On several occasions during their affair, Madeleine had a strange feeling. She thought Yves was using his creative struggles as an alibi to avoid her.

Yves was sweet and attentive, but he never wanted to go on holiday, hated the idea of family meals, and believed that if they moved in together, it would mark the end of their honeymoon period. Madly in love, Madeleine accepted his artistic temperament, his odd wishes, as long as she felt her love was returned. And it was; there could be no doubt about that. Yves loved Madeleine, to the point that he was surprised, knocked off balance, even vexed by the strength of his feelings.

Two years went by that way, and maybe the third year too. Madeleine began to hope, with increasing intensity, that they would settle down together. She didn’t dare admit to him that she would sometimes find herself thinking of names for their future children. Yves had always dodged such serious conversations, but one day he announced that he wasn’t against the idea of marriage. It wasn’t the most romantic declaration, admittedly, but – knowing her boyfriend well – Madeleine felt exultant. As he held her in his arms, he almost managed to imagine a different future. He always talked about his need for solitude, but was he sure he really had the right kind of mind to be an artist? His screenplay ideas never seemed to go anywhere, and his collaborations with others had produced nothing of note. Perhaps, for him, success was to be found in marital bliss. Of course, there was another factor that shouldn’t be forgotten: he wanted to make Madeleine happy. His heart pounded at the sound of hers.

But things became complicated. As their wedding day grew closer, Yves began to think more and more often: ‘I can’t, I can’t.’ Finally he spoke those words aloud to Madeleine. She tried to reason with him, to persuade him, to understand him. In vain. His attitude made no sense to her. It was obvious that Yves wasn’t a womaniser; he wasn’t playing with her feelings. It hurt him to hurt her. And it hurt her to hurt him too. They were caught in a vicious circle of romantic suffering.

Without any real explanation, other than a vague feeling of unease and a desperate need to flee, he decided to leave for the United States. Without her. As she recounted the story’s terrible denouement, the zenith of her despair, Madeleine started to hiccup. Decades later, the story of her devastation still had the unaltered taste of tragedy. I imagined that poor young woman living in a daze, suddenly severed from her raison d’être. Like a madwoman, she would return every night to the jazz club where they had met; and now I understood why she couldn’t remember the name of the place – it had nothing to do with age or Alzheimer’s. Amnesia has the benefit of making us forget any happiness that later turns to misery.