Pretty Things

by Virginie Despentes

  Published in 2018 by the Feminist Press

  at the City University of New York

  The Graduate Center

  365 Fifth Avenue, Suite 5406

  New York, NY 10016

  feministpress.org

  First Feminist Press edition 2018

  Copyright © 1998 by Éditions Grasset & Fasquelle

  Translation copyright © 2018 by Emma Ramadan

  Les jolies choses by Virginie Despentes was originally published in France by Éditions Grasset & Fasquelle in 1998.

  All rights reserved.

  This work received support from the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States through their publishing assistance program.

  This book was made possible thanks to a grant from New York State Council on the Arts with the support of Governor Andrew M. Cuomo and the New York State Legislature.

  No part of this book may be reproduced, used, or stored in any information retrieval system or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without prior written permission from the Feminist Press at the City University of New York, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.

  First printing August 2018

  Cover illustration by Molly Crabapple

  Cover and text design by Drew Stevens

  Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

  Names: Despentes, Virginie, 1969- author. | Ramadan, Emma, translator.

  Title: Pretty things / Virginie Despentes; translated by Emma Ramadan.

  Other titles: Jolies choses. English

  Description: First Feminist Press edition. | New York: Feminist Press, 2018. | “Copyright (c) 1998 by Editions Grasset & Fasquelle”—ECIP galley. | Identifiers: LCCN 2017056600 (print) | LCCN 2018006832 (ebook) | ISBN 9781936932269 (ebook)

  Subjects: LCSH: Sisters—Fiction. | False personation—Fiction.

  Classification: LCC PQ2664.E7895 (ebook) | LCC PQ2664.E7895 J6513 2018 (print) | DDC 843/.914—dc23

  LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2017056600

  To

  My parents,

  Dominique, the empress Caroline,

  Hacène & Emil Louis-Stéphane,

  Nora Hamdi Mehdi, Varouj, Rico,

  Tofick Zingo de Lunch & Vartan

  CONTENTS

  TITLE PAGE

  COPYRIGHT

  DEDICATION

  Spring

  Summer

  Autumn

  Winter

  ABOUT THE AUTHOR & TRANSLATOR

  ALSO BY FEMINIST PRESS

  ABOUT FEMINIST PRESS

  SPRING

  CHTEAU ROUGE. A TERRACE, ON A SIDEWALK, IN the middle of construction. They’re seated side by side. Claudine is blond, in a short pink dress that seems sensible but leaves some of her chest visible, the perfect doll, meticulously put together. Even her way of slouching, elbows on the table, legs spread out, has something refined about it. Nicolas’s eyes are very blue, he always looks like he’s laughing, about to do something mischievous.

  He says, “Fuck it’s nice out.”

  “Yeah, it hurts your eyes.”

  She forgot her sunglasses at home, she creases her forehead and adds, “I feel weird, seriously. Like right now, it’s burning.” She touches her throat and swallows.

  Indulging her, Nicolas shrugs his shoulders slightly. “If you didn’t pop antidepressants like they were candy, you’d probably feel better.”

  She breathes a long sigh, raises her eyebrows.

  “I don’t feel like you’re being very supportive.”

  “Likewise. You could even say I feel more fucked now that I know you.”

  “I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

  He’s tempted to get angry, point out that she isn’t funny, but it stays lodged in his throat and he settles for smiling. The waiter arrives, flings down two coasters and two half-pints on top of them. Impeccable moves. The bubbles rise through the gold in straight, rapid lines. They clink glasses mechanically, exchanging a brief glance. At the next table, a kid makes noise slurping the bottom of his grenadine with a straw.

  Nicolas stubs out his unfinished cigarette, really flattens it to make sure it goes out, and declares, “It’ll never work. It’s impossible to mix you two up.”

  “Good one, sweetheart, we’re only twin sisters.”

  “So how do you explain that I didn’t even recognize her when I went to get her at the train station?”

