Alex (19 page)

She takes everything out of the fridge: yoghurt, cheese, bread, bananas, and stuffs her face as she runs a bath. And unsurprisingly she barely makes it to the toilet before she throws up.

She catches her breath, drinks half a litre of milk.

She takes some surgical spirit and cleans the cuts and scratches on her arms, her legs, her hands, her knees, her face then, after her bath, she treats them with antiseptic cream. She is so tired
she can barely stand. Her face is a mess. Though the bruises from the abduction have begun to fade, the cuts on her arms and her legs look nasty and two are obviously infected. She’ll keep an eye on them; it’s all she can do. When she’s working, she always makes the most of her last day to stock up from the medicine cabinet. It’s amazing what she’s managed to pick up: penicillin, barbiturates, tranquillisers, diuretics, antibiotics, beta-blockers …

*

Finally, she lay down. Went straight to sleep.

Thirteen hours straight.

Waking up is like emerging from a coma.

It takes more than half an hour for her to work out where she is, to piece together how she got here. Tears well up again and she curls up on the bed like a baby and cries herself to sleep.

She wakes again five hours later; it’s six o’clock in the evening. Today, her radio tells her, is Thursday.

Groggy with sleep, she stretches her body; every limb aches. She takes her time, careful not to do herself an injury. Very slowly, she does some stretching exercises; though parts of her body are still stiff, she is making good progress. She gets unsteadily out of bed. Walks a little way, then her head starts to spin, she feels weak and she takes hold of a shelf so as not to fall. She is starving. She looks at herself in the mirror. She needs to dress her wounds, but her brain’s first whispered reflex is self-protection. First and foremost, make sure you’re safe.

She escaped; Trarieux will come after her, try to capture her again. He must know where she lives, since he abducted her on her way home. He must know by now. She glances out of the window – the street seems quiet. As quiet as the night she was kidnapped.

She reaches out, picks up her laptop and sets it on the sofa next to her. She opens a browser, types “Trarieux” – she doesn’t know his first name, only the son’s name, Pascal. It’s the father she’s looking for. Because she remembers exactly what she did to his fuckwit of a son, that retard. And where she buried him.

The third search engine result mentions an article about “Jean-Pierre Trarieux” on paris.news.fr. She clicks. It’s him.

POLICE BLUNDER IN HIGH-SPEED PÉRIPHÉRIQUE CHASE?

Alex’s mind struggles to keep up. When faced with a miracle, it is best to be sceptical.

This is why he hadn’t come back. When he was a bloody pulp on the Périphérique he could hardly come back and check on her. Or bring food for the rats. The bastard had been prepared to kill himself rather than have the police come and free her. Let him rot in hell with his fuckwit son.

The other crucial fact: the police don’t know who she is. They know nothing about her. Or at least they didn’t know anything when the article was published at the beginning of the week.

She types her own name into the search engine.
Alex Prévost
comes up with a bunch of people with the same name, but nothing, absolutely nothing about her.

It’s an enormous relief.

She checks her telephone. Eight missed calls. And the battery’s about to die. She gets up to look for the charger, but moves too quickly – her body isn’t ready for such bursts of speed; she falls back onto the sofa as though gravity is suddenly much stronger. She feels a dizziness, lights flash in front of her eyes, everything is spinning wildly, her heart lurches. Alex grits her teeth. A few more seconds and the dizzy spell passes. Cautiously she gets to her feet, tracks the phone charger down, plugs it in, then sits down again. Eight missed calls. Alex checks them and begins to breathe more easily. All work-related: temp. agencies – some of them have called twice. There’s work. Alex doesn’t bother listening to her voicemail; she’ll deal with that later.

*

“Oh, it’s you … I was wondering when I’d hear from you.”

That voice … Her mother and her constant criticism. Every time she hears it, it has the same effect, a lump in her throat.
Alex makes her excuses. Her mother always asks a lot of questions; when it comes to her daughter she’s a suspicious woman.

