Philippe Djian - Betty Blue

He took out two or three rather short kimonos, a pair of slippers, and some underwear. Then he went into the bathroom. He came out thirty seconds later wearing one of the kimonos. The girls clapped. Bongo picked his head up to see what was going on. Eddie’s legs were short, white, and incredibly hairy. He spread his arms out to be admired.

“Better get used to it,” he said. “It’s the only thing I like to wear around the house.”

He came and sat down with us, poured himself some coffee, and started talking again. I felt a little like going back to bed.

I spent the early afternoon with Betty packaging copies of my manuscript and looking up publishers’ addresses in the phone book. By now I was resigned to it. I approached it with a certain detachment, though once I thought I noticed a little spark coming out of my fingertips as I wrote the name of a well-known publisher. I lay down on the bed with a cigarette in my mouth. Betty came over to me. I felt fine. I felt light as a feather-geared down, somehow.

I was starting to give Betty the eye and play with her hair when I heard a noise on the stairway. Two seconds later there was Eddie, dancing around under our noses with a bottle and three glasses.

“Hey, you two, what’s with all the whispering? Listen, I got to tell you what happened to me…”

Lisa, Lisa, I thought, whatever drove you to this?

Later he got us all to climb into the car to go to the racetrack. The sky was getting cloudy, but the girls got excited. The radio cranked out miles of commercials, and Eddie laughed his head off. We got there for the start of the third race. I took the girls to the bar while Eddie bought tickets. I was bored already. It’s always the same-the people run to the betting windows… the horses run… the people go to the fence… the horses finish… the people run back to the betting windows-about as exciting as a soccer game. At the homestretch, Eddie would punch at the air, and his ears would turn red; two seconds later, he was pulling his hair out. He’d crumple his tickets up and throw them on the ground, whining.

“You didn’t win?” I’d ask.

The sky was getting pink when we left the stands. By the time we got out to the car, Eddie was back in high spirits. He even managed to disappear for a minute and come back with his hands full of french fries.

He had gotten on my nerves at the beginning, but if you didn’t listen too much to what he said, it was all right-he’d just wander into the house talking out loud to no one in particular. Once in a while I’d give him a smile. He’d sleep late, and come home around midnight, when the pizzeria closed. He always brought food and something to drink, and we’d have dinner together. Money being what it was, these meals were heaven-sent. Eddie was not completely oblivious to the fact-he would sometimes allude to it:

“Hey, you know, I’ve forgotten… What are your books about again?”

“Science fiction.”

“Oh yeah. That stuff sells pretty well, doesn’t it? There’s money in it…”

“Yeah, but it takes a long time before you see the royalties. Sometimes they even forget to send the check. I can’t complain, though…”

“No… I’m just saying… if you need a little…”

“Thanks, but I’m fine. I’m planning a new one now. Writing doesn’t cost much…”

Another time we were sitting in the car with the air-conditioning on, watching the girls walk on the beach in the wind.

“Maybe you should change your subject matter,” he said. “Some things sell better than others…”

“No, I think it’s just a matter of time.”

“Hold on a second… I forgot again…”

“Detective novels.”

“Oh yeah. Gee, there must be books that make thousands.”

“Oh yeah. Hundreds of thousands.”

“Millions even.”

“Yeah. There are. But I’m really into my new one now, no time to think about things like that…”

In truth, I thought of nothing else. All the money I had was what was in my pocket-a few bills and two or three jobs already booked. God forbid something should happen, or if we ever wanted to take off for a weekend… It was a pain in the ass. Betty had finished typing my manuscript over a week ago and now she was just hanging around the house, doing her nails once or twice a day. There was nothing new to see in the neighborhood. We would go out for a walk in the afternoon anyway, just to break up the day-taking old Bongo along through the maze of streets. We didn’t talk much. Betty always seemed to be thinking about something. She walked with her hands in her pockets. We would just wander around under a gentle, shy sun, collars turned up. The weather had been lousy for a few days now, but we didn’t notice. We were getting ready to give birth to something. Bongo and I would come back panting, but one look at Betty told you she could do the whole course over again sprinting, no problem. Life was putting me to sleep, but for her it was the opposite. A marriage of water and fire-the perfect combination to make everything go up in smoke.

One evening I ran up the stairs ahead of her and blocked the way, suddenly seized with passion. I slid a couple of fingers into her skirt, getting ready to make my way down to the fire and brimstone, when she just asked me point-blank:

“What do you think of Eddie’s offer?”

“Hmmm?”

“NO REALLY, what do you think?”

We’d done in a couple of bottles of Chianti downstairs, and on our way up the stairs her legs had been sending messages directly into my brain. We went into the bedroom. I closed the door and pinned her to the wall. I was going to set her free-rip her panties off in the icy moonlight. I stuck my tongue in her ear. “I want your honest opinion,” she said. “We have to agree on this completely.”

I pushed my knee up between her legs, stroking her hips and sucking her breasts.

“No, wait a minute… I have to know what you…”

“Yes. Yes… what is it again?”

“I mean in the end, maybe Eddie’s thing is not such a bad idea. What do you think?”

I had no idea what she was talking about. I pulled her skirt up over her hips. I noticed that she wasn’t wearing any panties-just panty hose. I had trouble thinking of anything else.

“Stop thinking,” I said.

I buttoned her lip with a wild kiss. Then she said, “We could do it while we’re waiting to hear on your book. It isn’t forever…”

“Yeah, fine,” I said. “Wait, look, let’s sit down on the bed…” We fell down onto the bed and I went crazy, sliding my hands over her nylons. Her thighs were as hot and smooth as a V-1.

“And also that way we can put a little money aside, don’t you think?… It’ll give us time to get ourselves together, buy some things-we don’t have anything to wear.”

I was writhing all over the bed, trying to get my pants off. I felt her soul drifting away from me.

“Don’t you think, don’t you think?” I said.

“I’m sure of it,” she said. “It’s an easy job, especially with pizzas…”

I jumped on top of her with 110 volts AC going through my veins. She grabbed me by the hair.

“I hope you trust me,” she said.

“Of course,” I said.

She shoved my face between her legs and I fell overboard.

I slid open the little serving window that went into the kitchen and stuck my head through it, plunging myself for the thousandth time into the overwhelming food odors that reigned inside. It was quieter than the dining room, though. It was Friday night and everyone was out. We’d had to add tables. I looked at Mario bent over the ovens, his face aglow and his eyes half closed.