Consequences (20 page)

They were bushed. Still naked, he smoked a cigarette, leaning against the back of the bed, while she lay spread out among the sheets, her arms crossed, laughing and claiming—as if talking to herself—that she had to be dreaming, that she was out of her mind. Smiling, he stretched out a foot to touch her. He regretted not being a writer. She deserved one. In the middle of the night, he'd read her a short story by Charles D'Ambrosio, and although she claimed to know nothing about literature, he could tell she had sound taste and a reasonably good ear. She deserved better than him, at any rate.

Lighting a second cigarette with the first, in the hushed atmosphere of night, he thought again of his sister's sex, now smooth as the skin of an apricot or fine luxury leather, pale as a new almond, undeniably astounding, at any rate; and just the idea of Richard being able to slip his hand down there took a sharp swipe at him, literally leaving him stunned.

Myriam maintained that he mustn't become preoccupied with the choices his sister would make. She looked him straight in the eye. Since they'd taken the hotel room the other morning, in such lovely weather, she'd continually reminded him that his and Marianne's lives were now separate, finally on a path toward normality, doing what came naturally, returning to a world in which brothers did not live with their sisters as if they were almost husband and wife, and no matter how vehemently he disagreed about this point in particular, he sensed that he wasn't being very convincing.

With a kiss she pushed him back onto the bed and mounted him, and made him experience moments for which he would
have almost—to put it one way—been willing to lay down his soul. She wriggled against him like a worm, squeezing her breasts; and as she did, he felt himself shooting into her like a skyrocket.

He raised the sound on his earphones to listen to Greg Brown's “Downtown” and bit his lip. Myriam had fallen into a doze against him, his arm around her, and there was nothing he could have wanted more. Not even being the writer that he hadn't been, a renouncement that gave him a certain sense of pride, considering what it meant to him. The intense emotions he felt for this deserted woman sleeping against his shoulder flabbergasted and confused him yet again.

Had he ever imagined such a thing could happen to him? He felt as if he'd been drugged, that the high had intensified as the hours and days went by.

The situation in Afghanistan was hardly settled, but she didn't seem worried about it. She studied him with a smile on her face, shaking her head and repeating that she was out of her mind. “How can I have a relationship with a man?! . . . ,” she would exclaim from time to time, her face taking on a horrified look. “I'm married! . . . How did they manage to stuff so much madness into a brain as small as mine?”

“We can't abandon that country after having mucked it up so much, Myriam. We should have thought of that before. I'm talking about the troops we have over there. Once you've meddled with something, you've got to see it through, there's no other choice.”

“I'm just trying to say that I had no idea things would turn out this way between us.”

“I'll speak to him. If he comes back, I'll speak to him. But I
don't really think he will. He hasn't given any sign of life in too long a time. Wait and see if somebody rings your doorbell, or wait to get bad news. And a medal, obviously.”

“We certainly will. I'm not thinking about that. Let's not talk about him. Look at me. Was it you I was waiting for? Was it you I took so long to find?”

Moved, he rolled on top of her and took her in his arms. This first weekend they were spending together, two hours away by car on the opposite shore of the lake, was going to their heads. They were talking idiotically, gazing idiotically, into each other's eyes, floating on some kind of idiotic cloud that they weren't trying to get off.

A few days before, he'd had to face facts. Annie Eggbaum had taken advantage of a particularly balmy day to glue herself to him and whisper into his ear about the results of the research her father's henchmen had carried out. He was annoyed, but listened anyway—after asking her to take a step back and behave herself.

For a moment, that black veil had swooped down on him. The buildings on campus had started to twinkle, and the grass lit up, caught on fire like sulfur. Then he'd got hold of himself. Thanking Annie, he'd let her hang from his neck and rub against him for two or three minutes. “Let's forget it. Come over to my place and rest,” she'd offered, full of hope.

“Tell me, Annie, is this about a bet? Did you make a bet?”

