The Elementary Particles (19 page)

At the end of his first week, Bruno stopped writing. What remained to be said was more tender, fragile and uncertain. After spending the afternoon at the beach, they were in the habit of going back to their apartment for an aperitif at about seven o’clock. He usually had a Campari, Christiane a vodka martini. He watched the sunlight play on the stucco—white inside, pinkish outside—and enjoyed seeing Christiane wander naked through the apartment, fetching ice or olives. What he felt was strange, very strange: his breathing was easier, and sometimes he found he could spend minutes at a time without thinking, without being so afraid. One afternoon, about a week after they arrived, he said to Christiane, “I think I’m happy.” She stopped dead, her hand on the ice bucket tensing visibly, and breathed out slowly.

“I want to live with you,” he went on. “I think we’ve both had enough, that we’ve both been too miserable for too long. Later we’ll have to deal with sickness and infirmity and death, but I think we could be happy together right to the end. I’d like to try, anyway. I think I love you.”

Christiane started to cry. Later, over seafood at the Neptune, they tried to work out the practical side. She could come and stay on weekends, that would be easy, but it would be difficult for her to get a transfer to Paris. Allowing for alimony, Bruno’s salary was not enough for them to live on. In any case, there was Christiane’s son to think of; they would have to wait. All the same, it was feasible. For the first time in many years, something seemed feasible.

The following morning Bruno wrote a short, emotional letter to Michel. He declared himself happy, and regretted that they had never truly understood each other. He hoped that Michel, too, might find a measure of happiness. He signed the letter:
Your brother, Bruno.

17

When Michel received the letter he was in despair over a theoretical crisis. According to Margenau’s theory, human consciousness could be compared to a field of probabilities in a Fock space, defined as a direct sum of Hilbert spaces. Such a space could be created by elementary electrical activity at a microscopic, synaptic level. Normal behavior could therefore be seen as the elastic warping of the field and free will as a rupture within it; but in what topology? There was nothing in the natural topography of Hilbert spaces that might give rise to free will. Michel was not entirely convinced that the problem could even be posed except in the most metaphorical sense. Of one thing he was certain: that a new conceptual framework was needed. Every night, before switching off his PC, he sent a request over the Internet for the daily experimental results. The following morning, he would digest them. As he did so, he remarked that around the world, research centers were groping their way along in a senseless empiricism. Nothing in their results brought them closer to a conclusion, nor did they provide support for any particular hypothesis. Individual consciousness seemed to emerge among animals for no apparent reason, and clearly predated the capacity for language. Darwinians, with their unconscious teleology, as usual put forward hypotheses about the possible selective advantages of the emergence of consciousness, but, as usual, these didn’t explain anything; they were just-so stories, no more. Then again, the anthropogenic model was hardly more convincing: life had thrown up something which could contemplate it, a mind capable of understanding it, but so what? That in itself did not make understanding human consciousness any easier. Self-consciousness, which is absent in nematodes, was clearly observable in inferior lizards like
Lacerta agilis,
implying the presence of both a central nervous system and something more. What that something was remained completely mysterious. Consciousness did not seem to depend on any single factor, whether anatomical, biochemical or cellular. It was all rather dsicouraging.

What would Heisenberg have done? What would Niels Bohr have done? Step back from the problem, take time to think, take a walk in the country, listen to music. The new was never simply a reworking of the old; information was added like handfuls of sand, predefined in their nature by the conceptual framework of the experiments. Now, more than ever, a new paradigm was essential.

The short, hot days went by sadly. On the night of 15 September Michel had an unusually happy dream. He was with a little girl as she gamboled through the forest, surrounded by flowers and butterflies. (An image, he realized later, that had floated to the surface from a thirty-year-old memory of the credits of
Prince Sapphire,
a television series he used to watch at his grandmother’s every Sunday afternoon, and which so accurately found an echo in his own heart.) A moment later, he was walking alone across an immense, undulating meadow through tall grasses. He could not see the horizon; the grassy hills seemed to stretch out to infinity under the brilliant gray sky. He walked on, however, purposeful and unhurried; he knew that some way beneath his feet ran an underground river, and that his feet instinctively would follow its path. All around him the breeze ruffled the long grass.

