by Lucy Wadham
Lola saw that the streets were busier. And the passers-by did not seem so languid. They hurried purposefully along the streets. Paco was right; it was thriving. Here was somewhere to bring up their boy. Then she thought of Astrid, alone in Paris, and her spirits sank.
Paco dropped her off outside the town hall. He made her promise to meet him for a drink that evening. With or without Mikel, he said. Lola waved as he and the sleeping youth drove on to the terminus at the school for mountain guides.
*
Lola turned the pages of a magazine in the waiting room of the town hall. Through the open windows came the cries of more children playing on the pelota court below. She raised her head to listen. She could hear the strange sonar of the swallows, ravelling the children’s call and pulling it with them into the deep mountain sky. Not long ago she had written:
I don’t long for children, Mikel. I long for your children. It’s a desire so deep in me that it’s like knowledge. It can’t be undone.
But she had not sent the letter.
The magazine was a tourist guide to the region. She looked at the picturesque photographs of her village, of the surrounding valleys and hills where she had spent her childhood, and experienced no sense of recognition.
The listing of this unique region by UNESCO as a biosphere reserve has helped to maintain the precious equilibrium between biological diversity and economic and cultural development. Henceforth the Social and Economic Activity Harmonisation and Development Plan has enabled us to achieve our goal of ‘sustainable development’.
She turned over the magazine to see who ‘us’ might be. Eusko Jaurlaritza: the Basque Government. She tossed the magazine onto the table beside her and looked at the clock. It had been almost an hour. She stood up and opened the door and looked out into the deserted corridor. She followed the muted sound of voices and stopped outside an office marked Cultural Affairs. She knocked softly and opened the door. A woman was on the phone. At the sight of Lola she smiled and held up her hand. She had dark hair with a razor-sharp fringe. Her blue eyes were made up like Cleopatra’s.
Lola looked at the posters on the walls and waited for the woman to finish. There was a large photograph of part of a Gothic arch, one of a heron with a fish in its beak and another of three fishermen unravelling their nets in some port, which she did not recognise. The woman hung up.
Yes? How can I help you?
I’m waiting for the mayor. It’s been forty minutes. Does he know I’m here? The woman who showed me into the waiting room seems to have gone.
I’m afraid he’s left. She looked at her watch, holding it delicately on her wrist. He had a lunch.
Suddenly Lola knew that this woman and Txema were fucking each other.
That’s a pity. As I said, I’ve been waiting for some time. I came from Paris to see him.
The woman sat up a little straighter in her chair. She picked up a pen from her desk.
From Paris?
Lola nodded.
Can I help you at all?
I’m afraid not. It’s personal. I’m an old friend. Can you tell me where he might be having lunch?
I wish I could.
What’s your name? Lola asked pleasantly.
Now the woman was on her guard.
Lorea Molina.
Lola nodded slowly. Manuela was right. She did have a hard face.
Well, Lorea, she said. I won’t waste any more of your time. She took a step towards the door.
And your name is?
Lola. Just say Lola dropped by. Tell him I’ll be at my mother’s.
Lola hurried along the corridor, down the wide oak stairs, and out through the main door. At the bottom of the stone steps, she stopped. A football rolled towards her feet. She kicked it back to the boys and walked on. Who was Lorea Molina? The name was familiar. Lola sat down on the stone wall that surrounded the pelota court. Here was recognition: the strange clarity in her head and the tingling numbness in her body that was fear. She stood up and walked on down the road to Txema’s bar.
THIRTEEN
Kader stood under the hot sun facing the slowly shunting traffic as it edged forward onto the motorway. With his good arm he held up the sign he had made, unsure that he had spelt Marseille correctly. He wanted to pull the hood of his tracksuit over his head for shade but he knew he would never get a lift if he did. He stood swaying slightly in the dust and the fumes, trying to focus on the drivers’ faces, his eyes closing against waves of nausea. His wound, now glued to his T-shirt, was banging in syncopation with the pulse in his head.
It felt good to fall. He saw the big blue sky rotate above his head and then shrink to the size of an aspirin and disappear. Throughout he never lost the sound of her voice. There was an accent. What was it: Italian? When her face came into view, he smiled. An Italian babe. Not young but a babe. She was looking down at him. He stared back at her for a long time, unwilling or unable to find his voice. He discovered that he could track her thoughts in the area around her eyes. There between her dark brows, he saw worry; then something was happening to her forehead, like a sheet being smoothed, and he saw relief. In the reduction of the space between her eyelids and her eyebrows he could see her making a checklist of some sort and there she was registering his gaze and a flicker of mistrust in her eyes and it was gone. He found himself wondering how this woman could go around like that with all her feelings plastered over her face for everyone to see. Kader noticed that he no longer felt sick. Indeed, he had not felt this good for a long time. She had her hand under the back of his head and she was lifting it off the ground and moving it a little so that his head felt like a balloon, light as a balloon attached to a string and floating and she had hold of the string.
Can you stand? You’re alright.
Kader was enjoying the film. He had no wish to move.
Try and stand. You should get out of the sun. You’re dehydrated.
