The Sleepworker Read online

  Camera on his shoulder, Jonas moves through the dense crowd, which is excited and talkative. The space has plenty of people, plenty of noise and plenty of atmosphere. No sentence is audible from beginning to end. Bits of comments emerge related to the opening: This is a nice event, I’m glad we came, we should actually come back to see the work, because it’s difficult to squeeze through to see this 148 x 79 x 68 cm wooden, fibreglass, polyurethane rubber and fabric sculpture, depicting the artist stretched out on a bed, awaiting death in various positions derived from some religion, like, for example, Catholicism.

  The video camera moves forward, inviting itself into groups’ discussions. Depending on the discussion and the people, some gladly offer their smiles to the camera, others turn away or get quiet. Suddenly, the camera catches a strange light. It’s a full head of hair or a man-sized Christmas tree. It seems to be moving. It looks like a head. A head with decorated hair: silvery, coppery, shimmering hair, gilded hair that glistens, shines, sparkles, with a thousand variations at the light’s whim. Party hair. Gay hair, joyous, resplendent, cheerful. It’s even more beautiful at night.

  Under this hair is Andy.

  Andy who?

  Andy, the new friend of the group.

  Before becoming the group’s friend, Andy had no friends. During the day, he saw no one except the woman with whom he shared a three-room apartment, who happened to be his mother. People say that during this time, Andy received regular visits from a guy named Dennis. Apparently, Dennis was one of those half-philosopher, half–art critic types who enjoys prowling around art openings and artists’ studios. Andy had met him while he was still working in communications, and at that time, Dennis was frequenting comm agencies. Dennis is also the kind of guy you see all over the place – can’t go anywhere without running into him. Being up-to-date on everything, Dennis enjoyed the story of Andy’s sacking, and wanted to let him know that, so he expressed a desire to speak with Andy, who, having no friends, agreed to let Dennis hang out in his bedroom-workshop.

  Upon seeing Andy’s drawings, Dennis stated, Not bad, delicate lines, undeniable talent as a colourist, sense of composition, bravo . . . it’s cute . . . there’s certainly sensitivity and a technique, but on the other hand, addressing Andy directly, finishing his sentence with a snicker, but if it’s art you want to do, then you’re not there yet. Andy expressed his desire to become an artist, to which Dennis said, Okay, now, pay close attention. And Dennis, the talker that he is, gave a speech showing Andy that it would be judicious for him to work in a certain way, in the process adding two or three pieces of advice regarding his way of being Andy. You will be loved, you will be hated, he concluded by way of a prophecy, showing his naked body and trembling with desire for an unfazed Andy.

  Following this studio visit, Andy seemed to work on his artistic expression, keeping Dennis posted on his progress with almost daily telephone contact. Up until the day Andy asked Dennis to visit, claiming he had a few things to show him. After pouring a thick and amber-coloured drink into a whisky glass, a glass he then handed to Dennis, Andy sat him down in front of two works on canvas, depicting two plastic bottles that at first glance looked identical.

  And as the story goes, Dennis observed a long moment of silence which he then broke with a long critical commentary, of which Andy didn’t miss a word, scattering in some why?s so that Dennis would say more, fully elaborate his ideas, explain his remarks to the fullest detail in order to achieve the clearest articulation possible, the most intelligible train of thought, using wording Andy would easily be able to reuse the day someone asked him to present his approach in a few short, memorable maxims.

  By all accounts, meetings between the two boys became spaced out after that. They planned a series of appointments, which they cancelled. They communicated less and less until they ended up not speaking to each other at all. Andy and Dennis stopped thinking about each other. They lost touch for good.

  Andy spent the following months in his bedroom where he drew, painted, decoupaged and coloured. Stretched out on a floor covered with newspapers, magazines, picture books and cut-up texts, with two different radios playing two different radio stations, he read and daydreamed.

