Hélène Casati was treating herself to a personal day, as she did from time to time. She did what she always did in those cases: be the first one up at six and eat breakfast while listening to Europe 1. She enjoyed Philippe Aubert’s show. He was funny and he knew how to talk about women, especially about Mathilda May.
A very precise routine regulated morning activities at home, dictating the use of the kitchen, bathroom, and toilet. The goal was to avoid face-to-face meetings, because nobody in the Casati household woke up in a good mood. But meals are a special moment in family life, according to Madame Dumas, the social worker they were assigned after the accident. Hélène remembered her, a fat, energetic woman who talked through clenched teeth. When Mme. Dumas sat down in the kitchen, her thighs took on alarming proportions. She dispensed advice while going through their household accounts. Hélène couldn’t stand seeing her stick her nose into their affairs.
“I am a bookkeeper, you know.”
“I’m well aware of that,” answered Mme. Dumas. “But we can always do better.”
The perennially even-tempered Mme. Dumas smiled then, as she picked her way through checkbook stubs, periodically wetting her index finger. She was really in her element. The judge had assigned her to the Casatis “for the good of the child.” To some extent, Hélène could understand taking that step. Even Patrick was making an effort. Everything had all happened so fast.
“Do you realize that you need help?”
The couple answered yes. Anthony got used to playing with the toys in the corner of the judge’s office. He once complained that he couldn’t find the Smurf with glasses. Some other kid must have taken it.
Of course they needed help. In the meantime, Mme. Dumas could drive you crazy with her fixed smile and relentless benevolence. Hélène had thought she didn’t have a shred of affection for her husband left, but the social worker’s behavior nearly made them reconcile. The fat woman was forever listing his habits, the number of beers he drank, the number of cigarettes he smoked, his friends, his rifles, the motorcycle, the language he used in front of the child, even his way of moving. She corrected each of his little ways so as to make the family function properly. “We’re making progress, we’re making progress,” said Mme. Dumas, a leitmotif she repeated immediately before blaming and prescribing. Patrick and Hélène had no choice but to go along. “What do you talk about during meals? Do you ask your wife how her day went?” Patrick puffed out his cheeks. How could he answer that? “You can go to the museum, too. It’s free for the unemployed.”
Though barely civil in the morning, the Casatis were forced to try having breakfasts together. They were eaten American style, with cereal and fresh fruit. Hélène still remembered the sound Patrick made as he slurped his coffee. She could still see Anthony stirring his muesli; he couldn’t have been more disgusted if you’d served him mud. Hélène finally told him to go drink his Nesquik in front of the television. She and Patrick wound up alone, unable to say a word to each other, feeling humiliated.
Another time, Hélène had organized a trip to Europa-Park. To endure the long lines at the rides, the heat, and all the assholes, Patrick drank beer continuously, maybe a gallon in all. That was the advantage of German theme parks: you could find Spaten on draft everywhere. Hélène took the wheel for the drive home, and they’d had to stop five times so he could relieve his bladder by the side of the road. Anthony had been happy with his day. He was still little; he didn’t understand.
When the period of administrative supervision was up, Mme. Dumas submitted a report that wasn’t very favorable. But the juvenile court judge was handling nearly a hundred fifty cases a year, some of them a lot more serious. So they were left in peace. What really saddened Hélène was to see that their completely made-up story about a serious fall had become the truth in everyone’s eyes. Even Anthony supported this version of events when he was asked. But Hélène had a good memory.
She had very nearly canceled her personal day off. First, because there’d been a storm the night before and there was no point stealing a day for yourself if it meant just staying indoors at the movies. And then the business about the motorcycle was driving her half crazy. Hélène thought about it day and night in the weeks since it disappeared, and jumped every time Patrick opened the door. The bike wasn’t worth anything; it served no purpose. They couldn’t even afford to insure it. But she knew that the moment her husband found out what happened, he would go berserk. To think that he was once prepared to go over to their neighbors’ with a tire iron because they were slow in returning a raclette grill.