  Claudine pouts comically, revealing she doesn’t get it either.

  Nicolas insists, “She passed right under my nose, I didn’t raise an eyebrow when I saw her. It wasn’t until all the passengers cleared out and we found ourselves alone, side by side, that I saw a vague resemblance between you and her.”

  “Maybe you’re kind of an idiot. Have to take that into account.”

  The waiter passes by their table, Nicolas signals for him to bring two more of the same. Then, rubbing his forehead with two fingers, looks into the distance as if he were contemplating the issue. When he’s had enough of not talking, he goes off again.

  “She’s nuts, your sister, totally insane.”

  “She’s just grunge. Compared to the freaks Paris churns out, I find her pretty calm.”

  “There’s no denying it. In the course of an afternoon, I heard her say exactly four words, and they were ‘You can fuck off.’ You call that calm?”

  “Put yourself in her shoes, she’s on the defensive.”

  “What bothers me is that you didn’t even warn me. You forgot to tell me lots of things, I’m sure.”

  She tenses, turns her head toward him, and he knows this face, when she loses her composure and becomes downright nasty.

  “Do you plan on being a pain in the ass all day? If it bothers you, then by all means, don’t force yourself. Go home, don’t worry about a thing. We’ll make do without you.”

  She doesn’t leave him time to respond, gets up and goes to the bathroom. The lock is all rusted and falling to pieces, yellow traces of cigarettes like scars on the toilet paper roll. Squat toilet, be careful not to spray your feet too much when you flush.

  Chest struck with a strange heaviness, she wants to be somewhere else. Rid of herself. That horrible anxiety is ingrained, it wakes up at the same time as her and doesn’t let up until she’s had a few beers.

  She sits back down next to Nicolas. A girl passes by in a combination of snakeskin and bizarre platform shoes. Farther off, a man yells, “Stop, thief!” Some people run and others get involved. Elsewhere, a honk, like a foghorn, as if an ocean liner were docking in the neighborhood.

  Claudine rummages in her bag, takes out her cash and spreads it on the table, announcing, “No tips for assholes, that guy pisses me off.”

  “The waiter? What’d he do to you?”

  “He doesn’t even try. He sucks.”

  She pockets the pack of cigarettes and the lighter, concludes dryly, “So will you go with her or not?”

  “I told you I’d do it, so I’ll do it.”

  “Great. Let’s go?”

  She has a slightly satisfied glimmer in her eye. She gets up and waits for him, then in a relieved tone, “I love it when it starts to get hot out, don’t you?”

  Nicolas and Claudine have known each other for a while now.

  The day she came to live in Paris. She remembers like it was yesterday. Decision made without any planning, she was talking to a girl on the phone, listed off their friends to bitch about them. She heard herself say, “Anyway, I’m taking off, I’m going to Paris, I don’t want this life anymore, where tomorrow never means anything.” And, hanging up, realized that
she was really going to do it; they weren’t empty words.

  Filled a bag, this and that, whatever, the stuff people bring. Line at the ticket counter, first-class ticket even though she barely had a dime, for the symbolism; she wasn’t going to arrive there like a fucking piece of trash. A little girl wouldn’t leave her alone—“Por favor, madame, por favor”—Claudine looked at her, said no, but the little girl didn’t let up, followed her all the way to the escalator. “Por favor . . . s’il vous plaît.”

  Spent the train ride in a strange mood, a budding impatience that would never leave her again. For real life to begin, whatever that meant.

  Leaving the train station, she’s struck by it all. The streets are enormous and packed with cars, commotion everywhere, all the Parisians hurried and stressed. She walked for hours, big eyes gazing out at the world, bag heavy and cumbersome, cutting into her palm and shoulder. At each street corner a new spectacle, imposing monuments and a flood of passersby. The smell of money was everywhere, an almost tangible current. And in her head, on a loop, I will eat you, you giant city, I will swallow you whole.

