Читать книгу Holiday in a Coma & Love Lasts Three Years: two novels by Frédéric Beigbeder - Frédéric Beigbeder, Frank Wynne - Страница 8

As I write, night is falling and people are going to dinner.

Henry Miller Quiet Days in Clichy

Groups form, forms group. Sooner or later we will sit down. The people standing around might be considered the elite of Western nightlife civilisation. Hundreds of Α-list celebs and a smattering of Bs who might well be dubbed the ‘Indispensable Ineffectuals’.

Money drips from everywhere. Anyone carrying less than 20k in hard cash on him looks suspect. And yet no one is showing off. All these despots secretly want to be artists. You have to be a photographer, an editor (even a deputy editor), a TV producer, ‘just finishing a novel’, or a serial killer. Nothing could be more suspect here than the absence of an opus. Marc Marronnier filched a copy of the guest list so as to have a better idea of the guests. Glancing through it, he is reassured: the same faces he met last night, the same ones he will meet tomorrow night.

Those placed upstairs are happy to have a table. Those downstairs are happy not to be at one of the tables upstairs.

A NIGHT IN SHIT

Inaugural Dinner – VIP List

Gustav von Aschenbach

Suzanne Bartsch

Patrick Bateman

The Baer Brothers

Henri Balldur

Gilberte Bérégovoy

Helmut Berger

Lova Berandin

Leigh Bowery

Manolo de Brantos

Carla Bruni-Tedeschi

The Castel Family

Pierre Celeyron

Chamaco

Louise Ciccone

Clio

The Albans of Clérmont-Tonnerre

Matthieu Cocteau

Daniel Cohn-Bendit

Francesca Dellera

Jacques Derrida

Antoine Doinel

Boris Elstine

Fab

The Favier sisters

His Excellency Geoffrey Firmin, consul

Paolo Gardénal

Agathe Godard

Jean-Michel Gravier

Jean-Baptiste Grenouille

The Hardissons

Faustine Hibiscus

Ali de Hirschenberger

Audrey Horne

Herbert W. Idle, IV

Jade Jagger

Joss + friends

Solange Justerini

Foc Kan

Irène de Kazatchok

Christian and Françoise Lacroix

Marc Lambron

Marjorie Lawrence

Serge Lentz + the tigress

Arielle Levy +2

Roxanne Lowit

Homero Machry

Benjamin Malaussène

Marc Marronnier

Elsa Maxwell

Baron von Meinerhof

Virginie Mouzat

Thierry Mugler

Roger Nelson

Constance Neuhoff

Masoko Ohya

Paquita Paquin

Roger Peyrefitte

Ondine Quinsac

Guillaume Rappeneau

The Rohan-Chabots and family

Gunther Sachs

Eric Schmitt

William K. Tarsis, III

Princess Goria von Thurn und Taxis

Lise Toubon

Baron and Baroness Truffaldine

Inès and Luigi d’Urso

José-Luis de Villalonga

Denis Westhoff

Ari and Emma Wiz

Oscar de Wurtemberg

Alain Zanini

Zarak

Loulou Zibeline

(Marc notes with some relief that no government ministers have been invited.)

He declaims the list aloud to emphasise the musicality of proper names.

‘Listen to this,’ he declares to no one in particular, ‘it is the music of the diaspora of existence.’

‘Hey, Marc,’ interrupts Loulou Zibeline, ‘did you know that Angelo Rinaldi mentions these public toilets?’

‘Oh?’

‘Of course. It’s in Confessions from the Hills, if memory serves …’

‘Wow, so the Shit served as a confessional? That’s a new one! Let’s drink to that!’ (Marc often says this when he doesn’t know what else to say.)

Loulou Zibeline, forty, journalist with Italian Vogue, specialises in Biarritz-school thalassotherapy and tantric orgasms (two not necessarily incompatible interests). Her long nose props up a pair of red-rimmed glasses. She has the disaffected air of a woman nobody tries to seduce any more.

‘Madame,’ Marc goes on, ‘I’m sorry to have to say this, but you’re sitting next to a sex maniac.’

‘Don’t be sorry. It’s a dying art,’ she replies, staring at him intently. ‘But I find what you say a little worrying. All men are sex maniacs. It’s when they begin to talk about it that one has to be careful.’

‘Don’t get me wrong, I never said I was a good fuck! One can be obsessed with something in theory and still be poor in practice.’

Marc always boasts that he is the worst lay in Paris: it makes women want to make sure for themselves and usually makes them non-judgemental.

‘Tell me, since you seem to know a lot about it,’ he interjects, ‘could you give me a short list of the best pick-up lines? You know the idea – “Do you live with your parents?”, “Your eyes are like limpid pools”, that kind of thing. It might come in handy tonight, because I’m a bit out of practice.’

