When I wake up, my teeth feel furry. There’s a foul taste in my mouth – a nasty sort of animal taste. Still, it’s better than at night, when I have the aftertaste of other people and their filth. My body is a hindrance. It spreads out on my sheets like a poorly inflated old sack. I try not to touch this sick body too much, too many hands have pawed it. It needs to rest a little longer in my grubby sheets.
I smoke in bed. Sometimes the ash drops on to the sheets making little grey smudges which I don’t bother to rub away. I sleep with my ashes, like in a casket.
In the mornings, my nails ache. The tips of my fingers are cold, slightly numb. Apparently it’s the alcohol. Whatever.
My hair’s greasy and it sticks to the back of my neck.
I sit up a little. Feathers escape from my pillow when I move it, fluttering gently down on to the white-tiled floor. I lean back against the wall, scratch my head then light a cigarette. To wash it down, I drink a little water from the old plastic bottle lying at the foot of my bed, which I fill every night from the little sink on the landing.
I don’t have a proper bed. I sleep on a sofa bed. I don’t bother to fold it away any more.
Then, I have to go and pee. The toilet’s on the landing, and I have to put on my shoes because the floor’s wet. It’s not a proper toilet, just a hole in the ground with two little white ceramic footrests. People say that in Turkey, you always have to shit crouching down. You have to squat in a ridiculous position over those toilets, too. My pee makes a loud tinkling sound as it hits the water, and that makes me laugh. I pull the little chain hanging from the huge cistern. You have to watch out – sometimes the water splashes your ankles.
I go back to my room, dragging my feet on the hexagonal red tiles. The door’s open – I never close it when I go to the toilet. If someone came in, I’d hear them.
I splash my face at the sink on the landing and then wipe it with the hem of my nightie. It’s a bit torn, but I like to feel its roughness against my skin. There’s something sort of pure about it. The men don’t see it.
I never start the day without a coffee. At night, when I run out, I walk to the store on Place Clichy to buy some more. Coffee’s expensive there and I have to go up Rue d’Amsterdam. That’s how badly I need caffeine in the morning.
Before, I used to have it sitting at the bar at Jeannot’s. Always cheerful is Jeannot – always cracking jokes. He lost his wife in an accident. He smiles when he talks about her, remembering the good times, her little feminine ways. And there are the guys – small-time delinquents, lost souls, the old men from the neighbourhood. All on Pernod or white wine. But you can’t smoke at Jeannot’s any more, and I need a fag with my coffee, so I’ve stopped going there. I did tell Jeannot why, but he doesn’t believe me. He thinks I’m going to another joint, the competition he calls it. He says I’m too stuck-up for his place, that I’m being a princess. When I walk past, he acts like he doesn’t see me. It’s really sad, this business, these anti-smoking laws. Lulu, my neighbour, she still goes there. She’s the one who told me Jeannot thinks I’m being a princess.
I drink my coffee all alone in my room, smoking my fags. To cheer myself up, I tell myself I’m saving money.
I’ve got an Italian coffee pot, a metal cafetière. You put in the water, the coffee, and then you screw on the top part. When it boils, you have to take the cafetière off the cooker. I’ve got an electric hotplate. It’s covered in grease and stinks a bit when you turn it on, but it still works. Maybe one day I’ll buy a new one.
I drink my coffee and smoke a cigarette. No TV, no radio. I listen to the sound of the tobacco sizzling when I take a drag. It’s relaxing. I try not to think. I’ve moved the table next to my bed. I sit there, puffing away and drinking coffee.
I get up, take
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