Some Dream for Fools

by Faïza Guène

  The nice waitress, whose name is Josiane, brought me my espresso with the kind of smile that makes you want to come back even if the coffee is disgusting. Curious, she asked me what I was writing with such an air of concentration. So I invented a whole life for myself, I imagined I was someone important, to see what that would make me in the eyes of a person I didn't know. I just wanted to know what kind of feeling it would stir in others and I decided that Josiane would be my guinea pig for this idiotic exercise.

  "Are you doing homework?"

  "No, not at all."

  "Ah. So what are you writing then?"

  "I write stories that are published every week in a magazine."

  "Really? Wow, that's cool ... What sort of stories? Love stories? Stories about crimes of passion? Because I love reading, I know all the books of Pierre Bellemare practically by heart ... And also every Wednesday I buy Detective, I don't know if you know it but it's full of sordid stories, assassinations, rapes, children shut up in closets. If you want to give them a peek there are the last ten issues over on the bar. My boss wants me to take them away because he says they give our customers bad ideas, but people ask for them, they like them so much. And like I say, the ones you find leaning at the bar here are often the ones who don't have much to say, and they give them something to talk about. Don't you think?"

  "Yes, miss, you're certainly right about that—"

  "Oh but you can call me Josiane! My name's Josiane Vittani and I've been working here for at least ten years. Everyone knows me around here."

  "I'm Stephanie Jacquet, but I sign all my articles Jacqueline Stephanet, just to keep myself anonymous."

  "Delighted, Stephanie," she said as she gave me her hand covered in rings.

  "Pleased to meet you, Josiane!"

  "So if it's not love stories or crime stories, what is it?"

  "They're more like social stories, I'd say. Stories about people who struggle sometimes because society hasn't given them the choice, who try to pull themselves through and find a little bit of happiness."

  "And people find that interesting?"

  Good question, Josiane. I hope so, deep down, but all the same I should have told you that I wrote love stories, of obsession and betrayal. It's safe to assume that interests people. But the story I want to write looks something like this:

  It would be i960, on a beautiful, sunny afternoon. A MAN would come looking for a WOMAN. They would have a date.

  While he would be in the middle of parking his Vespa below her house, she would be watching him from the bathroom window and saying quietly: "Oh, he's so handsome." She would powder the tip of her nose one last time before going down to join him. He would be thrilled to see her, she would have missed him enormously these past days and you'd notice a stain on his jeans. Then they would kiss fervently. Then they would both get on the Vespa and take to the road. A light breeze would caress their faces and they would tell each other about the grandeur of their love.

  Arriving at the roundabout at the shopping center, ANOTHER MAN would suddenly intercept them. In his hard face you would know right away that he was the villain in the story. He would say something like: "Hey! You two! Stop!" Then the young WOMAN would get worried all of a sudden and say something like: "Oh shit! Fuck! It's my asshole brother!" At that point a terrible brawl would break out between the brother and the MAN, all hits would be allowed, dirty punches, sucker punches, Trafalgar punches—punches that will have unknown consequences for years to come...

  The brother suddenly takes the MAN by the neck and says: "Listen to me good, coward, this is the last time I'm going to see you running around with my sister, you understand?" And then he would turn to his poor sister: "And you little slut! I don't want you going out ever again with a guy like that—black, illegal, Muslim, orphaned, unemployed, with a record! Otherwise I'll kill you, you little whore." Then she would try to defend herself: "But I love him!" And the brother, pigheaded, would reply: "I don't give a shit!" So the two lovers would be separated by the villain-brother, a militant member of the National Front, but the lovesick and valiant MAN would swear to return to his beautiful girl...

  The moral of the story, it has to be truly sappy, is that this sort of love has no color, no religion, no social security number ... I'm deep in my own world and it's very nice. Josiane offers me an espresso and invites me back whenever I want. I think that the Café des Histoires will become my regular spot. I'll come back with my little notebook, stolen from the Leclerc store down the avenue, or with my friends, or with Tonislav if he decides to call me again. I would never have believed that I would fall for an illegal Yugo with a gold-capped tooth.

