I stared up at the top of what had been Eric's apartment block, one of four identical monoliths marking the corners of a ragged patch of weedstrewn concrete wasteground punctuated by dead trees and a heap of smouldering garbage. A few metres away a couple of longhaired kids in jeans and T-shirts surely too thin for the season were executing desultory jumps on skateboards.
'Bloody Le Corbusier again' I thought. Seven years ago when I'd stayed here with Eric and his family the block had been white, light-filled, the park beneath it green, its trees still living. In the early days of its existence the estate had managed to preserve something of the optimism of the architect's maquette which doubtless had persuaded the municipal council of this Parisian suburb that Cities In The Sky were indeed the way to go when creating 'habitations à loyer modéré' -- homes at reasonable rents -- for its blue collar residents. Even then, though, I'd noticed something sulphurous about the atmosphere of the landings, which Eric told me was the reek of inefficient waste-disposal chutes and overcomplex plumbing which was constantly in need of maintenance it didn't receive. The lifts served all too often as impromptu lavatories for local vagrants and, he hinted, fellow occupants who just didn't care.
Seven years had wiped away any illusion that this kind of high-rise battery living held any advantage other than low rents. The outsides of the blocks had been eroded grey by weather and traffic fumes from the Paris ring road, the Périphérique, next to which they stood. No one having taken responsibility for it, the communal green space had deteriorated into the dilapidated skate park from which I was surveying the decline. I didn't know if Eric or his family even lived here any more. If they'd had the opportunity or any sense, I thought, they'd have moved out long ago.
Across the wire-reinforced glass of the entrance lobby someone had spraycanned 'Lasciate ogni speranze, voi ch'entrate' -- the inscription on the gates of Hell in Dante's 'Inferno': 'Abandon hope all ye who enter here.'
I'd caught the train from Blois just after midday, a stopping service that was supposed to get me into the Gare d'Austerlitz about three hours later. It was drizzling as we pulled out of the station, and my memory of the entire journey is in monochrome, like one of those stylish old films Jean-Luc was so fond of, Jean-Louis Trintignant or Alain Delon travelling moodily to some assignation or crime backed by a cool jazz soundtrack. Light rain streaked on the compartment windows, refracting and distorting the yellow of prematurely illuminated car headlights at level crossings.
My mood is best described by that old word 'melancholy.' I'd had a good time with Jean-Luc, Thérèse and Natacha, but it was the right point to move on and I didn't regret leaving. The fact that I'd promised Henri to look in on his nieces Diane (Doudou) and Zoë (Zaza) had given some structure to my planned wanderings when I'd originally made it, but that was before I fell in love with Alana, then had her taken away from me, then spent the next six weeks trying to pretend it didn't matter. Before I'd left England on this road trip I'd seen it as a way of finding what it was that I really wanted to do with my life before I went off to university, as well as have sex with a broad range and variety of women. I'd certainly managed the latter, but somehow, remembering Alana, it seemed a hollow kind of achievement. As to the former intention, I still had no idea.
I think I wanted to go home.
A promise was a promise, though. I'd call and see the girls in Choisy, and might even, I thought with a sudden burst of excitement, be able there to find an excuse to phone their uncle to see if he had any news of Alana. The visit to Eric was more tendentious, but I've always had this desire to know what happens to people. Life is pretty chaotic, despite the lies we tell ourselves and each other and the pathetic structures we construct to try and contain and predict our fates, and I've often found it comforting to discover that I'm not the only one to whom unexpected shit happens. What that might have been in his case I had no idea.
I didn't intend to spend any longer at either place than I could help, though. I stowed my canvas bag in a left luggage locker at Austerlitz, taking with me only my passport, the remaining traveller's cheques, and about 200 francs I had left in cash. I got on the Metro for the Porte d'Ivry.
When I saw the state of Eric's old home, the closed-down row of shops on the street next to the devastated park, the nervous-looking Arabs and hollow-eyed skinheads inscribed with tattoos declaring affiliation to the neo-fascist Front National party, I congratulated myself on the right decision. Not that I had anything worth stealing, but that wouldn't have deterred them from checking, and baggage draws attention.
What the fuck was I doing here?
"Like it?" a girl's voice interrupted my contemplation of the quotation from Dante. "I did that. It's from the 'Inferno.' It means..."
I told her what it meant.
"Clever" she said. "Got a cig?"
She looked about fourteen. She was very small, thin, pale, her chopped-up hair peroxide blonde, blue eyes heavily mascara'd, baggy camo combat trousers at least two sizes too big so she had to keep hoisting them up to cover a grubby knicker waistband. A torn Métal Urbain T-shirt rose above a tiny, vulnerable-looking navel in the delicate white curve of her stomach. It had a silver ring through it, matching an array of ironmongery in both her ears and nose. She held a plastic carrier bag that obviously contained a bottle.
I fumbled in my pocket for the pack of Gauloises the traffic cop had given me all those weeks ago in Laval. There were still a few left.
"French?" she said disdainfully. "You sound American. Thought you'd at least have some Marlboros."
"English. Take it or leave it."
She took the cigarette and let me light it for her from the matchbook Marielle had given me a thousand years ago.
"You might have got a blowjob for a Marlboro. Coming in?" she said.
I followed her through the door into the crepuscular lobby. She pressed the lift button, then struck it four more times with increasing force.
"Violence is the only language it understands."
"What's in the bag?" I said as the downward arrow above the lift door finally came on.
"You a cop? Nah, your hair's too long"
It had grown out a bit since I arrived in Blois. I wasn't likely to be mistaken for a soldier now, any more than a policeman.
"Wine and chocolate" she continued. "You coming up for a drink?"
"It was a blowjob a minute ago. You don't look old enough for either."
"Arsehole. I'm eighteen. I've got ID" she sneered.
The lift must have recently been cleaned, as it smelt of disinfectant as well as cigarette smoke and stale urine. As well, oddly, as cabbage.
"What's your name?" I asked the girl as we stepped in.
"Sure you're not a cop?"
"I swear."
"Joe. Which floor?"
"Me too. Short for Joseph in my case. Are you a Joséphine, a Joanne, or what?"
"Strummer" she said "After the singer of The Clash. My parents called me Carice. Do I look like a Carice? Which floor?"
"I suppose not. Seventh."
"Same here." She pressed the button. The door creaked slowly shut.
"Which flat do you live in? I haven't seen you before."
"Seventeen."
"Fuck! You are a fucking cop!"
I explained about Eric. She glared at me suspiciously. I fancied she was planning to hit me with the wine bottle if I didn't convince her.
