Fish Change Direction in Cold Weather Page 3

  ‘They’re keeping it another month. The work on their new house isn’t finished.’

  ‘Where will you go?’

  ‘Well, there’s the cottage . . .’

  ‘But how will you get to work?’

  ‘I thought that maybe you could go to the cottage . . . Just for the first month . . .’

  That’s when I understood.

  THEY LOVE EACH OTHER

  It had been dark for a while by now. Boris Bogdanov watched from the window as Julie left her house. Beneath her half-buttoned winter coat she was wearing a very short skirt. The taxi had been waiting for a few minutes already. She quickly climbed in and the taxi sped away.

  Boris Bogdanov sat down across from his aquarium and on a sheet of paper he carefully recorded the trajectory of one of his fish. His entire theory rested on his initial conviction. So before he could reach a hypothesis he must be sure his proof was well founded.

  ‘Da . . . da . . . da . . .’

  Research is very complicated, but the logic behind it is simple. Everything must be proved. If you maintain that Melanie can wee standing up, before you can prove that she wees standing up, first you have to prove that Melanie exists. If she doesn’t exist, how can you maintain that she’s having a wee? That is why Boris Bogdanov had to make sure, first and foremost, that his fish always swam in the same direction, over the same course. He had drawn the trajectories of each of his fish on a sheet of paper, using a different colour for each one. He ended up with an enormous four-coloured knot, and with this he hoped to prove that each fish’s path depended on the paths of all the other fish.

  Perhaps he should have paid more attention to Melanie having her wee. At least he could have had Melanie to talk to, because even with four fish it can seem really lonely when you feel like having a chat. The loneliness of the long-distance researcher.

  There was classical music coming from the apartment across the way. Simon and Michel were sitting on their big sofa, luxuriating in the music. An LP was going round and round on a high-end stereo system. The interior design was tasteful, borderline rococo, with a dominant red note.

  Before them on a little table was a bottle of Chivas Royal Salute 21 Year Old. Tonight, just like every night, they would drink two carefully measured glasses. The bottle lay in its blue velvet box, its neck adorned with a fine golden cord tied with a sailor’s knot. At one hundred and fifty-nine dollars a bottle in the shop at the Rare Spirits Society, they took good care of it. An all-white Maltese bichon, 4 Year Old, was whimpering in her wicker basket.

  ‘Simon took you out three hours ago. Patience, my friend!’

  Simon and Michel had been living together for ten years, but they never went out together. It was as if they were in hiding. Everyone in the neighbourhood thought they were brothers. With their short-cropped white hair and elegant moustaches, they resembled each other a great deal.

  They had met eleven years earlier. Simon was a psychoanalyst, and he had received Michel on his couch. Michel had gone into therapy for a malaise he could not explain. He was uncomfortable in his role as father and husband. He loved his only son, who was eighteen; he loved his wife, and they had been married for twenty-five years, but deep down something was not right. He didn’t feel well, as though he weren’t really himself. Only his job at the weather office, Météo Canada, made him happy. He was a hurricane specialist, working on a matrix for predicting the precise path of these natural predators. Simon, too, was married, and had two daughters, sixteen and nineteen.

  As time went by, they found they had things in common. Simon knew he must never get close to a patient. But the more Michel opened up to him, the more Simon understood him. They liked the same things. They began to wish they could share them. They simply felt good together. More and more, they felt unhappy if they spent too much time apart.

  ‘Michel, I have two tickets for Alain Lefèvre with the Montreal Symphony Orchestra. I shouldn’t normally go out with a patient, but it’s at Place des Arts, it’s not far from here . . .’

  They went further than not far. Both got divorced at the same time and their families took it very badly. Particularly Simon’s; he was Jewish. The psychologists’ association of Quebec had never found out he was living with a former patient and they did not want it to get out. Whenever Simon took Pipo for a walk, Michel stayed home to cook. They had decided to keep their happiness to themselves, all the better to savour it.

  The tempo of the music increased, from moderato to allegro. Simon’s hand slid over to take Michel’s.

