Imane had barely had the time to give him his injections and a few massages, as well as to tell him that her real dream was for him to recover soon so that he could paint her portrait: “I’ll tell you a lot of things when I’ll pose for that portrait. You’ll be surprised!” He’d agreed by nodding his head.
After Imane had left, the Twins had come to look for him so they could groom him. He’d muttered the word “hammam” and they’d looked at one another surprised, asking themselves if it would be an appropriate thing to do given his condition. One of them called the doctor, who told him it would be best to avoid the hottest rooms and the kind of forceful massages that were typical to popular hammams. The Twins hired out a room that was moderately warm and took the painter there in his wheelchair. He had been happy to reconnect with one of his childhood memories.
The Twins were efficient and highly capable. The painter was at his ease, and ready to be rid of a lot of dead skin. A man had come and he’d scrubbed the artist as though he were a root vegetable pulled out of the ground. Another came to give him a gentler massage. He felt good, especially after he got to his living room so he could rest. He dozed off and managed to sleep a little. He decided not to take any sleeping pills that evening. He was pretty relaxed and was able to sleep without a chemical boost. That night, everyone got mixed up in his dreams: his wife, Imane, his doctor, Ava, the professor of applied mathematics, the director of his gallery, and many others still who paraded before him for the entirety of the night. In the morning he’d woken up scared, thinking his dream had been premonitory, presaging all the farewell visits people made to those about to die.
Like all men who loved women, the painter thought about the succession of women who had loved him and whom he’d loved in his turn. He even imagined how he would one day assemble them under the roof of his house in order to tell them how much pleasure and happiness they’d brought into his life. He would thank them and kiss them for one last time. Then he suddenly asked himself: “Would my wife be there? Does she belong with those who gave me pleasure and happiness?” He didn’t want to be unfair. Pleasure? Yes, she’d certainly done that. He greatly enjoyed making love to her, although they never spoke about it. That would never do. He was surprised that she’d never said anything about their sex life, except for a single occasion when she’d told him in anger: “You don’t satisfy me either sexually or financially! You’re impotent!”
It was curious and interesting that she’d linked money and sex in a single sentence. The painter had read Freud and he knew a lot about the subject. But to be called “impotent” had made him chuckle. Of course, he hadn’t been able to tell his wife that the other women he’d been with had never had any complaints — quite the contrary, in fact. Still, from time to time that phrase would start ringing in his head like a crazy alarm clock. “Fine, maybe it’s true. She isn’t happy or satisfied, but I know it isn’t true. That is, unless she was faking, and I can’t do anything about that!”
After that incident, he’d asked himself the same old question: “Why have we never been able to speak to each other, to talk without arguing, to understand each other without wanting to smash everything around us — in short, to compromise and live together? Am I a monster and a pervert like she says I am? Am I so emotionally stunted to the point that she has to reproach me for never concerning myself with my family or what goes on in the house? I know that all of this isn’t true, but thanks to her endless accusations I’ve wound up believing her, or at least have started to doubt myself. Perhaps that’s what she was aiming for — to get me to doubt myself, to doubt my abilities, my actions, thus putting me in a corner from which I would be unable to escape, where I would be at her mercy, become her victim, so she would be free to do whatever she wanted, just like she’d been kept in purdah by an ayatollah!” Ayatollah, that was what she always called him. Did she even know what that word meant? It was an insult as far as he was concerned.
Defeat begins the moment that your enemy gets you to doubt yourself to the point that you start feeling guilty and you’re ready to submit to her will and bend to her demands.
One of his friends had confessed to him that his wife used to scratch him during their arguments. “We’re constantly at war,” he’d told the painter, “and sooner or later I’ll lay down my arms. Look, all our childhood friends have abdicated to their wives, they’ve been brought to heel and now they can enjoy peaceful lives. But I’m not at that point just yet. I’ll keep fighting until she sends me to my grave!”
A writer friend of his seemed to live an exceptionally peaceful life. Not only did his wife not vex him, but she actually supported him, fawned on him, and took it upon herself so that nothing or nobody ever bothered him. The painter had asked him for his secret. After a deep sigh, the writer had told him: “I don’t have secrets to share, I simply gave up. She controls everything. I don’t even know my bank account number. I never travel without her and I never see anyone outside our close circle of friends. She’s got access to my phone, my e-mails, and my post … she answers them for me. Journalists are afraid of her and so I’ve rid myself of all the bother of having to deal with them. I don’t even remember the last time I saw a naked woman. So from time to time I watch some pornos while she sleeps. I leave our bedroom on the tips of my toes to feast my eyes and occasionally jack off. There’s my secret. If you want peace, now you know the price you have to pay for it!”
Give up? One may as well disappear! What good would it do to become so small that people wouldn’t even notice you anymore? Was married life impossible unless one of the two transformed into a shadow? The painter reread a book that his friend had written. Dedicated to his wife, the novel told the story of an official who worked at the Ministry of the Interior in a country ruled by a dictator who spent his days torturing political activists but became a perfect husband and father the minute he returned home each night. He would drop off his kids at school in the morning, kiss them, button up their shirt collars so they wouldn’t catch a cold, and fifteen minutes later he would be taking off his jacket and rolling up his sleeves so he could start torturing his detainees in the basement of his office building. He had a clear conscience.
The allusions to the writer’s personal life were unmistakable. The painter hadn’t mentioned any of this to the writer. But as far as the painter was concerned, living like this would be unthinkable.
XV. Casablanca, August 28, 2000
If a recipe for conjugal happiness did exist, then all human beings would instantly stop getting married.
Tired of mulling over his dark thoughts on what was a hot midsummer afternoon, the painter closed his eyes and decided to reminisce about the women he’d known in his life. As though in a dream, the vision at first blended in with the horizon, then took on the colors of the sunset.
They suddenly flashed past his eyes simultaneously. He could see them without being seen himself. Some were dressed in black, others in white, but all were in mourning. But he wasn’t dead yet. Could they have misinterpreted that mysterious invitation for a ceremony of goodbyes?