and adolescence in Maisons-Lafitte, a bourgeois suburb par excellence, I moved to Paris and never left. I had never really visited this country of which I was, somewhat theoretically, a citizen. It was something I’d always meant to do, hence the VW Touareg, which I bought around the same time I bought those hiking boots. It was a powerful car. With its turbo-diesel V-8 and 4.2-litre common rail direct fuel injection, it could go 240 kilometres per hour. Although it was designed for motorway driving, it also had real off-road capabilities. When I bought it, I must have been imagining weekend expeditions, long drives down country roads, but nothing like that ever happened. I was content to spend my Sundays browsing the rare-book market in Parc Georges Brassens. And sometimes, I’m happy to say, I had spent my Sundays fucking – Myriam, mainly. My life would have been truly tedious and dreary if I hadn’t, every now and then, fucked Myriam. I pulled over at a service station called Mille Étangs – Thousand Ponds – just after the exit to Châteauroux. I bought a chocolate-chocolate-chip cookie and a large coffee at La Croissanterie, then I got back in the car to have my breakfast and think about the past, or nothing at all. The car park dominated the surrounding countryside, which was deserted except for a couple of cows – Charolais, probably. The sun was up now, but blankets of fog still drifted over the lower meadows. The landscape was rolling and quite beautiful, though there weren’t any ponds – or brooks, for that matter. To think about the future seemed unwise.
I turned on the car radio. The elections were off to a normal start; François Hollande had already voted in his ‘fiefdom’ of Corrèze. Turnout, as far as anyone could tell this early in the day, was high, higher than in the last two presidential run-offs. Some pundits argued that a high turnout favoured the ‘ruling party’ against the challengers. Others, just as well regarded, thought the opposite. For the moment, in other words, nobody had any idea what the high turnout meant, and it was a little early for listening to the radio. I turned it off and pulled out of the car park.
Not long afterwards, I saw I was low on petrol – almost down to a quarter tank. I ought to have filled up at the service station. I also noticed that the road was strangely empty. Motorways are never crowded on Sunday morning. That’s the moment when society takes a deep breath and decongests, when its members give themselves the brief illusion of an individual existence. Even so, I’d driven a hundred kilometres without passing another car. The only vehicle I’d passed was a Bulgarian tractor-trailer weaving in and out of the emergency lane, drunk with fatigue. All was calm, I drove past striped, fluttering windsocks. The sun shone on the meadows and woods like a trusted employee. I turned the radio back on, but now it wasn’t working: all my preprogrammed stations, from France Info to Europe 1, including Radio Monte-Carlo and RTL, were full of static. Something was happening in France, I knew it, and here I was, still driving along the hexagonal motorway system at two hundred kilometres per hour – and maybe that was the solution. Everything in the country seemed to be broken, for all I knew the traffic radar was down, too. At the speed I was going, I’d reach the border at Jonquet by four. Things would be different in Spain, civil war slightly less imminent. It was worth a try. Except I was out of petrol; yes, petrol was at the top of the agenda. I kept my eye out for the next service station.
Which turned out to be the service station at Pech-Montat. It had nothing special to recommend it on the information panel, no restaurant, no local crafts. This was a Jansenist station: its devotion to petrol was pure. At first I was tempted to hold out for the Jardin des Causses du Lot, fifty kilometres south, but then I pulled myself together. I could always make
I turned on the car radio. The elections were off to a normal start; François Hollande had already voted in his ‘fiefdom’ of Corrèze. Turnout, as far as anyone could tell this early in the day, was high, higher than in the last two presidential run-offs. Some pundits argued that a high turnout favoured the ‘ruling party’ against the challengers. Others, just as well regarded, thought the opposite. For the moment, in other words, nobody had any idea what the high turnout meant, and it was a little early for listening to the radio. I turned it off and pulled out of the car park.
Not long afterwards, I saw I was low on petrol – almost down to a quarter tank. I ought to have filled up at the service station. I also noticed that the road was strangely empty. Motorways are never crowded on Sunday morning. That’s the moment when society takes a deep breath and decongests, when its members give themselves the brief illusion of an individual existence. Even so, I’d driven a hundred kilometres without passing another car. The only vehicle I’d passed was a Bulgarian tractor-trailer weaving in and out of the emergency lane, drunk with fatigue. All was calm, I drove past striped, fluttering windsocks. The sun shone on the meadows and woods like a trusted employee. I turned the radio back on, but now it wasn’t working: all my preprogrammed stations, from France Info to Europe 1, including Radio Monte-Carlo and RTL, were full of static. Something was happening in France, I knew it, and here I was, still driving along the hexagonal motorway system at two hundred kilometres per hour – and maybe that was the solution. Everything in the country seemed to be broken, for all I knew the traffic radar was down, too. At the speed I was going, I’d reach the border at Jonquet by four. Things would be different in Spain, civil war slightly less imminent. It was worth a try. Except I was out of petrol; yes, petrol was at the top of the agenda. I kept my eye out for the next service station.
Which turned out to be the service station at Pech-Montat. It had nothing special to recommend it on the information panel, no restaurant, no local crafts. This was a Jansenist station: its devotion to petrol was pure. At first I was tempted to hold out for the Jardin des Causses du Lot, fifty kilometres south, but then I pulled myself together. I could always make
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