He keeps changing the channels for several minutes, his face a mask. This kind of hostility is much worse than getting angry or asking her for an explanation. It’s already too late, he doesn’t care anymore. A slight annoyance, an irritation.
She stays standing, planted there like a dope. The shame burns in her heart.
How long has he known, said nothing, let her lie.
She would’ve like to sit down next to him, own up to it, confess, relieve herself of the weight, beg him to understand.
But there’s the smell, she can’t go near him.
Finally he adds, without even turning his head, “On second thought, go clean yourself up. Otherwise I’ll vomit.”
His impeccable profile, You are everything that I love, you are everything that counts, look at me, at least give me your anger, at least give me something, there’s still a connection, there will always be a connection, at least show it to me.
Shower. Soap all over her, she scrubs, like she does every time. Even washes her hair and shines her nails, hostile and maniacal gestures, scouring her whole body. She cries beneath the water, stays shut in there for a long time, afraid to leave.
I want for you to understand, for you to still love me, for you to protect me from all of that, for you to protect me from myself, for you to stop me from doing it, for you to understand how sad it is, to be capable of doing that, to open yourself like I did, to someone other than you, the times he made me orgasm, I would have preferred not to know what I really am.
The towel is very dry, pretty soft, it smells good. She dries herself carefully, she’s crying less. She’ll explain it to him as best she can. She’ll leave the bathroom, find the words one by one for him to hear what she has to say.
Now she is almost at ease. She can’t do it anymore. She’ll go see the big boss and announce: these games are over, I almost wrecked everything.
She must have stayed locked in the bathroom for a long time. When she comes out, the first thing she sees is that his things are missing from all over. He didn’t have a lot, but a notebook always placed here, a few T-shirts piled there, an old book he drags everywhere. A few objects, not much, the void they leave jumps out at her as soon as she walks into the living room. She goes to look in the bedroom; he had enough time to pack his bag. Continues not to look at her. He gently pushes her aside to go into the bathroom, takes his shaving cream, his razor, his cologne, and his comb.
“What are you doing?”
As if it weren’t obvious, as if there were a chance of hearing him respond: “I’m doing a big clean-out,” or “I’m putting away my summer clothes,” or “Come on we’re going on vacation, hurry up and pack your bags.”
He presses his things down to be able to close his bag. He explains, “If I had wanted to be with Claudine, I would have gone to her.”
“You did come to see her though.”
“If you want me to pass by from time to time for a quickie, some coffee, and then take off again, that’s not a problem, I can arrange it.”
The tears come back, still noiseless, she feels them hot against her cheeks and dripping under her chin. He insists, “You have to tell me. Now that you’ve become someone I don’t know, you have to tell me what you want, I can’t guess.”
“Why are you saying that I’ve changed so much?”
“And on top of everything you’re fucking with me?”
For an instant, he gets a little angry, it’s less cruel than the rest, but it hardly lasts. He just adds, “A year ago, when I went to jail, I was going out with a hell of a girl, a real lady. You never cheated on me, I’m sure of it, you never treated me disrespectfully, you never demeaned yourself. I was proud of you, as soon as I saw some bitch on the street I thought of you, I was so fucking proud. But now, look at yourself, look at how you’re dressed, look at how you walk . . . And who’s boning you, over there? Is it a bunch of guys? Do you like it when they fuck you? Do you like it better than when it’s with me? Is it good, do they screw you how you like? I respect you too much, you don’t respect yourself at all anymore. There’s nothing left of this relationship.”
She doesn’t have time to protest, he’s put on his jacket, he’s already at the door. He turns back toward her, strokes her cheek. “I loved you so much. But now you repulse me.”
She hears herself scream, fall to her knees, convulsions. One last time she sees his eyes on her, sees nothing in them but contempt mixed, even so, with a little pity. He slams the door behind him, she’s lying on her back, she stamps her feet and tenses up, howls like a madwoman. She asks herself what kind of show she’s putting on.