‘My dear, the pick-up line is immaterial, whether or not you pick a woman up depends entirely on your face, full stop. But there are a number of questions which all women fall for. For example: “Haven’t we met somewhere before?” Banal, but reassuring, or “You’re not a supermodel, are you?” No one in the world will rebuke you for a compliment. Although insults work rather well too: “Would you be so kind as to move your enormous arse, as it appears to be blocking the aisle?” might work (though with someone not too callipygous, you understand).’

‘That’s really interesting,’ Marc declares, reaching for a couple of Post-it notes. ‘What about something along the lines of “I don’t suppose you have change for 800 francs?”’

‘Too absurd.’

‘What about: “What do you say we pretend there’s nothing between us?”’

‘Too pathetic.’

‘What about this one – it’s my favourite: “Do you take it in the mouth, mademoiselle?”’

‘Risky. Nine times out often you’ll go home with a black eye.’

‘Yes, but the tenth almost makes it worth a try, don’t you think?’

‘If you look at it like that, then yes, I suppose. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.’

Marc has just lied, for his preferred line when addressing a strange woman is ‘Mademoiselle, may I offer you a glass of lemonade?’

Their table is quite well placed. Joss’s table is just next door. A flotilla of waiters wearing white dinner jackets arrive with the platters of pearl oysters. It is an amusing diversion: one shucks the oysters oneself and there are people shouting:

‘Look, there are two pearls in mine!’

‘Why didn’t I get a pearl?’

‘Look at this one, it’s HUGE, isn’t it?’

‘You should have it mounted as a pendant.’

‘Darling, you are the only pearl in my life!’

It’s like Twelfth Night: Marc can almost see the three wise men wandering through the club, the only thing that’s missing is the smell of frankincense.

Irène de Kazatchok, a British fashion designer of Ukrainian ancestry, is chatting with Fab. Born on 17 June 1962 in Cork (Ireland), her favourite writer is V.S. Naipaul and she loves the Pogues’ first album. At university, she had a lesbian affair with Deirdre Mulrooney, the captain of the women’s rugby XV. Her elder brother is called Mark and he takes Mandrax. She has had two abortions: one in 1980 and one last year.

Fab listens, nodding. They don’t understand each other, but they are getting along famously. In the future, all conversations will be like this. Each of us will speak a different gibberish. Then, perhaps, we will finally be on the same wavelength.

Irène: ‘The clothes must rester stable sur la body parce que if you put les trucs comme ça and it hangs comme ça, c’est affreux, you don’t see the fabric, it’s just too crasseux, you know? Oh my God: look at this pear, elle est gigantic!!’

Fab: ‘Irie, in trance there’s, like, no after-effects, I’m totally in the rhomb, for real. Do you, like, percute l’hypnose mental? I’m like a space-time vector, like a fucking mononuclear biologist. It’s like space and its fly! Can I call you Perle Harbor?’

Irène is wearing a corset of plaited barbed wire over a PVC lingerie combo. The latest trend. Marc is doing his best not to miss a word of this historic conversation, but Loulou interrupts him.

‘So, I hear you’ve taken a job in advertising?’ she interjects. ‘I have to say, I’m really disappointed in you.’

‘The thing is, I don’t have much in the way of imagination: I only started working as a paparazzo to be like Marcello Mastroianni in La Dolce Vita and I got a job writing advertising copy to be like Kirk Douglas in The Arrangement.’

‘When in fact you look like an ugly William Hurt.’

‘Thanks for the compliment.’

‘But doesn’t it bother you that you’re contributing to the manipulation of the masses? To the blank generation. To all that shit?’

Multiple choice questions. Loulou has never forgotten May 1968 when she visited the Latin Quarter in her Mini Cooper and discovered multiple orgasms at the Théâtre de l’Odéon. She has regretted her revolutionary spasms ever since. As does Marc, in a way. He would like nothing better than to bring society crashing down. It’s just that he doesn’t know where to start.

‘Since you insist, madame, let me explain my theory: I think that it’s important to get involved in “all that shit” because no one is ever going to change things by staying at home. Instead of swearing at the passing trains, I’d rather hijack planes. Okay, end of theory. In any case, I’ve wound up in a complete disaster area. I feel like an investor ploughing all his money into steel.’

‘Still, I felt you let me down …’

‘Loulou, can I tell you a secret? You’ve put your finger on my greatest ambition: to let people down. I try and let people down as often as possible. It’s the only way to keep them interested. You remember your report cards at school when the teachers wrote “Could do better”?’

‘Oh, please!’