But she needed this day, needed a break.
So she left the house first, while Patrick was in the shower and Anthony was still asleep. At the wheel of her old Opel Kadett, she’d headed for Guérémange. She felt excited; it was like playing hooky. She was now driving on the departmental highway. Through the windshield, thin clouds emphasized the blue of the sky. Over there, a plane taking off left a contrail that promptly faded away. She rolled her window down to enjoy the earthy smell of rain on dry soil. The wet, dark scent reminded her of the first day of class, the smell of the next day, of nostalgia. It was going to be a beautiful day; they’d said so on the radio.
She first stopped at Carrefour to buy something to eat: bread, a tomato, a bottle of mineral water, and a copy of Femme actuelle. Then she drove on. When she reached the swimming pool parking lot, she looked at her watch. It wasn’t even ten o’clock. She had the whole day in front of her. She felt far away, and free; it was perfect. She punched her ticket at the front desk, where the woman was an old school friend. They recognized each other and exchanged a knowing smile; that was enough. Then Hélène went into the cabin and put on her yellow two-piece bathing suit. She had bought it a few years earlier, but it was still in style, cut high on the thighs and going up pretty high on the stomach. To wear something like that, it was best to be a bit tan, which Hélène was all summer. To finish, she tied her hair in a bun and wrapped a pareu around her hips. She picked up her purse and walked out to the open-air pool, sunglasses perched on her head instead of a headband. Her feet barely touched the ground. She was even humming to herself.
The Guérémange swimming pool was a model of the kind, both shabby and modern: dug in the 1970s, fifty meters long, with cement starting blocks and gravel tiles, six feet deep at the deep end. There weren’t a lot of people early in the morning except for the hard-core ones who swam laps before it got crowded. Hélène chose a chaise longue with a view of the swimmers as they emerged from the changing rooms. Along the way she gave a little wave to a pair of sexagenarians who were permanent fixtures at the pool. The woman was knitting while the man read a newspaper unfolded at his feet. They spent most of their summers there, oiled from head to foot, caramel brown and graying. After lunch they treated themselves to a little nap in the blazing sun. Then you could see the soles of their feet, which gave you some idea of their original color. Those two came from a nearly vanished era, when sunbathing was considered healthy. They didn’t drink or smoke and they went to bed early, yet they baked in the sun every day.
Hélène unwrapped her pareu, spread her towel, and lay down. A sigh of pleasure made its way between her lips. She tried to not think of anything. She watched her long, apparently smooth body relax. She studied it critically, inspecting her buttocks and thighs, raising some skin with the palm of her hand. It dimpled but, when released, reverted to perfect smoothness. Very gradually, Hélène’s skin had become a complex surface, a memory. The changes were undetectable day by day, but then one morning she would notice a variation, a wrinkled patch, an unexpected garnet-colored capillary. Her body seemed to be living a secret life of its own, mounting a gradual insurrection. Like many women her age, Hélène made herself follow seasonal diets. A strange pact struck between her and her body, with privations becoming legal tender in a barter economy. You traded suffering for vitality, emptiness for smoothness, restraint for fullness. The results were mixed, to be honest. Hélène patted her stomach and fingered the inside of her navel, producing a little round pop. She stood up, smiling. Time was passing, so what? Her butt still fit into those tattered 501s she’d found in the back of her closet. Men still turned to look as she walked by.
In the pool, the swimmers’ movements raised a distant swish of foam, a glittering blue backwash. When the more experienced ones reached the wall, they did a quick flip turn and shot back underwater, extended and wavy. Hélène could feel the sun slowly baking her cheeks and nose, stinging her thighs. She was hot; she felt good. She stood and walked over to the pool. Balanced on the edge, she raised her arms over her head. The rules said she should be wearing a swim cap. She dove in.
