The Happy Marriage (33 page)

Thus our love was born. I couldn’t get him out of my head and caught myself hoping for a sign from him, a telephone call, a postcard, or an impromptu visit.

Coming Alive

Voilà, I’ve gotten it all out of my system, and unlike him, I kept it brief and to the point. Regardless, I know that you’ll believe his version of events rather than mine, because his work will outlive our miserable love story. After all, I’m just the country girl who entered his life and wrecked everything. He never made me happy and yet I still made many efforts to ensure his life was pleasant. I regret having turned a blind eye to many things. Seeing him now in his wheelchair with half his body paralyzed fills my heart with pity. Pity isn’t a wonderful sentiment; however, I have no wish to see him regain his health so he can start betraying me again. From now on I’ll take care of him, be his nurse, his mother, his wife, perhaps even his friend. I’ve put a stop to the divorce proceedings. I’m going to change my behavior and alter my tactics, which will surprise him and he’ll realize he cannot do without me. I’m going to love him like I did in our early days, I’m going to love him and keep him close. I’m going to rid myself of my nastier urges; I’ll give up on exacting my revenge, I’ll be good to him and put myself at his disposal. I’ll stop asking myself whether I love
him or not because I know he’s utterly incapable of love, or of giving and receiving. I’m not a monster, even though he’s depicted me as a harbinger of death and disease.

My first gesture will be to bring him some broth, and then I’ll give him a nice long massage just like his beautiful Imane used to do. She’s now living just a few miles away from here. One day around the beginning of August I went to see her and brought her a present, a pretty dress that I haven’t worn in a long time, and invited myself over to the tiny apartment in a poor neighborhood that she shares with her mother and brother. I was blunt with her and said: “I’m going to look after my husband myself, he needs me. I want him to get better so that he’ll get back to his paintings thanks to me, because I’m his wife. He’s a great artist, and so I’m asking you not to look after him anymore, I can see that this bothers him and it’s affected his blood pressure, which is dangerous. I know I’m asking you for a favor, so I’m going to offer you something in exchange: I’ll get your brother a visa so he can go to Spain and I’ll keep paying you until you leave for Belgium. It can all be easily arranged, you can teach me how to give him his injections and to help him with his physical therapy. You’ll also need to appease him and tell him that you can’t come anymore because you’re going to get married and your fiancé is on his way to take care of all the arrangements. I’ll handle all the paperwork and I don’t think it’ll be complicated because your situation falls under the “right to family reunification” category. As for your brother, I’m sure it’ll be easy, I know the Spanish consul well and Javier never says no to me. He’s a good friend of my husband’s too.”

Imane was initially shocked by my visit and my proposal, but she had a good heart and thought it was normal for a wife to want to look after her sick husband. She told me she thought of Foulane as an uncle or father, that she’d just been doing her job, and that she loved her fiancé. I pretended to agree with her and stuck to practical questions. She showed me how to give him his injections, taught me how to massage him and revitalize his muscles. It was a very informative
afternoon. She gave me her brother Aziz’s passport and handed over her visa application to live in Belgium, which had been turned down. We hugged and I left, feeling proud of myself.

I’d gotten my plan off the ground and the trap was closing around him. All that was left to do was to approach Foulane and sweetly explain to him how his new life was going to unfold. I would have to practice in order to do that. Lalla helped me. She played the part of my husband, while I played myself. It was fun. At one point we burst out laughing. Lalla even said that our plan was going to be far more successful than all the incense the
taleb
from the mountains could provide. We opened a good bottle of wine to celebrate.