SHE WAKES UP for no reason, right in the middle of a dream, the sun has barely risen, the bed empty next to her, it takes her a few seconds to remember the night before.
No way of knowing from where she gets such an incredible tolerance for pain and heartbreak. Probably no greater than anyone else’s, but it feels more intense because it’s happening to her right now.
Waves of disgust churn inside her, lies, violent poisons. She sees herself in the big office, playing his games and doing things, it’s impossible that Sébastien abandoned her for that. Just as it’s unthinkable that he believes she’s changed because of some lipstick and a few low-cut dresses. A misunderstanding, he’ll come back. She can’t lose him, it wouldn’t make any sense, and no girl, anywhere, is made for him the way she is made for him, a misunderstanding, he’ll come back.
She knows very well that that isn’t true. She doesn’t want to know.
Down below men are arguing, drunk, others try to calm them down.
The look he had, before, when he left. And she was on the ground, thrashing about like she’d lost her mind. Even though she knows that it sickens him.
She had never done it before.
Those were Claudine’s games, tantrums at the first sign of a fight, and Pauline had watched her do it with disgust and exasperation.
Did it hurt Claudine as much as it hurt her when earlier . . .? Did she, too, feel powerless, seeing herself shatter into a thousand pieces, no longer knowing what to do and so afraid of being written off as crazy?
Her only sister. Did it chill her in the same way, in the hands of men, seeing them go crazy just from watching her undress, did it chill her in the same way, to be carried away by desires as powerful as they are degrading?
Her only sister. Did she wake up in the same way, in the same bed, sun not yet up? There are tons of sleeping pills in the cupboard, next to the bottles of perfume.
Pauline gets up and gulps down two. Then she waits, lying down, crushed and nauseous. When you hurt the man you love, by tearing yourself down, diminishing yourself, there’s a certain look he gives you. Then that gaze follows you everywhere, is sorry to see what it sees. It hurts down to the bone, not being who you’re supposed be.
WINTER
THE MAKEUP ARTIST IS CURT. SHE IS ANGRY WITH her colleagues, who don’t do a fucking thing and who hide instead of working. Tilts Pauline’s head like this and turns her head like that, look up, now close your eyes. She had sighed when Pauline sat down. “It’s going to take a while to do your foundation.”
There are five of them getting their makeup done at the same time, lined up in front of a big mirror. The weather girl comes to kill time every so often, in a great mood.
Hairdresser. “What am I doing for you?” Just straightening. She tells her to use sweet almond oil on the ends, it’s good for the hair.
Pauline hears that jerk Martin at the other end of the hallway, then he walks in, shrieking, “My darling! How beautiful you are!”
The first single hit two hundred thousand. In less than two months. He can hardly believe it. But it’s made him very friendly, and even decently respectful. He defends her when she’s attacked: “Okay, she got on her knees to get signed. But if you think that all it takes to blow up like she did is to give a little head . . .” with his affected airs.
He kneads her shoulders, asks her if everything�
��s okay. She smiles all the time now. It’s honestly become a kind of reflex; as soon as she hears noise, smile.
Dressing room. Flowers, alcohol, chocolates. Martin came with the publicist. The same person who had once asked, “Shall I send Madame Skank’s single around to all the local kindergartens? Have to get to them early if you want to sell them that shit.”
Two hundred thousand in your face, cunt. At least that’s a language they all understand.
She’s there to promote her second single. The producer is cool, seems nice. He tells people that she’s a “good girl.” He comes to see her. “Everything okay, need anything?”
She says, “I forget where the bathroom is.”
He takes her. A line on the toilet bowl. She tries not to sniff too loudly.
The stage lights up, she does the show. She doesn’t get along with the sound guy, the one who replaced Nicolas. He sulks at having to work with her because his friends make fun of him: “You’re doing pop music for sluts now?” But he doesn’t turn his nose up at the money. Sometimes, though, he changes a part without telling her, just to see how she reacts. Nice try, sweetheart, you can change the entire song, I’ll figure it out, every time. She can easily make herself cry tears of rage by the second verse, and start belting enormous, disconcerting sounds. She’s got this.
