Philippe Djian - Betty Blue

“We still have a long way to go,” I said.

A doll, docile and silent. They’d filled her to the gills with drugs. They’d already thrown the first shovel of dirt over her. The right thing to do would have been to ambush them all and slit their throats for being what they were-doctors, nurses, pharmacists, the whole clique; not to mention everyone who’d pushed her to that point, slave drivers, people who crush you under their thumbs, those who offend you, lie to you, use you; people who don’t give a shit if you’re one of a kind, people who glow brighter in the bullshit, stand taller on hills of crap, who weigh you down like a ball and chain. It wouldn’t have made me feel any better, though. Wading through the rivers of their blood, I wouldn’t be much better off. Like it or not, what’s done is done, as they say-and though I’m not the kind of guy who gives up hope at the drop of a hat, I understood that sometimes the world seems like the worst of all possible Hells. It depends on how you look at it. May God strike me dead: sitting on that bed in that room, for the longest minute of my life, I’d never seen anything so odious or black. Above us, the storm broke loose. I shook.

“I need you to make one last effort,” I sighed.

The first drops splattered against the window, like insects on a windshield. I bent over her delicately and took hold of one of the straps. I put the tip of it through the buckle and pulled tight. One for her legs. She didn’t move.

“You okay? It doesn’t hurt, does it?” I asked.

Outside was the deluge. It was like being inside the Nautilus. I picked up another strap and put it around her arms and chest, just under her breasts. I pulled it tight. She stared at the ceiling with her one eye. Nothing I did interested her. The moment had come to test my strength.

“I have to tell you something…” I started.

I took one of the pillows from beneath her head, one with blue stripes. I wasn’t shaking-for her I could do anything without shaking, I’d already proven that-I was just a little warmer was all.

“…you and me, we’re like two fingers of the same hand,” I went on. “And nothing can ever change that.”

I probably could have found something more clever to say or, better still, kept quiet. But at the time it seemed innocent enough-a little parade of improvised words. She would have liked that. It was a confection, written in whipped cream, not in stone.

I counted to seven hundred fifty, then stood up. I took the pillow off her face. The rain was making a hell of a din. For some reason I had a pain in my side. I didn’t look at her. I undid the straps. I put the pillow back where it had been.

I turned toward the wall, thinking that something was going to happen. Nothing happened. It just kept raining and raining. The light stayed where it was, and so did the walls-and there I was, with my white gloves and false breasts, waiting for some message from death. But no message came. Was I going to get out of this with only a pain in the side?

I put my wig back on. Just before leaving, I turned and glanced at her for the last time. I expected some horrific sight, but in the end she just looked like she was sleeping. Yet she came up with one more thing to make me happy-she knew how to do it. Her mouth was open slightly. I noticed a pack of Kleenex on the nightstand. It took me a moment to understand, then I started crying. Yes, she was still watching over me, showing me which way to go, even though she was no longer of this world. Her sending me this last sign flooded me with a river of fire.

I rushed back to the bed and kissed her hair, then grabbed the Kleenex and shoved all I could into her mouth, all the way down. I had a spasm-I almost threw up-but it passed. What I want is to be able to be proud of you, she’d said.

When I left, everybody must have been on coffee break. No one was in the halls, and almost no one was in the lobby. I went unnoticed. It was totally dark. The gutters were overflowing down the whole side of the building. It smelled bad-dried-out grass that’s been wet again. The rain was a luminous portcullis of electric wire. I turned my collar up, put my purse on top of my head, and dove into it.

I ran. I had the sensation that someone was chasing me with a flamethrower. I had to take my glasses off to see, but I didn’t slow down. As one might expect, there was no one on the street, so I didn’t worry about my makeup-luckily I hadn’t put on any mascara. I got a lot on my fingers trying to wipe my face off-l must have really smeared it good. Fortunately, you couldn’t see three yards in front of you.

I ran like a poisoned rat caught in a web of pearls. I didn’t slow down for intersections. Plipliplip went the rain; flap flap flap I went; baroombaroom went the thunder. The rain fell straight down. It stung my face-I swallowed some of it. I ran halfway home like a bat out of hell. My whole body was steaming; my breathing filled the street, no joke. I passed under a streetlight, and everything went blue.

At an intersection, I saw the headlights of a car. I had the right of way, but I let him go first. In the pause, I tore my wig off, then plunged ahead. The rain wasn’t enough to put out the fire raging in my lungs. I gave it all I could, then forced myself to give even more. It made me moan and cry, it was so hard. I ran because I’d killed Betty. I ran because I wanted to run. I ran because I needed something else. At the same time, it seemed a perfectly natural reflex-it came from the heart, after all, didn’t it…?

The cops paid no attention to the story-not one of them showed the slightest interest. A crazy girl who tears her eye out, then ends it all by swallowing a box of Kleenex-they visibly couldn’t have cared less. Of course, when I’d stolen the money they’d made a big deal out of it-it was in all the papers, and they threw up roadblocks all over town. But killing her-I could have done it five hundred times and no one would even have gotten up from his desk.

As for me, everything went just fine. How could a real love story end at the police station? A real love story never ends. It’s not as easy as it seems in the storybooks-you must expect to have to fly higher, your brain light as a feather. Anyway, to this day no one has ever come looking for me. No one has bothered me. I was able to get it out of my system in peace.

I took care of the worst of it by turning over a small fortune to the people at the funeral parlor. Despite their frightening faces, I couldn’t complain-they handled all the details with the hospital, I hardly had to do anything. In the end they cremated her. I have her ashes. I keep them close by. I still don’t know what to do with them, but that’s another story.

As soon as I had the time, I wrote a long letter to Eddie and Lisa. I explained everything that had happened, without telling them the decisive role I’d played. I apologized for not letting them know earlier. I hoped they’d understand that I wouldn’t have been able to stand that. I’ll see you soon, I told them, love to you both… P.S. I won’t be answering my telephone for a while. Kisses. On my way to the mailbox I realized that the weather had turned lovely again. The heat and humidity had gone. It was mild and dry. I came home with an ice cream cone in my hand. One.

It seems stupid, but I still found myself cooking two steaks, or leaving the water in the tub for her, setting two places at the table, asking questions out loud. I slept with the light on. It’s the details that are hell-the little things that remain on the branches, like fog, like a gown of tattered lace. Every time it happened, I’d freeze in my tracks, and take my time digesting it. When I accidentally opened the closet and saw all her clothes in it, I almost choked. I tried to tell myself that each time was less painful than the time before. It wasn’t easy to tell.