  After researching the lives of other artists from other times, from other places, Andy thought about his own situation. What could make him an original artist, an artist different from other artists? What if, on the contrary, Andy decided to become a non-original artist, i.e., an artist like some other artist? Andy told himself he could imagine becoming like some other artist. Which led him to the following problem: what is some other artist like? Andy wasn’t unaware that a good number of artists existed before him, some of whom were named Andy. However, is homonymy enough to ensure similarity to his models?

  During that evening’s opening in a squatted apartment, Andy took a tour of the exhibition, then designated a corner for himself. He said, This here is my corner, and he went to hide out. He did what one does when one is shy and finds himself in a place where he doesn’t know anyone and everyone else seems to know each other: stand off to the side, observe the surrounding opening-goers, listen, take notes. But given the present company at this opening, there is no corner in which to go be forgotten. There’s still a video camera lurking.

  Upon entering the shot, Andy was immediately offered an interview. Andy loves the idea of an interview. But he really prefers to ask the questions himself . . .

  Andy has developed a protocol that allows for an answer to be formulated before the question is even asked. Andy gives three possible responses in advance: yes, no, I don’t know. The trick is to choose a response beforehand, and stick to it when you find out the question.

  Andy: Yellow?

  Jonas: Yes.

  Andy: Black? White? Red?

  Jonas: Yes.

  Andy: Blue? Green? Yellow?

  Jonas: No.

  Andy: No?

  Jonas: I don’t know.

  End of interview.

  You know, Andy, I have these three friends, they have an apartment with a Workshop, what would you say to having a look around? Jonas proposes.

  At one time there were four on the sofas in the Workshop, but now there are five. Five friends who stay warm by huddling together. About the five friends: three of them seem to be especially talkative, maybe because they’re especially high. Andy, who is also high, doesn’t say anything. Jonas films the encounter. As a result, the five men truly understand each other very well, and all are mighty happy with the evening. So why not become friends? What’s stopping us from being together all the time?

  Why not form another group that we’ll call the fivesome?

  This evening, like every evening, the Workshop fills up. People come and go. Naked when they come, dressed when they go. Andy remains pensive. Attentive to the night’s proceedings, but pensive all the same. No one notices him, but he, from where he is, misses out on none of the night’s proceedings. His job is that of the watcher. In his hands is an anachronistic camera. The type of instant camera they called a Polaroid back in Andy Warhol’s day.

  Suddenly a very muscular boy offers his services to Andy.

  It’s very kind of you to have thought about me, but ass-fucking isn’t my cup of tea. I prefer not to do it. I prefer to watch.

  I prefer to photograph.

  I prefer to work.

  I prefer to watch John.

  Speaking of John, he uncaps his umpteenth bottle, downs it in one swig, and while opening another, performs some dance moves. Or what, for lack of a better term, we’ll call dance moves. A remarkable work of disequilibrium and disarticulation performed completely off-rhythm. A way to defy the laws of physics. A dance that is impossible to reproduce without risking injury. John will end up falling. He’s going to fall for sure. He’s going to fall. He’s falling. Hey! No. Phew. That was a close one. Bravo, Bob, nice reflexes. You all right? John starts up his moves again. Better to speak of ‘moves’ as opposed to dancing – he windmills his arms
above his head, his legs bend and straighten, his pelvis turns, accelerating like crazy as if he were getting ready to take off. He’s doing the helicopter. What’s that, you ask? The viewer is invited to measure the distance between the comedy and pathos. All of a sudden, he’s had enough. Stop. Enough. He’s beat. Cut the crap. Eyes half-closed, John staggers off the dance floor, parting the crowd by giving little shoves with his shoulder, which he accompanies with, Pardon me, please, quickly, get out of the way, watch out I’m gonna puke.

  But no, it was a joke. Just the magic words to clear a path through a dense crowd in order to get to an empty spot as quickly as possible. Like, for example, over here in this corner of the room where John squats to breathe. Now his back is to the wall, legs stretched out, eyes closed, neck loose, head drooping forward, back sliding down the wall. Laid out on the floor, John only has to spread his arms out in a cross and everything will be fine. John sleeps.

