Dominique Fabre - Guys Like Me

“He’s been coming to see me every day since I’ve been living here.”

The three of us sat down, he took the stool. He looked at us, drinking the pastis.

“How long have you been living here?”

He looked as if he was counting before answering. Nearly six months. It had belonged to his uncle. Did we remember him? He sometimes came to the lodge in Asnières, don’t you remember? I saw Marco make an effort to remember, but no, he didn’t, even though he too spent more and more time remembering, trying and sometimes really remembering things. We said no. I thought it might be best to quickly change the subject, but he was already launched. He’d been through three and a half years of hell. It was his family that had supported him in the last year, he hadn’t wanted to go on welfare, it was thanks to them that he’d rented this apartment.

“It’s not bad here, anyway,” we told him. He wanted to show us everything. We all went out into the inner courtyard, there were two children’s bikes and a little orange tent, which belonged to the kids opposite. He’d never had children. He told us that even more slowly, actually there were a lot of things he hadn’t had in this life. Once or twice, that evening, I laughed very loudly, I wasn’t really laughing at him, because when it came down to it he was like me, except that our lives weren’t similar anymore. We went back into the room, he poured us some more pastis. He’d put small plates inside larger ones, he served a big mixed salad, I realized what it meant to him. When was the last time he’d had guests? And, although it was impossible to ask him, when was the last time he’d had a woman here? So we were really there for him, he kept looking at us, there were moments of silence between the salad and the chicken. Then he started talking. He really didn’t know anymore when his troubles had started. When we were together in high school? Or even before? He’d never asked himself the question. After a while, he said to us, guys like him have to learn everything over again, and nobody gives them a hand, they can’t. This wasn’t going to be much fun, I thought, Marc-André lit a cigarette, so I did too, in memory of the good old days, so to speak, he hadn’t had any of those either, good old days, but to be honest, he didn’t give a damn.

The first thing he always did when he got up in the morning was to open the window and let the cat in and give it a little milk. From the morning onwards, he’d think of all those distant years, those years outside, in the unlike-liest places, oh really? He gave us that slow smile, yes, a place here, a room there, not far from here, but he would never have suspected their existence, like when you see guys sleeping under the entrance ramps to the northern beltway, around La Chapelle, Clichy too. We sat down on the sofa bed, he was sorry, he hadn’t made any dessert. He wasn’t really good at desserts yet. We talked, when it came down to it things hadn’t been too bad for him, did he have any music at least? He looked around, he had some old LPs and also a few DVDs of movies, since he’d started in his new job he’d been buying Le Monde , they sold DVDs as a supplement on the weekends, he got them in the hopes of buying a player one day. We smiled. When he’d had his troubles, video cassettes were still the thing, how long ago was that anyway, how long? We didn’t ask him the question. So, to cheer himself up, he suggested some more pastis, with a greedy air, he himself had never taken to drink during his bad years, but he knew guys, guys who weren’t like him for that very reason, except that to be honest he could have. You never know where the wind takes you, or what can happen to you. After a while, Marc-André couldn’t help smiling. The two of us were sitting on the sofa bed and he on a second-hand chair, he leaned toward us: how about you two? We didn’t know what to say, obviously. Marco lit another cigarette.

“What can I say? Things are OK for me. Yes, they’re OK. I haven’t had all these money problems like you.”

He nodded. “It won’t happen to you, I’m sure of that, you’re not the kind.”

Fortunately, the cat from the courtyard distracted our attention, it came in through the window and strolled between our legs. We sat there, watching the cat.

We left just after midnight. He left us on the sidewalk outside his building, both hands in his pockets, standing very straight. Marco had his car with him and we went back together, going through Courbevoie, through places we’d known forever and which I really couldn’t recognize anymore in spite of everything. I would never have suspected … Neither would I, I said. Neither would I.

“Did you notice how he carefully avoided talking about his job today?”

We were driving along the riverbank now, no need to go that way, but after all why not?

“By the way,” I said, “I’m going to buy a scooter.”

“Is that so?”

We slowed down on the Pont de Levallois.

“Why didn’t he talk about his job, do you know?”

“It isn’t going well … I talked to the guy I know, they don’t want to keep him on.”

“Really?”

For years, there had been cobblestones along here. The road had been restored and enlarged, but in places there were still cobblestones on the road to Asnières.

“He’s always late, he gets into arguments, he has a nasty temper.”

We didn’t say anything more after that. Marco dropped me off outside my building. I didn’t have any messages on the answering machine. I drank a large glass of water. I took a couple of aspirin because of all the pastis, I should have been more careful. If I’d dared I would have called Benjamin, but it was far too late. So I went to bed.

I hadn’t heard much from Marie lately. We were a little angry with each other, especially her, I think. How have you lived all these years, why don’t you go back to your wife? She blamed me for not telling her these things, it was the first time in a very long time that I’d been asked that question, I hadn’t been able to answer her immediately. She drove in the nail: it’s as if you haven’t gotten over her, is that it? We were at her place, in Brochant, we’d actually had a nice evening. We were still trying to please each other, and perhaps to love each other, it was a gift when it came down to it, for a guy like me, but it was that thing about not getting over my wife that set me off. Why had her saying that gotten me so riled up?

“She’s the mother of my son, we haven’t spoken for about five years, I don’t even see her, and you’re saying I’m still not over her?”

“Yes,” Marie had stood up, “that’s exactly what I’m saying, it’s what I see right now, look at yourself, you can’t even talk about her calmly.”

The blood drained from my temples, I’ve rarely felt that, in my life. But I tried to stay.

“Never talk to me like that again,” I said.

She must have sensed that she’d said too much all at once, and she wanted me to stay, I’m sorry. You have nothing to apologize for, and since I couldn’t sleep, after a while I left and caught a taxi. She didn’t try to stop me. There were still a lot of people on the square, people around the movie theater, customers from the Brasserie Wepler, and opposite, a long line of people on the sidewalk waiting to buy cigarettes from the little tobacco shop. I waited at the taxi stand until I’d calmed down. It was one o’clock in the morning, maybe that was why. I called Marie. She wasn’t completely asleep yet.

“I was hoping you’d call me, are you angry with me?”

“No, I’m fine.”

Marie said nothing.

“It’s good that you didn’t sulk for long.”