Marlene

by Philippe Djian

  He searched for something to say about her new glasses. He asked if Nath was around.

  She’s coming, Marlene answered. She’s parking the car. But I’m dead on my feet. It was nonstop today, we just closed up.

  A town official had grabbed a mic and was already spewing the usual blah-blah while the guys dropped their duffel bags like turds to sweep up their wife or mother or lift terrified children at arm’s length, and others headed rowdily to the watering hole where they were serving beer and refreshments.

  Luckily, they didn’t celebrate the heroes’ return every day. Dan’s legs began to shake, seeing all those boys who would soon tip into suffering and never come out. Well, that’s some face you’re making, Marlene whispered to him. Looks like something’s wrong.

  Nice glasses, he answered. The wood frames are a nice touch.

  Nath joined them a little later, the requisite smile on her lips, making her way through the baby carriages, pregnant women, fused couples, the manics, the zombies. She and Dan exchanged blasé looks. It was a small town. As they knew, it was either this or go to Mass on Sunday.

  Marlene, on the other hand, seemed delighted with the ambiance. She smiled at the mothers, spoke to the children. She took advantage to introduce herself, I’m Nath’s sister, I’m moving here, I work with her, it’s a beautiful day, I’m so happy to be here, to share this moment with you, I hope we’ll see each other again, get to know each other better. To the point where Nath finally grabbed her by the sleeve and dragged her outside, having no desire to spend the night there. She was hungry.

  So was Dan.

  FOWL

  Unlike other girls her age, Mona didn’t have a boyfriend and had never had sex. It wasn’t what everyone else believed, not even the two or three girls who imagined they knew her well, despite the vagueness she deliberately maintained on the subject. Especially since she was hardly the type to lower her gaze or blush at a sexual allusion.

  She had managed to forge a reputation as an experienced young woman without ever having to go through it, but she was the only one who could admire her handiwork. Even her own mother—and God knew that Nath had investigated the matter—couldn’t say for sure.

  She was in no hurry; she got along just fine on her own. She didn’t see what was so urgent about throwing yourself into the arms of the first doofus to come along. If it was just to be like everyone else, or like her mother, thanks anyway. She had something else in mind.

  It had been dark for a while, and she was going a bit stir-crazy when Dan came to pick her up.

  You took your time, she said.

  He shrugged one shoulder. The living room wasn’t a mess. He appreciated it, without letting it show. The train was late getting in, he said.

  First of all, I’m not hungry. And I’m also having my period.

  And the connection is…

  I’m not in the mood, that’s the connection. I’m not looking forward to seeing her.

  He leaned over the kitchen sink to wash his hands. Forced himself to remain calm, expressionless, before the painful spectacle of his tranquility vanishing in a blink if she refused to make peace with her mother and prolonged her stay at his place, sowing a disorder that she thought was invisible—whereas he could follow her every trace, with her scents, her reflections, her hair that he rinsed down with the spray nozzle and that clogged the drain, that he had to dig out with his fingers, her unmistakable presence.

  Anyway, your father will be out soon. This won’t make him happy. Be smart about it. The first thing we learned was how to stay low. Let things fly over your head, that’s my advice.

  He wiped his hands vigorously. For an instant, he wondered what she was going to do with her tampons, if he should furnish his bathrooms with little plastic bags before it became a problem—such as waking up one morning with a blocked toilet and Mona shrugging nonchalantly.

  The place was packed. The room bathed in an odor of food, alcohol, and sweat—the nights were still chilly, but most of the guys were in T-shirts, like most of the women, one group to show off their biceps, the other their chests, their tattoos, and all this unwrapping required a certain comfort, a certain temperature, they could feel the cold biting every time the door opened onto new arrivals—and the music wasn’t great, either, the thousand things you heard a thousand times, but Nath and Marlene had taken off their coats and were waving their bare arms at them.

  After they were seated, and mother and daughter had exchanged a few furtive glances, Nath grabbed up the menu and proclaimed that they shouldn’t get fish, the season was over.

  Marlene ordered a martini. Nath looked daggers at her. Marlene chose to ignore it and appeared delighted to see her niece, laid a grateful hand on hers. We waited for you to order, she said. We just had drinks.

  Nath folded the menu and looked at her daughter. I took the opportunity to change your sheets, she said. I’m sure you understand.

  Dan got up to fetch the drinks. He hoped the hardest part would be over by the time he returned to his seat, and the mere thought of returning home and finding the place empty left him almost euphoric.

  It was time for Richard to take back the reins. Dan observed the three women at the table across the room and instinct told him to keep his distance, not butt in. Richard was in for no fun. Managing those three, holding out on all fronts—forget it, the task seemed insurmountable. He wouldn’t have wanted to trade places. He wished him luck.

  Whatever the case, Mona’s bag was packed. Dan himself had put it on the back seat while she remained silent, with a faraway look. He reckoned that bag made her departure inevitable, that there was no turning back.

  I’ve given her back her room, Marlene announced.

  He hadn’t seen that one coming. On the spur of the moment, he found nothing to say.

  I’ll manage, she finally added, looking away.

