The day after the first interrogation, Margot met Mallock for lunch at La Coupole.
Outside, it smelled like exhaust.
The snow and cold were making things hard for cars.
They chose a special oyster platter. He liked the little ones, fat and milky with vinegar and shallots, while she preferred them green and translucent, with lemon. He saw in this still another reason for not expressing his feelings. They were too different, it would never work.
As if people had to be alike in order to love one another!
During lunch, he listened to Margot tell him about her latest travels. She was pretty when she talked. When she listened, too. All the time, in fact. Her mouth was like an incredible animal, a red octopus that sucked and smiled, unveiling white pearls and a pink tongue from which phrases and images departed. A word, a bite, an idea, a mouthful, a burst of laughter. She breathed mental strength and a disturbing physical appearance.
He ate little and did not speak.
He watched her.
He realized that he had never really looked at her. In any case, not like this. Without worrying about the emptiness. Looking at her until they were connected only by their eyes.
His love for Amélie and his feeling of guilt had prevented him from contemplating Margot like that, in all her brilliance.
His fear of happiness as well, probably.
She was magnificent, quite simply magnificent, with her too-bright eyes, her delicate neck and wrists. Her irregular teeth. Her cheekbones, her slightly jutting chin, her wide, slightly downturned mouth. And then her tanned skin that smelled of the open air, the sea foam, and all the suns of the world.
Mallock had a furious desire to eat her up.
Suck on her little ears.
Taste her breasts and her belly.
Spread her legs and enter her.
Ejaculate in her all his joys and sorrows, his love and his infinite desire for her.
And then caress her.
Mallock and Margot reappeared in their respective offices only around 4:30. What their hearts felt during the brief truce their bodies gave one another, neither of them had ever experienced before.
And neither had their skins.
Especially their skins, perhaps.