 |
 |
|
|
[ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ] 9 pid look on my face. 10 I go shake everyone s hand and kiss my grandmother 11 and my aunts. 12 When I get to Marc, I mean to slap him upside the 13 head, but he s with a girl. He s got his arm around her 14 waist. And from the minute I see her, I already know I m 15 in love. 16 17 I give my brother a punch on the shoulder, and, jerking 18 my chin at the girl, I ask: 19 That my present? 20 Dream on, moron, he answers. 21 I m still looking at her. It s like there s something play- 22 ing the clown in my stomach. I feel sick, and she s beau- 23 tiful. 24 You don t recognize her? 25S No. 26R Of course you do, it s Marie, Rebecca s friend. . . . 14514_00_i-x_001-194_r7jn.qxd 10/3/03 11:11 AM Page 69 Leave 69 ??? She says: We went to summer camp together. At Glénans, don t you remember? . . . Nope, sorry. I shake my head and ditch them. I go get myself something to drink. Damn right,I remember her.I still have nightmares about that sailing course. My brother, always first. He was the counselors pet: tan, muscular, laid-back. He read an in- struction manual at night, and he understood everything as soon as he got on board. I can still see him going out on the trapeze and sending up a spray of water, yelling over the waves. He never capsized once. All those girls with their little breasts and their vacant eyes staring like fish on a platter, thinking of nothing but the party on the last night. All those girls who d written their addresses on his arm with a felt-tip pen while he was pretending to sleep on the bus. And the ones who cried in front of their parents when they saw him heading toward our family Renault. And me . . . getting seasick. Yeah, I remember Marie, all right. One night, she was telling some of the other kids that she d surprised a cou- 14514_00_i-x_001-194_r7jn.qxd 10/3/03 11:11 AM Page 70 70 Anna Gavalda 1 ple of lovers kissing on the beach,and that she d heard the 2 sound of the girl s panties snapping. 3 What did it sound like? I asked, just to put her on 4 the spot. 5 She looked me straight in the eye.She pinched her un- 6 derwear through the cloth of her dress, pulled it back, and 7 let it go. 8 Snap. 9 Like that, she answered, still looking at me. 10 I was eleven. 11 Marie. 12 Damn right, I remember. Snap. 13 The later it got, the less I felt like talking about the 14 army. The less I looked at Marie, the more I wanted to 15 touch her. 16 I drank too much. My mother shot me a dirty look. 17 I went out in the garden with a couple of friends from 18 tech school.We were talking about videos we wanted to 19 rent and cars we d never be able to buy. Michael had put 20 a hyped-up sound system in his Peugeot. 21 Almost two thousand francs to listen to techno. . . . 22 I sat down on the iron bench the one my mother 23 asks me to repaint every year. She says it reminds her of 24 the Tuileries garden in Paris. 25S I smoked a cigarette, looking at the stars. I don t know 26R 14514_00_i-x_001-194_r7jn.qxd 10/3/03 11:11 AM Page 71 Leave 71 many by name. So whenever I have a chance, I look for them. I know four. Another lesson from Glénans that didn t quite take. I saw her coming while she was still a ways off. She smiled at me. I looked at her teeth and the shape of her earrings. She sat down next to me and said: May I? I didn t answer because my stomach was hurting again. So, is it true you don t remember me? No, it s not. You do remember? Yes. What do you remember? I remember that you were ten, that you were four foot three, that you weighed fifty-seven pounds and that you d had the mumps the year before. I remember the medical exam.I remember that you lived at Choisy-le-Roi and at the time it would have cost me forty-two francs to go see you by train. I remember that your mother s name was Catherine and your father s name was Jacques. I re- member that you had a water turtle named Candy,and your best friend was a guinea pig named Anthony. I remember that you had a green bathing suit with white stars, and your mother had even made you a robe with your name 14514_00_i-x_001-194_r7jn.qxd 10/3/03 11:11 AM Page 72 72 Anna Gavalda 1 embroidered on it. I remember that you cried one morn- 2 ing because you didn t have any mail. I remember that 3 you stuck some sequins on your cheeks the night of the [ Pobierz caÅ‚ość w formacie PDF ] |