  Night fell rapidly. Claudine all alone in a McDonald’s, a guy came and sat next to her. Classy shoes, nice watch, all-around wealthy appearance. He made his preliminary moves, testing the ground, judged her favorable.

  He was probably used to trying his luck with young women, brought her to eat at another place. A very chic restaurant, he must have deemed her worth the money.

  When she said she didn’t have anywhere to sleep, he felt he ought to warn her that he could only put her up for a night. Relieved all the same: it wouldn’t be money wasted, she wouldn’t take off at the last minute. Laughing, as if it were obvious, Claudine assured him, “I’m not going to move in!”

  But she already knew that if she liked the apartment, she would stay as long as she wanted. She knew guys like him: male nymphos with a compulsive and insatiable need to be reassured, so vulnerable. She possessed everything necessary to control that kind of guy.

  She played the girl who nearly cries because he made her come so good, then the girl who’s grateful to be satisfied so well, just as quickly followed by the girl who doesn’t get too attached, who isn’t too curious or too talkative, discreet signs of admiration with a zest of I’m used to people treating me like a princess so you better behave, to nurture within him a constant latent panic and the feeling that he’d nabbed a real prize.

  She must have done what she needed to because the next night the man insisted she move in. She resisted a little—“We hardly know each other, we’re not kids anymore, living with someone isn’t easy”—to make sure he didn’t have any reservations. But right away he responded positively—“When love presents itself, you have to take the risk”—nimbly convinced that it inspired the same in her: a powerful jolt of rare passion. She certainly didn’t deny it.

  Life at his place was pleasant, even though he wanted to have sex all the time.

  Disgust locked away, instinctively, that had always been her way, her exterior was all smiles, loving and serene. It stayed inside, her desire to vomit, and a certain astonishment each time: how incredible it was that people ever took anyone at face value.

  Thankfully, most of the time he went out to do things, and she was left alone at his place. Let the days go by.

  Paris was a more difficult city than she had imagined. Bursting with people just like her, set on carving out a good life for themselves. So she let time pass, worked out so that her body would be impeccable when the time came. Because the moment would come, she didn’t doubt that yet.

  A Sunday, winter sun, she went to the corner to buy some smokes. Long line of people at the only open tabac. A guy leaning against the bar was meticulously scratching his lottery ticket with a guitar pick. She watched him while she waited for her change. He was bland, sort of blond but not really, sort of tall but not really, blue eyes that could have been green, not poorly dressed but not well dressed either. Scraggly, nice smile, a nonchalance that suited him. Completely harmless, that was her first thought. Raising his head, he caught her eye, huge smile.

  “A thousand bucks. I don’t believe it! I never win anything.”

  “Maybe your luck is changing.”

  “I wouldn’t go that far, but I’ll take it. Can I buy you a beer?”

  He was over the moon. A radiant sparkle somewhere in the blue of his eyes. He called over the clerk, winning ticket in his hand, showing it off, proud of himself. Turned toward her again, “So, are you having something?”

  She had almost said no, purely out of habit of declining this kind of invitation. But she liked the look of his face, right off the bat. She thought it would be worth it to have a drink with him, accepted.

  As for Nicolas, he examined this prized knockout, amazed to feel so entirely ready to trust her.

  As far as bitches went, she blew everyone else away. Her white jeans and tight blouse like a second skin, accepting his invitation to have a drink. What did she want from him, with her big tits, her flat stomach, her curved hips, and why? She had a mesmerizing ass, and she knew exactly which pants to put it in.

  They threw one back at the counter. She laughed easily, seemed happy to be there. He proposed, “Let’s sit down for another?”

  “Are you going to throw it all away on beer?”

  “With all the debts I have to pay, it’s already spent.”

  She had perfect white teeth. She played with her hair a lot, one of her ways of being ravishing.

  “It’s been ages since I had a drink at a bar. Not since I’ve been here, actually, almost three months. I don’t have a dime, I can’t even buy good cigarettes.”

