The Cracks in Our Armor Read online

  Then he took a needle from a syringe and pierced the straw in several places. He glanced at me. It was okay, no problem, he could go on with his stupid little game.

  Then he stuck a nose clip on me and already I didn’t feel so good.

  I began to freak out.

  He turned to the boy:

  “What’s your dad’s name?”

  “Jean. But everyone calls him Jeannot.”

  “I see . . . ” Then he turned to me: “Are you ready, Jeannot? Follow me. Naturally, strictly no touching my little device. I can count on you, can’t I?”

  I pulled over, opened the trunk, took my shovel, and tucked my dead dog inside my jacket.

  The weather was fine, I zipped up my jacket and off we went.

  We followed the doctor down the hall and he asked us to wait for a minute. Ludo and I looked at each other, shaking our heads: Hey, who is this weirdo doctor, anyway? Well, actually, it was Ludo shaking his head; me, I couldn’t. I just rolled my eyes and even that took more energy than I would have thought. After that I didn’t budge an inch.

  Robestier came back. He’d taken off his white coat and he was skipping like a kid, toeing an old soccer ball.

  Then he kicked it toward me:

  “Go, Jeannot, come on! Pass it to me!”

  Not for one second did I have a hope in hell of touching that damn ball. Not one second.

  I waddled a few steps, but I tried to keep from leaning forward best I could. The straw had to stay horizontal. I couldn’t move my head too abruptly, especially not from left to right or up and down, otherwise I wouldn’t have enough air.

  But I tried.

  “Hey, Jeannot, c’mon! What you doing, buddy?”

  I didn’t recognize him. This man who’d just acted so proud behind his desk, and now he was acting all familiar and hopping around like some bunny rabbit.

  “You don’t need to score a goal, but hey, c’mon! Pass it to me, at least!”

  What with the straw I swore I would not spit out, the lack of air, plus my irritation at not being able to touch that damn ball, I began to lose it. I tried to stay calm, but I felt like I was going to die.

  “NO, MONSIEUR MONATI! NO!”

  And all I could do to keep from tearing off that goddamn adhesive, that is, to keep from losing face there in front of my kid, was to fall on the floor, curl up in a ball, and lie there motionless as long as I could with my forehead against my knees and my arms around my head to shield myself from the world.

  Don’t anybody look at me. Don’t anybody speak to me. Don’t anybody touch me. Just let me lie here playing dead as long as possible so that I can start living again.

  He held out his hand and pulled me to my feet while I peeled off his confounded booby trap.

  “So you see, Jean, what you just experienced, that’s what this is . . . ”

  He pointed to his machine. The little glowing screen where the best Ludovic could do, blowing as hard as he could, appeared in the form of a tiny spidery scrawl across a graph that was a thousand times too big for it.

  I didn’t think the hill would be so steep. I’m using my shovel as a walking stick and the words come back, and I say them out loud: So, Jeannot, where’s that pass? No, Monsieur Monati, no!

  That evening I went to see my kid in his room. He was in his bed, reading a magazine. I pulled the chair out from his desk.

  “You okay?”

  “Yeah.”

  “What you reading?”

  He showed me the cover.

  “Is it good?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Good . . . ”

  I could see he didn’t really feel like talking. He was tired and all he wanted was to read his thing about the ten enigmas of the solar system without being disturbed.

  “You take your Ventolin?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay, good . . . everything okay then?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Am I, am I bothering you? Keeping you from reading, is that it?”

  He looked me in the eyes.

  “Yeah,” he said, with a broad grin, “you are kinda bothering me.”

  Ah. When I think back. He was such a good kid. A really, really good kid.

  On leaving his room I couldn’t help but ask him:

  “So how do you manage?”

  “How do I manage what?”

  “To breathe.”

  He put his magazine on his lap and he paused, thinking, to give me the only possible right answer:

  “I concentrate.”

  I wished him good night and just as I was closing the door I heard him giggling:

  “’Night, Ronaldo.”

  And just to have a little laugh like that, quietly, just to poke fun at his old dad, well, it nearly suffocated him.

  The perfect spot. A sort of little outcrop facing south-southwest. He’d have plenty to see from there, my little busybody . . .

  I dug.

  I left him my jacket. I took the two lumps of sugar I’d swiped from a self-service and slipped them into the inside pocket.

  For the road.

  Didn’t take long to fill in the hole. He wasn’t a big dog.

  I sat down next to him and all of a sudden I felt completely alone in the world.

  I smoked a cigarette, then another one, then a third one.

  After that I took hold of the shovel to hoist myself back to my feet.

  All the doctors kept saying we had to send Ludovic somewhere with fresh air. That he had to continue his studies up in the mountains and far away from us. We had a hard time deciding what to do. Especially my wife.

  In the end we enrolled him in a sort of sanatorium-high school in the Pyrenees. It went smoothly. Nadine said it was because of his good report cards. In my opinion it was mainly because of his medical records, but in the end, it hardly mattered, he was glad to be going.

