Кристин Анго: Incest

The morning of the 26th, of Thursday the 26th, I worked. Alain Françon is staging Les Autres, Sujet Angot , and No Man’s Land as one play, I’d suggested combining the three, to make them all one language, my usual stew, my classic incestuous mix, which I wasn’t repressing up to that point. ‘Everything can always be mashed together’ could have been my motto.

Late that morning, I don’t know which of us called the other. She did, I think. She’s free after two thirty, to get together before the reading if I want or to go for a walk. After the blow with the Christmas… I ask if she’s joking. If it helps for her not to come, she agrees not to. Implacable reasoning, repetition of the reasons for Christmas, Nadine needs support, you don’t suddenly let drop people who have helped you at some point, she has a family, turn of the century morality, nineteenth century, I spew at her. Intolerable notions of loyalty and fairness. So ancient and arbitrary, to be honest. So vile.

When I recount my day on the 27th, Friday the 27th, you’ll be treated to Nadine’s phone call, you’ll see, it’s something else.

To summarize. A few dozen phone calls, at half past noon she asks me – I was in tears – if I want her to come over at two thirty. I tell her it will be too late, that I’ll be dead by then. We hang up and I go lie down.

At two o’clock Denis rings, we had a rendez-vous, I was in no condition to speak. Marie-Christine telephoned, hung up, called back. Two good hours have passed before she hangs up, saying “I’ll be right there,” without giving me time to say “no,” I could feel her exasperation. It was about four o’clock, about two hours before the reading. I wasn’t ready. I hadn’t prepared, I hadn’t showered, I didn’t have the strength to get to 20 Rue de la République, to say hello to Anne and Gil who had invited me to the CRL. I knew if I did, at what cost?

I called Moufid Zériahen. He was in.

—It’s Christine Angot. I have a reading at six o’clock, I’m not in any shape to do it, I’ve been having an anxiety attack since yesterday noon.

—Come right away.

—I can’t, I don’t have time. (Marie-Christine was going to come over. Unless I were to stand her up. After all!… Like Christmas.)

Despite all that she inflicts on me, I haven’t stopped loving her yet, what masochism. Paranoid, that’s certain, delusional, too, masochist, I’d have to check. The doorbell. It’s her. Moufid must have heard the bell. I tell him:

—I’d like you to say something that will calm me down.

I weep.

I go into another room with the hand-held phone.

—A few words.

—In that case, I need you to tell me a bit more.

—It’s about Christmas and Nadine, Do you remember?

—Yes, I do.

—Do you remember Marie-Christine told me she’d try?

—Yes, I do.

—She called Nadine yesterday, who told her it was impossible. And so she’s going. She’s going to Paris.

—And you’re surprised?

—Yes.

—Those are archaic relationships, you know, what would you have done if your father or your sister called, wouldn’t you have answered?

He’s feeling around, that’s not the issue, no, that’s not it. It’s difficult over the phone.

—No, I would have been ‘out.’ She called me yesterday, and I’ve been in this state since then, I have to do this reading. I’m very, very anxious, I scream and slap myself. I can’t stand it.

—What time does your reading end?

—Around eight thirty.

—Come see me after.

—But after it will be over.

—It may help you during the reading to know that you’ll be coming here when it’s done.

—Or I could come now.

—You just told me you couldn’t.

—I’ll see.

Marie-Christine arrived, exasperated. She saw I was on the phone, she kept making signs of impatience. Of anger, “I can’t believe it,” “No this isn’t possible, I must be dreaming,” “I came I’m here and you’re on the phone. I’m here, I’m paying a price to be here, and you’re on the phone, you’re unbearable and on top of that, when I’m here, when I come over despite everything, despite all the horrible phone calls this afternoon, despite the fact that your personality is impossible, delusional, paranoid, perverse, masochistic and sadistic, you are on the phone.” Completely exasperated.

I hang up, I say to Marie-Christine:

—Don’t get upset, I was talking to Moufid, he recommends I go see him.

—That would be a good thing.

She offers to take me in her car, we’d come back after, we’d drive straight to the reading if time is too tight. I call Moufid back, I tell him I’m on my way.

He fit me in for ten minutes between two patients and I went to do my reading. Things were a bit better. And it went well.

Night

She tells me she’s going to go to bed, that she’s going back to her place. I can’t possibly be alone that night, not at night. After all the effort. She’s dumping me, Christmas, and now at night. Again. When I’m in my worst state. Her reasoning: 1. She doesn’t have her things, 2. If she leaves her car parked where it is, she’ll get a ticket like the last time.

—OK, then I’ll go sleep at Claude’s, I can’t stay alone.

—If you go sleep at Claude’s then we’re done, do you hear me? Done. Come sleep at my place.

—I can’t, not after everything I’ve gone through since Wednesday, I don’t have enough faith in you to fall asleep at your place. Don’t you understand?

I started shivering again. Always the same spot, my lower back, around my kidneys. Gil and Anne had barely turned the corner. I collapsed onto my bed, on my back, my head hanging backwards, my eyes blank again, my fingers blue, it had started again. And Nadine getting ready for Christmas with twenty-five people. Her cousin is coming, that’s great, as always, it’s a ritual, an ancient ritual, it will happen again, once more, in a few weeks, since forever.

It must have been one in the morning, I couldn’t take it any more, I had to go to her place, make one more effort, go to the enemy’s, or else she’d leave me on my own. If I went to Claude’s, she’d leave me. She finally grabbed my bag, threw two or three things in it, took my hand, quick and easy. I put on my coat, I was like a huge bear that couldn’t walk anymore, nose dripping, crying, face contorted, a huge bear at the end of its tether. She goes downstairs, I stop on the landing, I can’t move.

—I’m downstairs and you’re staying upstairs, is that it?

Shouted up at me at half past midnight.

She climbs the stairs again, without any trace of tenderness, exasperated. She pulls me along to the street where her car is parked. I don’t cross the street, I’m petrified. I want to scream. I head back towards my place. She drives up, opens the door, she says “hurry up.” I get in the car. I say “take me back to my place.” An ancient ritual practiced since forever with people who have helped her and whom she can’t abandon. Out of loyalty, yes, out of duty, yes. Yes. It’s her family, she has a family, yes. Nadine is essential, Nadine is a fundamental part of me. If you can’t stand her, then you can’t stand me either. A cousin, godchildren, yes. I sleep very little. I wake up very early, the morning of the 27th, I call Claude. I say to him “please, I can’t take this any more, introduce me to some new people.” That very evening, there will be Nicolas and Judith, the daughter of my first psychoanalyst in Reims, she was at the reading yesterday, she liked it a lot. She’d heard about me all through her childhood, I shaped her father as an analyst, “the young woman” in exceptional terms. I’m too tired.