Hélène did the crawl through the cool water, with gestures she’d learned in public school thirty years before. In rediscovering their idiotic repetition, she reconnected with an undeniable sense of wellness. Very quickly, she felt warmth in her joints and shoulders. The effort produced a protected cocoon and she happily curled up in it. She could feel her stomach becoming leaner, her shoulders stretching. Every breath she took at the surface was a kiss.
After one lap she held on to the edge to catch her breath. Millions of reflections dancing on the surface stung her face. She blinked to get rid of the drops purling on her eyelashes. Her skin grew goose bumps in the breeze. It was a miraculous pleasure. Everything that confirmed the existence of her body filled her with joy.
Because every day, everything conspired against that body. Her husband, who no longer fucked her. Her son, about whom she worried herself sick. Her job, which was making her dull by dint of immobility, meaningless tasks, and endlessly repeated trivialities. And of course time, since that’s all it knew how to do.
So she resisted. It had already been the same story when she was seventeen. She and her sister loved to dance. They picked up boys, cut classes, bought pointy bras, listened to Âge tendre on the radio. In the neighborhood, people already called them the sluts because they refused to follow the proper stages in dispensing favors, the careful progression from first to second base and beyond. Hélène had the most beautiful ass in Heillange. It was a power you were given by luck and couldn’t refuse. The boys gaped at them, became stupid and prodigal; you could choose among them, line them up, go from one to another. You ruled over their foolish desires. In France in those days, a time of DS cars and Sylvie Vartan songs, when girls were stuck in the kitchen or working in shops, this was practically a revolution.
The most beautiful ass in Heillange.
That’s what Gérard told her as he was bringing her home one evening. He was a hunky guy with a fur-lined leather jacket. He wore it as if it were weightless, and she loved how light she felt in his arms. He was twenty and worked in a metalwork shop. On Saturday he would pick her up on his motorcycle. He took her out and they would make love in dark corners, standing up behind refreshments stands, in the countryside on Sunday afternoons, wherever they could. Gérard was ambitious. After he finished his military service, he planned to work abroad. Each time, as he buttoned up his pants when they were out in some rapeseed field, he would lay out his career plan. He would go work on jobsites overseas; they would have kids, seaside vacations, build a three-bedroom house. When he was on a roll he would even list the tools hanging in his imagined workshop, which would be next to their two-car garage. In the winter they would have a fire in their fireplace. With luck they might even go skiing; it would depend. Lying on her back, her eyes lost in the blue of the sky, Hélène listened. She could feel something warm dribbling between her thighs. She hoped it wasn’t what she thought. She asked him. He’d taken precautions, no problem. And anyway, would it be that bad? No. A family, two cars, living here, it would be great.
Hélène started on another fifty meters. Her legs hurt already. She was short of breath and felt old. But after the depressing stiffness of the first ten laps, she knew that a second wind would kick in and chase her gloomy thoughts away. The trick was to overcome the cold and the breathlessness, and the weariness that dragged you down. You had to hang on, to persevere in the absurd repetition of the laps. Thoughts passed through her mind, memories, melancholy. Swimming is a sport of endurance and therefore boredom. She stared at the bottom of the old pool and its missing tiles. The sun hit the water at an acute angle that produced glints, shadows, flashes of light. Each lap contained its own stages. Hélène swam.
The first time she met Patrick, his leg was in a cast. She was eighteen and wearing a gingham dress. A girl cousin of hers was getting married, and Hélène had put on high heels. She wasn’t used to them, and it made her look a little silly, as clumsy as a baby giraffe. The other girls chattered behind her back. They were all in a group with her sister.
Hélène was used to having the other girls envy and bad-mouth her. With her ass, face, and shock of hair, she knew that she threatened minor equilibriums, positions, and comforts. If she felt like it, she could get Bernard Claudel into her bed, for example, even though he’d been going with Chantal Gomez for nearly eighteen months and they would be married next year. Calling her a slut meant she was a threat and could use her body to solve certain problems. The term “slut” determined an unfair power she was envied for, and which people wanted to curb, out of caution, for fear of seeing certain things they relied on suddenly becoming fragile, turning to sand. In this instance, morality was pursuing a political project that didn’t speak its name, that of limiting the possibilities for disorder that Hélène contained. To restrain the effects of her beauty. To curb the excess power at her disposal thanks to her ass.
