The Restless Read online

  I was worried because in our part of Grande-Terre, the unions had already run into a lot of problems with bosses and gendarmes. I didn’t know all the details, but my father always said that in Guadeloupe every time the little guy asked for his rights, somebody got killed.

  I talked to Julien about it. I asked him if things had changed, and he answered that with people like that, you just never knew, and then he thought about it and added he didn’t think it could keep on like this forever. Maybe he was trying to reassure me: “If we don’t do something, nothing will ever get done, and everything will go on the same as before.”

  I was ready to believe him. Because with old Absalon—and we’d been trying to change things for the last ten years—I always felt that as soon as we managed to get something out of him, we took ten steps backwards.

  I really liked going to that meeting, even if I had a lot of trouble getting home and had to walk most of the way in the dark. All the same, it was nice to be alone, like that, at night, to have done something different with my evening, instead of hanging out in the shop on Mayoute listening to pointless discussions.

  I thought about everything that’d been said. I didn’t ever want to feel sorry for myself, but I realized we were all in the same boat—so little pay for what we did, not even enough to eat, when you thought about how hard the work was and how strong we had to be.

  I learned how many workers had been injured in bulldozer accidents. At Absalon’s work sites, we hadn’t had any problems with equipment, but I’ll never forget the driver who was killed on the road and the fact that Absalon had no insurance. I don’t know how it finally ended up. But that day all the work buddies went to the site of the accident and the boss was there crying like a baby, crying for that guy who died so stupidly, just because some bastard hadn’t stopped at the stop sign.

  Of course, he was also crying because he already had plenty of trouble, and that accident was only going to make things harder for him.

  I remembered I felt a little ashamed because I was worried they might take the work sites away from Absalon.

  My life was connected to his like a button to a buttonhole. I don’t know why, but in those days it didn’t even occur to me that I could look for another boss. Why was that?

  Why do we act like they’re part of our family when we know they never ever think of us that way? Maybe because we’re a real small country.

  I don’t understand how I could have thought like that back then. I tell myself I was just ignorant. But after the union meeting, I decided to change. And changing meant leaving the edge of the sidewalk where I usually stood at a distance, watching what was happening from afar, hoping that whatever happened, it wouldn’t really touch me. The way you pray that a hurricane that’s already torn through the entire ocean and looks like it’s fixed to end up right at your doorstep takes a turn at the last minute and hits the island next to you.

  7.

  Elizabeth pipes up again, “We want to see our teacher.”

  The principal is surprised because we can hear from Elizabeth’s tone that she’s not joking around. “Simion, go to my office this instant!”

  Annie moves over to Elizabeth and says, “She won’t go to your office because we are all waiting for Madame Ladal. If she goes to your office, we all go.”

  Sonia Zakarius takes it from there: “We are Madame Ladal’s students, not students of Madame Desravins, or Madame Laurent, or Madame Limon, or Madame Kancel, or Madame Simet-Lutin. We want to stay together and we want our teacher, Madame Ladal. She told us she’d see us on Friday.”

  I don’t know who says the next thing: “People like to think they can do what they want with us because we’re children!”

  The principal jumps at that one: “Who said that? Who said that? Nobody dares answer? Well, let me tell you, you are just children and you are students in this school and I am the principal.”

  The same voice lashes out (I’m sure now it’s Suzy Foggéa), “And just what kind of principal do you think you are?”

  We’re all real angry and the principal doesn’t understand that she’ll never be able to calm us down.

  “That’s enough. I’m calling your parents.”

  Elizabeth yells she shouldn’t bother because we want to leave right now, because we won’t go with any other teacher—they’re all bad—and because nobody in our class likes wicked stepmothers!

  To keep us in school and get us to calm down, she makes us go up to our classroom and sends in the concierge, Madame Parize, to watch us. Madame Parize tries to talk to us, “Children, I know you’re disappointed, but the principal is trying to find the right solution.”