‘Well, that’s my motto. My dream is that all my life people will say “Could do better”. Making people happy gets old very quickly. Making them unhappy is pretty scummy. But systematically, meticulously, letting them down, now that’s success. Letting someone down is an act of love: it fosters loyalty. “How on earth is Marronnier going to let us down us this time?”’

Marc wipes a drop of spit which has just landed on the cheek of his interlocutor.

‘You know,’ he continues, ‘I’m the baby of the family. I like coming second in everything. It’s something I’m pretty good at.’

‘At least you have no illusions about your abilities …’

Marc realises he is wasting his time blethering with this duenna. On her cheek, he notices a wart which she’s painted black to make it look like a beauty spot. Has anyone ever seen a 3D mole? Well, yes, but only a real mole. Loulou Zibeline has unveiled a new concept: the ugly spot.

*

Irène lights her cigarette from the candelabra. Marc turns towards her. He finds her attractive, but the feeling is not mutual: she’s only interested in Fab.

‘But you must agree,’ she is telling him, ‘that la mode, il n’est pas the same en France and in England. Le British people, they love les habits qu’ils sont strange et original, very uncommon, mais les français, they are not interested in le couleur or la délire, don’t you think?’

‘Okay, okay,’ Fab retorts, ‘it’s hardly a techno diva but you’ve still got atomic bombs in a murder stylee and if you get the supersonic babe on the dance floor, I gotta tell you, you don’t fuck with it, you more grooving on, like alpha and theta waves, capito?’

The vast speakers are blasting ‘Sex Machine’. A song recorded before Marc Marronnier was born and one which will probably still have people dancing long after he is dead.

Marc samples the soirée, turning full circle. Transformed into a human periscope, he tries to sort the sexy dogs from the ugly babes. He spots Jérémy Coquette, dealer to the stars (best little black book in town). And Donald Suldiras, kissing his boyfriend in front of his wife. The Hardissons showed up with their three-month-old (uncircumcised) baby. They’re getting him to smoke a joint for a laugh. Baron von Meinerhof, former female toilet attendant at Sky Fantasy in Strasbourg, is laughing in German. The attentive barmen jiggle their cocktail shakers in slow motion. People come and go, they can’t stand still. It’s difficult to sit when you’re eagerly waiting for something to happen. Everyone is so beautiful and so unhappy.

Solange Justerini, ex-smack addict turned soap star, stretches out her long arms like sneering seaweed. All the holes have been filled in. Her sylph-like waist seems almost too narrow. How many ribs has she had sawn off since Marc fucked her last?

The lights dim, but not the commotion. Joss Dumoulin is spinning a Yma Sumac – Kraftwerk remix over a soft background of crickets in Provence. Ondine Quinsac, the famous photographer, walks by, naked under a tulle dress, her face painted green. Someone has painted stripes on her back with nail-polish. Unless maybe they’re real.

Marc is surrounded by superwomen. Fashion celebrates models who have been nip/tucked. The most famous supermodels are posing at Christian Lacroix’s table. Marc admires their seasonally-adjusted fake breasts. He’s already felt such things: silicone breasts are hard with huge nipples. A million times better than the real thing.

Marc is their voyeur. He stares at these life-size models straight out of a fan-boy comic, a pornographic paint box. These creatures are the modern-day Brides of Frankenstein, synthetic sex symbols in patent leather thigh-boots, studded bracelets, dog-collars. Somewhere in California some lunatic with a workshop is mass-producing them. Marc can imagine the factory. Roofs in the shape of breasts, a vaginal doorway with a new girl stepping out every minute! He wipes his forehead with a hanky.

‘Hey Marco, you done eyeballing the vamps?’

Fab must have noticed his eyes on stalks. Marc downs his oyster in one (pearl included).

‘Just remember, Fab,’ he shouts, ‘you used to think the world was yours for the taking. You used to say: “All you have to do is bend down and pick it up.” Remember? Do you remember when you still believed that shit? Look me in the eye, Fab, do you remember back when girls placed bets on us?’

‘Chill, man. Where there’s collagen, there’s no fun.’

‘Bollocks. Double bollocks. Look at them, they’re the twelfth wonder of the world! Fuck nature! These cybersluts should be right up your street.’

‘They’re just a bunch of Klaus Barbie dolls!’ declares Fab, which makes Irène smile.

‘I think someone should work on plastic surgery for men,’ Loulou butts in. ‘There’s no reason why they shouldn’t. They could start with a scrotal lift for men who wear boxer shorts. Now that would be a good idea, don’t you think?’

‘No way, José,’ says Fab, ‘I go commando, no problemo!’

‘She’s right,’ says Marc. ‘Everyone needs something done. Look at Baroness Truffaldine over there! There’s plenty there to liposuck. And what about you, Irène, you wouldn’t say no to a 46-inch bust, would you?’

