Metro
I SPENT THE NEXT WEEK AVOIDING calls and angry texts from my father asking where the hell I was then blathering on about the lycée he’d got me into in the New Year. I couldn’t face any of that, so I tried calling my mother, thinking I could stay with her for a while, but her phone kept ringing out. It seemed being with Sami was my best option, at least in the short term, so I stayed in his room near Clignancourt, selling watches and perfume in the morning, pickpocketing on the metro in the afternoon.
At first, I didn’t know what he was doing on the train when he made a dash for the doors, but I leaped off just in time and followed him up the platform. He moved quickly, shoulders hunched, hands in his pockets as he weaved through the tunnels.
He turned a corner, pulled some cash from a wallet, and then threw it in a bin.
‘First rule – get rid of the wallet,’ he said, heading off down a passage.
‘Second rule – change trains,’ he said, as we boarded one heading in the opposite direction.
He always chose a crowded carriage, standing just inside the doors for a quick exit, and he dressed in his best jeans and trainers. He pretended to be absorbed in his phone, but his eyes scanned the people around us. Sometimes he’d talk to me, exaggerating his American accent to pass us off as tourists, while his eyes flickered over my shoulder.
He didn’t take long to home in on his targets, always choosing those absorbed in their phones, their senses tunnelled into the thin wafers of metal. Phones were made for pickpockets, he said, and it was true. People may as well just hand over their cash when they took out their phones.
On one of the first trips, I saw it up close. A girl stood between us, handbag under her arm like a warm brown chicken. She turned so it pressed against him and he sidled in, talking to me in a low voice as the carriage filled up, jostling and swaying against her with the rhythm of the train. She shrugged, angling off, bringing her phone to her face, her bag close to him. The zip was near his chest, and his eyes darted sideways, back and forth, checking no one saw him reach up slowly, peel the zip back, fingers spidering into the gap. He felt around, and there it was. The soft little purse. Always at the top, always within easy reach. The train took a bend and he used the movement to take it from her bag. When the doors opened, he was ready, shouldering through the crowd, riding out on the soft exhalation of brakes before she’d even read her text message.
‘Third rule – don’t make eye contact.’
We zigzagged the tunnels with tourists near the Louvre, went further afield at rush hour, then later, in the bountiful hours near midnight, we’d be up near the red light district where everyone was wasted and careless. Fear and adrenaline fuelled him, fine-tuning his luck as he moved in and out of the crowds, unseen, unnoticed.
Sometimes we saw others he knew. He never acknowledged them so you’d notice, just glanced over for a split second as they passed. He told me when they were young, it was a game. They’d tease each other and compete. But none of them were young anymore, their faces hollowed and stained with dirt. The shadows under their eyes were permanent, like tattoos.
One afternoon, we came up at Montparnasse to drop some cash at one of the bars Nick ran. It was better to get rid of the money so we weren’t caught red-handed, Sami said. It was hard to arrest someone for pickpocketing if they had no wallets or cash on them. We followed the Boulevard Raspail to the narrow street – Passage D’Enfer – where I’d first seen Sami that cold morning over two months before. I half expected to see the girl there, too, with her baby in a box by the tent.
Sami walked up to a shiny black door next to a boarded-up shopfront. He pressed the buzzer and soon a man appeared, unshaven, his eyes puffy with booze and sleep. He grunted to me in a way that said, ‘Wait here,’ and ushered Sami in.
There was a faded sign on the building opposite: FEUX DE L’ENFER – fires of hell. Bars and nightclubs lined the street, and they had names along the same theme: SEVEN SINS, JÉZABEL, TENTATION. The washed-out sign above the black door beside me said, PLEASURES OF PARADISE, the words written on a scroll held by a snake. Its body was covered in green scales beneath the fat smiling face of a cherub.
‘This is where I saw you the first time we met,’ I said to Sami when he emerged. ‘What is this place?’
‘It’s a nightclub.’
‘And Nick owns it?’
‘He runs it. He runs all the places along here for some rich guy.’
‘Who?’ I asked but he didn’t answer, just crossed the road back towards Montparnasse.
Nearing the metro, we passed the cashpoint I used to withdraw money from my father’s account. Sami and I hadn’t spoken again about the plan to rob my so-called friends, but it occurred to me that if I could figure out how to access my father’s account one more time, I could get the cash to pay back Tomas and survive for a few weeks until I got back on my feet. I knew I was taking a risk, but I had few other options.
*
I entered the apartment and immediately sensed his presence. He called my name, and I closed the door softly, trying to gauge his tone. I walked slowly down the creaking hall.
‘Are you all right? You look terrible,’ he said when I reached his study. His voice was stern but tinged with relief. ‘You’re filthy. I can even smell you from here. Where on earth have you been?’
I slid my bag off my shoulder. ‘Staying with friends.’
‘Staying with what friends? What the hell are you playing at, Alex?’
‘Just a friend, I mean. You don’t know him.’
Any sense he’d go easy on me disappeared and my body started itching like mad.