  He didn’t take the bait. She could think what she liked.

  The fact was, she wasn’t surprised. She hadn’t been here long, but she was starting to get to know him, see which of his screws were a bit loose. A guy with problems.

  Nath had explained all that to her, that nearly all of them came back with a marble missing, something broken. A few of them were at the bar, planted there since they’d leaped off the train, staring at a Beyoncé video with vacant eyes, as if they were knocked out standing. And yet they were strong guys, perfectly healthy-looking.

  Will you buy me a drink, she asked.

  Listen, he answered, don’t ask me to put you up. I hope you won’t take that the wrong way.

  No, that’s kind of you, but I have a room at the hotel.

  Until I can find a place.

  He nodded, looked at her a moment, longer than he would have liked, without making any headway in deciding whether the woman was fish or fowl. Her wood-framed glasses didn’t help. He glanced around him. It was a small town.

  COMMUNITY

  Drop your guard, even for a second, and you could wind up stone dead or caught in some implausible situation that would turn your life upside down, make you into some other person you never would have become had you remained vigilant. Dan knew what he was talking about. He was able to go for days straight without shutting his eyes. The other guys slept soundly when it was his watch.

  He grimaced at her.

  Does it bother you if people see us together, she asked.

  No, it doesn’t bother me.

  That’s how it seems to me, Dan. I might be wrong, but I get the impression you’re tense.

  Why would I be tense. I’m happy to see things return to normal. It’s probably just exhaustion. I adore Mona, but I’m glad she’s going home. Inviting herself to my place didn’t help anybody.

  Marlene nodded. It was becoming complicated with him; things didn’t progress much. She had quickly understood that Dan was more or less part of the family and that
she’d do well to stay on his good side, but he didn’t hold up his end. At least he wasn’t hostile. Which at this point, with a little distance, she considered a minor miracle.

  She glanced over at their table.

  Looks like it’s going okay, she said. I don’t think they’ll exactly kiss and make up, but still.

  Let’s bring them their drinks, he said.

  Outside the sky was clear, a deep black. They hugged goodbye on the sidewalk while Nath fished for her house keys. It was midnight. Eucalyptus trees were getting shredded in the keen air, waving their torn leaves in front of her house.

  Nath said she’d make something simple for Richard’s return, maybe lasagna, there wasn’t much to celebrate.

  Dan moved to pick up Mona’s bag but the girl beat him to it. He could expect her not to say a word to him for weeks to come; it was the price he had to pay. He raised his collar and watched the three women filing into the house. He shut his eyes a moment before tearing himself away.

  In front of his house, he ran into his neighbor, a guy who lived with his wife and kids and went off to work every morning in a suit, behind the wheel of his hybrid.

  A dentist or something; the family went to church on Sundays. He had thrown a duffle coat over his pajamas and was dragging a briard on a leash in the moonlight.

  This neighborhood reminds me of Switzerland, he announced. The calm, the quiet, the clean streets. You feel safe here, especially when you’ve got kids. We try to raise them the best we can, right. Adults have to set an example.

  You didn’t have to think too hard to read between the lines. A retiree lived across the street, a former accountant whose wife had up and left him without a word. Farther on, the house of a judge, the one who had given Richard three months without parole. In another, with its flowered white balcony, an angry-looking woman raised her Down syndrome child who spent his time in the pool, shouting and making faces.

  A community. It had taken them time to accept him, bury their distrust—the guys coming home from those distant massacres were always troublemakers, misfits, hotheads—to finally admit that by some miracle they had inherited the only more or less palatable veteran, with his regular job, his willingness to lend a hand, and polite into the bargain. Rather than some alcoholic, violent, raving, hairy junkie.

  Unlike Richard, Dan felt it was best to toe the line, keep a low profile while trying to get back on his feet, resume a normal life, and he wouldn’t get there by hanging out with the local zombies, drawing attention to himself. It was hard enough as it was.

  In that regard, Mona clearing out was for the best. You never knew. The crystal ball could blow apart at any moment, at the slightest infraction. At any moment they could rise up and expel him, one way or another. Richard laughed at him when they talked about it. He had an excellent reason: he hated people. They didn’t exist for him. Except when they threw him behind bars.

  You don’t agree, the dentist insisted in an affable tone. Dan nodded with a knowing smile. Then he lowered his head and locked the car, activating the alarm system, while the briard calmly peed against a tree under his master’s self-satisfied gaze.

  Once inside, before even turning on the lights, he headed straight to the bathroom to wash his hands. The water still came out of the faucet ice cold in late March.

  After a moment, it was scalding. No matter, what a relief to be there, finally alone again. Take a few sleeping pills and go to bed. Strain his ears and not detect a living soul. Not the slightest presence. He pressed the pedal of the garbage can and threw out a perfumed soap that Mona had left behind. He stood for a moment with his hands under the water, observing the furious flow in his sink. Tough day. Nonetheless, he launched into a bout of ironing. In the twilight—he was used to it—and in front of the wide-open window, despite the stinging cold, he felt like himself. He always delayed the moment when he would shut his eyes and turn toward the wall, pulling the sheet over him.

