Happy Are the Happy by Yasmina Reza Page A

he knows how to make it up with me, Odile said, swallowing the lemon slice. I didn’t like that she’d chosen the same meaningless adjective for both of them, and I didn’t like that she’d said the name Robert, that Robert had barged into our conversation. That she could offer such a banal glimpse into their life together, about which I could not have cared less, irritated me. It’s foolish to think that sentiment brings us closer. It does the opposite, it sanctifies the distances between people. In the excitement of the day, in the rain, on the platform with a microphone in her hand, in the car, in the room with the curtains drawn, Odile felt near, her face in reach of my hand, of my kisses. But in that gloomy, virtually empty restaurant where I’d begun, against my will, to scrutinize her smallest gesture and the tone of her every word with feverish attention, she’d ducked away from me, she’d vanished into a world I had no part in. I said, if I had to live here, at the end of two days I’d blow my brains out. Odile laughed (I foundher laugh caustic and conventional). —You claimed the opposite ten minutes ago. You were enthusiastic about Douai. —I’ve changed my mind. I’d blow my brains out. She shrugged and dunked a bit of bread in the remains of her soup. I had the feeling she was on the verge of boredom. I was on the verge of boredom myself, permeated with the sullenness of lovers when nothing’s going on outside the bed. I couldn’t think of anything to say. I heard the rain return and start pattering against the window. Odile put on a look of consternation and said, we didn’t take the umbrella. I thought about the asbestos demolition worker who showed his thoroughly stained teeth when he laughed, about the chubby organizer in the pleated skirt that made her look even fatter, and God knows why, about my father, an auto body mechanic whose shop was on the Avenue de la Porte de Pantin, on the edge of Paris, and who used to complain bitterly about whoever had installed the leaky skylight. I was tempted to tell Odile that story, but the temptation lasted half a second. I scrolled through the list of contacts on my cell phone and came upon Yorgos Katos. I thought, there you go, my boy, you can sally forth and lose your shirt at poker. I texted Yorgos: “Need an easy mark at the table tomorrow night?” Odile asked, who are you writing to? —Yorgos Katos. Haven’t I ever spoken to you about Yorgos? —Never. —He’s a friend who makes his living gambling. One day, years ago, he was playing with Omar Sharif in a bridge tournament. He could feel a crowd of girls gathered at his back. He told himself, they know I play much better than he does. It never occurred to him for a second that they wanted to see Omar Sharif’s face. Odile said she was in love with the desertprince in
Lawrence of Arabia
. As far as she was concerned, Omar Sharif wore a keffiyeh and rode a black charger, he didn’t sit huddled at a bridge table. I realized she was absolutely right. I felt lighthearted again. Everything returned to normal.

Chantal Audouin
    A man’s a man. There are no married men, no men who are off limits. None of that exists (as I explained to Doctor Lorrain the day I was committed). When you meet someone, you’re not interested in his marital status. Or his sentimental condition. Sentiments are mutable and mortal. Like every earthly thing. Animals die. So do plants. Watercourses aren’t the same from one year to the next. Nothing lasts. People want to believe the opposite. They spend their lives gluing pieces back together, and they call that marriage or fidelity or whatever. As for me, I don’t burden myself with such idiocy anymore. I try my luck with whomever I like. I’m not afraid of coming up short. And in any case, I’ve got nothing to lose. I won’t be beautiful forever. My mirror’s already growing less and less friendly. One day Jacques Ecoupaud’s wife – Jacques Ecoupaud, the minister,