*
Xavier pushes open the door, goes over and props himself at the bar. He does not greet anyone, does not pause in his monologue. Vernon has seen dozens of customers afflicted by this logorrhoea, typical of those who feel the constant need to keep a conversation going to avoid facing thoughts so excruciating they could dissolve them completely. The ex-bad boy turned blatherskite looks like a child wildly waving a toy sword to ward off evil thoughts. He’s pissed off with life and he talks like a sprinter. Vernon has no objection to being a passive sponge, soaking it all up.
It has been months since he spent an evening in a bar. He had forgotten the pleasure of propping an elbow on the bar top. When you knock back a few drinks at home on your own, it’s difficult to pretend you’re a social drinker, a bon vivant, since you are inescapably confronted by the rather dreary nature of the enterprise. They chain-drink and Vernon is in his element. He loves the noise, the bodies moving between tables, the bursts of laughter, the flamenco music he would never have listened to at home, the smell of cold alcohol, perfume and washing-up liquid; at the other end of the room, a slim brunette stares at him from afar, it is like a dance, a flirtatious flicker of lashes as she does something else, a wavering, insistent attentiveness. She has pale blue eyes, high cheekbones and a light complexion. A tattoo of flowering branches coils up her neck, emphasising her delicate throat. He watches the girl, hoping she will get up and go out for a cigarette . . . The background drone of Xavier shuts up only when he takes a drink.
*
“Personally, I don’t give a flying fuck about faggots. See those two behind the bar – the tall camp black guy and the short-arsed Arab poof? If they were wandering round Belleville like that, then fair play. I’ve got no problem. The two of them, hand in hand, I see them sometimes. It’s like Femen – you know, the Russian babes who are always getting their tits out. Hardly surprising I suppose, Russian women are either hookers or porn stars. Not that I’m complaining, long as they’re flaunting the flesh. You see them in the Goutte d’Or, screaming that the women in burkas should strip off. Fair play, girl, you’ve got balls, I’ll say that. No, the ones I feel like punching are the guys who act like men when really they’re homos – the ones who come on all butch in the corridors of Canal+ or at Cannes. The bad boys of the salon. You’ve just spread your arse for the producer, so give the tough guy routine a rest. If you knew what I have to go through, just because I refuse to brownnose . . . I swear, in France, being a scriptwriter is a mistake. The directors are all desperate to get their shitty little movie on T.V., but they’re not so keen to share the residuals . . . art-house cinema, my arse, bloodsucking fucking leech cinema is more like it. They’re not capable of writing a line of dialogue, they haven’t opened a book since they left school, but there’s no way they’re about to pass up a scriptwriting credit. You should see them, getting a hundred grand to make a film and then running around looking for contract players, and don’t worry when they get another €100k because the fucking thing has been on T.V., they don’t start ringing round to divvy it up. They’re all lefties, of course . . . but they’ll get over it. It’s simple – they want to have their nose in the trough. Now they’re starting to realise that the film subsidies will soon be coming from the far right, I’ll bet you they’ll change their tune – they’re pretty flexible when it comes to switching sides . . . give them four years, maybe five, and the same people who are churning out tearjerkers about the homeless will be making masterpieces about Jewish bankers, thieving gypsies and money-grubbing Russians . . . They’ll adapt, I won’t be losing any sleep over them . . . Marie-Ange hates it when I come home drunk. Have to admit that I’m an arsehole when I’m shitfaced, even I can’t stand myself. When you get to our age, getting into punch-ups in bars is tedious . . . But I’ve never been unfaithful to Marie-Ange. Never. Things are as important as you make them, I’m not going to cheat on the mother of my child, on the woman that I married. She’s a good mother. She’s decent, dependable, responsible. If I dropped dead tomorrow, I’d know the kid was in good hands. Mark my words: the mother is the most important. There’s no point having kids with some chick just because you want to jump her bones. The fact that your kid’s mother has got great tits is not going to get you far. What’s she like, this Canadian bird of yours? Does she want kids? If she’s a good woman, then go for it! I’ve never felt more emotional at anything than I do when my little girl falls asleep on my shoulder. We’re not twenty any longer, you have to build a life. Today, as Tai-Luc used to sing, my future is behind me. Hey, speaking of La Souris Déglinguée, you were saying you still saw Alex? Jesus, the guy was ludicrous right up to the day he died.”
“I was pretty shocked. Yeah, I still saw him occasionally.”
“In Quebec?”
“He played there a couple of times. He’s very popular in Canada.”
“All due respect, Canadians have no fucking taste . . . Frankly, just the fact that, of all of us, he was the one who managed to do something with his ‘art’ . . . he was the least talented, the least sincere . . .”