  AUSPICIOUS

  A few days before his release, Richard took advantage of the first wafts of spring, of a blue sky whose color alone changed everything, especially women’s moods—who knew why—to announce to Nath that he had acquired a new car.

  She stiffened a bit as he said it, even though he admitted only a third of the Alfa’s price. Her thoughts were racing at a hundred miles an hour; she weighed the pros and cons in less than a quarter of a second.

  Is this really the right time, she pretended to worry. And she gave a weak sigh, the kind someone who’s too softhearted might give an unruly child.

  Can you see me getting around this city on foot, he said, pointing a thumb at himself. I can’t.

  She nodded, with the hint of a pale smile toward the barred windows so he wouldn’t feel he’d won too easily.

  I mean, it’s pretty expensive, she defended herself limply. It’s kind of an extravagance, don’t you think.

  He took her hands and leaned in toward her. At that moment, she noticed that he’d been boiling inside for the last several minutes, that he was burning up, but no surprise there, she had taken care to select an outfit that wouldn’t leave him indifferent after three months of abstinence or God knew what. She made sure not to neglect any opportunity, to sharpen all her defenses in anticipation of Richard’s return. If she played her cards right, nothing would explode in their faces, no fires would start. She tugged on her skirt.

  For some time, their conjugal life had been nothing to write home about. And now here was her husband, with shining eyes and a dry mouth. In reality, they were driven by an animal, primal instinct that was almost comic. Richard’s forehead was beaded with sweat and he was kneading her hands without realizing what he was doing, lower lip brooding, cock stiff inside his cotton pants.

  She thought about the guy she sometimes hooked up with, who was already stammering by dessert, salivating for it. It was laughable. Maybe due to the arrival of spring.

  I know what you’re thinking, but fuck them, Richard declared with clenched teeth. Don’t get involved.

  I thought I might buy a flat screen TV, she said with a shrug. But no biggie, it’ll keep.

  Great. I can’t wait to come home.

  As soon as she turned to leave, he lit a cigarette and gazed after her. He could have done worse. Of all the girls he’d known, Nath was the one best suited to him.

  He was still convinced of that nearly twenty years later, despite all their highs and lows. The only girl who had weathered his storms, his repeated absences, the only one who had stood up to him—rightly so, in the final account, and clear-sightedly, but the present was all that mattered, and regrets never got you anywhere.

  The purchase of the Alfa had gone pretty smoothly, without much haggling, and Richard was still feeling the buzz, colored by a strong sexual appetite for his wife that the circumstances rekindled.

  During his recreational walk, he let it be known that he was looking for a flat screen, top of the line, at a good price. And the guy who’d sold him the Alfa happened to have a cousin who could find him one.

  Darkness was falling as he lay on his cot, wondering if Nath felt the same impatience he did, if desire was eating away at her, if she too was touching herself at that moment. They had kind of begun neglecting each other as time went by, especially since his return from Iraq, which had knocked him for a bigger loop than he let on.

  He thought about the time they’d wasted. Then of the pleasure he’d find again as soon as the Alfa was ready.

  He had ordered magazines on Amazon to familiarize himself with it. No pictures of naked women pinned to his wall.

  His upcoming release and Mona’s return sped things up, and Marlene moved into a furnished studio not far away—a five-minute walk from there. Not exactly cheery, but she only used it for sleeping. Her days were long and tiring: no one would have thought there could be so many dogs in this town, friendly ones, trembling ones, mean ones, a
nd night was already falling by the time they closed up shop and dragged a sack full of fur of all types, lengths, and colors to the garbage bins. Marlene had blisters on her fingers from the shears. And on the trip home, it was late and they didn’t have the energy to hold a real conversation about their various troubles.

  They ate haphazardly, whatever they could find, or else they ordered pizza, or empanadas, or sushi that they gulped down in the kitchen while Mona brought her plate in front of the TV and sat cross-legged—Nath didn’t want to confront her or criticize anything until Richard came home and she could relieve herself of some of the burden Mona represented. There was no magic key. No chance that problems would be solved overnight—if ever. But at least she could breathe. She could breathe twice as deeply, as she was ridding herself of Marlene by the same token and that was no small matter. In the evening, when she locked up, she would have given a bundle for her sister to vaporize on the sidewalk and not reappear until morning. We’d all like to have that power, at least once or twice in life.

  She tried not to think about Marlene being pregnant.

  Thinking about it left her feeling utterly demoralized.

  Now and then she cast sidelong glances at her sister, and it was so strange for her to be there, so improbable after all those years of separation and all those memories floating to the surface, everything she thought she’d forgotten, that she remained speechless, in a state of disbelief. As if she didn’t have her own problems to contend with.

  In the evening, when she went to bed, she sat upright for a moment, chin resting on her knees, and stared at the empty shape next to her, Richard’s spot, and after that she had trouble sleeping despite her fatigue, and she felt that before long she wouldn’t be able to stand the sight of another dog. Or another soldier. Or a single member of her family. She had been telling herself this for years.

  Since Mona was very small. Then came the moment when she took a sleeping pill, or even two, and fell asleep, often with fists clenched.