Upon waking he felt joyful and alive, something he hadn’t felt in the two months since he left work. He went out and walked under the linden trees down the avenue Émile-Zola. He was alone, but not lonely. He stopped at the corner of the rue des Entrepreneurs. It was about nine o’clock. Zolacolor was opening up; Asian girls sat behind the cash registers. Between the Beaugrenelle towers, the sky seemed strangely luminous; there seemed no solution. Perhaps he should have talked to his neighbor across the street, the girl who worked at
Vingt Ans
. Working for a lifestyle magazine, informed about cultural trends, she would surely know how to fit in. She would know about psychology, too. There was probably much that she could teach him. He walked back quickly, almost breaking into a run, and bounded up the stairs to the door of his neighbor’s apartment. He rang the doorbell three times. No one answered. Flustered, he retreated to his own building; as he waited for the elevator, he questioned himself. Was he depressed, and did such a question have any meaning? For years he had seen posters appear in the area, asking people to be vigilant and warning them about the National Front. The fact that he had no opinion on such a subject one way or the other was already a worrying sign.
Depressive lucidity,
usually described as a radical withdrawal from ordinary human concerns, generally manifests itself by a profound indifference to things which are genuinely of minor interest. Thus it is possible to imagine a depressed lover, while the idea of a depressed patriot seems frankly inconceivable.

Back in his kitchen, he realized that belief in the free and rational determination of human actions—which was the natural foundation of democracy—and, in particular, the belief in the free and rational determination of individual political choices, probably resulted from a confusion between the concepts of freedom and unpredictability. The turbulence of a river flowing around the supporting pillars of a bridge is structurally unpredictable, but no one would think to describe it as being
free
. He poured himself a glass of white wine, opened the curtains and lay down to think. The equations of chaos theory made no reference to the physical space in which their effects took place; their ubiquity meant that they applied as effectively to hydrodynamics as to meteorology, group sociology or the genetics of a population. As a tool for devising morphological models they were excellent, but their predictive capacities were nonexistent. On the other hand, the equations of quantum mechanics made it possible to predict the behavior of microphysical systems with exceptional, even perfect precision if one was prepared to give up any hope of a return to a materialist ontology. Certainly it was premature to establish a mathematical link between the two; it might even prove impossible. But Michel was convinced that the formation of attractors in the evolving network of neurons and synapses held the key to understanding human actions and opinions.

Looking for a list of recent publications on the subject, he noticed he hadn’t opened his mail for more than a week. Naturally, most of it was junk mail. With the launch of the
Costa Romantica,
a company called TMR hoped to completely redefine the luxury-cruise concept; the ship was described as an “authentic floating paradise.” The first moments of his cruise—“the decision is yours!”—might be described thus: “You step into the great hall. Sunlight streams through the great glass cupola. You take one of the panoramic elevators to the upper deck. Here, from the immense atrium situated on the prow, you can stare out to sea as though you were watching it
on a gigantic screen
.” He put the brochure to one side, thinking to study it in detail later. “Walk along the deck, contemplate the ocean through a transparent bulkhead, sail for weeks under a changeless sky . . .” Why not? While they sailed, Western Europe might well be atomized under a hail of bombs. They would disembark, tanned and sleek, onto a new continent.

In the meantime he had to live, and that was something he could do intelligently, responsibly, joyously. The most recent issue of
Dernières Nouvelles de Monoprix
stressed more than ever the image of a socially responsible company. Once again the editor took issue with the notion that gastronomy and watching your weight were incompatible. Their scrupulous choice of recommended dishes, their range of produce, their store-label products—everything, in fact, that Monoprix had stood for since the beginning—was based on exactly the opposite conviction. “It is possible to have gourmet food, a balanced diet and to have it now,” the editor boldly affirmed. After this first contentious, even combative article, the rest of the magazine was filled with “handy hints,” educational games and “useful information.” Michel was therefore able to calculate his average daily caloric intake. In the past weeks he hadn’t once swept or ironed, gone swimming, played tennis or made love; the only three activities he could actually tick off were sitting, lying down and sleeping. All told, he needed only 1,750 calories a day. From Bruno’s letter, it was clear that he’d been doing rather more swimming and lovemaking. He recalculated, using these new parameters, and discovered he would require 2,700 calories a day.

