The days are long. By the end of my first shift, I considered committing seppuku between the hunt- ing magazines and the Mauricie tourism guides. But I didn’t. I’ve never had such a boring summer job. I never thought I’d get hired at a tourist office, but unfortunately for me, I was the only applicant. Nobody ever comes in. I arrange the brochures, I sweep the floor, I stare at the ceiling. Every now and again, Charles, the guy who works in the park, drops by for a chat. I can talk to him about Star Wars and my obsession with the planet Tatooine. I think about my life. Not very original, I know; everyone thinks about their life. I wonder what the hell I’m doing here. I’ve been learning Mandarin for the past couple of years. I watch Chinese TV every night. I started really getting into Asia after I saw Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon with Chow Yun-Fat. Now that I think about it, it’s ridiculous to want to go work in Asia just because of a movie. I’d like to be an interpreter over there. Whatever. I’m thirty-one. I don’t have a girlfriend. I’ve never really had a girlfriend. Sure, I’ve kissed a few girls. And a guy once, too. He was a really good kisser. No, that’s not true: I had a girlfriend for two years. I even vacationed down south with her and her family once. I haven’t been in love much. Once, maybe. And it wasn’t with the girl I went on holiday with. I’ve fallen head over heels for thousands of glances, thou- sands of smiles, thousands of chins. I’ve had twinges of regret, disappointments, thoughts of death. Thoughts of death cause I’ll never be able to know everyone. Cause I’ll never be able to kiss everyone. I often feel like a ghost. A ghost who’s learning Mandarin. A ghost who works in a tourist office. “Whoo-oo-oo-oo! Where’s Trois-Rivières? Trois-Rivières is that way. Whoo-oo- oo-oo!” I try to find myself somewhere. I flick through the Gaspésie tourism guide. There I am. I’m the hole in Percé Rock.
It’s sunny today. Blue sky, no clouds, no soul, no nothing. It’s nine-thirty in the morning, and the heat is enough to burn your balls off. The air conditioning’s not working. I open all the windows, but it’s like being in a greenhouse. I’m a fucking Mandarin-speaking plant. I talked about Chewbacca with Charles, but he went off to mow the grass as soon as he saw a guy walk into the office. A man about fifty, wearing a bike helmet. I hate cyclists; they’re always happy. He smiled when he saw me. “Phew, I just rode fifty clicks!” I replied, “Way to go, that’s... that must be long.” I didn’t know what else to say. I have fifty clicks of skin wrapped around my heart. I don’t feel much. I watch the flies buzzing around the office. There are tons of them. I try to kill them all with my cap. It takes me an hour to kill five flies. Where do flies go when they die? I picture ghost flies flitting around my head. I spot a cute girl walking up to the glass doors of the tourist office. There’s something wrong with her; she’s limping. I like girls who’ve got something wrong with them. She walks past my desk and heads to the washroom. She disappears. Another girl, another sorrow. It’s incredible. Girls are like butterflies. They flutter, they dance when they walk, they appear like magic. They’ve barely come near me in months. I’m a very ugly flower, and the days are long. I’ve got a big, fat face. My face has gotten fatter. I’ve got fat cheeks. I try not to smile in photos, other- wise I look like I weigh about three hundred pounds. A three-hundred-pound flower. I look a little slimmer in the right pants. If my heart wore pants, it wouldn’t even exist. The sunlight’s done a one-eighty in the office. In the morning, the light’s the right way up. In the evening, it’s upside down. Like a bat.