‘Don’t you know?’

  ‘I do. But I like to hear you say it.’

  Nila had to say je t’aime because he liked to hear her say it.

  The next morning she woke up to his touch. She wanted to tell him to go away. She’d spend her lonely life alone. But when his tongue searched for hers, went deeper, searched for the cherries and found them like discovering untold wealth, when his sunburnt body desperately sought her cool waters and drank it up like a thirsty man, and when Nila was completely covered by his lithe body, her desire to be alone vanished. Nila felt even if Benoir loved a hundred women and not just Pascale, it was all right. It was enough if she got one out of hundred parts of him. Beggars were not choosers. She knew she didn’t deserve to have Benoir all to herself.

  Benoir was to spend the whole day with Nila because Pascale had gone to a friend’s house for the day. She had taken the car and Benoir had come by metro. Benoir felt it was silly to spend the day inside when it was a bright day outside. So they went out. They would go to Quartier Latar first and then they would roam around. Who lived there? Jean Jacques. He was in Paris for just a few days; he lived in Marseilles. He was a very talented man. This country had no dearth of talented men and so Nila didn’t ask anything more about this Jean Jacques. They took a taxi, went to a six-storeyed house in Quartier Latar on Rue Pierre et Marie Curie and when it was exactly five minutes past eleven by Benoir’s watch, they went upstairs. A man with long hair and a beard opened the door a crack, stared at the visitors and shut the door on their faces. A few minutes later another man, with a smile on his face, opened the door wide and invited them in. Benoir introduced himsel
f. Nila assumed Benoir didn’t know who Jean Jacques was. The smiling man invited them into the room. Benoir held Nila’s hand tightly and his palms sweated in her grip.

  She didn’t get a chance to ask him anything. The man passed two empty rooms and led them into a small, dark room with two stools and one sofa. He sat on the sofa and his nose didn’t look half as red in the dark. He stopped smiling and spoke in sombre tones, ‘You are Benoir Dupont, aren’t you?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Born in Orléans?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘October, 1979?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Quite healthy, even as a child?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘Met this girl quite suddenly?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You love her.’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘But you have a wife.’

  ‘And a daughter.’

  ‘She is very small?’

  ‘Yes.’ Benoir’s voice was mechanical.

  ‘Jacqueline has a disease, doesn’t she?’ Jean Jacques picked up a pen and chewed the top. His eyes were keen. Suddenly a bright green light came on, above Benoir’s head. He had beads of sweat on his brow.

  Jean Jacques spoke again, ‘Quite an old affliction?’

  ‘Yes, ears.’

  ‘She is a little hard of hearing, right?’

  Benoir said, ‘Yes, that happens sometimes.’ He looked anxious.

  ‘What is your wife’s name? Fabien? François? Pascale?’

  ‘Pascale.’

  Jean Jacques turned towards Nila. ‘This girl—yes, it’ll work; go ahead. She is from India. Indian women are sensible, they don’t act on impulse—ha, ha, ha.’

  Jean Jacques laughed and the light over Benoir’s head went off. The room was dark and there was a sharp sound. ‘Tell me, what is the problem?’ The lights were back and this time it was red.

  Beneath those lights Benoir looked like a ghost and his voice became more mechanical. Nila took one of his hands into hers. It was ice cold.

  ‘Alcatel is downsizing, right?’

  ‘Yes.’

  ‘You’ve also considered taking a job with Ericsson?’

  ‘I have applied.’

  ‘But you want to stay on at Alcatel?’