There was a second letter, this one from the town council at Crécy-en-Brie. In the light of development plans for a new parking lot, it was necessary to move the local cemetery; a number of graves, among them his grandmother’s, would have to be moved. According to regulations, a family member had to be present for the relocation of the remains. He could arrange a meeting with the funeral directors between the hours of ten-thirty and noon.

18

REUNIONS

The railcar to Crécy-la-Chapelle had been replaced by a commuter train. The village itself had changed considerably. He stopped for a moment in the square outside the station and looked around in surprise. There was a Casino superstore on the outskirts of Crécy on avenue Général-Leclerc. In every direction he could see new houses and office buildings.

It had all happened around the time EuroDisney opened, explained a clerk at the town hall, and the extension of the commuter railway as far as Marne-la-Vallée. Many Parisians chose to move here; land prices had more than tripled, and the last of the farmers sold off their fields. Now there was a complex comprising a gym, community center and two swimming pools. Delinquency posed some problems, but no more than anywhere else.

As he passed the old houses and the canals on his way to the cemetery, he felt the sadness and confusion of anyone returning to his childhood home. Crossing the covered way, he found himself opposite the windmill. The seat where he and Annabelle liked to sit after school was still there. In the dark waters, huge fish swam against the current. Sunshine briefly broke through the clouds.

. . .

The man was waiting for Michel at the cemetery gates. “Are you the . . .”

“Yes.” What did they call gravediggers nowadays? He was carrying a spade and a black plastic bag. Michel walked close behind him. “You don’t have to look . . .” he muttered as they approached the open grave.

Death is difficult to understand; only reluctantly does a person resign himself to face a precise image of it. Michel had seen the body of his grandmother twenty years before and had kissed her for the last time. Nevertheless, he was at first surprised by what he saw in the excavation. His grandmother had been buried in a coffin, but among the freshly dug earth there remained only fragments of broken wood, a rotting board and indistinct white fragments. When he realized what he was looking at he quickly turned his head and forced himself to look the other way, but it was too late. He had seen the skull caked with earth, clumps of white hair falling over empty sockets. He had seen her vertebrae scattered in the clay. He understood.

The man continued to fill the plastic bag, glancing over at Michel, devastated, beside him. “Always the same,” he muttered. “Can’t help themselves, they have to look. Coffin’s not going to last twenty years, is it?” he said almost angrily. Michel walked a few paces behind as the gravedigger poured the contents of the bag into their new resting place. Once he finished his work, the man stood up, came over and asked, “You all right?” Michel nodded. “We’ll move the headstone tomorrow. Sign here for me.”

That was that. After twenty years, that was that. Bones and earth mingled together and the mass of white hair, so much of it, so alive. He could see his grandmother embroidering in front of the television, walking toward the kitchen. That was that. As he passed the Bar des Sports, he realized he was trembling. He went in and ordered a
pastis
. When he sat down he noticed the interior was completely different from the way he remembered it. There was a pool table and video games; a television tuned to MTV was blaring out music; the cover of
Newlook
pinned to the bulletin board featured the Fantasies of Zara Whites and the great white shark in Australia. He gradually slipped into a gentle doze.

. . .

It was Annabelle who recognized him first. She’d just bought cigarettes and was heading for the door when she saw him slumped on the bench. She hesitated for a second or two before coming up to him. He looked up. “This is a surprise,” she said softly; then she sat across from him on the leatherette seat. She had hardly changed. Her face was still incredibly smooth and pure, her hair dazzlingly blonde. It seemed impossible that she could be forty; at most she looked twenty-seven or twenty-eight.

She was in Crécy for reasons similar to his own. “My father died a week ago,” she said. “Cancer of the bowel. It was long and difficult—and excruciatingly painful. I stayed for a bit to help Mom out. The rest of the time I live in Paris, like you.”

