He repeats words I cannot decipher. The yellow flesh wrapped around a cowl that no longer serves its purpose, for it has been torn in two, repeats a terrible sentence, which to my dismay I have not yet understood. It’s been a month since I started seeing him. Every morning, as I make my way out of the métro, I see the listless man, sitting, waiting for something which has not yet been. He is immobile save for the repetitive shaking of a penny-filled container. I think it incredible- the agility of his wrist, up and down, up and down, and in it the pennies are dancing. They dance to the sad song of misery and air, rattling away in a vacuum of decency. Someone should set up a stage for this man! Perhaps I’ll write to the mayor one of these days, ordering 30 metres of velvet pall, red, that I shall pin to the metro ceiling, all to glorify that shaking. While I am it, I’ll kindly ask Mr Mayor to fix the leak in my flat.
Thirty days it has been. Each morning as I kick my heels on the way to work, I hear that terrible phrase. It stuns me silly alright, and yet I don’t understand a word. There is a lot about this man that I do understand. I write about him all the time but most of it is rubbish anyway. I feel ashamed for his torn slippers, which he so carefully covers with plastic bags. I too have a hole in my shoes, but being who I am, too proud to admit being a failure; I hide the plastic bag inside the shoe. So the world still thinks that the leather on my feet make formidable footwear, when in fact, they are just a cover to the bags and torn socks inside. When it rains in Paris, I have to tiptoe all the way down the boulevards, steering clear of puddles and dejections, just to prevent wetting my socks. I keep my face, but my loins are weeping with the city. A façade, a façade I am. Oh Diego, you’re a spoof, a scamp, your mother would say. I sneer at my hypocrisy, rub my stubble and remember I am late for work- again.
Walking down the steps into the metro at Belleville, I decide I shall take the courage to speak to my friend today. Today Diego, you’ll find out what the sentence is. No longer shall you avert your eyes away from the man sitting on the steps. That was the old me, frail Diego. But today you are grand, brave, a remnant of the Lusitanian dynasty of King Sebastian.
The station is packed, people, children, billboards advertising distant paradises. I shudder at the thought of being stuck in this picturesque hell. A toddler pegged to its mother’s back by a thick piece of cotton-cloth pokes me in the eye as we wait for the train to come. My sense of drama suddenly kicks in and I imagine what the reaction would be if I poked him back. Eye for eye, mate! I remind myself he is but a toddler, and so pretend to stab him with my imaginary sword. Rolling his bald head backwards gently, a sweet brief yawn slips through his lips. He doesn’t react further to my attack and seems numbingly unimpressed. I want to insult the little brat now. He crossed the line of cordiality. You are out of order young fellow, out of order. I shall send you back to your cradle, no supper tonight! And to top this thought up, I hope frightening monsters eat your hand. The mother who until this moment had been gazing blankly in the direction of the tunnel suddenly turns her head to me. Her voluptuousness intimidates and arouses me at the same time. I picture us in the heat of a swampy land, sweating away under the shade of a centurial willow. The tree bends gently to the left, she to the right, her hair daggling over my chest, touching it ever so lightly. To the other side, the sage leaves of the willow dip their tips in the bayou. My skin turns into glass, and so her image is reflected on it, like the image of the leaves is reflected in the water. I conclude I am water, I am an ocean, I am greater than life! My southern goddess, elope with me, away from here!
I take a step back, breathe deeply, stick out my chest and smile. I try to look portly and proud, like the man who will finally sweep her off her feet, feed her grapes and fan her with palm tree branches. I am a hero, my princess. Diego LeGrand, Diego the writer. I shall re-write the history of your ancestors, and no-longer will you be discriminated against, I’ll kill the words, the vocabulary that animates this discrimination. Forget labels, forget cringing at the word octoroon, at passing, at all the treacheries that burden you. I am Diego, and as such, I shall create a world that bows when you pass.
But my bony structure and careless appearance betray me. Her eyes are scanning me now with laser-precision. To her, I am no hero, I am a rat. My feet start to sweat and so the plastic crackles. Luckily the train arrives and I disappear into the overpopulated carriage. Sometimes I just can’t help hating Paris. Though mostly, I just plainly hate myself.
I get off at my destination. Just as I step outside the carriage, the familiar lulling sound invades my senses. My duel of a few minutes ago must have sharpened my wits, made me more street savvy, alert to the beasts and fairies of the world. I hear the lull and am dragged towards it by the ears. I distinctly hear words now, where before they were mere sounds. It must have been the duel! «Où est Allah? Où est Allah? Où est Allah? »I seem to hear. And so I do.
Leaving the platform, the staircase leading over-ground is only a few meters away. My blood starts to pulsate faster than usual, and my mind is startled by a battalion of questions. A mad battle between why’s and what’s breaks loose. My brain transforms itself into a challenge arena surrounded by bleachers packed tightly with dainty women, summoned, waving desperately at the knights in armoured suits. What these women don’t know is that the knights are no longer people- they are words. Why’s and what’s, scribbled words riding horses and covered by iron masks. Ludicrous! I realise my fear of this pauper is getting to me, creeping upon me, consuming my sanity inch by inch. My feet are pacing steadily towards the source of conflict, despite my mind’s desperate attempt at tugging the reigns. Useless effort though, my feet disobey, they are charged by a sense of duty entirely dissociated from my will.
Then the unthinkable happens. Where the man used to sit, I find but dust and cigarette butts. So what was it I heard as I alighted from the train? Instead of an answer more questions arise. In despair I raise my hands towards the sky and for the first time in years, I pray for someone to illuminate me. Our Father, our Father who art in heaven. I have read Kafka, learnt about loneliness, yet not once until this moment had I actually felt it. Desolation and guilt trip me to the core. I had missed my chance to do well, to be a hero. I am all pretence and no better than the next man. I gather he was taken by the winds of Paris, blown safely out of the sight of the rich passer-by. It took a month. I can just picture them, gathered around a fine mahogany round table, discussing the future of the less fortunate. I say we condemn them for the filth, one would say while banging his fist on the piece of furniture. Oh marvellous Antoine, marvellous, let’s approve a law, whereby people may be charged for insalubrité another would reply. And they would all break into a universal laughter fit, regulated by norms of conduct as well. Their faces are red and their cheeks bloated by cynicism and intolerance. And their eyebrows are just too damn scary to describe. I have failed you, dear friend. You died nameless, and so my body will be buried alongside shame, together forever in eternity. On my tombstone my dear mother shall inscribe: Diego the Traitor, aged 21, hung and shunned for treason.
I rush to the office, running faster than my breath or muscles can handle. I stop once, just long enough to buy last evening’s newspaper. Then sitting down at my desk, one of so many lined-up in orderly fashion; I flick through the paper for names, dead names. I browse the obituary section- nothing but pompous names belonging to anonymous people. I search the ads for lost people: only children and beloved pets. My friend is gone, not dead, not recorded, simply gone, nameless, swiped off the face of this planet.
All day long, damnation fell upon me. A poorly disguised frown took control of my face, and nobody, nobody I called agreed to buy advertising space from the newspaper.