La Moustache (B2)
La Moustache
La Moustache is a psychological novel about a man who shaves off his moustache and expects people around him to notice. However, no one reacts, and his wife even insists he never had one. This unsettling situation slowly makes him question his memory, his identity, and even his sanity, leading to a growing sense of paranoia and loss of reality.
« Que dirais-tu si je me rasais la moustache ? »
Agnès, qui feuilletait un magazine sur le canapé du salon, eut un rire léger, puis répondit : « Ce serait une bonne idée. »
Il sourit. A la surface de l’eau, dans la baignoire où il s’attardait, flottaient des îlots de mousse semés de petits poils noirs. Sa barbe poussait très drue, l’obligeant à se raser deux fois par jour s’il ne voulait pas, le soir, avoir le menton bleu. Au réveil, il expédiait la tâche face au miroir du lavabo, avant de prendre sa douche, et ce n’était qu’une suite de gestes machinaux, dépourvue de toute solennité. Le soir au contraire, cette corvée devenait un moment de détente qu’il organisait avec soin, veillant à faire couler l’eau du bain par la douche, afin que la vapeur ne brouille pas les miroirs qui entouraient la baignoire encastrée, disposant un verre à portée de sa main, puis étalant longuement la mousse sur son menton, passant et repassant le rasoir en prenant garde de ne pas attaquer sa moustache dont il égalisait les poils ensuite avec des ciseaux. Qu’il dût ou non sortir et paraître à son avantage, ce rite vespéral tenait sa place dans l’équilibre de la journée, tout comme l’unique cigarette qu’il s’accordait, depuis qu’il avait cessé de fumer, après le repas de midi. Le calme plaisir qu’il en tirait n’avait pas varié depuis la fin de son adolescence, la vie professionnelle l’avait même accru et lorsqu’Agnès raillait affectueusement le caractère sacré de ses séances de rasage, il répondait qu’en effet c’était son exercice zen, l’unique plage de méditation vouée à la connaissance de soi et du monde spirituel que lui laissaient ses vaines mais absorbantes activités de jeune cadre dynamique.
"What would you say if I shaved off my moustache?"
Agnès, who was leafing through a magazine on the living-room sofa, gave a light laugh, then answered: "That would be a good idea."
He smiled. On the surface of the water, in the bath where he lingered, floated little islands of foam scattered with small black hairs. His beard grew very thick, forcing him to shave twice a day if he didn't want a blue chin by evening. On waking, he dispatched the task in front of the bathroom mirror, before taking his shower, and it was nothing but a series of mechanical gestures, devoid of any solemnity. In the evening, on the contrary, this chore became a moment of relaxation that he arranged with care, taking pains to run the bathwater through the shower head, so that the steam would not fog up the mirrors surrounding the built-in tub, setting a glass within reach of his hand, then spreading the lather over his chin at length, passing and repassing the razor while taking care not to touch his moustache, whose hairs he would afterward trim with scissors. Whether or not he had to go out and look his best, this evening ritual held its place in the balance of his day, just like the single cigarette he allowed himself, since he had given up smoking, after the midday meal. The calm pleasure he derived from it had not changed since the end of his adolescence—his professional life had even heightened it—and when Agnès affectionately teased him about the sacred nature of his shaving sessions, he would answer that indeed it was his form of Zen exercise, the one stretch of meditation devoted to self-knowledge and to the spiritual world that his empty but all-consuming activities as a young go-getter professional allowed him.
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