Michel looked down. There was a moment’s silence. At the next table, two young guys were talking about karate.

“I ran into Bruno about three years ago, at an airport. He told me you were a scientist—and important, well known in your field. He told me you’d never married. My life is less brilliant—I’m a librarian in a local library. I never married either. I’ve often thought about you. I hated you when you didn’t answer my letters. That was twenty-three years ago, but I still think about it sometimes.”

She walked him to the station. It was almost six and getting dark. They stopped on the bridge over the Grand Morin. There were plants in the water, chestnut trees, willows; the water was still and green. Corot loved this scene and had painted it many times. An old man in his garden looked like a scarecrow. “We’re at the same point now,” said Annabelle, “the same distance from death.”

She stood on the step of the train and kissed him on both cheeks just before it pulled out. “I’ll see you again,” he said. She answered: “Yes.”

She invited him to dinner the following Saturday. She was living in a studio apartment on the rue Legendre. It was very small, but the place seemed warm and inviting—the walls and the ceiling were paneled in dark wood like the cabin of a boat. “I’ve been living here for eight years,” she said. “I moved in when I passed my library exams. Before that I worked in the coproduction unit at TF1. I’d had enough—I didn’t like working in television. I lost two thirds of my salary when I changed jobs, but I like it much better. I work in the children’s section in the public library in the seventeenth arrondissement.”

She had made a lamb curry with dal. Michel said little as they ate. He asked Annabelle about her family. Her elder brother had taken over the family business. He was married with three children—a boy and two girls. Unfortunately, the business was in trouble; competition in precision optics was fierce, and on more than one occasion he had almost filed for bankruptcy. He drowned his sorrows drinking
pastis
and voting for Le Pen. Her younger brother had gone into the marketing department at L’Oréal and had recently been made marketing director for North America; they didn’t see much of him. He was divorced, childless. Two completely different fates, but both somehow equally archetypal.

“I haven’t really had a happy life,” said Annabelle. “I think I was too obsessed with love. I fell for guys too easily; once they got what they wanted, they dumped me and I got hurt. It took me years to come to terms with the cliché that men don’t make love because they’re in love, but because they’re turned on. Everyone around me knew that and lived like that—I grew up in a liberated environment—but I never enjoyed the game for its own sake. In the end, even the sex started to disgust me; I couldn’t stand their triumphant little smiles when I took off my dress, or their idiot leers when they came and especially their boorishness once it was all over and done with. They were spineless, pathetic and pretentious. In the end, it was too painful to know they thought of me as just another piece of meat. I was a prime cut, I suppose, because I was physically perfect, and they were proud to take me out and show me off in a restaurant. Only once did I think I was involved in a serious relationship; I even moved in with him. He was an actor, and there was something very imposing about him physically, but he never really made it—in fact I paid most of the bills. We lived together for two years and then I got pregnant. He asked me to have an abortion. I did. But as I was coming back from the hospital I knew it was over. I moved out that night and checked into a hotel for a while. I was thirty. It was my second abortion and I couldn’t take much more. This was in 1988 and everyone was starting to worry about AIDS. For me it was a salvation. I’d slept with dozens of men and there wasn’t one of them worth remembering. People think that when you’re young you go out and have fun, and only later do you start to think about death. But every man I ever met was terrified of getting old. They worried all the time about how old they were. They get obsessed about it when they’re quite young—I’ve seen twenty-five-year-olds worried about getting old—and it just gets worse. I decided to give up, to stop playing the game. I live a quiet, joyless life. In the evening I read, I make herbal tea and hot drinks. I go to see my parents every weekend and spend a lot of time looking after my nephew and my nieces. Sometimes I get scared at night; I have trouble sleeping; it’s true I need a man around. I take tranquilizers and sleeping pills, but they’re never really enough. I just want life to go by as quickly as possible.”

Michel said nothing; he wasn’t surprised. For many women, adolescence is exciting—they’re really interested in boys and sex. But gradually they lose interest; they’re not so keen to open their legs or to get on their knees and wiggle their ass. They’re looking for a tender relationship they never will find, for a passion they’re no longer capable of feeling. Thus they begin the difficult years.