‘First, you’re expelled for dealing drugs, then you disappear for over a week. Now you have the gall to come back here like nothing’s happened, slinking through the door like a filthy dog.’
I picked up my bag and turned to leave.
‘Sit!’ he yelled, pointing to the chair.
It didn’t take long to get into a full-blown argument. He’d found out about the money I’d stolen and he stood there, pointing a pencil at my face as if he was about to drive it between my eyes. He also blamed me for hacking his computer because he’d worked out I’d used it to access his bank account. Thanks to me he’d lost a ton of work and valuable documents. Irreplaceable, he said as he loomed over me.
My guts hollowed as I sank further into the chair, and I felt his fury physically, unsure what he was going to do next.
I said I’d pay him back, but of course I had no means of doing that. When I said he could cut my allowance, he actually laughed.
‘If you live under my roof, you need to live by the rules.’
‘I do live by your rules.’
‘Drug-running and stealing are not my rules.’
‘So what are your rules, then? Drinking till you pass out? Sleeping with your friends’ wives?’
He looked at me, stunned. ‘It’s none of your business what I do.’
He moved over to the drinks cabinet, his hand reaching for the Scotch but then he hesitated and poured himself a glass of water.
‘You started this. I hate living here. It was your idea to move back to Paris,’ I said. ‘So don’t blame me for what happens.’
‘Don’t blame you? Who else am I supposed to blame? No one’s forcing you to sell drugs. No one’s holding a gun to your head while you steal money from me. Or have I got this all wrong?’
‘What about Mum? Why can’t I live with her?’
‘We’ve been through all this before.’
I leaped out of the chair. ‘You always said it was because I was at school in the States and she was here. We’re in the same country now, or near enough.’
I’d never asked so openly before. I knew my mother and Olivier had sold their apartment and were moving to Monaco in the New Year, but it was worth a try at least for a few weeks until he cooled off.
‘Why can’t I live with her?’
‘Because you can’t. And while we’re at it, you’re grounded.’
‘But I’m going to stay with Mum this weekend.’
‘No, you’re not. You’re staying here until things improve.’
‘You’re such an arsehole. No wonder she won’t come near you.’
He walked to the window. ‘Don’t speak to me like that,’ he said quietly.
I grabbed my bag and this time he didn’t try to prevent me leaving. I went to my room. May had tidied it up, and of course, the hash pipe was no longer on the balcony, the grass no longer in my drawer. Even my computer was gone.
I paced the room. He wasn’t going to stop me seeing my mother. I’d had enough of living by his rules. It was time to start doing things my way.
I rang her number. There was silence down the line. I tried again. The same emptiness, so I stripped off and had a shower, attending to my eczema, which had worsened, then repacked my bag with clean clothes and a few other things I needed.
‘Where do you think you’re going?’ he said when I passed his study.
‘I’m going to stay with Mum,’ I said, pulling my backpack onto my shoulder. I intended to go straight to her apartment.
He followed me down the hall.
‘Listen to me,’ he said, his voice tight. ‘I don’t know if you’ve heard any of your messages, but I’ve called that lycée. They can take you in January when term starts again. Work hard, get through your Bac and then you can do what you like.’
I watched his head move as he went on about the Bac, until finally, something snapped inside me.
‘I hate you, and I hate living with you. Why do you always stop me seeing Mum? You can’t stop me seeing her.’
He turned. ‘Grow up, Alex. You’re not eight years old anymore. I’m not stopping you seeing her.’
I yelled at him. ‘Yes, you are! You’ve stopped me this weekend. You just said I’m grounded.’
He slammed his glass down, and water flew into the air like a fountain. ‘She rang to say she couldn’t have you this weekend. I don’t even know where the hell she is, but wherever it is, she doesn’t want you there. Olivier doesn’t want you there! For God’s sake, Alex, isn’t it clear after all these years?’
All of the fatigue and exhaustion of the previous weeks came crashing in around me, and as I ran down the corridor, the walls seemed to shake. I couldn’t stay with my father any longer. He was suffocating me with his rules and restrictions, and now he was poisoning my head with lies about my mother. I stood at the door and put my head against the cool metal panel, my mind a reel of images of her smiling, shaking her head, making excuses as to why I couldn’t stay with her that night, that weekend, that holiday.
I stared at him as he stood there, water dripping over his hand.
Why did he have to say it so plainly?
But he was right. She never really wanted me with her. And the times we spent together were always cut short, plans changed at the last minute. He always backed her up, colluded, even anticipated those excuses by saying I couldn’t go, I was too busy, or I had too much homework.
And what if he was only putting up with me because she wouldn’t? What if he was only doing it out of the same worn-out sense of duty she’d discarded? My head felt tight, and there was a metallic taste in my mouth, like blood.
I needed to be by myself, away from both of them.
‘Alex, wait,’ said my father. ‘Let’s talk about this. I’m sorry.’
I opened the door and tossed my keys at him. They clattered onto the floor and slid along the corridor to his feet. ‘No, you’re not.’
I ran down the stairs.
He called from the balcony, but I didn’t stop.
I just kept running.