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It was the morning of my second consultation. I had taken a sleeping pill the night before, but still only managed to rest for three or four hours. I applied some dry ice to my eyes to seem more awake. I took longer than usual to get ready. Mark wanted to accompany me but I insisted on going alone. It was difficult to justify, but in a way he was already familiar with my tendency to withdraw, to feed my need for privacy. Talking to a doctor is very personal, on the outskirts of intimacy, I wanted to own completely my immediate reactions, even if only to share them better, later, that’s what I said. He wanted to hold my feelings in his hands, be they sorrow or happiness, and throw the sad ones away, be there. With me. We didn’t argue but I suspect it was only because he wouldn’t have forgiven himself, had he given me a hard time on such a fragile morning. The sky was beautiful, illuminated by some flamboyant patches of light but somehow still dark, black and white, three shades of grey, yellow, orange; it could have rained but it didn’t. I was feeling very clean, very fresh, I took the equivalent of three showers. I prepared a cup of strong coffee, walked out on the terrace and checked that my clothes were in tune with the temperature. Crisp, there was a subtlety to the air that morning, an elegance to the view that wasn’t there before; it was a landscape, a scene that needed to be looked at. So much apprehension, so much tension. I was nervous, excited, scared, in a state of anxiety that my body wasn’t willing to admit because I also seemed calm, from the outside I guess, possibly just tired. I wished I had slept more, were more alert, but there was a dreaminess to my demeanour, at least I wasn’t completely beside myself. I still had to dry my hair so I went back in, took off my jacket and ran upstairs. I did it in no time and then tied it up in a pony tail. I looked at myself. I looked fatigued it and bothered me. I forced a smile on my face, some sort of jaw exercise, opened my mouth, and closed it, and again, I said hello, touched my hair, how are you, brushed my eyebrows, said the 22 words to myself in the mirror, not for the first time, at all, wondered if I should wear earrings and decided against it, adjusted my necklace, positioned my lips so they could enunciate the first letter of his name, and then I said it again and again, his name, à la Antoine Doinel, and then I said mine, and finally I combined the two, and was very happy with the perfectly balanced sonority and rhythmic structure of the serial repetition. But Mark wasn’t. He was standing right there at the bathroom door, and was staring at me with eyes that I had never met before, just like he had never met my craziness, and now my humiliation. His eyes screamed out horrified perplexity, and an awkwardness that he compassionately felt for me. I sort of smiled and apologized, I’m sorry I’m just playing, but I didn’t know what kind of game. Hot electric shocks of embarrassment were piercing their way through my head. I was mortified. So that’s what it’s about then, you going alone and being so private, he said. I must have left the bay window open because I could feel a current of air swimming around us, forcing itself around us, taunting us like a long and rapid snake, a swirling mist of confusion and doubt insisting on its place with sharp and painful incisions, a warning, and Mark could feel it too because his eyes filled up with worry and fear, and some sadness, and we both looked at it and we were glad that it was still moving fast and not so much threatening to settle. We both knew what it meant, and we both wanted it out, we couldn’t take our eyes off it, and our hearts started to beat dangerously fast.
Except where stated, all material copyright © Emmanuelle Dauplay.