A section of boulevard Voltaire is blocked because of a strike. The warm croissants will go cold. “You need to take rue Richard-Lenoir,” a policeman tells her, and she has an urge to retort that that was the street where she was raped and she doesn’t feel like walking along it, and, as an agent of the law, he should find another solution by way of compensation. She doesn’t say anything. The entrance to the car park isn’t all that wide, after all. It was dark, but Marie suddenly thinks it strange that no one saw anything. She pictures people turning away at the point where the deepest core of her parted company with the rest of her body, people happier to stare straight ahead than witness that disturbing sex scene. She doesn’t stop, quickens her step, gets away from the place by crossing the street. A furtive moment of suffering that stirs memories. She doesn’t remember the pain now.
Laurent is only just waking. He went to bed late last night after finishing his defense. The trial starts soon. He gets up to kiss his wife. “How lucky am I to have such a wonderful wife…She brings croissants for breakfast. I didn’t even hear you go out!” She didn’t want to wake him and run the risk of being subjected to his morning sexual enthusiasm. She sets the table meticulously, arranges the five croissants on the large silver dish her parents gave them as a wedding present, and pours freshly squeezed orange juice into a jug. Laurent starts cooking eggs and bacon, filling the room with the smell of frying. “Can you open the window a little, otherwise the whole living room smells of it.” She gets up. Her stomach churns again. How many times has she thrown up in the last few days?
Laurent looks at her. “Hey, are you okay? Are you sick?” She hurries to the bathroom and doesn’t have time to close the door. Laurent watches her through the half-open doorway and smiles.
“What are you laughing at? Watching me on all fours, puking?” Laurent comes over to her but she pushes him away. She finds the situation disgusting and asks him to go back to the kitchen and finish making breakfast. It hurts deep down in her stomach. She can’t take any more of this aching. It’s always in the same place, as if the pain has made up its mind to keep knocking at the same door, reopening the wound with the same determination. Marie has nothing left to throw up, she’s spitting bile. The green liquid dribbles down the inside of the toilet bowl. She drags herself back to join Laurent. He’s sitting on a chair, slightly offended that she banished him so harshly. He gets the picture before she does.
Marie sits at the table without a word, still wincing because of the acid that keeps rising up her throat. She can feel Laurent staring at her. She looks him right in the eye until he gives up and looks away. She doesn’t want to know what he’s thinking, doesn’t want to hear the words come out of his mouth. If she listens to his explanations she’ll scream, spit in his face, try to push him out the window at any opportunity or chuck the hot oil from the bacon in his face. “I’d rather stay at home today, I’m a little tired from the week I’ve had.” He was planning to go to an exhibition at the Musée d’Orsay, which Marie loves visiting on Saturday mornings before tourists get all overexcited about Paris. The light there soothes her; soft vaporous beams filter through the glass roof of this former train station, casting a heavenly protective halo over the large marble statues. He won’t go alone, he’ll get on with his work or go visit his parents in Melun.
Marie returns to the bedroom to get some rest, burrowing back under the unmade sheets contentedly. Some days aren’t worth the effort of being lived anywhere but in bed. She can just see herself in her pajamas, slumped on her plump comfortable mattress, receiving clients, friends, and relations. The nausea is back, stronger than before. “Do we have any medicine for this? Something to stop me throwing up?” Laurent brings a pack of small red pills and a glass of water. She’d like to tear the smile off his face, peel off his skin, blot out any trace of satisfaction in him. He needs to leave, and plants a kiss on his wife’s forehead like an encouragement for what lies ahead. She’s going to sleep all day. Sleep at last. For a few hours she just won’t be here.
Marie has never been particularly fond of her mother-in-law, Jeanne. She finds her too invasive, protecting Laurent like a persecuted little boy, studying every move he makes so she can then give her advice on absolutely everything. Marie hates unplanned visits, and even more so now. “She insisted, I really couldn’t turn her away!” Marie wanted to make the most of this week of vacation to get some rest, staying in bed to read and eat chocolate. Laurent is showering his increasingly fragile wife with thoughtful attention. Jeanne arrives at lunchtime with a large apple tart. Marie reflects that the woman must have spent more time in her life baking than taking care of herself. But she can’t see any similarities between Jeanne and her own mother, even though the rather broad status of homemaker—taking care of the house, cooking, raising children, and ensuring her husband’s happiness—is virtually identical for the two women. There are just different levels of submissiveness. Marie’s mother is less ridiculous in her duties than Jeanne. That’s just an aspect of personality, though, because her mother cultivates a more obvious elegance and restraint. Where would Marie be on this scale? At what point would she be capable of going against everything her environment has taught her?
“Oh my, sweetheart, you looked tired! We should go out to get some air after lunch, go have some tea in the Luxembourg Gardens.” Jeanne’s perfume, an unrelenting combination of incense, sandalwood, and musk that Marie often recognizes in the street on older women, reawakens her nausea. She endures the meal with the same revulsion that she harbors for vaudeville: it’s too loud, the stage is overcrowded, and the laughter is exaggerated. She needs a pause in this torment so she slips away to the bathroom. The walls aren’t very thick and she hears her mother-in-law mutter something to Laurent. She can’t make out the words, almost certainly some criticism about the frozen quiche she’s served.
When Marie returns there’s silence in the room. “I’m not really feeling up to going for a walk today, but you go without me.” Jeanne eyes her tenderly, looking her up and down, lingering over her figure and virtually undressing her. Laurent purses his lips and nods his head approvingly. Marie finishes her slice of apple tart in silence. Sugary snacks are the only thing she can keep down at the moment. Jeanne and Laurent decide they will go out.
“In case you have a problem, honey, I’ll have my cell. You just call and I’ll be here.” She thinks this comment stupid. She’d like to ask him where he was when she was being raped. Now he wants her reassurance over a simple stomach bug. What a farce. She gives Jeanne a peck on the cheek, keeping away from her like someone with the flu, then apologizes about the quiche and heads back to bed.
* * *
—
Sunday is Marie’s favorite day in Paris. It’s the day she and Sophia go to the big market on the rue Mouffetard in the Fifth Arrondissement. She likes strolling around that street for hours. She knows all the traders and they know she’s a loyal customer. The small bakery stall is between displays of cheeses and fish. When it’s the season this is where she comes to buy her game, and then she makes a big steaming casserole of wild boar or venison stew for the whole family.