Three Women in a Mirror (18 page)

Even if the concierge, the receptionists, and the cleaning ladies knew that the star had just hooked up with her director, they kept their eyes down as if she were on her way back from a funeral. That was what made a luxury hotel superior to the sleazy roadside motel: the basic action didn't change—a rented bed, maids cleaning the sheets, glasses left here and there, the fear of being heard in the middle of it—but the behavior of the staff was infinitely classier. They would not judge you. A total absence of commentary. In a place like this, Anny would not be affected by a proprietress's frustrated grimace, or the knowing gaze of the drunken manager. In the hotel business, anything over $2000 a night and they will ignore salaciousness; they won't judge the client; they host only saints. Money has greater purifying powers than the holy water of Lourdes.

The valet brought Anny her convertible and she drove off.

It was the sort of weather that had made Los Angeles into a movie capital, back in the days when they filmed without projectors—a weather of never-ending, joyful luminosity, without a backward glance.

Ethan was only scheduled to arrive at eleven o'clock at night because he was on duty at the medical center. She wondered how she could hurt him. Should she tell him about her fling? If he wasn't in love with her, he would shrug his shoulders, and her confession would merely confirm his theory about her.

It's so stupid . . . I'm sleeping with men to get rid of them.

She thought again of her most recent conquests, David and Zac. Honestly, why
had
she slept with them?

She had thrown David into her bed because she had a guilty conscience, in order to obtain his forgiveness for her not recognizing him at the clinic.

As for Zac, with him she was regaining confidence: nothing impressed her anymore, and it was a way to get free of David.

Shit! Ethan was right. I sleep with men to keep my distance, not to get closer.

For her, sex wasn't about affinity. She wanted forgiveness, deliverance, security.

At a red light Anny slammed on the brakes and swore. Her pride was wounded, and she was still angry because Ethan, with his perfect diagnosis, had just humiliated her once again.

He wasn't blaming her for sleeping around; what he was blaming her for was her reason for sleeping around. He didn't condemn her for loose living or lechery, no, he didn't care how many men she saw; what interested him was the cause behind so many men.

Regarding the nonchalant ease with which Anny gave her body, he said, “Why not?” And immediately added, “But why?”

A few miles farther along, after twice nearly running over a pedestrian, she left her car, exasperated, and continued through the streets of Santa Monica on foot.

As usual, the sidewalks were swarming with old hippies, bare-chested athletes, young boys crouched atop their skateboards, and nymphets full of Coca-Cola bursting the seams of their jeans. Alongside the local population were the tourists—stiff-legged Japanese women, Frenchmen with halting English, laid-back Latinos, sweating Germans, apoplectic Brits.

Protected by her sunglasses, hair tied back and a baseball cap on her head, Anny wandered around incognito—but “incognito” didn't exactly mean “unnoticed,” because people often turned around to look at the radiant young woman.

What was the source of her charisma? She had known, ever since the day a major film critic had devoted a profile to her. According to him, Anny Lee was made of a single piece, whereas most individuals have fragmented bodies. Look around you: people look like collages, repaired statues, as if they'd been put together with bits and pieces. That woman's top and bottom are different, and they don't match because her top is narrow and her bottom is bulging. Or that one: an unusual face, but a very ordinary torso, and if you look closely you will see that her face and torso are also separated by their individual rhythms: they don't move together, they're not breathing in unison, they're not inhaling the same air. And that woman has enormous, protruding, triumphant breasts, of the kind that should belong to someone with a different build—she's otherwise so frail, unless those breasts are the result of surgery. And that man stretched out in the shade of a palm tree: it looks as if someone had transplanted a soft unwieldy alcoholic's belly onto his nervous physique. If you want to grasp the full poverty of human anatomy—which could be termed “disjointed”—all you have to do is compare yourself to an animal. A cat, for example, with its flexible anatomy, displays a constant connection among all its parts: its ears correspond to its chest, which segues into its paws, which blossom into claws—claws drawn in anger and withdrawn for a caress. From tail to nose the cat is self-expression: it leaps, runs, meows, arches its back, and stretches, all in a coherent fashion. There was something feline about Anny. Like Marilyn Monroe, another famous cat, she moved through space as if undulating: elastic, compact, agile, even when she wanted to be slow. Her lip commanded her ankle, her eyelids moved her hips, her supple hair found an echo in the curve of her back. Her body movements were homogeneous; she was not a body assembled from a kit, and this wholeness gave her an infinite sensuality.