  He had just turned fifteen, was in tenth grade, and he was an adorable kid. I’m not saying this just because he was my kid, I’m saying it because it’s true. Was it just his nature, or was it his illness that had made him like that? I have no idea, but I’ll just say it one more time: he was an adorable kid.

  Really small for his age, but already a fine gentleman . . .

  It happened just before Easter vacation. We were waiting impatiently for him to come back. His mother was going around in circles and I’d asked for my days off. We were going to take him to the Futuroscope before heading down to his cousins’ place in Parthenay. I was there when the phone rang.

  The headmaster of the school informed us that our son Ludovic Monati had had an attack during recess and the administration had immediately called for an ambulance, but the boy died on his way to the nearest hospital.

  The hardest thing was clearing out his room at the school. We had to take everything and put it in garbage bags: his clean clothes and his dirty clothes, his games, his books, the posters he’d hung around his bed, his notebooks, his secrets, and all his boxes of medication.

  Nadine did not bat an eyelash. Her only request was not to run into the headmaster. There was something about this “sad affair,” as he put it, certain details she could not stomach.

  A fifteen-year-old boy doesn’t just up and die like that, out in the schoolyard during recess.

  When we were outside the building she turned to me and said:

  “I don’t want you in the way. Go and wait for me in the car. I’d rather be on my own.”

  She never had to repeat it and yet from that day on I have always felt like I’m in her way.

  Traffic’s heavy. I didn’t think there would be such gridlock. I’m not used to driving at this time of day. I’m not used to feeling trapped by traffic. People honking their horns and me missing my dog.

  Tomorrow I’ll get back int
o my truck and his smell will be there.

  I’ll need some time to get used to not having him around.

  How long?

  How much longer?

  How long until I stop looking over his way, asking him if everything is okay, reaching over toward the passenger seat, huh?

  How long will it all take?

  I said, It’s me, and I went into the kitchen to pour myself a beer. I was about to go downstairs when she called out to me. She was sitting in the living room.

  She wasn’t wearing her apron and her coat was folded across her lap.

  “I was getting worried, so I called your work and Ricaut told me about your dog.”

  “Oh?”

  I’d already turned to go when she added:

  “Do you want to go for a little walk?”

  I was speechless.

  “Come on, let’s go. Put your shoes back on and come with me. I’m waiting.”

  We went out, I locked the door, night was falling, and we took each other by the hand.

  HAPPY MEAL

  I love this girl. I want to make her happy. I’d like to take her out to lunch. A big French brasserie with mirrors and proper tablecloths. So I can sit next to her, gaze at her profile, look at the people all around us and let everything get cold. I love her.

  “Okay,” she says, “but we’re going to McDonald’s.”

  She doesn’t give me the time to protest.

  “It’s been ages,” she adds, putting her book down by her side, “seems like forever . . . ”

  She’s exaggerating. It was less than two months ago, I counted. I know how to count, but I’m resigned. The young lady likes her nuggets and barbecue sauce: what am I supposed to do?

  If we’re together long enough, I’ll teach her about other things.

  About grand veneur sauce, Pomerol wines, and crêpes Suzette, for example. If we’re together long enough, I’ll teach her that waiters at the big brasseries are not allowed to touch our napkins, and that they slide them onto the table by raising their presentation napkin slightly. That ought to astonish her. There are so many things I want to show her. So, so many things. But I say nothing while I watch her buttoning up her pretty coat.

  I know what girls are like when it comes to the future: they make promises, and that’s it. I’d rather take her to that crap fast food place and make her happy one day at a time. The crêpes Suzette can wait.

  In the street I compliment her on her shoes. She takes offense:

  “Don’t tell me you never noticed them, I’ve had them since Christmas!”

  I mumble something, she smiles at me, so I compliment her on her socks and she tells me I’m being dumb. As if I didn’t already know.

  We go through the door and I instantly feel nauseous. From one time to the next I forget how much I hate McDonald’s. That smell . . . that smell of frying fat, ugliness, cruelty to animals, and vulgarity combined. Why do the female employees allow themselves to get so ugly? Why do they wear that pointless sun visor? Why do people stand in line so passively? Why do they play that elevator music? Where is the elevator? I stamp my feet with impatience. The customers ahead of us have no manners. The young women are vulgar and the young men have an empty stare. I have a hard enough time with humanity as it is: I shouldn’t come to this sort of place.

  I stand straight and stare at a point far ahead of me, as far away as possible: the price of the Maxi Best Of menus and the chemical composition of the Very Parfait posted above the counter. “Maxi Best Of.” “Very Parfait.” How can anyone make words sounds so ridiculous? I’m getting depressed. She can tell, she senses these things. She takes my hand and gives it a gentle squeeze. She doesn’t look at me. I feel better. Her little finger is stroking my palm and my fortune line is overlapping my love line.

  She changes her mind several times. For dessert she hesitates between a milkshake and a caramel sundae. She wrinkles her cute little nose and twirls a strand of hair with her finger. The waitress is tired and I feel emotional. I carry both our trays. She turns to me and says,

  “I suppose you would rather sit all the way at the back?”

  I shrug.

  “You would. You like it better there. I know you do.”