In the dressing room, everyone congratulates her. She takes flowers, declines Martin’s invitation—“We’ll go out for a drink, all together?”—to talk shit about everyone, who’s gotten fat, who sells how much, who aged overnight, and who signed where.
A car brings her back to her place. The driver is an old man, Spanish accent. He tells her how he left his wife fifteen years ago, on a whim, for a younger girl. And how he regrets it. “After six months, I understood what a mistake I had made.” But she already had someone new. And since then, he’s been waiting for her. “My children tell me I’m crazy. But I know that she’s the one, there’s no one else.”
That’s the main problem with coke, when you come down from it, it feels shitty. She could cry. She asks him, “And you think she’ll come back?” He’s sure of it. “I’m waiting for her. I’ve put some money aside, for us to grow old together.”
Later, at home, a host of messages have accumulated on the answering machine. Newspaper reporters, TV producers, photographers from somewhere, radio hosts, and a bit of whoever asking for a bit of whatever. She listens to them, wonders if Sébastien will return her call. He went back home, he lives there with a cool girl she knows well. He did it so quickly. Just a matter of convenience.
The big boss left his congratulations, some “my sweetie pie,” some “and I know that it’s just the beginning,” with some “I’m overcome with emotion.”
The day after Sébastien left, she called the big boss. “Can we see each other?” “Yes, yes, of course, come when you like.”
She arrived at the office. “I came to tell you that I can’t make this album.”
At first he thought she was scared; it was three days before the recording session. He took it lightly, patted her shoulder. “It’s the big leap, huh? Now that you’re here you want to backpedal . . . It’s nothing. I believe in you. The day of, you’ll be there, and you’ll be incredible. You’re made for this, I know it.”
She shook her head no, unable to speak, still really mixed up. She started to cry, he approached her, she pushed him away with both hands, “Don’t touch me anymore you fucking pig! Understand? I don’t want to make your stupid album or keep playing your games!”
Then he behaved differently. He waited for her to calm down, canceled all his meetings, let his wife know that he would be home late. They stayed in his office until everyone had left. The first hours, she couldn’t speak anymore, she wanted to leave but had to stop crying first, to avoid bursting into sobs in front of those people and making them laugh. It obsessed her, those people, she kept repeating, “And they’ll be so satisfied, to know I got screwed.”
The big boss let her voice her incoherent thoughts in her fucked-up state. “It’s because of this album that he left. That’s why I don’t want to do it anymore. I don’t want to be a bad person, can you understand that?”
And while she was unloading, she was regretting doing it in front of him, though it was definitely him that she had come to see. She was even angrier with herself because of that. “She passed on all her vice to me. I know I wasn’t like this before. She passed on all this chaos, but I’m not her, I don’t want this.”
He figured it out on his own. He said, “I didn’t know you had a boyfriend.”
“That’s none of your business.”
Finally, he came to sit next to her. Before approaching, he raised his hand. “Don’t worry, I won’t touch you, I didn’t know you were seeing someone.” And suddenly, he started acting like he was talking to his daughter. He apologized, sincerely ashamed. “I think I was wrong about you, Claudine. You know, it’s difficult to know things about someone if they never say a word of what they’re thinking. I’m happy you came to see me.”
Then he took out the whiskey, clinked glasses with her. “To the album, which will be fantastic. And your boyfriend will come back, no one leaves a woman like you. To all the good things in store for you.”
He never made her come by his office again, not even a suspicious gesture. He followed the recording closely, and the release, even doubling his zeal, to prove to her what kind of guy he was. The kind you can count on.
She’s at home. Not tired. She tries to reach her dealer, but his voice mail is always full. She mainly just wants to see him, he’s the only person she really likes right now. He’s always smiling, recounting his impossible missions; when he’s not trafficking metro passes it’s contraband cigarettes or Hermès scarves brought back from exotic countries. “We pass the tollbooth, I see border control, I felt myself dissolve. I said to myself: you’re done for.” And then he gets away with it every time.