  There's No Point in Running if You're Chasing a Cheetah

  "Where are you going now?"

  "Out."

  "Don't mess with me, I can see that you're going out, so stop trying to be slick. Answer my question, Foued, where are you going."

  "I'm going to the basement to play video games with everyone. I'll be back in half an hour..."

  "Who's everyone?"

  "Shit, you're annoying. Everyone is the same as always: Abdoullah, Bensaïd, Hassan, and the brothers Villo, Nikolas and Tomas. I don't understand why you have to play the big heavy, the boys don't report to anyone—"

  "I already told you that I don't like it when you hang out with them, they make you hateful, it's a bad crew, they're idiots and you're getting worse than them—"

  "Their mothers say the same things about me."

  "Fine, go, get lost, and I hope that it's not to go watch your porn DVD, you band of dirty little thugs."

  "Whatever, I don't need to go to the basement for that, I have a TV in my room—"

  "Ahhh! Get out, move it! Go on, get out! Don't tell me the story of your life, you little pig. You think that you can spread your wings because you're sixteen? Don't forget that you pissed the bed until you were eight and eight is only half of sixteen! And don't forget either who cleaned your little piss-covered swizzle stick back then!"

  Around then he galloped across the apartment hallway like a crazy person, stuck on his sneakers, letting his mocking laugh ring out. The shit pellet is getting his jollies at the idea that he could have made me sick of him and runs off carrying his soccer and combat games under his arms. All the same there's no risk that I'll get tired of my only brother whom I raised since he was just a baby. On the other hand, the more he grows, the more I want to slap him every morning, the chétane. And he plays it close to the wire because he's completely aware of his powers of seduction. It's true that Foued is a very attractive kid, he has nice skin that doesn't get shiny, black mischievous eyes, nice teeth, a reasonably toned body for his age, and his golden rule, summer and winter, hair shorn almost to a shave. And if I ask him why he doesn't let it grow out a little he says to me:

  "If I let my hair grow, it'll look nasty. With my frizzy Arab hair, it would be like I had a carpet on my skull. It's for street cred."

  When he turned sixteen I let him pierce his ear but he had to earn it. He wanted it, that's for sure. When he came back to it a little later he had improved his grades at school and sometimes even did the dishes for me.

  "You want me to dry, Ahlème ?"

  "Ahlème who?"

  "Ahlème the sister I love with all my heart."

  "What else...?"

  "The most wonderful, the most intelligent, and the hottest chick in all of Insurrection."

  "Good, that's enough, not bad but I think you went a little too far this round, you degraded yourself. You shoved your pride way down deep into your ass, I can see that you really want this piercing don't you?"

  "Yeah, I want it and I'm going to have it, no matter what happens!"

  "You must be pretty sure of yourself to say that—"

  "I mean, if my dear sister says I can do it, of course."

  "There, I like that better."

  So I ended up agreeing. Against my will, of course, but I agreed. All the same he deserved to be rewarded for all his
work. The day that he came home with a diamond in his ear, I took it hard, I admit. I had a hard time swallowing it. It bothers me that my little brother looks like all those R&B singers and, honestly, less masculine than me.

  But then I didn't give in on everything. Foued wanted to go to Leclerc together and have me buy him a blond rinse—L'Oréal Excellence Crème. That one, my good man, is out of the question. I would rather he tattoo a scorpion on his abs like Joey Starr, that would be less traumatizing.

  He does take care of himself, the little idiot. Mornings are hell, he has a whole ritual, he races to the bathroom. He spends hours in there. He wastes all his pocket money and his school money on clothes and creams. I tell him all the time that it's shameful for a boy his age. My brother's generation, it's the "G" generation, which in their lingo means a fine thing, a tight guy ... And not only is Foued a real, clean G but he also only hangs with G's. Their slogan is: "G or nothing." And when they pass by girls, the djoufs as they call them, they make like peacocks and the girls go into raptures in front of them: "Aww, look at the boys, look at the tenda G's!" which does nothing but inflate their already abnormally overdeveloped narcissism.