  They love each other.

  AND I PRAYED TO THE SKY TO HELP ME

  My dad got the bean, my mum got the crown, I got nothing. They looked at each other. My dad breathed in, my mum breathed out a sigh.

  ‘We have something to tell you.’

  I didn’t want to hear it, but on they went anyway.

  ‘We want you to know that your mum and dad love each other very much.’

  ‘Well . . . still love each other very much.’

  ‘But, you know, sometimes you love someone, but everyday life gets hard . . . Things change . . . Time passes . . . You’re not the same any more . . .’

  This all sounded complicated. My mum paused to catch her breath and at the same time put the crown back on, which had slipped off her head.

  ‘Sometimes it’s so hard that you can’t live together any more, because it’s just not the way it used to be.’

  Friends at school had told me how their parents had broken the news to them. I hardly listened to what came next; I’d already heard it.

  ‘Your father and I have decided to split up.’

  They stared at me, waiting for my reaction. I didn’t move.

  ‘We decided a month ago, but we didn’t want to spoil Christmas for you.’

  I lowered my eyes, so that I wouldn’t have to say thank you. Let’s not get carried away here. I didn’t want to look at them, but I could tell they were looking at each other to see whose turn it was to speak. My mother has always been the more talkative one.

  ‘You will still have a mummy and daddy, they just won’t live together any more . . . One week you’ll be with Daddy, here. The other week you’ll come to my place. You’ll see, it’ll be almost the same as before. There are lots of children who are very happy living like this . . .’

  That would make fourteen of us in the class now who migrated every week. Some of them say it’s cool. I looked up. I was all churned up inside. My mum stared at me. I stared back. She seemed worried.

  ‘Are you okay? You look like you’re not bothered about this . . . You’re allowed to feel something, you know.’

  I had to say something. I didn’t want them to imagine I didn’t love them any more. I wasn’t thinking straight.

  ‘Who’s going to cook when I’m at Dad’s?’

  My dad smiled as best he could. Not at all reassuring.

  ‘I’m going to buy a cookbook, and we’ll give it a go together. It’ll be fun.’

  It was off to a bad start, this shared custody business. I stood up.

  ‘I have to get my bag ready for school.’

  My mum just took my hand.

  ‘If you need to talk, if you have any questions, you mustn’t hesitate.’

  I let go of her hand. She was expecting something. I went closer and hugged her. She squeezed even harder than me. When she let me go, I went and did the same with my dad. He squeezed me really hard.

  ‘Dad, you’re squashing me . . .’

  I didn’t have anything more to say or do. I went into the hall and headed for my room without stopping at the bathroom. I could hear them whispering. I didn’t feel like listening to them any more.

  In my room, once I’d closed the door, I felt weird. I heard them switch on the television. Off went my dad on his evening TV shift. My parents hadn’t spoken for long and for once they hadn’t argued.

  I picked up my video camera but I wasn’t in the mood to look at the neighbour’s boobs. I rewound
to New Year’s. We’d spent it at Julien’s place in Montérégie. I’d been spared the hyperactive twins jumping on the sofa. They were with their mum. It was better that way for Julien, he didn’t have to run around after them all evening. Joint custody probably suited him. It only ever really suits the parents anyway.

  I couldn’t stop going back and forth between 1997 and 1998. I pressed rewind and listened to it over and over, the fateful countdown.

  ‘Five . . . four . . . three . . . two . . . one . . . zero! Happy New Year!’

  Then I saw my mum and dad wishing me Happy New Year into the lens. They’d had trouble finding the right words. Now I understood why they’d been so uncomfortable.

  ‘Dad, get closer to Mum so I can see both of you in the picture!’

  I pressed stop. I’d seen too much of them. I put the tape with the neighbour’s boobs back in. I switched the video camera off and put it away in my schoolbag.