She bought an ice cream—a blue, sea-colored one—and went on with her pondering.

Ethan puzzled her: why was he paying so much attention to her if he didn't want to sleep with her? By refusing her, he was setting himself apart from other mortal men, an anomaly that, in Anny's opinion, made him by turns despicable, pathetic, terrible, and fascinating.

As she made her way along the beach, she was reassured by the insistent gazes of passers-by. This was normal. Such was nature. While Anny didn't care about sleeping with men, on the other hand she really did believe that all men dreamt of sleeping with her. Where had she gotten this idea? From her sexual education, Hollywood-style. Since the age of five she had been living in a world of adults who did not refrain from displaying their desires, expressing their fantasies, and frequently filming them.

“What is an adult?” a reporter once asked her, when she was fifteen years old.

“Someone who wants to get into my pants,” she had answered.

Her spontaneous declaration had gone around the world: some people quoted it to laugh at it, others to deplored it.

They didn't seem to have a particularly complicated psychology; they reacted to breasts, hips, butts, and lips—that wasn't hard to understand, they were reduced to starving creatures who aspired only to touch, kiss, suck, caress, and abuse; their sexual appetite was as basic as their appetite for food.

And where was Ethan in all that ?

She thought she could see him in the distance, and called out his name. A stranger turned around. She hid between two hat vendors to elude his look of surprise.

Ethan got on her nerves, the way he was always avoiding her. She couldn't have a predictable relationship with him; on the one hand he was more attentive than anyone she knew, but on the other hand he was more evasive. With him she was losing her usual control.

Because it's in the game of giving and withholding that a woman excels; the alchemy of seduction demands careful dosing. On the other hand, abstinence makes one weary; and systematic debauchery even more so. A prude ends up left on the shelf of useless accessories; a woman who gives herself without limits is reduced to becoming a sexual object, the type of gadget that always ends up in the trash.

Anny made up her mind: since she couldn't control him, she would get him out of her life.

So he thought he was coming over to see her at eleven ? He would find the house locked.

Anny walked faster. Hey, this was convenient, the store she wanted to go to was not far from there.

She went into Ruth and Debbie's, which sold Indian dresses and tunics, Turkish scarves, incense, soap, books of wisdom, and new age music, and she insisted on going down into the cellar. There she lay down on a mattress and she ordered from Ruth a strong dose of opium. This way she would be out for a few hours, and she wouldn't have to think about Ethan anymore. Let him bang away at a closed door. With a bit of luck she might even have enough strength on waking up to go to the Red and Blue and take a little pill, and she'd have the energy to dance until dawn.

Come now, Anne, come with us to the market.”
In spite of Hadewijch and Bénédicte's silent entreaties, the young woman sat in the stairway, curled in upon herself, back rounded and shoulders hunched, deaf to her aunt's requests.

“I promised the merchants that you would come with us,” insisted Godeliève. “Everyone will be so happy to meet you.”

Anne almost said, “That is the problem,” but kept silent, imagining that silence would inspire more respect than any explanation would—she would gain authority if she did not attempt to justify herself.

“You are not showing enough consideration for the love that people bear you, Anne. It does them so much good to see you.”

On hearing this, Anne got up, climbed the creaking stairs two at a time, and bolted herself in her room.

Godeliève, Hadewijch, and Bénédicte were disappointed, and hurried off to do the shopping without delay because, by the all the saints of Bruges, it was time for the fish to be unloaded.