  My brother is so bigheaded that sometimes I could really thump him. His tango with the blond rinse, I found the whole thing a little too much. Under the influence of the pop-psych books Nawel lends me now and then, I even told him that if he didn't know who he was anymore he could ask himself some questions about what felt out of whack and we could talk about it. He answered me, laughing: "Don't worry, I'm not gay, is that what you think?"

  Bleached hair has been the style for a few years. As summer nears you see all these blond heads rise up from nowhere, a wave of little chicks walking around the neighborhood. That can make a style "fresh-groovy-smooth-now," but it can also scare little children too. It cuts both ways. I'm afraid that Foued will wreak havoc later. He's my little brother, it was me who raised him, but I think that he will be a real bastard with the ladies. I can tell. The phone rings a lot more these days and I regularly hear the voices of the little honeys who want to speak to him.

  Today, despite myself, I had to referee a ping-pong match, a real pro event, like the ones with the super-quick Chinese who play so fast that you have trouble following the ball. Two chicks called one after the other, it felt like the words passed each other, except that Foued wasn't there right then. I cracked fast enough when one of the two took the liberty of telling me her life story and I sent her packing. I was cold, it's true, but at the same time she had some serious nerve.

  "Excuse me, it's Eva again, I already called just now for—"

  "Yes, I remember that you already called, you're not teaching me anything there. What do you want now?"

  "Uh ... I wanted to know if Foued came back yet or not?"

  "You called no less than ten minutes ago and I told you that he would be back in around half an hour, true or false?"

  "Uh ... true."

  "So if you know how to count to thirty, he'll be back in about twenty minutes, so please be a good girl and stop calling because it's really starting to bug me."

  "You his sister?"

  "Yes, exactly, his sister, not his secretary."

  "Does a girl named Vanessa also call your house?"

  "Am I asking you questions? We don't know each other, I'm not your friend, I am not even your age! Did I ask you the color of your underwear? There is no Vanessa who calls here and soon there won't be an Eva either."

  "There's no reason to talk to me like that, I won't call anymore."

  "Great news. Bye."

  I had forgotten how painful it was to be sixteen. The second honey called a few minutes later. Her name was, in fact, Vanessa. It's a good name for a little breezy. I didn't even let her have the time to introduce herself before I hung up.

  I'm taking advantage of Foued's absence to clean up his bedroom a little bit because he doesn't really appreciate my intrusions into his "sector," as he calls his room. Fatal error. Tell me about the mess in your room and I will tell you who you are. And so I can tell you that Foued is a little oblivious fuckhead. Just thinking that I would clean up the cracked drawer filled with useless things, I find packages of multicolored condoms. I see that the Monsieur denies himself nothing. Getting ready to sort through the clothes all jumbled in the closet, I take out three big trash bags filled with women's handbags—Lancaster, Vuitton, Lancel—and as I go past them ... I find a shoe box under the bed with bundles of bills. Not two bills, not three, not ten, not twenty or more. Bundles.

  I can't even believe it when I discover all this. I'm crushed. It's impossible that this is his. But yes, it has to be his.

  The first idea that comes to me is to take it all, put it in the toilet, and pull our old friend the flusher. As for the bags, I would burn them in the empty lot behind the hill. But this sort of nonsense is vigilante justice, the kind you see in moralist American movies where honesty wins out over everything. Only here, it's real life, and in real life I don't really want my little brother to shoot himself. So I don't touch anything without knowing more.

