The Happy Marriage (20 page)

He could notice the progress he was making with each passing day and saw that he was in a better shape. The prospect of seeing Imane made him rejoice. One day she arrived with a bouquet of roses.

“Today we’re going to walk for an hour, it’s nice outside. You’re recovering your reflexes in your left leg and arm. You can stand up on your own by leaning on a crutch.”

The walk did him a lot of good. Imane met her mother on the promenade. She introduced her to the painter. She was still young. She thanked him for all that he’d done for Imane. Once she’d left, the painter stopped and told Imane:

“What did she mean by all the good I’ve done for you? You’re the one who’s done a lot for me, you’re so patient and your hands have healing powers …”

“My mother was referring to something else, which I haven’t told you about. I lied to her and told her you’d agreed. You’re wondering what I’m talking about? Well, it’s about my brother, whose dream is to leave this country and go to Europe to look for work. My mother thought that your fame and connections might be useful to him. I didn’t dare bring it up with you, you know what Moroccan families are like.”

“Oh, I’m well aware, there’s nothing wrong with helping someone out, let’s talk about it some other time.”

Then, after a brief silence, he said:

“This idea of leaving Morocco at all costs is very new. This country has missed out on every opportunity it’s ever had, and this is the result, all its young people are leaving! I’ll try to find your brother a job, but I’ll look for it here, close to you, which will be easier for me, and besides, Europe is not the land of milk and honey that people think it is.”

While they talked, the painter tried to think of ways to keep Imane close to him. He wondered whether she might make a good assistant for him, but on the other hand he worried about being unable to keep his work and personal feelings separate.

Once they’d returned to the house, Imane massaged his legs and then sat by his feet as she so often liked to do and began telling him a story:

Once upon a time there lived a little girl who wanted to grow up faster than time would allow, mistaking herself for the south wind, which was strong and forceful. She would arrive somewhere like a storm and sweep away all in her path. They called her “Fitna,” which in Arabic means “internal turmoil” and by extension “panic.”

But by and by as she grew up, the little girl calmed down and transformed into an “evening breeze,” so people started calling her “the murmur of the moon.” In the evenings, she would stay up and walk the streets along the riverbanks, collecting the stories that were handed down from generation to generation and placing those stories inside cups of wine, which poets, especially the cheeky ones, were fond of drinking
.

Once she’d grown up, the girl left for the mountains and was never seen again. A legend was born amidst the stones and the wild weeds. The young girl had become the goddess of solitude, reigning over a kingdom of the hardest rocks known to man, barring way to all illnesses that hailed from diseased, unloved countries
.

It was also said that this woman had given birth to three sons after lying with the devil. Once they’d grown into adults, her sons caused a great deal of havoc and violence: stealing, killing, torturing, and always managing to evade the law. Quite the contrary, in fact; they prospered and managed to mingle with the city’s most distinguished notables. One night, their mother came down from the mountain and ate them. In the early hours of that morning, the bloated corpse of a mare was discovered lying in front of the city’s gate, and when they sliced it open, they discovered the bodies of the three men, whose skin had turned green and whose eyes had gone missing …

On seeing the captain’s astonished expression, Imane stopped and said:

“Don’t worry, I just made that up, don’t be scared!”

“Are you sure you don’t have a nicer story to tell me before you leave?”

“Yes, I love you.”

“Now that’s a nice story.”

XXIII

Casablanca

December 19, 2002

I know why Katarina and Peter go through hell. They don’t speak the same language. They have to translate everything into a common language. Sometimes it’s like listening to preprogrammed tape recorders. Sometimes all you get is the vast silence of outer space.

—
INGMAR BERGMAN
,
Scenes from a Marriage

On his psychiatrist’s request, the painter used a tape recorder to list all the reasons why he’d fallen out of love with his wife. He used several tapes. He wanted to be specific, and tell the whole truth in so far as he saw it. He might have made some mistakes, but in any case this was meant to be an outlet for him, and not an indictment against his wife.

He pressed “record” and launched into a preface of sorts:

Here is the list of reasons that led me to the conclusion that my wife and I haven’t loved one another in a long time. I may be wrong, and needless to say, these reasons are subjective, and they aren’t exhaustive either. Well, here we go:

My wife always does what she pleases.

My wife is a flash flood, a flood of words, a storm.

My wife is a diamond that nobody polished.

My wife believes in things she can’t see: she believes in ghosts, in haunted houses, in the evil eye, in bad energies and destructive vibes.

My wife is in love with love and the idea of a Prince Charming.

My wife likes cars that are big and beautiful. She can’t stand being driven around. She always drives on the left side of the road and thinks that all the other drivers are always wrong.

My wife never admits to any of her mistakes and doesn’t know how to compromise.

My wife doesn’t know how to keep track of time, but she does however have a keen sense of direction. She’s also good with numbers and sums …

My wife always thinks she’s sincere. She tells the truth when she lies.

My wife is a wild woman who is still haunted by hunger and an inclement land.

My wife turns into a fury when she’s upset, an animal whose wound becomes her weapon.

My wife displays a kind of logic that no mathematicians could have ever predicted. She’s the only one who knows how it works and the only one who uses it.

My wife is capable of destroying herself so long as it proves the other person is guilty.

My wife has convinced herself that she’s oppressed and that my family’s always been out to get her.

My wife is a happy and crazy drunk. Yet she claims she’s never abused alcohol or been drunk.