Sitting at her window, Anne was sorry she had distressed them; however, she wanted no part in the worship that Bruges paid her nowadays. In just a few weeks her status had changed: the miraculous survivor had become a savior.

On the evening after the battue, the dashing Rubben could not bear the thought of his failure, nor the so-called fatigue of his companions, who had abandoned the hunt for the wolf. Therefore he had left the group behind at the gates of the city and decided to track the animal during the night.

As he went back the way he had come, he had the same idea as Anne: he must find the animal's watering place. However, he was more cautious than the young woman had been, and did not run the risk of showing himself; as soon as he reached the bend in the river he climbed up a tree that enabled him to see the clearing in the distance.

As for the rest of his plan, he thought it was very straightforward: from his lookout point he would shoot an arrow and slay the wild beast.

However, once he had straddled a sturdy branch, he realized he could hardly move and, moreover, his target was not within reach of his bow and arrow.

He waited.

Imagine his surprise to see a young stranger on the banks of the stream. He was furious, and was just about to warn her away from the place when something held him back: if he called out, he would signal his presence to the predator.

Too late. A mournful howl emerged from the nearby thicket.

Rubben felt shivers run through him, and he had to cling to the bark not to fall.

The wolf sprang, his jaws foaming.

Helplessly Rubben looked away, refusing to watch the slaughter.

A sudden silence incited him to look again. The huge animal had stopped in front of the young woman: he was closing his jaws, and his bristled fur was subsiding.

In that moment Rubben realized this was not a respite: in spite of the distance, he could sense the peacefulness that radiated from the young stranger. She was frail and delicate, but she imposed the force of her mind upon the wolf and the hunter—the naked killer and the armed one—and ordered them to cease their hostility. She conveyed her tranquility to them.

After half an hour had gone by, the atmosphere was so changed that Rubben had the impression he was witnessing an encounter between a little girl and a big dog.

He thought this might be a good opportunity, so he reached for his bow. And had cause to regret it: as he groped for the quiver that was wedged between his shoulder blades, he made an awkward movement, lost his balance, and went flying. Fortunately, he had the reflexes of a young man and was able to grab another branch, and position himself again.

In the distance the wolf showed alarm, perceiving a threat. As did the young woman. Did she imagine a hero might come to save her?

Rubben did not move, out of fear of the wolf, and worried he might encourage the unfortunate young woman's hopes. Careful not to give himself a cramp in the neck as he spied on them, he concentrated on his precarious balance.

After some time had gone by he heard the furtive footsteps of the retreating wolf, whereas the young woman went on sitting by the water's edge.

He decided to stay high up in the tree. Clouds were hiding the moon again, obscuring the clearing. At around four o'clock in the morning, when the entire world seemed to be asleep, he climbed down from his perch, massaged the numbness from his legs, and headed for Bruges, practically at a run. There he emerged into the marketplace, to tell the crowd of the fantastic scene he had witnessed in the moonlight.

The good people of Bruges were overwhelmed by the story, and it captured their imagination because it transgressed the laws of nature. It was when the worried Godeliève, Hadewijch and Bénédicte went to inform the constabulary that their niece and cousin had disappeared that a connection was made between Anne and a young woman who had miraculously been spared by the wolf.

From that moment, the townspeople waited for Anne's return. A miracle was a sign of God! The faithful seized upon the event, and began to say that if God had saved this young woman, it was because she was pure, virginal, and without sin. Her entire life was reevaluated in the light of theology. People even began to reinterpret her flight into the woods from her fiancé; it was almost as if Philippe had been a seducer, a tempting serpent. As for her silent behavior, it was thought to be humility.

The moment Anne walked through the gates of the city the townspeople rushed up, surrounded her, crossed themselves, even fell to their knees. The priests announced that special services would be held, and plotted against each other to obtain the young woman's presence.

Aunt Godeliève, in spite of her country simplicity, was daunted. Instead of greeting her niece with reproaches and a slap, she hurried to see the priest, who questioned her and begged permission to embrace her.