  I prepared something for The Boss to eat, read him the newspaper, listened to him talk about the endless domino games he played at Lakhdar when he lived on the rue des Martyrs. The Boss was very good, he won every round, every time he had the best combinations. The others envied him, especially Abdelhamid, who always tried to figure it out: "But Moustafa, how in the devil do you beat your opponent and win all the points? Maybe you have a special technique that you don't want to share with us? Or maybe you put a spell on the domino games at Lakhdar?" Nothing of the sort. The Boss's only technique was to trust in luck. Someday I would like to succeed in following this life philosophy, only, too bad for me, I don't believe in luck, or trust either. Today I don't believe in much. I believe in Allah who is my only guide and in public aid too, thanks to which I survive.

  The Boss is finally sleeping. Everything is almost getting peaceful again.

  Foued's been gone for nearly four hours, not "half an hour" like he promised before he went down to the basement. Though now I'm not at all sure that he really went down to the basement, I'm no longer certain of anything to tell the truth.

  He came into the apartment, playing cool, whistling the tune from some ad for pickles that runs all the time lately. He doesn't know what's waiting for him, the poor thing, I'm going to fry him up like a sausage. Sitting on his bed in the shadows, I watch him come in.

  "Ahlème! Ahlème! Where are you? Is The Boss sleeping?"

  He moves into his room, feeling his way in the dark and pressing the light switch. He jumps, surprised to see me there.

  "Fuck! I nearly shit myself! You scared me! What happened? Why are you kicking around here in the dark?"

  I say nothing in reply, just look at him. I want to rise up and annihilate him.

  "Answer! What are you on? It's like you're possessed! Naâl chétane."

  I stand up, grab him by the neck, flatten him against the wall, and then shake him wildly like I have a rag doll in front of me.

  "You little shit! Where does it come from—all the crap I found in your room?"

  "What are you talking about? Let go of me! You're sick!"

  "I'm not letting go! And stop fucking around with me! You want me to choke you? You know exactly what I'm talking about, asshole. The paper in the shoe box, the handbags in the closet! And the jimmies in the drawer, what's all that?"

  Caught off-guard, he violently pushes me away. I lose my balance and find myself back on his bed. I stand up again and throw myself at him even harder. The energy with which I catch him by the throat shocks even me. I squeeze his neck and start wailing with rage.

  "I asked you where it came from! Answer me before I kill you! Answer me!"

  "Stop! Please stop! You're hurting me—"

  "And me? You think that I'm just all right? I kill myself for you, I did everything for you!"

  "I can't breathe, let go—"

  The Boss is awake. Hi
s voice drags me out of my mania.

  "I can't sleep. Turn off the television!"

  "Go to sleep, Papa! It's fine, don't worry, the TV's off."

  I take Foued by the shoulders and push him so he's sitting on his bed. He touches his neck like he's trying to make sure it's still there, that his head is still really attached to his body. I must have gone at him pretty hard, he's all red and his eyes are popping out of his head.

  "It's not worth getting all bent, I'm going to tell you. The money's not mine. It's the big dogs', I'm holding it for them, that's all ... I swear to you it's not mine, I swear—"

  "You're holding it for them?"

  "Yeah, I'm holding it for them. They pass it to me to keep for a few days and afterward they come pick it up and in exchange they slip me an ace, leave me fifty euros or something like that—"

  "Are you joking? What about the bags?"

  "That's one of the bigs who trusted us with a little deal, that's all."

  I sit down near him—if I stay standing up much longer I'm going to die.

  "What do you mean, 'deal'? And who are they, these bigs?"

  "It means that they give us some stuff and we have to clear it out, so we sell it and there you go. Then at the end they give us some cash. It's like that."

  "Like with the DVDs?"

  "Yeah—"

  "Yeah ... That's all you say ... Last time didn't teach you a lesson? I swear you're completely oblivious! Did you think about the cops? What would happen if you got picked up? They'd want to come and do a search of the house. What did you think, my friend? The big guys are bastards, they'll use you as a cover, you understand? You want The Boss to have a heart attack when the cops come here, is that it? And me too, while we're at it? Fuck ... I want to kill you! What do you want?"