Such dedication, stubbornness. Obviously, these simple qualities would have deserved more consideration, attention; but he had no more time to devote to her now—ever since the first moment he'd laid eyes on Myriam, ever since he'd felt that electricity under his fingers when he touched her, ever since
he'd felt the grip of her white thighs, had kneeled before her frothing wellspring, etc. He'd gone home and lay down.

His telephone had rung several times. Around twenty novice writers panicking, obviously, at the idea of failing one of his courses; or even Richard trying to reach him to find out what was happening. He stayed on his back for part of the afternoon, foundering in a half-sleep.

He'd brooded like this until evening, in the empty, silent house, gliding like a dark pebble into the bronze light of dusk. He stayed lying on his upstairs bed, which he'd furnished with a wonderfully comfortable mattress pad, knowing as he did how indispensable a good sleep was. Then he decided that he didn't regret anything. Decided that, as a whole, the balance sheet was in the black, that the price to pay had no importance. He'd sat up and grabbed his phone to reserve a double room in a quiet place.

He'd bought new sports shoes and had a strong desire to give them a try. Wanted to run through the woods a bit. Maybe toward the cave, he wasn't sure; he just needed to get out, breathe. The idea of going away for the weekend with her sparkled like something fallen from the sky, like a lantern being waved in the night, pointing the way to the house, the ultimate destination. Basically, everything was clear.

T
he room was actually a
cottage at a motel. He'd chosen the one that was the most out of the way and laid away a large stock of cigarettes.

Now he knew what sweetness was. He understood from now on what a woman had to offer, beyond sex. He had the hang of it. He felt at peace.

He pushed her away gently—she was slipping and tumbling off all the time—then he got up to look outside. The front fender of the Fiat was so damaged that it looked like it had run into a tree. They had hit a buck on their way there, which had come out of the woods while he was driving without concentrating, perhaps because he was still disturbed by the information Annie had given him a few days before. The animal had suddenly appeared against the sunlight, and they'd hit it head on.

The hotel management had sent a bottle of champagne to their room. They'd hurried to drink it before they'd even gotten their breath back. Nothing had happened to them, but the animal had taken quite a while to die. They'd undressed hastily and started their fabulous weekend without even taking the time to open their bags, in the spirit of the type of unbridled sex triggered by nearness to death. The animal had died just as
they were deciding to pull it onto the shoulder, despite the fact that it weighed more than four hundred pounds, and its blood emptied onto the pavement in the most horrendous way, until the police arrived.

Thirty-six hours later, nothing about the view had changed except the light: the forests plunging toward the lake, the distant mountains, clear sky. Through the large window, he felt the mild air touching his bare skin, especially his testicles. Soon the lake would come alive in an ocean of fire, its banks coated with flames. He picked up his sunglasses.

The house had ended up burning, from cellar to attic. The upstairs had caved in with a grim roar. He'd stayed there another ten or so minutes without batting an eyelash—although he was far from being in good shape on the brink of his fourteenth birthday and was reeling a little, his cheeks still smarting, his eye swollen—then he turned on his heel. Nor did he faint until he'd gotten a little farther, to the edge of the path. First he fell onto his knees, then collapsed flat onto the tar road as Marianne came running, a few seconds too late to break the fall, her arms stretched out toward him, full of despairing, moaning adolescent sorrow.

He touched Myriam's foot to show her the squirrel that had come into the room, attracted by the smell of cold toast swollen with maple syrup. How could he blame her for anything? He studied her lying on pillows; she looked washed out, cold. He wondered if the fact that she was a police officer didn't sometimes add to her appeal.

In any case he had no intention of bringing up the subject with her. Of telling her that he knew, that she was unmasked. What was the use? Running over a buck was a bad sign. They'd
seen themselves in its dulling eyes, and that wasn't good either, not a good omen; but even so, they'd kept the clouds at a distance. They'd had to. This was their first long time together, their first weekend alone.

