You Changed My Life (13 page)

We invested a small fortune in equipment, registered the business with the chamber of commerce, I put a girlfriend at reception, and we were off. We made a bundle of cash very quickly and then, suddenly, it slowed down. So the idea came to me to type the company name into the Minitel. I found out they opened a second store without telling me. I had the keys for the first one. I went one night, took out the oven—a Bakers Pride worth thirty thousand francs—took the mopeds, and resold everything in parts. My partners had nothing on me: we never signed any contract, my name wasn't anywhere on the documents. They went out of business just after that.

My friends and I, we were pretty happy with ourselves. We didn't need much. The category of small-time crooks suited us just fine. We weren't looking to make millions, we didn't really think we were smarter than anybody else, we had fun playing pranks on people where no one really got hurt. In our little group, nobody drank, nobody took drugs. We didn't need any useless baggage. Most of all, we knew none of us would ever kill for money and we didn't want to be in the hardened-criminal
category. We were looking for fun in all its forms. We got girlfriends from our clientele. After closing up, we'd head to the college girls' places for part two. Between us, we had a competition going: who could get the prettiest girl. It was hot in those tiny studio apartments under the roofs of Saint-Germain. Brahim had his technique: he pretended to be clairvoyant and predicted the girls would fail their finals. He was hoping to console them. His strategy didn't always work. Messengers of bad omens don't go over well with intellectuals. Personally, I made them laugh. You know what they say about a woman who laughs.

I had a hard time getting up in the morning and thought I must be pretty stupid to keep torturing myself like this. Work is tiring. Whether you do it legally or not, it's tiring. I was starting to get fed up. I was afraid of ending up just like the honest people I considered total morons. And on top of that, the pizzeria chain was starting to equip each store with a computer. That was the end of trafficking orders. I asked to be let go. I left to go to the unemployment office with my work certificate. Without making the slightest effort, I was going to get an amount close to my official salary for two years. I had no problem taking advantage of the system.

At that point in my life, I really was like Driss, my character in the film
Intouchables
. Careless, joyful, lazy, vain, explosive. But not really mean.

Serving hamburgers. Carrying crates from the truck to the
warehouse, from the warehouse to the truck. Starting all over again. Filling a tank, giving change, pocketing your tip. When there is one. Guarding an empty parking lot at night. Trying not to fall asleep, at first. Then, sleeping. Observing that the result is the same. Entering bar codes into a computer. Planting flowers in roundabouts. In spring, replacing the pansies with geraniums. Trimming back the lilacs just after they bloom . . . I tried a ton of small jobs for three years. Strangely, I didn't discover my vocation. I went to the unemployment office when they called me in, the same way I went to see the judge when I was sixteen to eighteen. Appearing docile and obedient was the unavoidable condition for getting unemployment checks. From time to time, you had to provide something extra. Proof of your good intentions. Nothing big. So, serving hamburgers . . . Place the slice of meat between the two pieces of bread. Press the mayonnaise distributor. Go light on the mustard. I handed in
my apron fast. I awarded myself a family-sized helping of fries, covered the potatoes with a blob of ketchup—they stank like stale grease—and left giving a huge smile to the whole team.

I was supposed to look for a job. I looked very little and did it badly on purpose—that gave me a lot of free time. Day and night, I kept partying with friends who had the same kind of lifestyle . . . random. They worked for four months, the minimum requirement to qualify for unemployment; then they showed up at the unemployment office and got along nicely for a year or two. None of us did anything bad anymore, at least not much. We did sometimes invite ourselves onto a work site at night to goof around with a backhoe, or organize a scooter rodeo in the Bois de Boulogne, but nothing that would disturb the peace. We went to the movies. We snuck in through the exit and left before the credits. Still, I'd almost become a good guy. To prove it, I gave my seat to a pretty mother who was bringing her son to see
Robocop 3
. The kid was wearing nice leather high-tops, American style, and had big feet for his age. I wanted his shoes. I almost asked him where he got them. It didn't even occur to me to take them. That got me worried:
So, Abdel, you getting old or what?
But then I thought,
I don't really need those shoes .
. .

