THE APARTMENT WAS on the fourth floor. The building had no lift. On his day off the man lay on the mattress that served as a sofa and read, slowly and carefully, all the newspapers of his city. The tall windows were open on to the balcony. Every twenty minutes a bus swerved in to the stop down below, and the curtain puffed past his face. At two o’clock the woman came into the living room with her boots on.
‘I feel like going for a walk,’ she said.
‘Bon. D’accord,’ said the man.
‘Want to come with me?’
‘Up to Sacré Coeur and back. Not far.’
‘Ouf,’ said the man. ‘All those steps.’ He put one paper down and unfolded the next.
‘Oh, come on,’ said the woman. ‘Won’t you come? I’m bored.’
‘I don’t want to go down into the street,’ said the man. ‘I have to go down there every day. I get sick of it. Today I feel like staying home.’
The woman pulled a dead leaf off the pot plant. ‘Just for an hour?’ she said.
‘Too many tourists,’ said the man. ‘You go. I’ll have a little sleep. Anyway it’s going to rain.’
Late in the afternoon the man went into the kitchen and opened the refrigerator. He looked inside it, then shut it again. He walked across the squeaking parquet to the bedroom. The woman was lying on her stomach reading a book by the light of a shaded lamp. Her wet boots stood in the corner by the window.
‘There’s nothing to eat,’ said the man. ‘No one went to the market.’
The woman looked up. ‘What about the fish?’
‘Yes, the fish is there.’
‘We can eat the fish, then.’
‘There’s nothing to have with it.’
The woman marked her place with one finger.
‘What happened to the brussels sprouts?’ she said. ‘Did the others eat them last night?’
‘No.’
‘Well, let’s have fish and brussels sprouts.’
Before she had finished the sentence the man was shaking his head.
‘Why not?’
‘Fish and green vegetables are never eaten together.’
‘What?’
‘They are not eaten together.’
The woman closed the book. ‘People have salad with fish. That’s green.’
‘Salad is different. Salad is a separate course. It is not served on the same plate.’
‘Can you explain to me,’ said the woman, ‘the reason why fish and green vegetables must not be eaten together?’ The man looked at his hand against the white wall. ‘It is not done,’ he said. ‘They do not complement each other. Fish and potatoes, yes. Frites. Pommes de terre au four. But not green vegetables.’
‘It’s getting on for dinner time,’ said the woman. She turned on her back and clasped her hands behind her head. ‘The others will be back soon.’
‘I don’t know what to do,’ said the man. He moved his feet closer together and pushed his hands into his pockets.
‘If I were you,’ said the woman. ‘If I were you and it was my turn to cook, and if there was nothing to eat except fish and green vegetables, do you know what I’d do? I’d cook fish and green vegetables. That’s what I’d do.’
‘Ecoute,’ said the man. ‘There are always good chemical and aesthetic reasons behind customs.’
‘Yes, but what are they.’
‘I’m sure if we looked it up in the Larousse Gastronomique it would be explained.’
The woman got off the low bed and went to the window in her socks and T-shirt. She looked out.
‘I’m hungry,’ she said. ‘Where I come from, we just eat what’s there.’
‘And it is not a secret,’ said the man, ‘that where you come from the food is barbaric.’
The woman kept her back to the room. ‘My mother cooked nice food. We had nice meals.’
‘Chops,’ said the man. ‘Hamburgers. I heard you telling my mother. “La bouffe est dégueulasse,” you said. That’s what you said.’
‘I said “était”. It was. It used to be. But it’s not any more. It’s not now.’
The man took a set of keys out of his pocket and began to flip them in and out of his palm.
‘Aren’t there any onions?’ said the woman, still looking out the window.
‘No. Not even onions.’
‘I don’t see,’ said the woman, ‘that you’ve got any choice. What choice have you got? Unless you cook the fish by itself, or just the sprouts.’
‘There would not be enough for everybody.’
The woman turned round from the grey window. ‘Why don’t you go out into the kitchen and cook it up. Cook what’s there. Just cook it up and see what happens. And if the others don’t like it they can take their custom elsewhere.’
The man took a deep breath. He put the keys back in his pocket. He scratched his head until his hair stood up in a crest. ‘J’ai mal fait mon marché,’ he said. ‘I should have planned better. We should have—’
‘For God’s sake,’ said the woman. She leaned against the closed window. ‘What’s the matter with you? It’s only food.’
The man put his bare foot on the edge of the mattress and bounced it once, twice.
‘Tu vois?’ he said. ‘Tu vois comment tu es? “Only food.” No French person would ever, ever say “It’s only food”.’
‘But it is only food,’ said the woman. ‘In the final analysis that’s what it is. It’s to keep us alive. It’s to stop us from feeling hungry for a couple of hours so we can get our minds off our stomachs and go about our business. And all the rest is only decoration.’
‘Oh là là,’ said the man. ‘Tu es—’
He flattened his hair with one hand, and let his hand fall to his side. Then he turned and walked back into the kitchen. He opened the refrigerator. The fish lay on its side on a white plate. He opened the cupboard under the window. The brussels sprouts, cupped in their shed outer leaves, sat on a paper bag on the bottom shelf. The man stood in the middle of the room and looked from one open door to the other, and back again.