Gérard hadn’t been able to come to the wedding where Hélène met Patrick. So he didn’t see the looks they exchanged. Patrick was hobbled with his immobilized leg. He wasn’t able to dance and stayed in his corner. He looked sad, or thoughtful, which made him look appealing in a Mike Brant kind of way. When the wedding party broke up, Hélène managed to get herself into the Simca that took Patrick home. After that, they had to see each other secretly, reconcile their families, behave themselves. It was easy. At that time in their lives, love could do anything. Later, they rented a little apartment and made plans. A family, two cars, living there; it would be perfect.
As it turned out, Hélène would never see Gérard again. Twenty years later she learned that he indeed did go abroad to work, in Tunisia, Egypt, and as far as India. He became a master welder, working for aeronautical, nuclear, and agricultural corporations. These would gradually become more powerful than countries and afforded Gérard the kind of lifestyle and benefits once dispensed by nations that printed money and declared wars. Hélène learned that Gérard had settled in Paca, somewhere between Toulon and Dragnignan, where he built himself a two-story villa and drove an Audi. That he married an Antilles woman with short hair, which didn’t stop him from voting for the National Front once or twice. Two children, friends, kidney stones, a neighbor whose tall hedge annoyed him—Gérard wasn’t bored. Hélène learned that he’d caught the travel bug, meaning that once a year he would go on-site to verify the existence of landscapes he’d seen on television: Vegas, Madagascar, Vietnam. Hélène would learn all that at a funeral. That’s always where you run into old acquaintances.
Hélène could feel herself catching the second wind she was waiting for. The difficulty diminished, giving way to a sense of expansion, acceptance, and rebirth. She could easily cover another thousand meters, she told herself. Afterward she would feel slim and energized. All she had to do was get past that hurdle to where the body surrenders and the spirit soars. Right now, everything was fine. Hélène would soon turn forty. People sometimes still called her “the slut,” but less often. She still had her looks and saw no reason why she should hide her legs or belly, much less her ass. Above all, she still wanted her share of love. At that thought, she smiled into the water, which kept the secret of her undiminished appetite for men. When driving, she would sometimes need to suddenly stop by the roadside to caress herself and come very quickly while some thirty-two-ton semi roared by, shaking the Opel Kadett. It was all still there in her belly, intact, her need for hands and eyes, and the possibility of pleasure between her legs that defied the rules of the office, the rules of the road, her marriage contract, and most other laws. They weren’t taking that away from her.
Hélène had been sleeping with a coworker for some time now. He was an uncomplicated man who wore Eden Park shirts and pleated pants. She used to watch him walk by when he went out for coffee. He had a nice ass and also hair, which past a certain stage really matters. She’d drunk too much at the Christmas party and, as they were saying goodbye, more or less kissed him on the mouth. They began to circle each other. One evening as they were closing the year-end accounts she stayed late and he waited, in his office. They found each other and started kissing. Hélène had almost forgotten those deep, quick feverish kisses, with intertwined fingers and a panicky heart, like kids. She took his cock out of his pleated pants. He entered her pussy almost immediately. Standing up, fully clothed, agitated and clumsy, it only took a minute. The very next day they went to a hotel. In the heat of the action, he fucked her while she was kneeling on the rug. Hélène had no problem with the concept, but changed her mind later, when she saw the carpet burns on her knees. Patrick didn’t even notice. But after that, fucking on all fours on the floor was out of the question.
