Читать книгу Undressing Emmanuelle: A memoir - Sylvia Kristel - Страница 26

22

We return from our holiday sooner than expected. Not to the hotel but to a new apartment my father has bought for us. Everything has been organised, foreseen. We are at the end of a separation process that was begun several months ago. Everything has been planned. Our things and a few bits of furniture have already been moved from the hotel to the apartment. My mother asks to pass by the hotel again. The whore tells her it’s not necessary, that everything has been moved. My mother insists – all this is so sudden – and my father ends up saying yes.

My mother has a few hours in which to say goodbye to the place she has managed and held together for fifteen years. She walks from room to room in a daze, her every movement tracked by the new mistress who keeps an eye on her possessions. My mother retrieves a small jewellery box she had hidden under a pile of tablecloths. The contents are checked and my mother is allowed to take away her memories. My mother is calm, strong. In her distress she does, however, forget some basic items. Towels and sheets, such everyday items in a hotel, are left behind. We sleep in sleeping bags for the first few nights. My mother is shocked, driven out, humiliated, but she doesn’t falter. I follow her protectively. In defiance I feign indifference. I feel so close to my mother, on the same team for the first time.

On her way out, hurried to the door, my mother puts a hand on the Chinese vase in the lobby, coming to a halt by this familiar object which has witnessed her comings and goings for so many years. She often used to stroke it as she walked past, it was a reference point, she loved its beauty and refinement. She opens her arms, deciding to take it in a fit of bravery; it will be her souvenir, her link, proof that life has not come to an end but is continuing under another roof. Every glance at the vase will recreate the earlier setting and my mother will be able to believe, as she focuses on the magic vessel, that her lonely new life is a temporary hell. Hanny screams, and snatches back the vase.

‘That’s not yours!’

This woman is simply evil. She wants to hurt, to take revenge. But on what? My mother is not fighting, the battle is not equal. She is emptied while the other is full of venom. I go to take the vase, but my mother holds out her hand to me.

‘Come on, let’s go …’

‘Take the vase!’

I look up; my father has been watching the scene from the top of the stairs. He avoids my eyes and returns to his attic.

We don’t close the hotel door when we leave.

My mother is holding the vase like a pregnant belly, and my arms are stretched around the jewellery box as if it were plunder.