straightaway, so she could come give him head, him the leader of the Syrian forces, his revolver at his minister’s temple: ogres want everything, take everything, eat everything, power, money, weapons, and females, in that order, and these stories of monsters reminded me of my own ogres, Serbian, Croatian, who could unleash all their rage and quench all their thirst for mythic humanity, violence and desire, these stories were the delights of the man in the street, the children, the meek, happy to see the powerful get humiliated in turn in front of someone more powerful, lose their honor their wives as the poor had lost their houses their children or their legs in a bombardment, which after all seemed less serious than dishonor and humiliation, the defeat of the powerful is tremendous, beautiful and loud, a hero always makes noise when he collapses, a hundred kilos of muscle strike the ground in one huge dull thud, the public is on its feet to see Hector tied to the chariot, see his head wobble and his blood spurt, the ogre conquered by an even bigger ogre: Ghassan couldn’t help but be fascinated by these heroes, the Jumblatts, Kanaans, or Geageas, admire their feats of arms and their escapades that he recounted like good jokes, slapping his thighs, smiling from ear to ear, over a spritz or a Campari and soda on one of those Venetian squares that themselves seemed the opposite of all violence, on the other side of the world, a piece of history floating on the motionless lagoon, one of the centers of the political and economic Mediterranean cut off from reality and eaten away by tourists as well as by vermin and moss, slowly but surely, the army of underlings has taken the city, they stroll among the dead palaces, invade the sumptuous churches, happy to contemplate the corpse of the giant up close, the empty shell of the dried-out snail—with Ghassan we were absolutely insensitive to all the beauties of Venice, he the emigrant, the worker, I the depressive who in La Serenissima probably appreciated only the silence of the deserted streets invaded by night and fog, disoriented, incapable of making a step towards firm land, Marianne had to leave me one fine morning on the Ponte delle Guglie for me to wake up, we were coming back drunk from a night of endless talk, Ghassan and I, it must be six or seven in the morning, I almost haven’t seen Marianne at all the two or three preceding days, she in light and I in darkness and there she was on the bridge, in the grey dawn, pajamas on under her coat, her hair loose, pale, rings under her eyes, and when I go up to her worried she lands me a furious kick right in the balls which doubles me over cuts off my breath and she disappears, she leaves right in front of the dumbfounded eyes of Ghassan who doesn’t even dare laugh for a few minutes, astonished as I clutch my abdomen my head against the parapet not understanding what’s just happened not realizing that my aching testicles are sounding the alarm, that this unexpected shot from Marianne is propelling me out of Venice, I’ll never see her again, she took the first train, she left, and I did too, shaken all of a sudden by her despair the pain makes me come to my senses, at daybreak, Ghassan stunned watches Marianne walk away without believing it, what was she doing outside at that hour half dressed I guess she was looking for me, she was looking for me to tell me she was leaving, it was over, she couldn’t say anything she aimed her shoe at my privates I hurt all the way up to my ears, my eyes full of tears, I took note: I took note, I woke up, shaken, pulled out of waiting and drunkenness, I packed my bags in the shadow of Marianne’s vanished perfume, Achilles the proud warrior gathers his spoils, his shining greaves, and his bronze weapons into hollow vessels, I said goodbye to Ghassan knowing full well I probably would never see him again and three days later, more than six months after my arrival, I took a train almost
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