  It’s late. Andy is walking home. It’s raining, or rather it has rained, the pavement bears a trace of recent dampness. Andy doesn’t really care that it has just rained. Andy’s head is somewhere else. His head is with John. Andy is thinking about this John who is capable of going to sleep in public. And then Andy thinks about Andy. Andy thinks someone is following him. Andy looks back. A woman is walking behind him. She has long, very brown hair, black eyes and olive skin. The reason she is there is to kill Andy. She’s there as Andy’s assassin. She’s walking in the same direction as her prey, ten or so metres back. Andy’s frightened. Andy speeds up his pace. He looks back. The assassin’s long brown hair shines in the street lights. The woman acts like she’s the one walking home, she pretends to be cool while on the inside the passion of her crime possesses her. A voice inside her repeats: you’re here to kill Andy, you’re here to kill Andy, kill Andy, kill him. She knows she’s Andy’s assassin, Andy knows it too, in fact everyone is in on it. But what is she waiting for to commit her crime? Andy hails a taxi, the taxi doesn’t stop, and Andy concludes that the taxi is the brown-haired woman’s accomplice. It’s useless to try and escape an arranged death that even the taxi drivers seem to be in on. A few more minutes and Andy will be dead, assassinated. Andy thinks about John again. Andy clears the idea of taking a taxi from his mind – it’s true, why take a taxi when you live just around the corner. Andy walks along 14th Avenue, turns at the intersection of 3rd Street. Andy arrives home to his mother. That’s when he looks back.

  Andy has an extremely precise concept of his death. He sees it as violent and spectacular. With New York New York being a very large city, Andy tells himself that there inevitably exists someone who would like to kill him. Either someone who has considered killing him for a long time and will one day do the deed, or – and this is the solution Andy holds on to – someone circumstance will put in a position to kill Andy, who will say, hey, why not assassinate this guy, and this someone, to his own great surprise, will take pleasure from the fulfillment of this act.

  And the next morning, at breakfast with his mother, Andy considers that perhaps his demise is not all that imminent. For the time being, he’s dying of hunger. What are we having?

  From deep inside a pocket of a pair of men’s pants, a telephone rings.

  It’s an outdated model that was never cutting edge, in any case. When it came on the market, its fun blackberry-coloured keyboard allowed it to be distinguished from competing models. For a time, the salespeople found it entertaining to promote a phone that was fresh and joyful in the eyes of their youngest clientele, up until the technological discussion was taken over by a generation of subscribers concerned about performance and features. In all honesty, because it’s so inexpensive, this second-rate phone barely makes a profit. It was a good product for making calls, but its job is done. It’s been ages since it was for sale anywhere in the city.

  The telephone we are talking about is one of the last of its kind to still function. It spends most of its time in the patched pocket of a pair of low-cut, straight-leg men’s pants made from a 98 percent cotton, 2 percent spandex mix, a flexible faded material. Along with a telephone, the pants pocket houses a lighter, some tobacco, rolling papers and filters, sometimes accompanied by a handkerchief, a used subway card and small amounts of change.

  The telephone sees light for only a few minutes a day. And not necessarily every day. It befalls the phone to stay in the man’s pocket for several days straight, sometimes spending a full week in darkness, silence and contemplation. For a telephone, it’s not exactly overworked. It lives to the rhythm of a small cellular plan that allows only for short conversations. Most often, its job is to link two people who are trying to find out where one is, where the other is, and how they’re going to meet up. Another one of its missions consists of ensuring communication between two people whose way of loving seems to be compatible, as far as they understand, and now wish to take action.

  Today, the phone is responsible for a mission of the utmost importance. It’s taking it to heart to ring its alarm for this man, this wreck of a human trying to prolong his night on a sagging couch, in the aftermath of a party, among scattered cans, a sticky floor and the odour of stale smoke. Its screen says 1:02 p.m. The sleeping man has to wake up. Which is why the telephone goes off with such conviction. It puts all the power it can behind it and, as if that weren’t enough, it also begins to vibrate. The vibrations cross the cotton-spandex fabric, carrying through to the snoozing subscriber’s thigh, provoking muscular tension on that spot, which quivers, and soon the vibrations reach his balls and then, almost simultaneously, his anus. Once the subscriber gets a hard-on, he wakes up.