“But he was a good-looking guy.”
“He was a big black guy, yeah. Say what you like, but white women always got wet at the idea of being gang-banged by the proud lions of the Cameroon.”
“Alex wasn’t from Cameroon, was he?”
“He was black. He was a stupid bastard. Jesus he was a stupid fucking bastard . . .”
“Actually, I was wondering if you’ve got any director friends who might want to make a documentary about him . . . I’ve got four hours of video interviews he did at my place . . . I don’t know what to do with them. I thought maybe I could make a quick buck out of them . . .”
“A documentary? About that bourgeois hipster has-been? I don’t think I’ve got anyone in my Rolodex interested in that . . . You want to sell them?”
“If anyone is interested . . .”
“I hope the fucker rots in hell.”
*
With these words, Xavier – drunker than he seemed from his slurred diction – bites into the glass he is holding, spits out the glittering slivers with a thin trickle of blood and glares into the middle distance, his eyes unable to focus on a single point. Then there is the whole theatrical number while he tries to find his credit card, the barmen are blasé, they’ve obviously seen this routine before and they know he won’t get out of hand. Vernon is annoyed, he would have liked to stay longer, to talk to the girl who has not stopped looking at him, he would have liked to chat with the guy at the other end of the bar in the fluorescent orange beanie, to make the most of this evening. But Xavier clung to him like a limpet, paying no attention to the people around them. Vernon has to help him across the street. He was always like this, the big guy. Sensitive and delicate. The moment he starts to spill his guts, he becomes uncontrollable. The fat fucker must weigh a hundred kilos, easy. Vernon puts his back out serving as a crutch, but finally manages to get him into the lift.
*
The family are setting off at dawn, they have an early flight to catch. Vernon gets up, wearing boxers and a scruffy T-shirt and tries to put on a good show – as though the massed carillon of the apocalypse were not tolling inside his skull – while, line by line, Marie-Ange goes through the interminable list she has written in a cramped, careful hand, of instructions for taking care of the dog. It is much more complicated than it seems: the animal eats at specific times, a judicious mix of fresh vegetables kibble white meat and organic dogfood, she must be taken out four times a day according to a strict protocol – the evening walk does not follow the same route as the morning walk, etc. The dog is called Colette. Vernon does his best not to laugh when he hears this. Sitting next to the suitcases, the animal watches with a mournful eye as they prepare to leave. Xavier is cradling his sleeping daughter, enduring his hangover in stoic silence. Then the door slams; Vernon waits for a few minutes to make sure they have not forgotten something, then runs into the kitchen. He is ravenous. Vernon succumb
s to the temptation of the freshly squeezed orange juice, a decision he immediately regrets – it is a counterintuitive choice, one his stomach vigorously rejects. He makes do with some cheese, hacking off a chunk of Comté and eating it standing up while he studies the provisions. A corn-fed free-range chicken – close to its best-by date, according to Marie-Ange who suggested he cook it but make sure not to give any bones to Colette, though she loves the meat and the skin. Yeah, sure, he’s going to give a €19 free-range chicken to the dog. It’s right there on the pack: €19.00. Wankers. And a pack of chocolate Sveltesse yoghurts without a gram of fat. And multipacks of Kiri cheese for kids – it’s all top-of-the-range stuff – and chestnut honey. He spots the price tag on a glass bottle of cranberry juice – €12.80. Vernon finishes off the Comté.
The dog is sitting at his feet, patient and attentive. “Clingy bitch, aren’t you?” She tilts her head and listens. Eventually, he realises she wants some cheese. He gives her the rind, hoping it will not make her throw up. Happy to have worked out what she wanted, he strokes her for the first time. Then he goes back to sleep, the dog climbs onto the sofa and is asleep and snoring within two seconds.
*
Vernon is in the habit of keeping a tight control over his thoughts. The mind is a formidable craft that must be manoeuvred with caution. He manages pretty well, he is not the sort of guy to be suddenly surprised by a dangerous reef. But something has weakened, perhaps it is the silence, or the comfort. He has to struggle not to give in to the masochistic temptation of self-pity. He reminds himself that, although things are shit, he is lucky. He has lots of friends. The dog-sitting gig was a bonus. The apartment is large and comfortable, he will be able to spend the weekend watching movies and stuffing his face. But he can distinctly sense something looming, something that weighs on his chest. If he were at home, he would do some tidying. He’s always been the king of categorisation. He needs to avoid thoughts that begin “if I were at home” at all costs, but the words came too fast for him to police them. He feels a thunderbolt in his chest, short, sharp, a rending, followed by the bitter taste of ashes that has nothing to do with his hangover.