  I stretched out on my back and looked at the ceiling. It was white like before, but the white looked different. I didn’t get it – everything seemed the same. But nothing was the same any more. Then it started, all of a sudden. Tears streaming from every corner of my eyes and pouring down my face. I put my hands on my cheeks but the tears kept coming. I couldn’t stop them. I was crying as I’d never cried before. Usually I only cry if I hurt myself or a friend hits me. This time it was coming from inside. It hurts so much more. I didn’t know that.

  This couldn’t be happening to me! Not me. How could they split up? Share me? Impossible! Your own parents aren’t supposed to split up, only ever other people’s.

  ‘They mustn’t! They mustn’t! They mustn’t!’

  And I cried some more until there was nothing left. I didn’t know that would end either. They hadn’t even asked me what I thought. And yet it was my business too, it was my life! If they were behaving like this it must mean they didn’t love me any more, since they had said they still loved each other, but not in the same way.

  ‘Help me! Help me! Help me!’

  No one answered. I was all alone. I went over to the window. It was raining, and I looked up at the sky, grey and black. I couldn’t stop staring at it. I was so small, and it was so big.

  And I prayed to the sky to help me.

  BÉBÉ . . . JE T’AI, TOI, BÉBÉ . . .

  ‘Ten to twenty millimetres of rain, now that could cause a few problems . . .’ The man on the television screen was relaxed and in a cheerful mood. He strolled along through a light rain, in his loose green raincoat, doing his usual banter. Bad weather was his moment of glory. That was normal – he was the television weatherman. It went without saying that the sky held no secrets for him. He didn’t give a damn there under his umbrella. The anchorwoman seemed to think it was pretty funny.

  ‘Go and dry off! We want to see you again at the end of the programme. You must be completely frozen now!’

  ‘He can go piss himself, that’ll warm him up, fucking faggot.’

  Alex didn’t say anything. He didn’t laugh. Or smile. In fact, he didn’t even notice his dad’s sarcasm. Ever since Doro – his wife, his love – had left him without warning, Alexis saw faggots everywhere. And when they weren’t faggots, they were Jews, rarely both at the same time.

  Alexis no longer looked at women and he didn’t try to attract their attention. So no women were attracted to him. And yet at forty-five he was still a good-looking man . . . but he didn’t like himself any more. Hating others was what kept him afloat.

  ‘All fags! Fucking Jews!’

  Around his son he was different. He had a gentle side, nurtured no doubt by his sense of guilt. Alex’s hair was as black and frizzy as Alexis’s was straight and fair and blondish-grey. Only their names were similar. Just the kind of bad idea a dad would have.

  ‘In Alexis, there’s Alex!’

  Every so often Alex asked Alexis to tell him who his mother was and why she’d gone away.

  ‘I just can’t, Alex. It’s as if she no longer exists.’

  It’s not something you can talk about, a thing that doesn’t exist. So Alex never asked again.

  ‘What bullshit! They never told us yesterday that there’d be black ice, and now there is, and I’ll bet you tomorrow there won’t be any. Can you imagine, if I worked the way they do?’

  Alex looked at his dad. It was at moments like this that he most missed having a mother. She was the one who should have been glaring defiantly at Alexis. She was the one who should be making him see reality, asking him, ‘Would you look at yourself?’

  Alex had often wondered if he’d really had a mother, if you could just come from nowhere. He had no memory of his early childhood. All he knew was that Alexis had been a musician, a singer-songwriter and guitar player. Alex remembered how when he was younger he used to spend long days at the recording studio. He could remember those huge mixing desks, and how he would sit sprawled on a sofa watching his dad behind the big pane of glass, his guitar strap over his shoulder. He may have been just a kid, and not meant to understand everything, but he had a fairly good idea what was happening.

  ‘Alexis! It’s always the same thing with you! Can’t you just play what we asked you to play? C minor is C minor, and A minor is A minor . . . And we’re paying you to play C minor!’

  ‘After a C minor you never play an F sharp, didn’t your music teacher teach you that?’

  ‘Alexis . . . All we’re asking is for you to play the damn score, we don’t give a fuck about your opinion.’

  ‘No F sharps after a C minor!’

