She may have been reading trash but she was really luscious, so I pulled out all the stops.
And all the stops with a nice boy like me who’s been brought up by a feminine mom and a feminist dad, who knows how to recognize a Dior perfume, his faults, and an accent from Nice, and who was on his way home after three days by the seaside, believe me when I tell you it means pulling the pin on the explosive device in no time flat.
Well, no time, maybe not quite. Let’s be honest. I had to pay a lot, from my own pocket (and anyone who knows the price of a drink on board the TGV will sympathize), and my person (more sympathy, please). Yes, more sympathy, because it was a real war dance. Here I go, I will flatter you and talk to you about your crap book and listen to your confessions about the suffering of your inner child whom you have to console if you want to stop being the ideal prey for manipulators and enpies—
“Enpies?”
“Narcissistic perverts.”
“Ah, I see.”
. . . and your inner kiddiwink always goes for the most expensive cookies, and I don’t dare get out my restaurant coupons, not to look like a dork, and I will pay you compliments, and make you laugh and giggle, and jerk your tears as well (yes, my mom died at Christmas and I went home so I could go and pray at her grave . . . yes, it’s sad . . . yes, I put lilies . . . she loved them . . . yes, they wither all too quickly but it’s the thought that counts . . . and yes, you are really so stupid but so good, and yes, I am really very stupid but so so good), and I will touch your arm, and tuck a strand of hair behind your ear, and I will seem as if I’m really under your spell, and look I’m even stammering from the emotion, do you realize? But . . . But who’s manipulating who here? Hang on a minute, I’m completely entranced . . . Say, will you lend me your book, to help me learn to cope? Go on . . . Go on. If we get married someday, you’ll put it in your trousseau, okay? You’re so lovely. What’s your name? Justine? Like in the Marquis de Sade? No. Nothing. You are beautiful, Justine. Are you coming? Shall we go? No, not to my place, not just yet, to our seats.
And why aren’t you coming?
Oh? You have a call to make? To whom? The bridal shop? Ah, no, your boyfriend.
Oh?
Your boyfriend.
Oh, I see. Okay, well then, I’ll be off. Will you give me your number anyway, princess? We could . . . we could be friends.
Merde.
I went back to my seat like yesterday at low tide: soaked, dazed, shaken by the waves; my old age under my arm and my tail between my legs.
Shit. She really was a stunner.
And I was in a hell of a mood for a cuddle.
Especially tonight.
I’d just seen my fiancée get married to another guy, for fuck’s sake.
My Delacroix pieta was asleep now.
I sat down across from her and observed her against the light.
She reminded me of Lisbeth Salander, the girl with the dragon tattoo.
She was messed up big-time with all her hardware and Goth-Punk regalia, but asleep, she looked like a fragile little girl.
A little sleeping doll. Any enpie’s dream.
I tried to retouch her, mentally. Removed her makeup, unstudded her, unpierced her, undyed her, cut her hair, undressed her, redressed her, unneedled her tattoos, and rubbed her hands with cream.
I prepared the stretcher, fixed the canvas, and licked the hairs of my paintbrush before dipping them in the pot.
I was repenting, big-time.
Oh, dearie me . . . What rubbish.
And her slut-face companion still hadn’t shown up. Was she telling her boyfriend all about me or what.
Rat-a-tat-tat! Classy Joe, take your revenge!
You know, sweetie, I’ve just met someone and we really have to talk because my inner little baby-waby is really really afraid of losing her pacifier, now . . .
Or maybe she was telling one of her girlfriends in Nice all about me. Yes I swear! Just like that, in the lounge car. Yes right next to the place where they keep the defibrillator on the wall. Yeah, really, like . . . Yeah, just like I said . . . A really drop-dead gorgeous guy from Paris. Visa Gold card, white shirt, all suntanned. And an orphan on top of it, can you imagine? Hey, like . . . The guy was so hot he was, like, dripping with juice . . . Sounds good, right? Ha ha ha. What? Did I give him my number? Are you crazy or what? Those Parisians, they’re like chickpea socca, you have to eat them with your tips of your fingers . . . Ha ha ha.
Ha ha ha. Lulled by the ebb and flow of my stupidity, I went back to sleep.