The summons to the employment agency got sent to my parents. I'd find the mail balanced on the radiator in the entry where, a few years back, there were letters from Algeria. Communication between my birth country and me had been cut off
for a while. It had gotten tense with Balkacem because of the political climate in Algiers. When he watched the news, my father shrugged his shoulders, sure that the journalists were piling drama onto the situation. He didn't believe that the intellectuals were gagged; he didn't believe in the tortures, the disappearances. I didn't even know there were intellectuals there. And by the way, what was an intellectual anyway? Someone who thought well? A professor? A doctor? And why would you kill a doctor? Belkacem and Amina turned off the set.

“Abdel, did you see? You got a letter from the employment agency!”

“I saw, Maman, I saw . . .”

“And? Aren't you going to open it?”

“Tomorrow, Maman, tomorrow . . .”

There was only one envelope on the radiator, but two different summonses. One urged me to go to Garges-lès-Gonesse, where, if I was lucky, I'd become a security guard at a minimart. I don't get it. Garges-lès-Gonesse—is that a new metro station? Did they dig it while I was at Fleury? Ah, no, I see the postal code, in small print between parentheses: Garges-lès-Gonesse (95). There must be some mistake. I specifically told the employment agency that my job search was limited to the beltway around Paris. I crumple the paper into a ball, shove it in my pocket, and check the address on the other paper: avenue Léopold II, Paris XVIth. Well there you go! That's more like it! Old Leo's neighborhood. I knew it like the back of my hand.
Follow the guide. Accessed by two Line 9 metro stations, Jasmin and Ranelagh, the area is home to city mansions and buildings constructed in
grand style
. . . People didn't live in apartments here, they lived in vaults. You can fit twelve people into a toilet; every room has an en suite bathroom; the rugs are as soft as the sofas. In this neighborhood, with no shops, you see little old ladies in fur coats who have their lunch delivered to their doors by the very best caterers. I know that because Yacine and I used to entertain ourselves by cutting off the delivery personnel (who were sometimes little old ladies themselves—we nicely offered to carry their load and then took off with it). We had the commendable intention to create a gourmet food guide, but before doing that we had to taste everything! We tested Fauchon, Hédiard, Lenôtre and even fish eggs from I-can't-remember-where. Don't take us for bumpkins: we knew those little jars were worth gold and contained caviar. “Caviaaaar,” as the locals called it. Honestly, it was nasty.

So, here I am on the way to avenue Léopold II . . . I don't even look at the description of the job they're telling me to try for: I already know I won't get it. I just want to get the summons signed so I can prove I really did show up. I'll send it back to the employment agency saying, alas, once again they didn't want me. Life is hard for youth from the projects, you know . . .

I'm standing in front of the door. I back up. I step forward again. I put my hand on the wood, carefully, as if it might burn me. Something's weird. It's like the entrance to a castle. Lower the drawbridge! In a minute, I'll hear a voice through the wall. It'll say: “Be on your way, peasant! The lord doesn't give alms. Be gone before I throw you to the crocodiles!”

Is Abdel Yamine Sellou going to make movies? It seems that way, because I feel like I'm taking on the role of Jacquouille la Fripouille in
Les Visiteurs 2
. That's me, the visitor. I look for hidden cameras behind the cars parked along the sidewalk, perched on the shoulders of contracted cameraman. I'm happy in my little daydream. I look like a real whackjob there on the sidewalk . . .
It's okay, Abdel, relax
. Still, I realize I probably shouldn't have thrown the other summons away, the one for Garges-lès-Gonesse. I have to at least send a signature to the employment agency . . . I check the name of the street. It's the right one. Then I check the building number. That's right, too. But still, something's off. Unless . . . wait! Don't tell me they've sent me to the rich people to do housecleaning!