He tried to imagine her in her navy-blue uniform. The day before they'd left, while she was sleeping, he'd ended up finding her weapon—hidden at the bottom of a boot under a thick wool sock—and had had the chance to examine it in the half-darkness. For a moment, he was stupefied by his incredible myopia all this time, despite all his famous rules, precautions. Often, in hindsight, you can only tremble at how close you came to the edge of the precipice without being aware of it, the risks you ran, the hair's breadth to which you owe still being alive. He shook his head. Opened the window to smoke.

Warm air flowed in. The noises around the motel pool became more audible, phone conversations, drinks, diving. For a moment, he almost suggested they go for a plunge, but he reneged immediately at the idea of having a conversation with some young actor in his cups or a drink with the wife of a soccer player or any other double for Paris Hilton. Anyone had it coming who took the risk of heading for the beach umbrellas, strolling among the deck chairs at martini time, and sitting down with the others facing west in observance of that pleasant tradition that required you
ooh
and
ahh
at the sunset the way you applauded the pilot of a 747 who landed his aircraft without incident. It was the kind of infantile behavior characteristic of the imbecility of any group.

For how many miles around them were hotels fully booked every weekend? How many candles, dinners by candlelight, and adulterers were there? He grinned at the image of him that
suggested, one he certainly had to take on, although he was sure she'd have preferred going camping and dining on kebab.

Ground glass sparkled on the carpet in front of the chair upon which he'd folded his trousers. When the TV screen had shattered, it had let out a hollow, muffled sound and rained down on his head through the slot in the box he was carrying at arm's length between two cars.

He'd just smashed the fifty-inch flat-screen that he was bringing back to Richard's brother against the corner of a heavy, rather old sign with a metal frame that yesterday's heavy winds had twisted and bent above the sidewalk. At the same time, an incredible pain had radiated from his coccyx, then disappeared immediately as if by magic, leaving him stricken, paralyzed by the fear of a second unpredictable attack.

“But what the hell are you doing, old man?” sighed Yannick Olso, standing at the threshold of his store with his arms crossed. He was the owner of Olso Hi-Fi, which specialized in top-of-the-line equipment. “What the fuck are you doing, jeez?!”

His back had fallen out during a hundredth of a second, really caved in. There was nothing to do about it, unfortunately, no treatment to follow except to wait for nature to reach the end of its slow, meticulous mending work, to keep from forcing his luck in the meantime by lifting heavy things.

Leaving the box on the sidewalk, he dusted himself off, shook his hair. “You were supposed to send me somebody,” he'd said, “and you didn't send anybody. So here's the result. Great savings, huh? Zero.”

“Was supposed to do it, but that's not the point,” the other went on, shaking his head and looking crushed. “But are you supposed to be so damned clumsy?”

“Okay. Sorry. You got a glass of water, I need to take a tablet.”

His migraine had come back. Once inside, Yannick Olso went back behind his counter. “You wouldn't want to try out a video projector?” he asked. “Check out the video projector. Listen to me. I'm sure I have something that'll fit the bill.”

“How about a drinking fountain and some cups? So I can swallow these lousy thingamajigs,” he'd answered dully.

That was the reason why, forty-eight hours later, minute splinters of glass were sparkling on the carpet, in the amber light of the setting sun, in the gold of its nearly pink, low-angled rays; they'd obviously fallen from the cuffs of his pants or some other folds in the lining.

He caressed Myriam's leg, which now had straightened nearly completely; it had been waxed just before coming. The fact that even an ounce of the desire he felt for her hadn't worn off after thirty-six hours of complete intimacy didn't surprise him. Nor did the fact that he hadn't tried to get away—nothing could have been less strange. But he'd known girls who let themselves be screwed while chewing gum, smoking, or taking inventory of the books in his library as they twisted their necks to one side. In what way could Myriam be compared to them? In what ways were they playing at the same game? When she held him tight against her breast, with shortened, quivering breath, how could he have resisted her? Then what difference did it make whether she was a cop or a nun?