He opens a beer and takes a tour of the premises. It is a parents’ home, full of useless objects he cannot imagine buying. Xavier has got life sussed: he needs to find a woman who’s loaded. When they were younger, they wanted warrior women, sexual animals, gorgeous dreamlike creatures, they wanted rock ’n’ roll, groupies and rock chicks, they wanted stunning babes, sleazy sinners, feral Amazons who had to be conquered in the sack. As you get older, you don’t give a shit about such things. The most important thing, it has taken him a while to realise, is a woman with an apartment like this, languorous sunny weekends and a fully stocked fridge into the bargain.
*
Then Vernon dozes in front of the television. “Paris, Texas” dubbed in French, a comedy about football, a cop show, fat people on diets, a couple of trailer trash a vicious guy and his masochistic girlfriend. Curled up next to him, the dog is snoring. Vernon thought he might have had to lock her up to stop her pestering him, but she is only interested in sleeping. He strokes her again, promising to take her for a walk, though he is not convinced that he actually will.
Trying to work out how to connect his iPod to the amplifier, he accidentally turns on the radio. The room is filled with Alex’s voice “. . . And if I fall asleep in your arms, it’s because another girl spurned me”. He liked to sing this sort of sadistic shit, it was his teenybopper Gainsbourg routine. The speakers ooze a thick bass sound – slick, aquatic, a slapped bassline that forms bubbles, a lick borrowed from funk but tarnished with a fuzz pedal. On this first album, Alex’s voice is scornful, sneering, aggressive. Sexy, even to guys. Alex didn’t know yet that he was singing to an audience of millions, he would sing in the kitchen to make his friends laugh. It was genius, that first album. A shriek that made girls wet and boys want to be like him. He was a twisted, reckless, wounded dandy. Songs that seemed effortless, wantonly malevolent. This was something else he lost along the way; in time he became a heartless bastard in life and bleeding heart in his songs. How anyone could be miserable with all the attention, the travelling, the wild surprises, the fabulous opportunities, is a mystery to those around him. But Alex is hardly the first rock star to systematically tear down the castle that he built. At the end of the day, the guy was completely lost. For more than two years, he was incapable of composing a thing. Vernon did not really want to comprehend the extent of the tragedy. Had he been a good friend? Clearly not. But it seemed impossible, given his situation, for him to help someone who was probably a millionaire. He remembers Alex’s ravings about synchronising brain waves. He had given Vernon a long-winded speech about alpha, beta, gamma waves – a vast cosmogony of horseshit based on binary beats and neurodynamics . . . Unable to produce a new record, Alex had decided to reprogramme humans. Early on in the conversation, Vernon was thinking, go ahead, make hippie music, none of my business – but when Alex started talking about how the granite blocks of the Egyptian pyramids had been transported by sound waves . . . Vernon felt a twinge of alarm. But he had done nothing to stop Alex from sinking further into the depths.
Gone. Another one bites the dust. Vernon feels his body stiffen, something rumbling inside him makes him panic. The dog lays her head on his hand so delicately that for a moment he is left speechless, frozen. Every memory is booby-trapped. The tight covering he has kept over his fear is slipping – his skin is exposed. His was a hermetic, comforting, all-mod-cons bubble. He was living in formaldehyde, in a world that has collapsed – clinging to people who are no longer there. He could criss-cross the planet, smoke rare herbs, visit shamans, solve enigmas, study the stars – the dead are no longer here. Nor is anything that has gone.
Vernon whimpers. He is surprised at the sound he makes. The dog stands up on her hind legs and, in a frenzy of panic, starts licking his eyes. He tries to push her away, but she refuses. The only living creature who cares about his pain is a dog; he tries to make himself feel worse at this thought but the dog’s face is so comical that he finds himself laughing. Colette has a clown’s face. She bounds from the sofa and races to the front door, pawing at her leash and looking at him as though proposing some way-out plan: “Come on, take me out, you’ll see, we’ll have a blast.”
*
Once outside, she tugs on the lead like a lunatic; he lets her guide him. She knows the way to the park.
Just inside the Buttes-Chaumont, a man sitting on the first bench is eating a yoghurt and talking to himself. He is laughing at something, his shoes are falling apart and attached to his ankles with string. The dog inspects the area, snuffling around before squatting to take a shit. There is no way Vernon is picking up anything. He glances around him casually as if to say: she’s not mine. All things considered, he thinks that being seen with a lapdog like Colette is seriously detrimental to his masculinity. He wishes there was something about his demeanour that indicated that he is not her master – sweet though she is, he finds it difficult to be seen with her in public.
Vernon Subutex One Page 7