An Excerpt from Captive [Anabiose], Translated by David Scott Hamilton

The following excerpt has been taken from Captive (House of Anansi, 2015), David Scott Hamilton's English translation of Claudine Dumont's novel Anabiose (Les Éditions XYZ, 2013).

Another day. I think. How long before someone notices my absence? I see my parents twice a year. And I saw them last month. They’ll start worrying in six months. No one will notice anything at work. A missing customer service representative isn’t exactly noticeable when the company employs more than four thousand. And people don’t stay long. Except for me. In the five years that I’ve worked there, the cubicle to my right has seen roughly 30 employees come and go. The one to my left, twice that number. It’s a job that eventually softens your brain. No one bothers to give two weeks’ notice. They just stop coming. That’s all. And Human Resources replaces them. There’s undoubtedly someone already doing my job, taking calls from unsatisfied customers. And there’s no end to that dissatisfaction. I have some friends I rarely see that I haven’t seen at all for some time. Ex-boyfriends I no longer talk to. There’s not even a putrefying cat in my apartment to alert the neighbours. I’m the girl who can disappear without a ripple. As if I didn’t really belong to society. A nonparticipating member of humanity. Insignificant, whether present or absent. Not exactly a revelation.

I’m banging on the door. With my fist. For how long? My fist hurts. I start banging again. I don’t think I even inhabit this body that’s banging a fist against a steel door. Stubborn. This is stupid. They don’t answer.

I open my eyes. I have no idea how I even manage to sleep. I’m not tired. I don’t do anything. I try not to think about what’s going to happen next. That’s all I do. Relentlessly. Try not to think that nothing will ever happen. That everything will stay the same. An unending string of empty moments. An eternity. I drink, I piss, I walk around in circles, I don’t think, I sleep. There’s no reason for me to wake up. There’s no reason for me to sleep. I’m not sure if I’ve gotten used to fear, or if fear is no longer necessary, but I’m less afraid. I open my eyes, grey concrete. Always grey concrete. I’m not afraid of grey concrete. And the pitchers of water are always full. There has to be something in the lemon-scented pitcher, because I’m not hungry at all. I dream about eating. About putting something solid in my mouth. Chewing. Tasting. Smelling. Cinnamon buns. Some bread and cheese. French fries with way too much salt. A greasy hamburger. Anything. When I think about it, my mouth fills with saliva. I salivate like a dog. I miss eating. But I’m not starving. I feel like drinking alcohol, but not really. There’s nothing here to avoid. I don’t need to fog up my mind. It’s more like desire out of habit. Comfort. But not really.

“I’m the girl who can disappear without a ripple.”

I don’t get up anymore. I lie on the mattress. I open my eyes. I close my eyes. I don’t dream anymore. I’m not sure if I sleep. I drift. Conscious, unconscious. But it’s always grey. And time doesn’t pass. Nothing changes. A hell in which nothing happens and nothing moves. As if I were already dead. Something has to change. I need something to mark the passage of time. So I don’t go crazy. I close my eyes. I have a dream. I dream that I can see myself sleeping on the mattress. The grey mattress. On the grey cement. And my body turns grey. The floor, the mattress, me: a mass of grey. Motionless. Petrified. I wake up. I don’t want to disappear. I don’t want to die. I can move. I must move. I will move. Do some exercise. Like those guys in prison who bulk up because they have nothing else to do. Am I in prison? I’m going to exercise. I have nothing to lift, but I still have my body. My body is all I have. I get up. I take a drink. I take off my skirt and start stretching. Then some sit-ups. Not too many. I’m quickly exhausted. I do some squats. My thighs are burning. I keep going. I try some push-ups. I do two. I can’t do more. Then I start running. In a circle. Barefoot. Like a rat in a cage. I’m not in prison. I’m in a cage. I run. I stop to have a drink. I feel a little better. I’m hot, there’s sweat on my face, the underarms of my shirt are soaking wet. I can smell sweat. Just sweat. Not death. A reassuring smell. It smells like life.

I open my eyes. I have something to do. I get up. I drink some water. I ache all over. I didn’t know that pain could make me feel good. I drink the lemonscented water. A different taste. I don’t stop. I stretch. I push through the pain. It feels good. I do the same thing I did yesterday. I run in a circle.

It’s morning, or perhaps it’s not, but it’s my morning. My hair is damp. My clothes smell of disinfectant. They’re washing my clothes. They wash me. I realize that I haven’t passed any stool since I’ve been here. Enemas? They’re cleaning my insides as well? How do they do that without waking me up? The water. They must be putting something in the lemon water. I can feel a kind of rebellion forming inside me. They’re cleaning out my insides. They’re drugging me. they. A knot in my stomach. Then nothing. What can I do? I’m not going to stop drinking. My exercises. My skirt is too big. I don’t have to unzip the zipper to take it off. I’m not sure why I continue to wear it. It’s not cold in here. It’s must be something else. Rats don’t wear skirts. But they run when they’re cooped up. They run around in circles. I’m not a rat. I place my skirt on the mattress. I run. In circles.

