Nancy Huston - Infrared

Any fifteen-year-old girl, Subra murmurs, would be flattered to hear herself called a woman, to say nothing of a sensuous woman.

‘I shouldn’t have touched you — oh, you naughty hands!’ And he started slapping his own hands, making me laugh and leap to stop him—’No, don’t do that. I forbid you to hurt the hands that just gave me so much pleasure!’ I thought the doctor looked cute as hell, all deprofessionalised like that, with his hair tousled, his jacket off, his tie askew, his shirt wrinkled, his cheeks fairly flaming with embarrassment and arousal. I was still lying on the couch, and he was on his knees between my thighs. ‘Well, if I can’t come to any more appointments with you,’ I added, gently running my index finger along the three parallel lines on his forehead, ‘I hope I can at least see you outside of the office now and then.’

A silence ensued. The good doctor’s eyes were riveted to mine. ‘Do you mean that seriously?’ he asked me. ‘Do you really want to see me again?’ ‘My father holds you in high esteem,’ I told him disarmingly, in a clever reversal of roles. ‘So I mean, maybe we could just get together downtown every once in a while and chat over coffee?’ ‘Maybe we could, little one,’ said Dr Walters. ‘Just maybe I’d be able to handle myself a little better in a coffee shop. But I’m not making any promises.’ ‘Oh, I wouldn’t want you to handle yourself too well,’ I said, pouting up at him sweetly. And so, laughing, elated, in cahoots, the great specialist of neurosis and the little madwoman buttoned and zipped themselves up, kissed each other on the lips, and parted ways.

Thus ended my first experience with psychotherapy. I was careful, though, to say nothing to my parents about its termination; that way I could go on staying away from home every Thursday after school, wandering around the eastern part of the city, watching life, devouring life, drinking life in through my eyes, stealing make-up, clothes, records, books, a transistor radio, and finally — my crowning glory — a Canon. I brought that off, I remember, in an under-protected camera shop at the corner of Saint Lawrence and Saint Catherine…Hmm. Turns out the guy who got grilled like a hamburger has been part of my destiny for a long time! As for lovely Saint Catherine, her body was reduced to bloody mush by a four-wheeled machine bristling with spikes and saws that revolved in opposite directions. (When I think some critics dare to call me perverse…I who so ardently cherish the human body!) That’s how, from the ruins of my therapy, my vocation was born.

Josh Walters and I continued to see one another and enjoy each other’s company. We stuck to cafés, but what went on in the bathrooms of those cafés was memorable. Memorable. Joshua taught me any number of positions, the most apparently awkward of which were not the least arousing. True, I could have noticed certain things…For example the way he’d sometimes jerk my arms behind my back when he was about to climax, brutally handcuffing my wrists with his own hands. I didn’t find that significant until much later. But I took pleasure in our conversations and actually started feeling something like love for this man.

It’s almost impossible, murmurs Subra, not to love someone who has told you about the pain of his childhood.

The following year Dr Walters got a divorce and, to celebrate, invited all his friends and acquaintances to a party on the roof of his building. My mother refused to attend — she was friends with Joshua’s ex-wife, and found the idea in poor taste. So my father and I went to the party together. My therapy with the good doctor now being officially and successfully terminated, Simon must have figured it wouldn’t do any harm for me to go along. Is that logical? I’m not quite sure. Maybe he wanted me there so as not to arouse Lisa’s suspicions? I’m trying to understand.

Josh was already half-soused when he welcomed us at the door. Seeing the Canon hanging around my neck, he burst out laughing: ‘Hey, that’s a terrific idea, young lady. You could make a fortune specialising in divorce photos. I mean, why does everybody take wedding photos? Weddings are banal. All weddings are alike, whereas every divorce is unique, unforgettable…and so much more dramatic! Let me do your Divorce Album! Marital quarrels with flying crockery! Tug-of-wars over children, books, furniture, household appliances! Gloomy hours spent in judges’ waiting rooms! Astronomical checks for legal advice…’

Simon and I laughed until we wept.

Up on the roof, the party was going full blast — Brazilian music, eighty people intent on having a good time, barrels of sangria, the late-June sky an abstract painting of pink and purple swirls. And when Simon saw his colleague clap his hand onto his daughter’s ass as they glued their bodies together to dance the samba, he held his tongue, and when I saw my father do the same with a girl I’d never seen before, I held mine. Blonde and buxom, the girl was wearing stiletto sandals and a fuchsia miniskirt; each of her fingernails was painted a different colour and her hands moved incessantly over my father’s back, now on his shirt, now under it. All that. All that, that night. An unending flow of sangria and saliva and sap. My excitement at being suddenly acknowledged by my father as an adult. My discomfort at seeing him blithely betraying my mother before my very eyes.

‘The human species still has a long way to go,’ he said to me gravely in the car, as we headed back towards Westmount at four a.m. ‘Possessiveness and jealousy are really nothing but vestiges of our ancient past. They date back to the Neolithic, when men first co-opted women’s fertility and invented the nuclear family to keep track of lineage and property rights. Jealousy serves no purpose at all in our day and age. Between women’s lib, the high divorce rate and contraception…Speaking of which, I hope you’re taking precautions?’ ‘Yes, Daddy.’ ‘Good. That’s good.’ ‘What’s her name?’ ‘Sylvie.’ ‘Is she Québecoise?’ ‘Yes, but perfectly bilingual. She works as a secretary at the university and takes night classes in theatre. She’s an amazing person.’ ‘I see.’ ‘Let’s leave it at that, okay? You agree we should leave it at that?’ ‘Yes, Daddy.’

To Lisa, Sylvie was neither more nor less than a vague colleague of her husband’s who occasionally phoned him at home to discuss administrative issues. It was both thrilling and guilt-inducing to share this secret with my father — concealing from my mother, by tacit agreement, such a crucial part of our lives. A bit like mutual blackmail— I’ll keep your secret if you keep mine —each of us holding the card which, slapped down, could ruin the other’s game in an instant. The incredible thing was how easy we found it to be duplicitous, week after week and month after month for nearly a year. I even made friends with Sylvie. We compared our methods of contraception. I was on the Pill, and Sylvie, to make sure she didn’t give me a half-brother or — sister, used a diaphragm. How did we convince ourselves that the situation could lead to anything but disaster?

What’s going on? Subra asks. Why are all these old stories coming back to haunt you this morning?

Rena has no idea. Photography’s not allowed in the museum, so her Canon is of no avail. She’s at the mercy of every memory her brain chooses to dredge up. No matter what work of art she chooses to look at, the floodgates open and it seems that nothing can shut them again.

She moves on to the next room.

La Scultura

Here, aptly enough, are the different art forms as sculpted by Andrea Pisano. Chiselled in small marble panels: La Musica, La Pittura, La Scultura. The latter brings her up short.