“A temp job? In Orléans? So is that where you’re calling from?”

Alex always hears a note of disbelief in her tone. She says, “Yes, but I can’t talk long.” The response is instant.

“Not much point calling then, was there?”

Her mother rarely calls, and if Alex calls her, it’s always like this. Her mother doesn’t live; she reigns. Think of something. Talking to her mother is like taking an exam – you have to prepare, revise, focus.

Alex doesn’t think.

“I’m going away for a bit, down the country; it’s a temporary position. I mean another one …”

“Oh, really? Where exactly?”

“It’s a short-term contract,” Alex says again.

“So you said, a short-term contract, down the country. I’m assuming it’s got a name, this place down the country?”

“I got it through an agency, but they haven’t got the details yet. It’s … complicated – we won’t know until the last minute.”

“Oh,” her mother says.

She’s clearly not buying this story. A moment’s hesitation, then, “So you’ve got a short-term contract, you don’t know where, covering for someone, but you don’t know who: is that it?”

There’s nothing unusual about the conversation – in fact it’s typical. The only difference is that today Alex is weak, much less thick-skinned than usual.

“No, it’s n— not like that …”

When it comes to her mother, it doesn’t matter whether or not she’s tired; sooner or later she ends up stuttering.

“Then what is it like?”

“Listen, my b— b— battery’s almost dead …”

“Really … And I don’t suppose you know how long it’s for, this temporary contract? You’ll just cover for this person and one day they’ll tell you that’s it, you can go home, is that it?”

She needs something, “a few well-chosen words”, as her mother would put it. But Alex can never think of any. Or rather she can, but always after the fact, when it’s too late, after she’s hung up, on the stairs, in the
métro
. When eventually she thinks of something, she’ll kick herself. Repeat the useless quip over and over, replay the conversation in her head for days – it’s as pointless as it is destructive, but she can’t help herself. Embellish the facts until, over time, it becomes a completely different story, a sparring match in which Alex wins every round, but then the next time she calls her mother she’s K.O.’d at the first word.

On the other end of the line her mother is waiting, silent, incredulous. Finally, Alex chucks in the towel.

“I really have to go now.”

“O.K. Oh, Alex …”

“Yes.”

“I’m fine, by the way. It was nice of you to ask.”

She hangs up.

Alex’s heart sinks.

She shakes herself, shrugs off all thoughts of her mother, focuses on what she needs to do. Trarieux, case closed. The police, out of the loop. Her mother, dealt with. Last: text her brother.

(she thinks for a moment, weighs up possible destinations)

It’ll take him at least a week to pass on the message. If he does at all.

Alex takes a deep breath, closes her eyes. She’s getting there. Slowly, she’s managing to do what she needs to do in spite of her tiredness.

She changes the dressings on her wounds as her stomach howls with hunger. She goes and checks herself in the full-length bathroom mirror. She looks fully ten years older.

She takes a shower, turns it to cold for the last few minutes, shivers –
God, it’s good to be alive
– a head-to-foot rubdown with a towel, she feels life rushing back –
God, it’s good when it hurts like this
– she pulls on a rough sweater over her bare skin – it’s a feeling she used to hate, but now she longs to feel the prickling itch of the coarse wool, to be intensely aware of her whole body, even her skin prickling with life. A pair of linen trousers, baggy and shapeless; they’re hideous but they’re soft, loose-fitting, like a caress. She picks up her bank card, her keys, says hello to Mme Guénaude in passing.
Yes, just got back. Yes, I’ve been away. The weather? Magnificent. Well, in the south of France, what do you expect? Tired? Well, it was a tough job, didn’t get much sleep the past few nights. Oh nothing, just a stiff neck, nothing serious. Oh, that?
She touches her forehead.
Completely stupid. I slipped and fell
. Mme Guénaude:
Not too steady on your pins?
A laugh.
Yes, you too, have a lovely evening.