Folded out, the sofa bed took up most of the room. “I’ve never actually used it before,” Annabelle said. They lay down side by side and held each other.

“I haven’t been on the pill for a long time, and I haven’t got any condoms. Do you have any?”

“No.” He smiled at the very idea.

“Would you like me to take you in my mouth?”

He thought for a moment and at last said “Yes.” It was pleasant, though not intensely so; in fact, it never had been. Sexual pleasure that’s so intense for some is faint, almost insignificant for others (a result of culture, neural connections or what?). There was a poignancy in the act, which symbolized their reunion, their interrupted destiny. But afterward, it was wonderful to take Annabelle in his arms when she turned away to sleep. Her body was soft and pliant, warm and perfectly smooth; she had a slim waist, big hips and small, firm breasts. He slipped a leg between hers and placed his hands on her stomach and breasts; in this warmth, this softness, he was at the dawn of the world. He fell asleep almost immediately.

At first he saw a man, a form in space, only his face was visible. The expression in his eyes as they flashed in the darkness was difficult to decipher. There was a mirror facing him. When he first looked into it, the man felt as though he were falling into an abyss. But then he sat down and studied his reflection as though it were a thing apart, a mental image unrelated to him, transferable to others. After a minute, he began to feel more or less indifferent, though if he turned away, even for a few seconds, he had to begin again. Once more, he had to force himself, painfully—as one begins to focus on a nearby object—to shatter the feeling of identification with his reflection. The self is an intermittent neurosis, and this man was far from cured.

Then he saw a smooth, white wall and, as though from within, letters began to form upon it. Little by little they rose, creating a moving bas-relief in time to a nauseating throb. At first it resolved into the word
PEACE
, then into
WAR
, then
PEACE
reappeared. Then, suddenly, the phenomenon ceased and the surface of the wall was as smooth as before. The atmosphere seemed to liquefy, pulsing in waves; the sun was an immense yellow. He could see to a distant point, the root of time itself. This root sent out tendrils across the universe, knotty at the center, their tips cold and sticky. They wound around, encircled and encapsulated portions of space.

He saw the brain of the dead man as a part of space, containing space.

Last, he saw the mental aggregate of space and its opposite. He saw the mental conflict through which space was structured, and saw it disappear. He saw space as a thin line separating two spheres. In the first sphere there was being and separation, and in the second was nonbeing and the destruction of the individual. Calmly, without a moment’s hesitation, he turned and walked toward the second sphere.

He extricated himself from their embrace and sat up. Annabelle’s breathing was deep and regular. She had a cube-shaped Sony alarm clock which read 3:37. Could he get back to sleep? He had to get back to sleep. He had some Xanax with him.

In the morning, she made him coffee while she had tea and toast. The weather was beautiful, though it was already a little cold. She looked at his naked body; his still skinny frame seemed strangely adolescent. They were both forty, which was difficult to believe. Nonetheless, she could no longer have children without running the risk that they would be genetically malformed; his virility had already largely ebbed. From the point of view of the good of the species, they were a couple of aging human beings of middling genetic value. She had lived a bit: taken cocaine, participated in orgies, stayed in luxury hotels. Her beauty had put her at the epicenter of the movement of moral liberation which was such a major part of her youth. As a result, she had suffered greatly—in the end, she would almost give her life for it. His indifference had left him on the periphery both of that movement, and of life, and of everything, so he barely had been touched by it. He had been content to be faithful to his local Monoprix and to coordinate research in molecular biology.

Their different existences had left few visible marks on their separate bodies, but life itself had long since begun its work of destruction, slowly overburdening the capacity of cells and their organelles to replicate. Intelligent mammals capable of loving one another, they looked at each other on this autumn morning. “I know we’ve left it a bit late,” she said, “but I’d still like to try. I still have my train pass from 1974–75, the last year we were at school together. Every time I look at it, I feel like crying. I can’t understand how things can have gotten so fucked up. I just can’t accept it.”