I’ll be at his beck and call day and night. I’ll offer him a truce for the sake of our children. It’s the best way to avoid him slipping out of my grasp, so that he can finally become the man I always dreamed he could be. I’ll look after him and become indispensable to him. I’ll love him for what he is and I’ll never try to change him again. I’m not a monster; I have feelings too. I can be a little wild and brutal, it’s my nature. I hate all the playacting and hypocrisy that’s so common in his family. I’ll love him and give him everything I didn’t during those years of disagreements, and I’m also going to admire him, even though I’ve always done all I could to prevent him from seeing how proud I was of him. I want him to see how much I love him, and to realize that I’m not his enemy, and that I’m the only woman who actually loves him, especially now that he’s an invalid and his life has been stunted by his illness and its ramifications. I’ve acquainted myself with his condition and I’m told he’ll make a full recovery. But will he recover full possession of his motor skills? Will he ever be able to paint like he used to? The doctors can’t say for sure. There’s nothing to do apart from watch his progress and be happy that he’s able to pick up a brush again. I’ll keep him close, no other woman will ever
be able to get near to him, I’ll be right here and he won’t be able to budge from his wheelchair. The Twins, as he calls them, will help me when he needs to go to the bathroom or to go out. But from now on I’ll be the one who washes him, so I can see him be utterly dependent on me, just like a child, and he won’t be able to grumble, threaten me, or insult me like he used to do in the past. I’ll be out of his reach. I’ll sleep beside him, make him herbal tea, give him his medication, and even slip him some sedatives, so that he’ll be able to sleep properly. The time has come for me to prove I’m a good selfless wife who’s ready to sacrifice her youth yet again so that he can have a good life. I’ll be attentive and never leave him alone. I spoke to his doctors and they think this is a good idea. After all, we promised ourselves to be good to one another, “in sickness and in health” as the traditional Christian vows say. In our country, people promise to help one another through illness, and that’s what I’m going to do.

I’m going to take charge, but I’ll do so with such tenderness that he’ll be surprised, and it’ll make it easier to handle him. I’ve already put all of his affairs in order. No documents can be signed without my consent. I’ve hidden a few of his paintings in the basement and locked the door with a padlock and I’m the only one with the key. He won’t be able to give them away to people anymore. I called his agent who immediately told me that the price of his paintings had shot up and that it would be a good idea not to sell any for the time being. He explained that the fewer of his canvases are in circulation, the more prized they’ll become. So regardless of what Foulane thinks, his painting days are over. In any case, he’ll never be able to execute the kind of large paintings that go for such large sums. It’s done,
fini
! He’s mine now and I can do what I like with him, and I want him to be calm, obliging, maybe even happy.

There’s still an important detail that I need to take care of: ensuring he hasn’t fathered any other children. I found a photo in his chest that depicted a little boy in the arms of a blonde woman …

The meek wife who endured all those slaps is a thing of the past.
I, Amina Wakrine, penned this response to my husband’s manuscript on the night of October 1, 2003, and I have decided to love him despite the state that he’s in. My feelings won’t wander down dead-end streets anymore. It was a carefully considered decision, which I came to largely thanks to Lalla. She was the one who came up with the idea that I should salvage the marriage. She’s very clever. If it hadn’t been for her, I would be moping around and crying in a corner. She even suggested I should bring him a woman from time to time if it would please him, but I don’t know whether I’ll be able to do that. No, I shouldn’t exaggerate. This will be my revenge, and it will travel down the path of goodness, kindness, and generosity. It will be born out of love and redemption. I’ll fill him with a deep, boundless love, a love that will leave him moonstruck, and envelop him with a sweetness that he doesn’t even know can exist. I’ll be docile, ask for his forgiveness, obey his every wish, and learn to anticipate his desires, to the point where he’ll no longer be able to doubt my goodwill and desire to smooth out all his troubles and be his to command. Yes, I’ll submit to him and resign myself, in the hopes of carving myself a permanent niche by his side. I’m grateful that fate has afforded me another chance to recover my place, which I should never have lost. Foulane won’t be able to go back to his old ways once he understands what’s going on. I’ll do everything I can to make him into my object, my invalid, completely and utterly reliant on me and me alone. I will relish these moments. I’ll revel in this blessing. Free at last, I’ll finally be alive.

TAHAR BEN JELLOUN
was born in Fez, Morocco, and immigrated to France in 1971. He is an internationally bestselling novelist, essayist, critic, and poet, and the winner of many of the world’s most prestigious literary prizes, including the Prix Goncourt and the International IMPAC Dublin Literary Award. He lives in Paris.

ANDRÉ NAFFIS-SAHELY
is a poet, critic, and translator from French and Italian.