What are you, a nurse?
She slid her arm under his back. He winced as he felt his wound split open.
What is it?
She was taking his arm out of his tracksuit top.
How old are you? he asked her. He could feel her fingers pressing on the skin beneath the wound.
Forty-two. When did this happen? she asked.
You look good.
Is it a knife wound? she asked.
Are you a cop? he asked.
The muscle has hardly been touched.
Kader turned his head and looked. She had pulled back the T-shirt and the wound was bleeding again. He looked at her and wondered if she were impressed by his arm. He wondered if she ever slept with anyone young.
I’ll take you to the nearest hospital. They’ll sew you up.
He had his hand round her wrist and was gripping tightly.
I’m not going to hospital. I’m going to Marseille.
This motorway goes to Bordeaux. Not Marseille.
Shit. You serious?
She nodded. A coil of her dark hair sprang free. She hooked it behind her ear.
Bordeaux, he said. I might as well go to Bordeaux. It’s not a bad team. You going to Bordeaux?
I’m going to Spain.
You’re Spanish. I thought you were Italian.
Try and stand please.
He let her help him into the passenger seat. In the wing mirror he watched her legs as she walked round to put his bag in the boot. He liked being in the passenger seat of this woman’s car. Think what you liked, it felt good. He closed his eyes.
When he opened them again she was sitting beside him in the driver’s seat, looking through a blue plastic box on her lap. In the box were first-aid supplies. He closed his eyes again. Spain: now there was a thought. Amadou and Aisha in Spain. He knew no one from Spain. He thought their music stank but they had beaches. He opened his eyes.
What’s your name? he asked. His mouth was dry and his words sounded slurred.
She took out a roll of gauze.
I’ll disinfect the wound a
nd dress it for you. Then I’ll drop you off at the nearest service station.
Kader did not argue.
I’m not running from the cops, he told her.
It doesn’t concern me, she said, without turning. She was cutting through the gauze with a pair of large silver scissors. He liked the care she took. He watched her soak the gauze with pink liquid from a plastic bottle. He looked at the heavy silver bracelet swaying on her arm. He saw the long, lean muscle moving under her skin, which was a yellowish-brown colour, like his own when he was not tanned.
Give me your arm, she said. It won’t hurt.
Kader watched her clean the wound with the piece of folded gauze. The pink liquid smelt of chlorine. Soon the gauze was brown with his blood. She had small hands and she kept her fingernails cut short. The clean wound was a perfect incision and looked to him like a thin slice of watermelon.
You’ll have a big scar if you don’t have stitches.
He grinned at her.
Cool, he said. But she did not look at him. I’m not running from the cops. I swear.
I don’t care if you are.
I’m going to Spain.
Well I’m not.
Bullshit.
She cut another piece of gauze and applied it to the wound.
I’ve changed my mind, she said, tearing some tape and sticking down the dressing. I’m going to stop about ten kilometres further on from here. There’s a service station just before the exit. You’ll be able to get a lift from there.
Sure you’ve changed your mind. You’re not looking for a delinquent Arab in your car. Am I right?
She looked straight at him. Her eyes were dark, darker even than his sister’s, but shining.
I’m wrong, he said, holding up his hands. I see I’m wrong.
I’m going to give you some stuff so you can change the dressing. From tomorrow you can leave it open. You’ll have your scar and you’ll be fine. Hold out your arm.
He watched her as she wound a length of fine bandage around his arm. Her mouth was slightly open and he could feel her breath on his collarbone. A warm feeling was spreading upwards from his groin to his face. He did not dare to breathe in case he disturbed something. When she had finished she sat back in her seat.
Come on, what’s your name?
Astrid.
What’s that? Spanish?
I think it’s Swedish but there’s a famous Brazilian singer called Astrid. My father was a fan and he named me after her.
Well well, he said. Aren’t you going to ask me my name?
She tidied away her supplies.
It’s Karl, he said.
She raised her eyebrows.
Strange name for an Arab.
No stranger than Astrid for a Spic.
She looked down at her box to hide her amusement. He found he wanted to see her teeth but could hardly say, Show us your teeth, lady.
She leaned into the back and put the box on the seat.
Here, she said, handing him a bottle of water. You should drink.
Are you married?
Yes.
He watched her put her hand on the ignition key. He was in no hurry to go.
Where’s your husband?
Just be quiet and drink.
Where’s your wedding ring?
I don’t wear one. I’m a surgeon.
Kader whistled.
If you’re a surgeon, you can stitch me up.
I don’t have my equipment with me. Now drink.
Kader tipped back his head and drank.
Astrid watched the Adam’s apple move in the boy’s neck. His skin was so smooth, she doubted he even needed to shave. He gulped until water dripped down his jaw and neck. When he had finished he handed her the empty bottle, which she threw into the back, then she turned on the ignition and pulled back onto the motorway. She was grateful to this boy. His appearance by the side of the road had woken her. She wondered at the moral stupor that had enabled her to desert her post, hang up on Chastel, and drive out of Paris. The idea that she might have driven, unchallenged by reality, all the way to Saint Jean de Luz, frightened her. Some arbitrary force had intervened. She now decided to go to Orsay and see Régis Aubry. She would ask him about his research on a new immunocompetent molecule. By the time he had finished telling her, she was sure it would be too late to meet Mikel.
