He tries to kiss her, presses himself against her, presses her against the wall, she usually likes that, when he’s stronger than her. She used to say it was reassuring, his arms, his will. Then she stopped saying anything, but he feels she loves him, that often it even makes her weak at the knees. She tries to disengage herself, but he’s insistent and forces a knee between her thighs.

“Shit, let go of me!”

“But you’re my wife, aren’t you? Fuck! I’m still entitled to fuck my wife!”

She tries to push him away with her slender arms but without result, so she wrinkles her nose with almost actedout disgust, overdoing it. He’s still hard and large, and won’t let her go. As she struggles to break free, she rubs herself against his knee, despite herself. That excites him, so she slaps him. His breath is heavy with alcohol, his panting grows quicker. He lifts Séverine’s skirt and pulls down her pants; she slaps him again. Manuel’s large head barely stirs under her blows. Séverine stifles a cry by biting his bull neck violently. He takes the bite for an encouragement, an admission. She feels the grainy wall against her back. Manuel pushes into her so hard that she lets him come in, opening wider so as to avoid the pain, her thighs lifted, her shins resting on his back.

Sometimes, she imagines someone else, someone who doesn’t exist and who would want her for the first time. He has no face or definite shape. Not an athlete or an actor but perhaps a blend of the two, with something new and inexpressible she yearns for without knowing it. A man who can dance, perhaps. Her purple pants, hanging from one of her ankles, are swaying in time with Manuel’s buttocks, and this makes her want to cry. She manages to put one foot on the floor, like a thread reconnecting her to the world. Apart from that, her back is knocking against the wall, but it’s not too painful – movements that set a rhythm and tilt her body under his desire. She can smell the discharge of familiar sweat, and the urgency of a helplessness she cannot give a name to makes her close her eyes. Séverine keeps replaying the words she fed Charlotte: she loves her life, she wouldn’t change any of it for the world, and with Manuel things are as hot as in the beginning.

The Wretched of the Earth

The Wretched of the Earth