My wife believes a married couple cannot have any secrets between them. She thinks they should live in sweet harmony and that partners should be blindly complicit and assimilate into a single, uncomplicated person.

My wife’s memory is very selective, and she’s possessed of great charm and intelligence, is fiercely determined, and displays a kind of calculated madness that is just shy of crazy enough to make it seem like she’s not mad.

My wife doesn’t like analyzing things, or questioning them, hates doubts and the possibility that she might be wrong.

My wife isn’t a witch, but she trusts all the sorceresses she comes across and would more readily believe a magician than a scientist.

My wife is like a house that was built without foundations.

My wife is sweet to everyone except her husband.

My wife thinks her parents are actually her children.

My wife calls every drama a tragedy.

My wife wants to cut me down to size so I’ll be at her mercy.

My wife doesn’t have a sense of justice, but she sees herself as a paladin of justice anyway.

My wife is fiercely jealous.

My wife has never thanked me.

My wife has never told me she loved me.

My wife is only tender toward her children, brothers, sisters, and parents.

My wife thinks other couples don’t have any problems.

My wife annoys me at least once a day.

My wife acts in bad faith with certainty and triumphalism.

My wife confuses “true” with “good” and “false” with “bad.”

My wife has never sought my advice before making a decision.

My wife pretends that she’s never had a lover. Which I very much doubt is true. But I pretend to believe her when we’re face to face. It’s a bad idea to offend a woman who’s cheated on you.

My wife thought that she loved me—and so did I. I don’t love her anymore and that’s fine by me …

A few days after finishing his list, he listened to the tape before heading out for his appointment at the psychiatrist’s. The painter felt he’d missed the big picture. So he hit “record” again and said: “I’m solely responsible for this failure. There were many more differences between us than simply our social standing or ages. No, the real difference between us was a lot worse than that. We’ve never shared a life throughout the entirety of our marriage and we never even realized it.”

XXIV

Casablanca

January 4, 2003

Dying is easy. Living’s the hard part.

—Mrs. Menoux to Julie

FRITZ LANG
,
Liliom

He’d never taken the initiative to leave a woman. His wife would be the first. His decision was final. He’d taken a long time to reach that decision, but the stroke had finally helped to sway him more convincingly than any of his friends or his psychiatrist. He’d waited for Christmas to pass, had prepared a speech, had completed the paintings he’d been working on, had rested, then had chosen a day when she’d seemed calmer than usual and had asked her to come see him in his studio late that afternoon.

When he’d announced his decision to leave her, and told her that he didn’t love her anymore, she pretended that she hadn’t heard
him and instead asked him where he wanted to dine that evening. He didn’t answer her. A long silence ensued. All of a sudden, she went on the offensive: “But what will become of me? Everything you have you owe to me: your career, your success, your money. You’re nothing without me, just a wreck stuck in a wheelchair. It was thanks to me and my intelligence and the energy of my youth that you became famous and celebrated, and that your paintings are now worth hundreds of thousands of dollars. All of that will fall apart when I’m gone. Not to mention that I’ll make you pay dearly for this! You have no idea what I’m capable of. You wanted to have children with me, to start a family, and so you’ll have to assume your responsibilities. I won’t lift a finger to help you and one morning you’ll wake up and find yourself face to face with cruelty in the shape of a woman. I’m the one who made you, and I know how to destroy you!” On that note, she left, slamming the door behind her. The painter wasn’t shaken. He was going to hold steady.

When his wife realized a few days later that he wasn’t kidding, and that he wasn’t making idle threats and was serious about wanting to leave her, she took the initiative and handed him a letter written by a lawyer asking the painter for his opinion. The lawyer suggested an uncontested divorce. Knowing his wife and having heard all the threats she’d made, the painter was initially surprised. He read and reread the letter, then told himself: “After all, it’s better this way, this will make things easier and quicker.”

He grew disillusioned in the weeks that followed. His wife had absolutely no intention of agreeing to a compromise. She was going to be ruthless, sick or not, disabled or not, she’d made up her mind: that man would have to pay for the audacity of wanting to leave her. The painter couldn’t find any rest. War had been declared and nothing would be able to stop it. “Uncontested divorce!” The idiot who’d come up with that term—one of those formulaic sentences of which
there were so many in the world—couldn’t have imagined that the word “uncontested” didn’t mean anything to his wife.

Some of his friends volunteered to talk to her, to try and bring her to her senses since she was being so unreasonable. They wanted to help them reach a solution that would be mutually beneficial, without any more damage being caused and without involving the kids. Poor friends! They spent hours talking to her, which was a complete waste of their time. She listened to them, smiled, thanked them for their friendship and their concern. But it was like she had a thingamajig, a blender situated between her ears that pulverized their words into nothingness. Sometimes she swore that she would call her lawyer and withdraw from the divorce proceedings, then she would return home and ask their children to act as witnesses: “Your father wants a divorce, he wants to leave us, he’s found a girl who’s got her clutches on him and who wants to steal our money. I will have to ask the girls to lend me some money.”

When one of the children told her that it was the driver who always went out to do the shopping and run errands, and that their father still gave him money for that, she dodged the question and said: “I know, but he doesn’t want to anymore … Regardless, I wonder what kind of woman could possibly want him, considering the state that he’s in. He’s just a wreck, a vegetable, he’s good for nothing, he can’t paint anymore and his agent told me that he’s very worried because the price of his paintings have dipped lately!”