‘What did he say?’ asks Irène.

Marc is having it large. He’d give anything to be a hot girl for a couple of hours. It must be exhilarating to have such power … Right now, he doesn’t know where to look, there are so many!

Question: Is the world a wonderful place, or is it that Marc can’t hold his liquor?

For his part, Joss Dumoulin is still more or less on top of the situation. Though the assembled company is anything but disciplined. But for the moment, everyone seems to be laying the groundwork, warming up. In a book of lesser stylistic ambition, the author would say this is the ‘calm before the storm’.

Impotent millionaires knock back carafes of wine as they wait for the outbreak of hostilities. Underlings snub their masters. No one is eating the food.

Marc decides to subject the girls at his table to his famous ‘Triple Why’ experiment. Usually no one survives it. The ‘Triple Why Theorem’ is simple: when you pose the question ‘Why?’ for the third time, a person’s thoughts invariably turn to death.

‘I feel like some more wine,’ says Loulou Zibeline.

‘Why?’ asks Marc.

‘To get hammered.’

‘Why?’

‘Because … I feel like having a good time tonight and if I have to sit here listening to your jokes, there’s not much chance of that.’

‘Why?’

‘Why do I want to have a good time? Because you’re a long time dead, that’s why!’

The first candidate for the Triple Why experiment passes with the jury’s congratulations. But in order to scientifically establish a theorem, it must be repeatable and verifiable. And so Marc turns to Irène Kazatchok.

‘I work too hard,’ she says.

‘Why?’ Marc asks, all smiles.

‘Well … to make money.’

‘Why?’

‘Get out of here! Because we all have to eat, that’s why.’

‘Why?’

‘Gimme a break. Because otherwise you die, my boy.’

It goes without saying that Marc Marronnier is jubilant. His experiment is utterly pointless, but he enjoys rigorously testing the futile theories he dreams up to kill time. The only drawback is that now he’s riled Irène, leaving the field open for Fab. Never mind: the advance of science is surely worth a few setbacks.

*

‘Hey, Marc, the tall man over there with the walking-stick, that’s not Boris Yeltsin, is it?’ asks Loulou.

‘Looks like him. We’re being invaded by Eastern Europeans, what can you do …’

‘Shhh. Here he comes.’

Boris Yeltsin has clearly been working on his nouveau capitalist look. He is particularly overdressed (in rented tails) and he thrusts out his hand two seconds too early, like Yasser Arafat with Yitzhak Rabin. He has not yet worked out that at society events, unlike standoffs in Hollywood westerns, it’s best to draw last. His spongy hand hovers in the void. Overcome with compassion, Marc takes the hand and kisses it.

‘We welcome great Russia to our Luna Park,’ he cries.

‘You’ll see, soon we shall be as rrrrrich as you, we shall rrrrise above the rrrrabble by selling our nuclearrr weapons to your enemies [Boris rolls his ‘r’s with application]. One day, we shall wearrrr Mickey Mouse costumes of finest orrrrgandie.’

‘Good, good! Party on!’

‘Do you know,’ Loulou murmurs in a confiding tone, ‘I have a friend who is so racist and so anti-communist that she has always refused to drink Black Russians.’

‘Ha, ha,’ Boris laughs. ‘Now, perrrhaps she will change herrr mind!’

‘I adore your cane,’ says Irène. ‘It’s marvellous, really.’

‘Fo’ shizzle, man,’ chimes in Fab. ‘The stick is shabby.’

‘Hey, wow,’ yells Marc, ‘it’s not just my table, it’s a global village!’

‘Look, I have amassed thirrrteen pearrrls,’ brags Boris, brandishing a small purse full of small nacreous spheres.

‘Why?’ asks Marc, with something in mind.

‘As a souvenirrrr of this soirrrrée!’

‘Why?’

‘So that I can tell the storrry to my grrrandchildren!’

‘Why?’

‘So they will have something to rrrremember me by when I pass away …’ intones the Russian President gravely.

Marc’s inner glee can be read in the gleam in his eyes. Pythagoras, Euclid, Fermat – watch out! The Nobel Prize for Mathematics can’t be far off.

The service isn’t slack. Already they’re bringing on the main course: rack of lamb with Smarties. Marc gets up to go for a piss. Just before he leaves the table, he leans over to Loulou and whispers in her ear:

‘I swear, when you really need to take a piss, well, it’s almost as good as shooting your load. So there!’

Marc knew the party would be a success when he saw the mob at the ladies’ toilets, touching up their make-up or snorting coke (which amounts to the same thing since cocaine is simply brain cosmetics). On a Post-it, he writes: ‘The twenty-first century will take place in the ladies’ toilets or not at all.’