  ‘You’re impossible . . . Just get the hell out of here.’

  ‘You don’t know who you’re losing! You’ll be sorry!’

  That was how the final sessions always went. Not one of the studios was ever sorry they’d lost Alexis. But he was blindly stubborn, so he didn’t give up on his career. When you’re sure you have talent, sure that you have the keys to success, you don’t walk away from the profession that could turn you into a star. You just have to change direction.

  ‘I’ll make them understand what music really is!’

  And so Alex followed his dad onto the streets of Old Montreal. Alexis busked, playing his guitar all hunched over, more mumbling than humming, as if he were only playing for himself and didn’t care whether anyone heard him or not. When you don’t have anyone to love, it’s hard to sing love songs. Lovers would walk past him, give him nothing, then go and smooch on public benches. From that point on Alexis’s condition deteriorated.

  ‘All fags! Bleedin’ Jews!’

  So music had ditched him, too. But with a child to support, you have to eat. He began painting; not pictures, but walls and windows, then ceilings, too. Everyone agreed he was a good worker. But too often he would forget to turn up, or he would quarrel with his co-workers, who couldn’t stand listening to him any more.

  ‘They’re all fags, those carpenters! Fucking plumbers! Bloody Jews!’

  It always took him a few days to get the feel of a new construction site. It was better for him to work on his own. Alexis was a drinker, of course. Not a chronic alcoholic, but at night he’d drink as many beers as he needed to get to sleep. The number varied.

  When you’ve only got one person to love, and that person loves you, however badly, you love them back. Alex loved his dad. And he wondered why he’d been given this life. He knew his future was all plotted out. The educational director at school had said as much: You’ll come to a bad end, you will!

  Alex hadn’t protested. He behaved the way all children do. It’s not what parents say that matters, but the example they give. Looking at Alexis, no one could believe that his son had a happy fate in store.

  ‘Night, Dad!’

  ‘Are you going to bed already?’

  ‘Got school tomorrow.’

  ‘Already?’

  ‘Yeah, Dad, it’s the fifth of January, we go back to school.’

  ‘You’re too serious for your age.’

  Alex wasn’t serious a
t all. He fought with everyone. The shopkeeper at the corner shop didn’t want to see him there any more, because he nicked things. Alex lied to his dad. He faked his signature. He copied his tests off his best friend. He never told his dad when there were parent–teacher meetings. And anyway, his dad was beyond caring about any of that. All he looked forward to was falling asleep on the sofa. First he snored, then he mumbled a song, always the same refrain.

  ‘Bébé . . . Je t’ai, toi, bébé . . .’

  Alex pulled a blanket over Alexis.

  ‘Bébé . . . Je t’ai, toi, bébé . . .’

  Alex never tired of hearing those gentle words. He often stayed next to his sleeping dad until late at night. It was so rare for him to hear anything about love.

  ‘Bébé . . . Je t’ai, toi, bébé . . .’

  Monday, 5 January 1998

  ‘The forecast was for ten to fifteen millimetres of freezing rain, but we’ve got nearly double that amount: twenty-five millimetres in Montreal, thirty over the Laurentides and twenty in Montérégie. The weight of the ice has been affecting power lines, cables have started to break, and there have been reports of power cuts . . .’

  YOUR PROBLEMS CAN’T BE THAT BAD

  The alarm clock rang. I woke up with a start. I must not have been sleeping very soundly. For at least five seconds I felt really good. I stretched, and then it all came back. Happiness vanished. I got up and went over to the window and pulled open the curtain. The ground was shiny. Was that ice? I looked again. It was ice! I looked up and the sky was grey and ice was falling! Was this what the sky had done for me?

  I ran into the kitchen, full of hope. My mum and dad were finishing their breakfast, staring into their mugs. When they raised their heads and saw me, I understood instantly that nothing had changed.

  ‘Your father will be leaving today.’

  I filled my cereal bowl and sat down across from them. But this morning I didn’t feel like keeping silent in front of them, only to go and cry afterwards.