She looked at her passenger again. She could see at least one break in the bridge of his nose.
Go on, Astrid, he said, without looking at her. Take me with you to Spain. I’m good company. I’ll tell you all about my adventures.
There can’t be many, she said. You’re not old enough.
Guess how old I am, he said, striking his chest with the flat of his hand. Go on.
She glanced at him.
Seventeen? Eighteen?
Twenty-one, he said triumphantly.
You’re lying.
That makes two of us then.
Why?
The husband, he said, sitting deeper in his seat. He began drumming rhythmically on his thighs. There isn’t one. He’s dead or divorced is my guess.
What about you, Karl? Have you got a girlfriend?
One or two.
He grinned at her. She saw that he had learned to use his smile, which was full-blown and generous. She noticed that his teeth crossed over slightly at the front. Perhaps, she thought, it was a smile that had come untainted from childhood.
Where are you from? she asked.
Nanterre.
And your parents?
Algeria.
Whereabouts?
Why, do you know it?
I know Algiers a little.
My Dad’s from Algiers and my Mum’s Kabyle from a village in the mountains.
Do you ever go back?
Why would I? Don’t you read the papers? The place is a mess. People getting their heads taken off with chainsaws. Hooded cops kicking down your door in the middle of the night. No thanks. Where in Spain are you from?
A little village in the Basque Country.
He shook his head.
Never heard of it. Basque. Is that where the lobster soup comes from?
She looked at him in disbelief.
Bisque, she said. Lobster bisque.
He pointed at her.
You smiled. I know the Basques. They plant bombs. I don’t know where or why, though.
Spain. They want independence from Spain.
Put it there, he said holding out his hand. We’re both from oppressed races. Basques, Berbers, Kabyles. What’s the difference?
She swept his palm but he caught her hand in his and looked at her. He had pale, honey-coloured eyes. She pulled her hand free.
Here we are, she said, pulling into the service station.
He sank down in his seat and drove his hands deep into the pockets of his tracksuit top.
Shit. You can’t leave me in this dump. Look. It’s a truck stop. I’ll get raped.
Please, she said.
Her please discouraged him.
Tell me the truth. Where are you going, really?
The new pathos in his words set up an unwanted intimacy. She was in a hurry for him to get out of her car.
I’m going to the campus of Orsay University, to the molecular biology department. I’m going to talk to a colleague. Then I’m going to turn round and drive back to Paris.
All right then, Madame Astrid-the-Surgeon. Just tell me what kind of a surgeon you are, in case I ever need an operation.
Liver, she said.
And who should I ask for when my liver’s falling out? Dr Astrid what?
Arnaga.
Cheers then, Astrid Arnaga, he said. It’s been a pleasure.
And he opened the door and climbed out. Astrid drove away quickly to try and elude the desolation of his sudden exit. In the wing mirror she saw his tall, loping, delinquent walk. She shivered once and turned off the air conditioning.
*
It was two o’clock when Astrid walked
across the main lawn at Orsay. A couple of students, each plunged in their reading, sat together in the parsimonious shade of the monkey puzzle that stood right in the centre of the lawn. Its spiked form was reflected over and over again in the smoked glass of the prismatic building that housed the research laboratories. As Astrid passed beneath the portico she too was reflected, but in a foreshortened version. A video camera, picking her up in the reception, righted her again.
A pretty young woman in a navy-blue suit smiled at her enquiringly from behind the reception desk. Astrid found she missed the former receptionist, a middle-aged man with the commercial flair of a museum guard who barely looked up from his crossword magazine when he handed over the visitor’s badge.
Is Professor Aubry expecting you?
Régis was not, as far as she knew, a professor.
No. No, he’s not.
The young woman opened her mouth and caught the tip of her tongue between her teeth.
I’ll just call then, she said. Name?
Dr Arnaga.
She watched the young woman drag the rubber end of her pencil down the list of names.
And some form of identification please, the woman said, without looking up.
What was this place? Interpol? Astrid handed over her carte de séjour.
Thank you, she sang. Silly me, it’s at the top isn’t it? Here we are: Aubry. Extension 297.
The young woman cocked her head to one side and looked wistful as she listened to the ringing tone. When Aubry told her he would come to the reception, she took this as confirmation of her suspicion that the woman before her was an interloper.
Just take a seat, please. The professor will be down when he can.
He’s not a professor.
I beg your pardon?
Aubry isn’t a professor. I’m sure he wouldn’t thank you for referring to him as one.
The receptionist opened her mouth to protest, seemed to hold her breath for a moment, then smiled indulgently and returned with her pencil to some spurious notation of the list of names on her desk.
Astrid now felt sorry for her. She turned her back on the receptionist and looked out through a triangular smoked-glass pane at a magpie landing on the lawn. One for sorrow: she spat discreetly.