  She clears the way for me. People who are sitting in the way scrape their chairs as she goes by. Faces turn. She doesn’t see them. The impalpable disdain of the young lady who knows she is beautiful. She is looking for a little niche where the two of us will be comfortable. She finds a spot, smiles at me again, and I close my eyes in agreement. I put our pittance down on a table smeared with squirts of ketchup and streaks of grease. She slowly unwinds her scarf and wiggles her head three times before she reveals her graceful neck. I go on standing there like a big ninny.

  “What are you waiting for?” she asks.

  “I’m looking at you.”

  “You can look at me later. It’s going to get cold.”

  “You’re right.”

  “I’m always right.”

  “No, my love. Not always.”

  A little grimace.

  I stretch my legs out into the aisle. I don’t know where to begin. I already want to leave. There’s nothing I like about these little parcels. A boy with a nose-ring is joined by two other loudmouths. I fold my legs under the table to let this strange herd go by.

  I have a moment’s doubt. What am I doing here? With my vast love and my tweed jacket? I feel a ridiculous urge to go and get a knife and fork.

  She is worried:

  “Is something wrong?”

  “No, no. Everything’s fine.”

  “Then eat!”

  I do as she says. She delicately opens her box of nuggets as if it were a jewelry box. I look at her nails. A bluish polish. Dragonfly wing polish. I’m telling you, I don’t know anything about nail polish colors, but as it happens she also has two little dragonflies in her hair. Tiny barrettes that just barely hold a few blonde strands in place. I feel a surge of emotion. I know, I’m repeating myself, but I cannot help but wonder: was it for my sake, as she thought about our lunch together, that she painted her nails this morning?

  I picture her in her bathroom, concentrating, and already dreaming of her caramel sundae. And of me at the same time. Oh yes. Of me. Inevitably.

  She dips her pieces of defrosted chicken into their plastic sauce.

  She’s relishing it.

  “You really like that?”

  “I love it.”

  “But why?”

  A triumphant smile.

  “Because it’s good!”

  She’s implying that I’m an old-fashioned killjoy, I can see it in her eyes. But at least she shows it tenderly.

  Pray God it lasts, this tenderness. Pray God it lasts.

  I join in. I chew and swallow, keeping time with her. She doesn’t say a lot. I’m used to that. She never says much when I take her out to lunch. She’s far too busy looking at the tables around her. People fascinate her. Even that weirdo at the next table wiping his mouth and blowing his nose in the same napkin is more interesting to her than I am.

  And while she’s looking at him, I take a moment to stare at her, undisturbed.

  What do I like best about her?

  Top of the list, I would say her eyebrows. She has lovely eyebrows. Very well drawn. The Great Architect must have been inspired that day. He probably used a sable brush and his hand did not tremble. Number two, her earlobes. Perfect. Her ears are not pierced. I hope she will never succumb to that ludicrous temptation. I will stop her. Number three, something that is very tricky to describe. For number three, I love her nose or, more precisely, her nostrils. The soft little round backs of those two tiny shells. Those pale pink shells, almost white, like the ones we have been looking for every summer since we met and which the kids on the beach call cowries. As for number four . . .r />
  But the spell has been broken already: she could tell I was looking at her, and she simpers as she nibbles on her drinking straw. I look away. I hunt for my phone, patting my pockets.

  “You put it in my bag.”

  “Thank you.”

  “What would you do without me, huh?”

  “Nothing.”

  I smile at her and reach for a handful of cold fries.

  “I would do nothing,” I continue, “but I wouldn’t have to go to McDonald’s on a Saturday afternoon.”

  She didn’t hear me. She has started on her sundae. With the tip of her spoon she starts by eating the chopped peanuts, then proceeds conscientiously along each swirl of caramel.

  Then she pushes her tray back.

  “Aren’t you going to finish it?”

  “No. I don’t actually like sundaes. I just like the peanut bits and the caramel. The ice cream makes me feel sick.”

  “You want me to ask them to put some more on?”

  “Some more what?”

  “Some more peanuts and caramel.”

  “They’ll never do it.”

  “Why not?”

  “I just know they won’t. They won’t want to.”

  “Let me try.”

  I get up, holding her little cup of ice cream, and head toward the cash registers. I wink at her. She looks at me, amused. My heart is in my boots. I’m a valiant knight who is carrying his princess’s colors to a faraway, hostile land.

  In hushed tones I ask the woman for another sundae. It’s easier that way. I’m a valiant knight who has some experience.

  Off she goes again, painstakingly picking at her dessert. I like her gourmandise. I like her manners.

  So graceful.

  How is this possible?

  I think about what to do next. Where shall I take her? What am I going to do with her? Will she give me her hand when we’re back out in the street? Will she pick up her charming chirruping where she left it when we came in? What was she talking about, anyway? I think it was about Easter weekend. Where were we going for Easter? Good lord, my dear, I don’t even know myself. I can try to make you happy from one day to the next, but ask me what we’ll be doing two months from now, that’s going a bit far. I’ll have to find another topic of conversation, in addition to a place to go for a walk.