We talk for almost two hours. He insists I need nothing more than to let myself be carried away—and that even my greatest fears are unfounded. I explain my desire for revenge. He listens without commenting or judging a single word. The longer we speak, the better I begin to feel.
He suggests we leave and walk through the park. At one of its gates are huge plastic chess pieces and several black and white squares painted on the ground. Some people are playing, despite the cold weather.
He hardly says anything more; I keep on talking nonstop, sometimes thankful and sometimes cursing the life I lead. We stop in front of one of the giant chessboards. He seems more attentive to the game than to my words. I stop whining and also start following the game, though it doesn’t interest me one bit.
“Go all the way,” he says.
Go all the way? Cheat on my husband, put the cocaine in my rival’s purse, and call the police?
He laughs.
“Do you see these players? They always have to make the next move. They can’t stop in the middle, because that means accepting defeat. There comes a time when defeat is inevitable, but at least they fought until the end. We already have everything we need. There is nothing to improve. Thinking we are good or bad, fair or unfair, all that is nonsense. We know that today Geneva is covered by a cloud that might take months to go away, but sooner or later, it will leave. So go ahead and let yourself go.”
Not one word to stop me from doing something I shouldn’t?
“No. By doing what you shouldn’t, you will realize it yourself. As I said in the restaurant, the light in your soul is greater than the darkness. But for this you must go all the way to the end of the game.”
In my whole life, I don’t think that I’ve ever heard such a preposterous piece of advice. I thank him for his time, ask if I owe him anything. He says no.
Back at the newspaper, the editor asks what took me so long. I explain that because it’s a rather unorthodox topic, it took me a long time to get what I needed.
“And since it’s not all that orthodox, might we be encouraging any unlawful activity?”
Are we encouraging unlawful activity when we bombard young people with incentives for excessive consumption? Are we encouraging accidents when we advertise that new cars can reach speeds of up to 250 kilometers per hour? Are we encouraging depression and suicidal tendencies when we publish articles on successful people without explaining how they got there and make everyone else convince themselves they’re worthless?
The editor-in-chief doesn’t want to discuss this. It could be interesting for the newspaper, whose headline piece of the day was “Chain of Happiness Raises 8 Million Francs for Asian Country.” I write a six-hundred-word article—the most space they would give me—and it’s all taken from Internet searches. I wasn’t able to use anything from my conversation with the shaman that had turned into a treatment session.
JACOB! He’s just risen from the dead and sends me a message inviting me for coffee—as if there weren’t so many other interesting things to do in life. Where is the sophisticated wine taster? Where is the man who now holds power, the greatest aphrodisiac in the world?
But most of all, where is the teenage boyfriend I met back when anything was possible?
He married, changed, and sends a message inviting me for coffee. Couldn’t he be more creative and suggest a nudist run in Chamonix? Maybe then I’d be more interested.
I have no intention of answering. I was given the cold shoulder and humiliated by his silence for weeks on end. Does he think I’ll come running just because he gave me the honor of an invitation?
After I go to bed, I listen with headphones to one of the tapes I recorded of the Cuban shaman. When I was still pretending that I was just a journalist—and not a woman frightened by herself—I had asked if self-hypnosis (or his preferred term, “meditation”) could make someone forget about another person. I broached the subject in a way that would allow him to understand “love” as “trauma by verbal attack,” which was exactly what we were talking about at that moment.
“That is a somewhat murky area,” he replied. “Yes, we can induce relative amnesia, but since this person is associated with other facts and events, it would be practically impossible to eliminate someone completely. What’s more, forgetting is the wrong approach. You should face things head-on.”
I listen to the whole tape, and then try to distract myself, making pledges and jotting down a few more things in my calendar, but nothing works. Before I go to sleep, I send a message to Jacob accepting his invitation.
I can’t control myself, that’s my problem.
I WON’T tell you I missed you because you won’t believe me. I won’t tell you I didn’t reply to your messages because I’m afraid of falling in love again.”
I really don’t believe any of that. But I let him continue to try to explain the unexplainable. Here we are in a regular café, nothing special, in Collonges-sous-Salève, a village on our border with France that’s located fifteen minutes from my work. The small handful of other patrons are truck drivers and workers from a nearby quarry.
I’m the only woman, except for the one working the bar, who walks from one end of it to the other, overly made-up and engaging the customers in witty banter.
“It’s been a living hell since you showed up in my life. Ever since that day in my office when you came to interview me and we exchanged intimacies.”
“Exchanged intimacies” is a figure of speech. I gave him oral sex. He did nothing to me.
“I can’t say I’m unhappy, but I’m increasingly lonely, though no one knows. Even when I’m among friends, and the atmosphere and drinks are great, the conversation is lively and I’m smiling, all of a sudden, for no reason, I can’t pay attention to the conversation. I say I have an important commitment and I leave. I know what I’m missing: you.”
It’s time to get my revenge: You don’t think you might need some marriage counseling?
“I do. But I would have to go with Marianne, and I can’t convince her. For her, philosophy explains everything. She’s noticed I’m different, but attributes it to the elections.”
The shaman was right when he said we must take things all the way. At this moment, Jacob has just saved his wife from a serious drug-trafficking charge.
“I’ve taken on too many responsibilities and I’m not yet accustomed to it. According to her, I’ll be used to everything soon. What about you?”
What about me? What exactly do you want to know?
All my efforts to resist fell apart the moment I saw him sitting alone at a table in the corner with a Campari and soda in front of him, and he smiled as soon as he saw me enter. We’re like teenagers again, only this time we can drink alcohol without breaking any laws. I hold his icy hands—icy from cold or fear, I don’t know.
I’m fine, I say. I suggest that next time we meet earlier—daylight savings time is over and it’s getting dark fast.
He agrees and gives me a discreet kiss on the lips, anxious not to draw attention from the men around us.
“For me, one of the worst things are the beautiful sunny days this autumn. I open the curtains in my office and see people out there, some walking and holding hands without having to worry about the consequences. And I can’t show my love.”
Love? Did that Cuban shaman feel sorry for me and ask for some help from mysterious spirits?
I expected almost anything from this meeting, except a man opening his soul to me like he is doing now. My heart beats stronger and stronger—from joy, surprise. I won’t ask why this is happening.