Platform by Michel Houellebecq Page A

protests, marked by a desperate violence; tons of slurry were dumped on the Esplanade des Invalides, a number of pigs were gutted in front of the Palais-Bourbon. At the end of 1986, the government announced emergency relief followed by a recovery plan for pig breeders. In April 1987. Valerie's father sold his farm —for over four million francs. With the money from the sale, he bought a large apartment in Saint-Quay-Portrieux, where he planned to live, and three studio flats in Torremolinos. He had a million francs leftover, which he invested in unit trusts and was even able —it was his childhood dream —to buy a small yacht. Sadly, and with some disgust, he signed the farm bill of sale. The new owner was a young guy, about twenty-three, single, from Lannion, just out of agricultural college, who still believed in the plans to revive the industry. Valerie's father was forty-eight, his wife, forty-seven. They had dedicated the best years of their lives to a hopeless task. They lived in a country where, compared to speculative investment, investment in production brought little return; he understood that now. In their first year, the rents from the studio flats alone brought
    in more money than all his years of work. He took up crosswords, took the yacht out into the bay, sometimes fishing. His wife found it easier to adapt to their new life and was a great support to him; she started to want to read again, to go to the cinema, to go out.
    At the time of the sale, Valérie was fourteen, she was just starting to wear makeup; in the bathroom mirror she watched her breasts as they gradually swelled. The night before they moved out, she spent a long time walking around the farm buildings. The dozen pigs that remained in the main sty came up to her, grunting softly. They were being picked up that night by a wholesaler and would be slaughtered in a few days' time.
    The summer that followed was a strange period. Compared to Tréméven, Saint-Quay-Portrieux was almost a small town. When she walked out of her door, she couldn't lie on the grass, letting her thoughts float with the clouds, flow with the river. Among the vacationers there were boys, who turned to look at her as she passed, and she never really managed to relax. Toward the end of August, she met Bérénice, a girl from the high school at Saint-Brieuc. Bérénice was a year older than she and already wore makeup and designer skirts; she had a pretty, angular face and very long hair that was an extraordinary shade of strawberry blonde. They got into the habit of going to the beach at Saint-Marguerite together. They would get changed in Valerie's room before they set off. One afternoon, as she was taking off her bra, Valérie noticed Bérénice staring at her breasts. She knew that she had superb breasts, round and high, so swollen and firm that they looked artificial. Bérénice stretched out her hand, traced the curve and the nipple. Valérie opened her mouth and closed her eyes as Berenice's lips approached her own; she abandoned herself completely to the kiss. She was already wet when Bérénice slipped a hand into her panties. Impatiently she took them off, fell back on the bed, and parted her thighs. Bérénice knelt in front of her and placed her mouth over her pussy. Her stomach quivered with warm spasms, she felt her mind floating in an infinite heaven; she had never imagined pleasure like this could exist.
    Every day until they went back to school, they did it again. First in the afternoon, before they went to the beach; then they would lie side by side in the sunshine. Little by little, Valérie would feel desire mounting in her skin, and she would take off her top so that Bérénice could see her breasts. They would practically run back to the bedroom and make love a second time.

    From their first week back at school, Bérénice began to distance herself from Valérie. She avoided walking back from school with her, and shortly afterward, she started going