I don’t hurt when I get up anymore. No more nausea, no more headache. No more ache in my muscles. No more pain. Not even fear. I can do 50 push-ups. But no more than that. I prefer to run. I can run for what seems like hours. There is something in the lemon water. Which allows me to do all that. Without eating. I’m sure of it. The taste is different. I know when they’re going to wash me, too. The taste of the sleeping pill through the lemon has become evident. I can choose not to drink. I don’t. I run. While I’m running, I don’t think of anything.

“I can smell sweat. Just sweat. Not death. A reassuring smell. It smells like life.”

My thighs have changed. My body has changed. I know it. It marks the passage of time. I know it, but I don’t see it. I can’t see myself. I haven’t seen myself since. Since. I pat myself to ensure I’m still here. But I can’t see myself reflected in the grey concrete. The globe on the ceiling is too high to return my reflection. The pitchers are made of plastic. A material that reflects nothing. And there is no one to tell me. No one. I’m used to the absence of others. I always sought isolation. Before. I built it around me. They weighed too heavily on me. Others. They caused me pain. With their looks, their questions. Their expectations. Their disappointments. I’d had enough. I didn’t want to see myself in their eyes anymore. Their image of me. The image of who I no longer was. I couldn’t tell them. Too difficult. Too complicated. I lacked the words. And if I found the words, no one wanted to hear them. Not really. They kept clashing with the old version of me. I would say, “I don’t want to be here.” Someone would say, “Come on, you love this, of course you want to be here.” I didn’t love it. Not for a very long time. But no one listened. No one listens to change. I couldn’t act any other way. And I no longer knew who I was. I no longer knew what to say. I decided not to say anything anymore. I avoided people. No one really noticed. Same thing at work. My job. I wouldn’t dare do anything else. Working in an isolated cubicle, with only the voices of the dissatisfied, no one looking at me. Just floating voices that protest, demand, scream. Which don’t touch me.

“There’s this thought. Always my first thought. I think about tomorrow, which will be the same. As today. No change. Ever.”

I say nothing. I can do that. I do it well. And then I go home, my mind at rest. Home, I miss my home. A home for me. No cat. No one. Just tequila. To forget. And kill time. While I wait. I was waiting for things to change. I think I was. Without doing anything to bring about the change. Things. People. Now, things have changed. There aren’t any things. There aren’t any people. Nothing to avoid. Just me. And me. With me. And I forget. It’s more effective than tequila. I forget who I was. Why I avoided things. I can’t remember. A girl. Who drank. Too much. Who worked. Like an automaton. Who lived. Barely. Like an automaton. Who avoided. Who was afraid. That fear was nothing. It was the fear of my own shadow. Brought on by pride. By shame. Humiliation. Failure. It doesn’t really exist. It’s all in your head. In my head. In the heads of others. Unreal. It doesn’t exist anymore. Not here. Here, there’s nothing. Do I really exist when there’s nothing? I exist. I live. I move. I’m not waiting anymore. There’s nothing to wait for. Freed from expectation. Nothingness. The void. But there is still a desire for life. A desire not to die. A desire not to go crazy. To keep control of my mind. Of my thoughts. To want. Is that enough? I am not going to concede.

I open my eyes. There’s this thought. Always my first thought. I think about tomorrow, which will be the same. As today. No change. Ever. A stream of unbearable days. Identical. I refuse this thought. I can’t think like this. It paralyzes me. I push the thought far back in my mind, behind a grey concrete wall. I get up. I concentrate on the next minute. The next second. I take a drink. I take off my skirt. I pitch it at the mattress. It misses. It hits the wall. I leave it. I run. I’m exhausted. I run all the same. When my lungs start to burn, I stop thinking. I don’t stop running. When I can’t go any further, I run a little more, and then I stop. A vague feeling of accomplishment. At least it’s something. As I bend down to pick up my skirt, I notice a mark on the wall, probably from the metal tab of the zipper. I take the tab between my fingers, the skirt hanging below my hand, and start scratching the wall. The concrete crumbles a little. Not much. But a little. A mark. I can make a mark. I sit down on the mattress. A world of possibilities. A mark. My hands are shaking. I kneel down in front of the wall. I hold the metal tab between my fingers. I make a line. A curve. My heart starts beating faster. I draw another line. It doesn’t mean anything, but it’s something to do. I start laughing. The sound of my own laughter scares me. I stop.

David Scott Hamilton is a literary translator. Exit, his translation of Nelly Arcan’s final novel, Paradis, clef en main, was shortlisted for the Governor General’s Literary Award for Translation and named a Globe and Mail Top 100 Book. He lives in Montreal.