  We don’t speak to her and keep our arms crossed over our chests until eleven o’clock.

  You can hear a pin drop, as Madame Ladal would have said.

  8.

  Friday, May 26, 1967. I left my house early in the morning. I left knowing I wasn’t going to lean against a tree like a big sad bird and wait for the car horn bellowing like an insult, saying to everybody who’s still sleeping: Here I am to pick up my worker, just like a piece of charcoal left on a rickety table.

  Sometimes I felt that’s what I really was: a piece of charcoal or maybe a sack of potatoes, and somebody just places a pickax, a shovel, a pick, or a trowel between the sack’s hands and yells to the potato to get going: “An nou ay: patate, mété’w o travay!”

  That morning I was already up and moving while lots of houses still had their eyes shut. There was a small light here or there; a voice whispering so as not to make a scene and wake up the neighbors, but angry all the same; a child having trouble getting up; a little girl who’s wet her cabanes again and somebody’s going to have to hang the sheets outside so they dry.

  I took advantage of the early morning freshness like a man who’s finally opened his chest to the winds of freedom and breathed in all he can.

  I waited for Léogane’s green bus, but it never came, so I hopped on Palatin’s old communal mini, the one with the torn seats. “Ou avè nous jòdla, Guy-Albè?”

  I sat right behind the driver and told him exactly where I was going, and I spoke my piece like I’d never dared to before: about work, about the humiliation of it, about having to kiss the boss’s ass. And the whole bus listened to me, some voices shouting in approval, “That’s right! Right on. You’re right, you sure are.”

  Somebody else said, “But be careful, fellas, be careful all the same.”

  The old ways—the ones I’d lived with since my father told me I had to help out at home, find a job, and keep it—the old ways had started to work their magic on the bus. I knew people here and there were falling back into their old habits, and if I didn’t pay attention, I’d fall back into them too: being careful, having patience, staying hopeful, your day will come, don’t count your chickens, no plans, no dreams, don’t speak too loudly . . . I don’t know what came over me, but I kept on talking, more and more, whistling like a bird trying to tell all of creation that he’s up and awake—awake like never before.

  I said we’d been careful long enough; we’d discussed enough; waited long enough for those men to listen to us, to give us what we’d asked for.

  “It’s time. The time has come to speak loud and clear. Even they know we can’t go on like this, but it’s like they’re incapable of saying, ‘Okay, the men are asking for a raise. Let’s look and try to see what we can give them.’ No, they wait; they pretend they don’t give a damn; and they’ve started to act like they only need to listen to us when we scare them, when their work sites are stopped, when their factories go dead, when their buses don’t leave the garage—but, if they’d only think about it, they’d see that they lose more that way than they would if they just tried talking to us. How many times have I seen that—with my current boss and even with the first boss I ever had.

  “He ran an even smaller operation, but he really made me feel like I was nothing: told me I was a dumbass, that I didn’t understand a thing, that I’d n
ever amount to anything, that it was only because he pitied my family—who he knew—that he agreed to keep me on. And with him, too, a salary that amounted to a hill of beans, but the hours we worked were endless. You had to stay till you finished the job. Like Papa always said, ‘Pa ay trapé bab é patron aw, ti gason!’

  “I took it and took it and took it. But now the union has proposed an action and we’ve decided to go for it—two percent more. Two percent! That’s the raise we want and this time we’re not treading lightly. Since yesterday, they know we mean business. Since yesterday, we’ve rallied the troops. And at the first blast of the trumpet, every construction worker—on every work site, in all the forgotten corners of this country, on all the big roads, on all the buildings under construction—at that first note, they heard us say, ‘Men, today, we stop! Throw down your shovels, pickaxes, picks, trowels, and hammers. We’re stopping work.’ You should’ve heard those guys. Everybody’s ready and with us. So today, I know I’m going to speak to my boss and ask the same from all the bosses. Yes, I am! Two percent! And that’s not all I’m going to demand. And it’s not just me—there’ll be maybe ten, maybe a hundred, maybe a thousand. We’ll just see.”