Out on the street, the bluish haze of early evening is so beautiful she could weep. Alex suddenly laughs hysterically to herself. Life is wonderful. There’s the Arab grocer, a handsome
man – she’s never given him a second look before, but he really is very handsome – if she could hear herself – she wants to stroke his cheek, gaze deep into his eyes; she laughs to feel so full of life. Everything she needs to eschew, all the things she’s usually so careful about and which now seem like a reward: crisps, chocolate pudding, goat’s cheese, a nice bottle of Saint-Émilion and even a bottle of Baileys. She goes back to her apartment. The slightest effort tires her, almost making her cry. Suddenly she has a dizzy spell. She concentrates, waits, manages to overcome it. Carrying all the heavy shopping, she takes the lift. She’s so in love with life. Why can’t life always be the way it is at this moment?

*

Alex, naked, wearing only an old, baggy bathrobe, stands in front of the full-length mirror. Five years older – O.K. then, maybe six. She’ll recover quickly, she knows that; she can feel it. Take away the cuts and bruises, the bags and the wrinkles, the ordeal and the pain, and what are you left with: Alex looking gorgeous. She holds the bathrobe wide open, stares at her naked body, her breasts, her belly … and inevitably she starts to cry, standing, staring at her life.

She laughs to hear herself crying because she’s no longer sure whether she’s happy that she’s still alive or unhappy because she’s still Alex.

She knows how to deal with this danger that looms up from the depths. She sniffs, blows her nose, closes the bathrobe, pours herself a large glass of Saint-Émilion, an obscene, ridiculous meal of chocolate, rabbit pâté, biscuits.

She eats and eats and eats. Then slumps back on the sofa. She leans over, pours herself a half tumbler of Baileys, and with her
last scrap of energy, goes to fetch some ice. She can feel exhaustion closing in, but the happiness is still there, like a background noise.

She glances at the alarm clock. She’s completely out of sync; it’s 10.00 p.m.

Sump oil, ink, petrol – difficult to list all the smells that come together here, not to mention Mme Gattegno’s vanilla perfume. Fifty-something, when she saw the police arriving at the garage, she immediately rushed out of her glass-fronted office and the apprentice who had been hurrying to meet them scampered off again like a puppy surprised by the sudden appearance of his master.

“It’s about your husband, Madame.”

“What husband?”

This kind of response sets the tone.

Camille jerks his chin out as though his shirt collar is too tight – he scratches his neck distractedly, stares up at the sky. Wonders how he’s going to handle this, as he sees the woman fold her arms across her print dress, ready to be a human shield if necessary. He wonders what it is she’s got to protect.

“Bernard Gattegno.”

This obviously catches her off guard. The arms go slack; her
mouth drops open. She wasn’t expecting this, wasn’t thinking about that particular husband. Admittedly, she remarried last year, a five-star lead-swinger, younger than her, the best mechanic in the garage; she’s Mme Joris these days. It was a disaster. The minute he was married her husband decides he didn’t want to do a tap, reckons he can spend all his time at the bar. She shakes her head; a bloody waste.

“You have to understand, I did it for the sake of the garage,” she explains. “On my own …”

Camille understands. It’s a big garage, three or four mechanics, two apprentices, seven or eight cars, bonnets open, engines ticking over; on the hydraulic ramp, an Elvis Presley-style pink-and-white convertible, a strange car to find in Étampes. One of the mechanics, a youngish, tall, broad-shouldered guy, wipes his hands on a dirty rag and comes over, jaw clenched menacingly, and asks if he can help. He looks at his boss. If M. Joris succumbs to liver failure, there clearly won’t be any problem finding a replacement. His biceps scream that he’s not the type to be intimidated by the police. Camille nods.

“And for the kids …” Mme Joris says.

She harps on about her marriage – maybe this is what she’s been trying to do from the start, to justify remarrying so quickly, so disastrously.