Thirty laps was already fine, Hélène told herself. She swam over to the edge, her heart full of that pleasant feeling of a job well done. Kids had arrived while she was swimming, alone or in pairs, boys and girls between fifteen and seventeen. They sat on the concrete bleachers along the pool. She recognized some of them by sight. Around here, you always wound up recognizing a face. Looking at them, Hélène felt a twinge. They were chatting; they were in a good mood, carefree and perfect. The water and the hours of training had created bodies built for speed. The girls with their tapered thighs and wide shoulders. The boys with childish heads perched on bodybuilder chests.
Conceding gracefully, Hélène smiled and went back to her chaise longue to dry off in the sun. The coach arrived and gave assignments to the swimmers, who lined up behind the starting blocks. The first ones dove in. The rest followed, synchronized and disciplined, barely raising a few drops when they entered the water. She watched their long underwater trails. Soon the two lanes were filled with their regular strokes. Under the sun, they went fast, they were young, and death didn’t exist.
Hélène lost herself in her magazine and let her mind wander. It was past eleven, and the edges of the pool began to buzz with people. After lunch she dozed awhile under the parasol. Around three o’clock, a kind of torpor settled on the pool. The heat was sweltering. You had to walk on tiptoe to get to the bathrooms. People sought refuge in the shade. In the water, a jumble of children splashed and yelled.
A little before four, the tall guy with the light-colored eyes arrived. He had an odd gait, awkward and rolling, like John Wayne or Robert Mitchum. Hélène wasn’t waiting for him, exactly, but she’d still hoped he would come. He set his things down on the steps before his swim. Hélène was one of the regulars at the pool and so was he. Once, she and her girlfriend Line had enjoyed checking him out and imagining things about him, his job, his name, his voice, the sounds he would make during sex, whether he had children, his little habits—that sort of thing. They even came up with a name for him, Tarzan. That big, strong, clumsy body. Hélène watched him swim for a while, then forgot about him. When he came out of the pool, she studied his long arms, broad shoulders, and the water running down his stomach. He glanced in her direction and she felt a great void in her gut. She brusquely returned to her magazine, wanting to hide. He was going to come over. He was coming. Obviously not. He went back to his spot and dried himself off before leaving the pool. Next time. She felt ridiculous, as gleeful as a kid.
The parenthesis had ended.
Going home, Hélène still felt light as a feather. She drove slowly, in no hurry to get back, one elbow out the window. A sad Dalida song was playing on the radio. She should arrange this more often; these little escapades did her a world of good. Passing her parents-in-law’s house, she remembered a Christmas Day party with the whole family, the afternoon they spent around the table. They’d been dead for quite a while now. Everything was there; every street spelled her history; every building held a memory. She cruised by the fire station, drove around the primary school. Then a tall column of black smoke in the distance caught her eye. As she got closer to home, she saw it grow and began to catch whiffs of melted plastic and burning gasoline. A worried frown furrowed her brow. It was very close to their place. She began to pray that nothing bad had happened. Once in their development, she drove past two blocks of houses before seeing a crowd of neighbors. They were all looking at the fire. It was the motorcycle: broken, burning, melted, and unmistakable.
Hélène yanked on the handbrake and shot out of the car without bothering to close the door behind her. She could barely stand. People watched her coming. She looked gorgeous, her hair flaming, electrified in the heat, tangled after her swim. As she passed, someone said, “This is another job by those little ragheads.” A voice called to her:
“Hélène!”
Évelyne Grandemange had extricated herself from the little group of bystanders, holding her eternal Gauloises. She was wearing a white blouse smudged by the smoke. She looked to be in shock and was trembling.
“Your husband is out looking for you,” she stammered. “He took the truck. He’s looking for you everywhere.”
Hélène thought of her son and ran toward her car.
“Wait!” said Évelyne. “What are we going to tell him?”
“I’ll be right back,” Hélène promised.
“Wait, the firefighters are on their way.”
But Hélène had already driven off. She had to find Anthony. She was in such a panic, it was nearly a minute before she shifted into second gear.