It was a way of avoiding the possibility of the impossible.Ī fault line, to that point unknown to the island’s geologists, ruptured on a Tuesday in January.
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They preferred not to think about him nor speak of him. Alexandre was an illness, an inconsolable regret, a tender but bitter memory, a veil not to be lifted. The story of Alexandre was stuck in that golden afternoon, in that bizarrely tender moment when he left the shocked household with two nurses, stupefied by a shot of tranquilizer. There had been a whole life, a bundle of large and small moments that they hadn’t shared with Alexandre. There had been travels, studies, vacations, encounters, loves, marriages and divorces, births and deaths. Forty years was hardly the same as forty days. The family no longer knew Alexandre, lost for so long in his illness. What did they know about his life, about the voices that took away his reason and his speech, about the specters who, day after day, sealed his lips shut? How did he live in his own silent realm, on the very margins of life? What did he know about the wars throughout the world, about a Black man ascending to the rank of president of the United States of America, about the death of Michael Jackson? Did he know the name of the Pope in Rome, about gay marriage, about the internet and cell phones? He lived and breathed in the same city as they did, but their worlds had been separated for ages. Alexandre had suffered from schizophrenia since adolescence and had lived inside the four walls of a psychiatric institution for more than forty years. So, in moments like these, he rationalized: “Under what improbable circumstances could Alexandre come home? For what unthinkable reason would he leave the Institution? How could they imagine the possibility of their brother’s presence in their midst?” This perspective was quite simply impossible.
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Yet the idea of his return floated around in Grégoire’s head for a few months. Maybe the others thought about it too, sometimes––about Alexandre’s return––but in general, they spoke very little about Alexandre. Everyone in the family trusted Grégoire’s intuition.
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He had a knack for a lot of things, for as long as he could remember. Grégoire knew that Alexandre would be coming home to live with them soon.