  She waved her pack of smokes with an amused disgust. Then raised her beer to cheers him, waiting for him to clink his glass. She smelled good, he could smell her from his seat. She folded her hands on the table prudently, her nails were pink. It was impossible for Nicolas to figure out if she was dressed all trashy like this is my thing, or if she actually thought it looked good.

  Later, after many more drinks, he asked her, “But why do you dress like such a slut?” Rolling her eyes she responded, “Listen, darling, you can feed me all the lies in the world, what I know is that all men adore this. Whether or not it’s absurd is besides the point, what matters is that it works every time.”

  Three drinks later, she was telling him her life story: “I live with him, honestly he’s nice. That’s kind of the problem, I feel like I’m sleeping in honey. It’s fine, it’s sweet, but it’s sticky, and besides, I’ve had better. Anyway, it’s temporary, as soon as I find a way to make money I’ll get a room, even a shitty one. Sometimes, when he’s there, I go out for a walk, I look up at the apartments with balconies, huge windows, and yards in the middle of the city . . .”

  And it was true, later on he’d see, when he was walking with her she would often stop, extend her arm to point out a window, “One day, I’ll live there,” and her eyes would light up, she was so sure of it, she knew how to be patient.

  She kept talking, wasn’t hard to listen to. “Starting out, it’s like I’m expected to clean toilets without batting an eye. That’s the only way I can be here, on the alert, but the first chance I get, I’ll jump at it. It’ll take the time it takes.”

  She chewed her bottom lip while she spoke, he noticed sometimes, asking himself if he was imagining the tears of rage that rose in her eyes.

  She must not have been a regular drinker because she couldn’t control herself at all, was in a daze, her eyes staring off into space.

  “Why did you come to Paris?”

  “To be an actress.”

  “In porn?”

  It came out on its own, but you had to admit she looked the part. She just wrinkled her eyes, like she had swallowed something bitter. He stuttered, a vague hope of redeeming himself, “I really didn’t say that to hurt you, I know a lot of girls who—”

  “I don’t give a shit about the girls you know, and I don’t give a shit wh
at you think of me. I’m not so naive that I don’t know what I look like. And I’m not so naive to wait for someone to tell me what I’m capable or not capable of doing either. Time will tell where I end up. And I’ll laugh at all those people who took me for an idiot. I’ll show them.”

  She stood up straight as she spoke, her entire chest stuck out against the world, and then she slouched all at once, comically, self-consciously.

  “But anyway, I’m also not so naive to think I’m the only girl to say that.”

  She kept quiet for a moment.

  “Let’s have one more?”

  “Won’t your man be worried?”

  “Yeah. We were supposed to spend a wonderful afternoon together, watching dubbed action movies and smoking the disgusting pot he gets in the shitty part of town. The kids rip him off, I’m too scared to tell him. But honestly, we’re smoking henna. Anyway, you’re right, I have to get going.”

  “You want another or not?”

  “Just a quick one.”

  The next morning, he got up to puke and she was on the sofa. He didn’t really remember how she’d ended up in his living room. They had coffee, it was comfortable. She stayed with him until she found an apartment. They became friends almost inadvertently, by virtue of always being happy to see each other and always wanting to.

  Three months ago, Nicolas—who was meeting someone near Claudine’s place—went by to see if she was there. “Buy me a coffee?”

  He found her overjoyed. “You know Duvon, the producer? He’s down for the record, I have to call him as soon as the demo’s ready. Listen, I think he’s really into it. The guy really wants to give me a shot. I’ve been telling you about it for a while now, haven’t I?”

  He turned his eyes away from the TV screen where a guy—filmed from the ceiling for no apparent reason except to make it look shitty—approached another guy in the bathroom to shoot him in the head, calling him “my angel.”

  “The demo?”

  “Yeah. I lied, I told him it was almost ready. I thought of your tracks, you know, the two I really like . . .”