  After that, nobody said a word. The bus continued along in complete silence—a little cough now and again, maybe somebody clearing his throat, or a deep sigh. But I was already far away. I was at La Place de la Victoire, in front of the subprefecture, where we were supposed to meet while we waited for the negotiations to begin.

  So I’d left the bus, my ideas had flown straight into the stratosphere, and there was complete silence around me, until a little later when a woman got on with her baskets. The conductor hitched the baskets to the roof and when the woman got her breath back and noticed that nobody was talking, she asked loudly in the strident tone she used to attract clients to her wares: “Ka ki tini, zò ka véyé on mò isidan?”

  No, nobody had died; this wasn’t a wake. We all laughed, even me. It did us good. We were upbeat again, and nobody said anything else serious.

  Strange as it seems, I asked the driver to drop me off in front of the boss’s house. I really don’t know why. It was on the way; I could take rue Vatable until Lethière and end up right behind the subprefecture. I was early; I’d started off before I needed to, out of habit. That habit of getting ready at daybreak when we weren’t really meeting up until 10:00 a.m. But what should I have done? Stayed at home, watching my wife get more and more anxious? Watch the kids leave without knowing when I’d see them again, or even if I’d see them again?

  As worried as I was, and it was pretty much eating me from the inside, nothing was going to keep me from taking the bus, demonstrating next to Potiron and maybe Julien, closing ranks with other construction guys I knew from different sites, shaking their hands, and then sticking mine in my pockets like a guy solidly planted on his own two feet, a guy who wasn’t afraid of a scuffle.

  And that’s exactly what I did when the bus let me off in front of Absalon’s house. I put my hands in my pockets, and if the boss had been on his balcony, he would’ve seen me look him straight in the eye. But he wasn’t there and the house was still closed up. Sand and gravel were piled high on his sidewalk, the water hose was slung across the sand like a sleeping snake, and the wheelbarrow—well, they hadn’t even bothered to bring it inside.

  Even the boss was neglecting his work sites!

  I kept on my way and walked down rue Vatable. The barbers had begun to open their big doors; the smell of warm bread was wafting from Delbourt’s Bakery; the popsicle seller was arranging his stock of lemon ice bars; the street sweepers were collecting garbage from the dirty water of the gutters. The town of Pointe-à-Pitre was waking up. I’d rarely seen it so early in the morning.

  Passing behind the subprefecture, I saw that the gendarmes had gathered, ready to protect the building. Yep, there they were. I took a good look as I was passing by to gauge how calm I could keep myself, stop my heart from beating so hard. I wanted to see if the old fear was still there, or if the new language pouring out of my mouth had also bolstered my courage. It didn’t feel like my heart was doing a flip flop. I walked past, and they didn’t pay any attention to me. I could see La Place from the small straight corridor of rue Lethière. It was still too early, and hardly anybody was there.

  The sun made its way up into the sky and the kids started to cross La Place, going in all directions, towards Dubouchage, Michelet, Carnot—boys and girls walking gaily to their schools. I hoped they’d go far enough in their studies to not find themselves at the mercy of others, never having learned how to defend their interests. I smiled when I saw the littlest Absalon walk by, a girl who liked to tell stories in front of her mirror while us workers passed each other buckets of cement to finish the second floor. A funny kid who’d sometimes watch us work and swipe our tools for the games she thought up with her brother. We had to fight with them to keep them from taking the wheelbarrow. Maybe they’re the real reason the wheelbarrow’s still outside. Forgot to put it back in the courtyard. She sure was jolly that morning, that little one. One of her friends was running after her, yelling, “Wait for me, come on, wait!” And her? I couldn’t tell what she was saying, but she was repeating the same odd words, laughing and singing. Yeah, she’s a funny little bird.