  It’s high time to get moving because at 4:00 p.m. John is expected to be at the Centre for Public Poetry, where he’s been invited to read his work.

  A place of creation and dissemination for contemporary poetry, the Centre for Public Poetry organizes public readings, meetings and exposure to magazines and editors for both living and dead poets. The Centre offers thematic colloquiums, consciousness raising, writers’ residencies, presentations abroad and translation workshops. To top it off, there’s also a specialized library.

  The Centre postulates that poetry isn’t dead, and neither are the poets.

  In poetry, as elsewhere, there is only one first time. Same thing for the second – no matter what they say, it’s still unique. It’s at the Centre for Public Poetry’s Seventh Unpublished Poets’ Night that John does his first reading.

  It’s happening here, come on, hurry up, get inside, it’s about to start, find a seat, turn off your phones, it’s starting now.

  The room is plunged into darkness. White face, steady breathing, muscles relaxed, standing under a halo of light behind a microphone, illuminated, amplified, John has just walked onstage.

  An hour ago, a knot formed in his stomach. It hasn’t stopped growing, so now it’s risen to his throat. But John knows that once his first word is delivered his throat will unknot and meaning will flow. He knows why he is there, he knows exactly what he has to do. He’s ready to give it his all. He’s ready to open his mouth and his heart, he’s ready to open his mouth and his heart. Tonight he is John the Poet.

  The four other members of the group take up the second-to-second-to-last row of the room. Andy is to the left of Jonas, to the right of Bob, and William is beside Bob. Guess to whom the hand resting on Bob’s thigh belongs. A clue: it’s moving up his thigh to draw a W around B’s fly.

  In the darkened room, Andy removes his glasses. He smells very strongly of cologne. John, in the light, standing, behind a microphone, inhales, looks at his text, opens his mouth and starts the evening off.

  Reading.

  (. . . )

  Unpublished poet number two, Michael, facing the audience, reads standing up, behind a microphone stand, finishes reading, leaves the stage, applause.

  Unpublished poet number three, Cecile, facing the audience, reads sitting, reads standing, behind a microphone stand, finishes reading, leaves the stage, applause.
>
  Thank you all for coming!

  End of the Unpublished Poets’ Night.

  The chairs, folding onto their velvet seat backs, produce the clacking of velvet.

  The poetry lovers head toward the exit or in the direction of the guest poets.

  Any comments?

  It was very good, spot-on, had some rhythm, not boring at all. Right from the start we felt that you have something, a way of doing things that only you can do. The text is good, simple and good. You know, we get so many poets here who. And who’ve been doing it since. All right, well, I’ll shut up. No, well done. For real, this was your first time reading in public? For a first reading, frankly . . .

  Superb. Fantastic. Marvellous reading. The room empties out, Andy, Jonas, Bob and William are still congratulating their friend. Soon, they’re the last ones in the room. Before shutting off the lights, the organizer invites the five friends to move into the next room, the layout of which instantaneously summons a very strong sense of familiarity.

  It’s an exhibition room.

  It has a bar.

  For the exhibition, some poems are hung on the walls, shelves house some books, glass showcases display journals and posters. The whole thing is organized into an exhibit retracing the history of poetry in New York New York. We’re going to take a look, Jonas, Bob and William let it be known before disappearing.

  Over by the bar, John is downing one glass after another. He drinks indiscriminately – what’s important is to drink. The thing is that this evening he’s a poet, and for him, as it is for Andy who is standing by his side, that’s strange to hear. John doesn’t speak, he’s feeling empty, empty and alone – perhaps that’s why he’s drinking, in order to fill himself up. His cup barely has enough time to be empty before it’s miraculously full. There’s no need to believe in divine intervention. No, instead it’s the intervention of this guy in a dark suit, who, with a determined stride, heads towards John, plants himself between John and Andy – now there’s an undeniable fact.