Billie Read Online Free Page B

having to
ask
something of a teacher . . .
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    As he thought I was hesitating (no, actually, it was just, wow, the prospect of spending two weeks there), he added timidly:
    â€œShe’s a seamstress . . . Maybe she could make us costumes.”

 
    I went to this lady’s house every day and each time stayed a little longer than the day before. I even slept there one night because the film version of Guy de Maupassant’s
The Necklace
was playing on TV and Franck invited me to watch it with him.
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    As for the Morels, for once, they didn’t bother me too much. It’s awful to say, but in our world, you get respect if you spend the night with someone early on.
    I had a boyfriend, I was dating. At fifteen years old, I was finally screwing, so I wasn’t such a loser after all.
    Of course, I couldn’t help having such totally humiliating and dirty thoughts; first of all, I was used to it, second, as soon as they let me run off, I no longer gave a damn.
    My stepmother even paid for me to get new clothes for the occasion. A boyfriend, that was impressive, more so than good grades.
    If I had known, I said to myself while looking at my first pair of passably stylish jeans, if I had known, I would have invented tons of “pelicans” before this . . .
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    Without knowing it and in countless ways that were impossible to analyze at the moment, Franck’s simple existence—not even “in my life,” no, just his existence—changed the situation.
    Mine at least.
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    It was the only vacation of my childhood and the most beautiful one of my life.
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    Ah . . . what a pain in the ass . . .
    My little bolster.

 
    W hat really bothered me in the beginning was how calm it was. Since Franck’s grandmother left us alone and because he spoke so quietly, I felt as though there were a corpse in the next room. He wouldn’t stop asking, “How are you doing? How are you doing?”—because he saw quite clearly that I wasn’t doing well at all. I answered fine, fine, but really, I was super uncomfortable.
    And then I got used to it . . .
    Just like at school, I let my guard down and changed my attitude.
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    The first time I visited, we went into the dining room where it was so clean that no meal could ever have been served there. It smelled strange . . . like old people . . . sadness . . . We sat facing each other, and he suggested that we begin by re-reading our scene together once through before figuring out how we would rehearse.
    I was embarrassed. I didn’t understand a thing.
    I understood so little that I read the text like an idiot. As if I were deciphering Chinese.
    Finally he asked if I had even read the play or at least our section, and when I didn’t respond right away, he closed his book and looked at me without saying anything.
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    I felt my fangs coming out again. I didn’t want him to beat me over the head with that bullshit from the fourteenth century. I wanted to learn my required lines like gobbledygook from earlier times, you know, sounding it out but without regard for the meaning, but I didn’t want him to act like a teacher with me. I was fed up with people who put me in my place all the time by making me feel like a piece of shit. Already at school, I kept my trap shut to avoid any extra trouble, but not there, not in that room that reeked of Polident. He had to stop looking at me like that or I would leave. I could no longer stand anyone staring at me all the time. I just couldn’t.
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    â€œI love your first name . . . ”
    It made me happy even if I thought to myself: well, for sure, it’s a boy’s name . . . but right away he set me straight:
    â€œIt’s the name of a marvelous singer . . . Do you know Billie Holiday?”
    I shook my head.
    No, of course not . . . I didn’t know anything.
    He told me he would