  Nothing much happened that morning. We just waited on La Place while negotiations went on at the Chamber of Commerce—some discussion, a run to the bar to wet our throats. Potiron and I stuck together. We wondered what was going on inside, and how come nobody was coming out to tell us what was happening. The delegates had promised to keep us informed about the proceedings, but up till then, nothing.

  Over in a corner, near the basketball courts, a group of young men seemed to be waiting too, like us. They were talking among themselves and they weren’t leaving La Place. At one point, one of them came over and asked Potiron for a light. I stepped in to try and find out if he worked construction. He just laughed. “Us? We’re unemployed, comrade.” And he walked away.

  9.

  When she has to go down to ring the school bell at 11:00 a.m., Madame Parize makes us go with her.

  I linger behind to ask if she knows where our teacher is, and she tells me they’d summoned Madame Ladal to the rectory yesterday. But she doesn’t know why.

  “Will she be back this afternoon?”

  “They were going to make up their minds at the education division this morning. I think the principal’s already called them. I don’t know what they said, but maybe she’ll be back—Sé timoun-la, zò ay tibwen fò! Behave, children!—I hope so, you have a very nice teacher. I like Madame Ladal. I like her a lot.”

  Now and then, the principal tries to grab one of us, but we all manage to skip out of the schoolyard.

  We end up in the Darse neighborhood, next to the fishmongers and vegetable sellers. We regroup on the corner before crossing rue Duplessis.

  Suzy Foggéa slams her book bag on the ground and asks, “What do we do now? Ka nous ka fè sé timoun-là?” Elizabeth thinks we should go to our teacher’s house. I really want to do that, but I tell them if we do, the principal will think Madame Ladal put us up to it, and she’ll have even more problems with the administration.

  I also tell them what the concierge told me, and Tanya protests, “She won’t be back. I pé ké déviré ankò. She’ll never come back to us.”

  You can feel the terror in her voice! It breaks our hearts. We don’t know what to do.

  So I think about you, Papa.

  I think maybe you could go talk to the school. You’re always talking to administrations, to bureaucracies. Why aren’t you here now, Papa, when we need you most?

  I remember the day Emmett threw a fit. He was threatening to kill the gentleman you gave our dog to because he barked too much. Emmett broke everything in his room. You started to be worried for the man and you felt bad for Emmett so you brought the dog back.

  Without really thinking, I tear my dress and break my glasses in
anger; and I hope you’ll be home to see what I’ve done.

  But no, you’re still not there.

  No, you don’t have lunch with us. And I’ve promised my friends you’ll do something and because they don’t have any solutions either—and you don’t know this because you’re still not home—we’re thirty-two little girls depending on you, my Papa, to help.

  I leave home after lunch to get back to school by one o’clock.

  I’m ashamed to return without anything to say, no good news to tell my classmates.

  I’m so ashamed I don’t actually go to school.

  I hide my book bag in an alley so nobody will ask me why I’m not in class.

  I roam around La Place de la Victoire, but I make myself invisible so if I run into a neighbor, she won’t go tell you (and she would) that I’m playing hooky.

  I watch the market ladies gather their wares, their baskets. I see the bicycle porters coming to pick them up, loading the vegetables they didn’t sell. I see the fishmongers throw seawater on the sidewalks to clean up the traces of fish blood.

  And all of a sudden, I hear voices getting louder and louder, voices of people who’re really angry. They’re yelling something I can’t understand.

  The market ladies are afraid. They grab everything that’s left and take off running. The ones who don’t have their own porter will take a bus home.

  I hear somebody say that already this morning policemen have beat up some workers.

  Someone screams, “If they go after us this afternoon, all hell’s gonna break loose! O swè la, si yo frapé, sa ké chofé alè!”

  10.

  What the delegation told us at the afternoon break, around 12:30 p.m., didn’t make us feel better—not one bit.

  Nothing important had been decided; the bosses couldn’t agree on anything. But the main thing to hold on to was we weren’t getting anything we asked for.