I felt annoyed with myself. I’d known this was a sensitive, even painful subject, and yet I’d clumsily blundered into it at the end of the meal. I should have been more tactful. She had already opened up so much, and she’d let me into her family. I made it clear that she would be the one to decide when and how much she wanted to tell me. I felt certain that the best way to get people to talk was not to pressure them too much. I had the same attitude towards writing, in fact: if I couldn’t find the right words, I wouldn’t keep racking my brains – I’d just wait for the words to come to me.

We left the restaurant like two friends who have lunch together occasionally. The conversation had flowed easily, and I’d have been happy if she’d wanted to keep talking. But Valérie was already late for her next class. I held out my hand, but she kissed me on the cheek and said: ‘See you at home tonight!’ She walked away quickly, looking cheerful, but after a few steps she turned around. ‘There’s something I have to tell you … I don’t think I love my husband any more. I’m going to leave him. It’s important you know that … for your book.’ Then she walked away again as if what she’d said had been nothing of consequence; just a semicolon in a novel.

20

I was stunned. Why had she announced that so suddenly? Without even giving me the chance to respond. Then I thought maybe she’d acted that way to make my story more intriguing. She’d actually said: ‘It’s important you know that for your book.’ So she’d told me a secret to help me with my project. I had sensed several times during lunch that she feared her life wasn’t wild enough, and I’d had to reassure her on that point. Had she made that declaration to prove she wasn’t boring? Did she really believe what she’d said? The couple I’d had dinner with had seemed tired, unenthusiastic about their daily life. But all the same it struck me as odd that she would reveal something so intimate. Despite the pact we’d made, I was still a stranger. I started to think that it was perhaps my presence that was pushing her to put words to what she was feeling. By getting her to talk about herself, I had driven her to a new lucidity. I hadn’t foreseen that aspect of the situation, but now I could see it clearly: my intrusion into the Martin family was going to wreak havoc.

21

Valérie would tell me certain details a little later. Her husband no longer touched her. Her sensual life was dead. Yes, that was what she said: my sensual life is dead. There was so much violence in those words. You can die from not being looked at.

Yet Valérie felt sure she was still attractive. Pierre, one of her colleagues, had been flirting with her more and more openly. He would compliment her on the way she looked or suggest they go for a drink after work. She was not insensible to male attention, but deep down she couldn’t help finding the whole thing slightly pathetic. She didn’t want to have sex in a Villejuif hotel after classes with a man who didn’t really turn her on and who had no intention of leaving his wife for her. She found adultery repellent. She wanted to be touched, but not at any price. Her life might be loveless, but it wasn’t worthless.