She doesn’t turn on the TV because she sees herself on it too often. Impossible to get used to her own stupid face. It takes a lot of work to sell that shit. She is surrounded by herself. Never has she existed so little, no life, nothing. But she’s everywhere. People have violent words for her, she’s the bitch you love to hate.
She rolls a big joint with two papers, to kill off her brain cells, she does it every night now. Doesn’t feel well enough to run around in circles not giving a shit.
“CLAUDINE, PICK UP, it’s important.”
Dead of night. She was in the middle of a dream full of leaks, the walls in her apartment were crumbling plank by plank, and the ceiling was decomposing. She needs some time, to emerge and then to understand. It’s the big boss on the answering machine. She doesn’t move. Can’t she sleep in peace?
He insists, “Pick up, please.”
She’s heavy when she gets up, everything in her wants to be asleep, to be lying down, hearing nothing. The answering machine cuts off, he had been talking for too long. She looks at the clock, it’s 6:30. He gets up every day at that time, to work out. An old man’s body needs to be looked after. It rings again immediately, she picks up. He’s annoyed.
“You should have warned me you had done that. We could have done something . . .”
“Hang on, hang on. That I did what?”
“You can’t guess? It involves a certain videotape. They wrote a huge article about it. Tomorrow all of Paris will be talking about it and nothing else.”
“I still don’t understand.”
She could have fallen asleep where she was standing. And now’s the moment he speaks in riddles.
“Your porno, my dear. It was going to catch up with you one day or another, you should have known. Why didn’t you say anything? A big company bought it, they’re going to do a lot of publicity for it, it’s going to be bad bad bad for us—”
“My porno!”
“Are you telling me you don’t remember?”
“No, no, no, I do. Of course. You don’t forget something l
ike that.”
“Do you have it at your place?”
“Uh . . . no. I didn’t keep it.”
“I’ll have it sent to me. Let’s meet later, at one? We have to see what we can do. I’ll warn the lawyer, he’ll be there. I’ll—”
“Can you send a courier with a copy for me too? To refresh my memory.”
When she hangs up, it makes her laugh. A nervous laugh, inappropriate. But at the same time, it’s genuinely funny.
She goes back to bed. And dives back into her dream full of leaks. The floor has given way, the apartment is threatening to collapse, and the landlord doesn’t want to do anything about it.
It’s called Luck Be Two Ladies, Claudine being one of those ladies. She’s pictured on the cover, blowing a guy.
Pauline is more awake when it arrives. She hesitates before watching it.
It begins, Claudine is at home. Her own apartment, where Pauline is at this moment.
She’s in front of her Minitel, bare ass under a T-shirt, very serious look, she writes down a telephone number, hits END CONNECTION. Then she calls someone. “So, my darling scoundrel, are you going to make me come?” She gives her address and the code, then tells him she’s waiting for him, that they’re really going to have some fun.
We see her getting ready. She takes a shower, then puts on a garter belt. It’s all filmed at her place. We see her in front of the mirror, trying on sexy underwear. Then she puts on makeup and perfume. Right when she’s done, the doorbell rings. She goes to open it for the guy, he starts groping her immediately, says that he’s lucky. “I found me one hell of a girl.”
He brought a bottle of whiskey, he wants her to serve him on all fours, he strokes her ass while she’s doing it, pleased, “You didn’t put on any underwear, like I told you, that’s nice, your pussy’s soft, you’re already wet, you slut.” Then he wants her to suck him off, but without using her hands. That’s important: no hands. While she does that, his cell phone rings, he picks up. He explains, “I’m in the middle of getting a blow job. Hang on, don’t hang up.” And he tells Claudine, “Lick my balls a little,” then to his friend, “You want to come over? She’s the kind of whore that can handle two.”
Pretty Things Page 15
