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| Il Fait Chaud | |
| By robokent | ||||||||||||||
| 02 May 2006 | ||||||||||||||
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this is how it happened... ‘Il fait chaud,’ he said. My back had been turned to him from the moment we had stepped inside. Though I had thought it better to appear like I was ignoring him, in truth every ounce of my being was aware of the man behind me. When he began to speak to me, I was in the process of contorting my body in such a manner so I could feel my wallet in my right back pocket, just in case he had tried to lift it. Isabelle eyed me, surely wondering if I would bother to respond to the man. How could I not, though? He was obviously directing his comment towards us, and it was innocent enough. The shop was crammed with a late-night crowd. There had been a big soccer game – Paris St. Germain versus Marseille, I think. It looked like maybe half the little restaurant had been watching the match in a bar somewhere near here in Montparnasse, then after a couple hours of celebrating the PSG win, had descended upon the tiny creperie for a snack. The place was about the width of a metro car, and no more than a third the length. Isabelle and I were just inside the door, where a dark-skinned man sweated over two round grilling stations, feverishly preparing crepes for the hungry patrons. Isabelle and I, and the other man, were getting ours ‘à emporter’, ‘to go.’ I turned slightly towards him now while Isabelle ordered two chicken and cheese crepes. I responded, ‘Oui, mais c’est bon’. It was incredibly cold outside for late April, so it felt good to be inside, where it was warm. He nodded and smiled, saying he was by no means complaining that he was able to spend a few minutes inside. I couldn’t help but smell the alcohol burning off his breath. ‘Je dors juste là,’ he continued, indicating a spot on the sidewalk, a little alley between two buildings. I could see a sleeping bag, and a lump inside it, apparently another homeless person. I nodded and mumbled, ‘Ah.’ I wasn’t exactly sure what to do with this information. He had mentioned it in a casual manner, much as if he were telling me what part of the city he resided in, as if the sidewalk was just another apartment building. There was no shame in his voice. Somehow, either by my appearance or by my accent, he pegged me for a foreigner. He switched to English. It was broken English, but very understandable. As Isabelle looked on, he told me how he and his friend and their dogs liked the little corridor where they lived, because it provided a natural windbreak, and on cold nights like tonight, that was important. He told me how the police were constantly making them move, as they didn’t have the right to stay there. (As if homeless people could apply for permits, or something, to take up residence on a particular sidewalk, or maybe a nice park bench in the shade.) He mentioned something about 8:00 being wake-up time, because by 9:00 he had to be gone. I assume he was talking about the morning, not the evening. I tried to turn back around, to go back to minding my own business. In the same casual tone as earlier, he asked me if I had any change. He said if I didn’t have any, it wasn’t a big deal. I said, ‘Sure,’ and took out my change pouch. I picked out a 2 Euro coin, then put it back. I found a 50 cent piece, and a couple other coins of smaller denomination, probably a total of 90 cents. I handed them over to him, and he thanked me. I felt incredibly awkward now. Not knowing what else to say, I asked him where he was from. He said, ‘France’, and I asked, ‘Paris?’ ‘No, Bretagne, near Brest.’ I knew the town’s name because in the Tintin comic books, Capitaine Haddock is always using the expression, ‘Tonerre de Brest!’ I did not mention this to the man. All during our conversation, my body made a slow semi-rotation, so that by the finish I was facing him. He was young, probably early 20s. His face was white and pointy. The piercings only accentuated this latter fact. He had a stud in his chin, and one in his nose. But it was the ears that one noticed above all. His left earlobe had a nickel-sized hole in it, in which a silver ring had been laid, so that his ear resembled on of those indigenous tribesmen you see in National Geographic, or something. His right ear, punctured by a red stone midway up, had a gaping hole in it where I imagine a similar ring had once been. Now, the absence of the second ring created a wrinkly, amorphous hole in his right earlobe, as if long ago someone had shot a bullet straight through and it had never healed. He told me he had come to Paris to get some sort of tattoo work done on his arm. Though it was too cold outside to be in short sleeves at the moment, he assured me that his right arm was one big tattoo, and he was very proud of the fact that he had gotten the whole thing done at the apparently bargain price of 140 Euros. I wouldn’t know if that is a good rate or not. I don’t have any tattoos. He told me in the summer, he goes to pick fruit and works that way as much as he can. But now our crepes were ready. Isabelle paid, and we left. At the same time, a worker arrived from the back of the shop and passed a panini to the man. We all left together. I said, ‘Bonsoir,’ and he said the same.
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