Three Women in a Mirror by Éric-Emmanuel Schmitt, Alison Anderson Page A

. . thing swells up and blocks her orifice. At the time, it’s dreadful for the poor bitch—I have heard my Ketty wailing with pain—but five minutes later, she’s fine.”
    â€œOnce my husband had finished, I would stay in bed and not move for two full hours! On my back. Making sure my hips and pelvis were right against the mattress. Long enough for . . . for it to go where it must! You would have had to shout ‘Fire!’ to get me out of bed! Look at the result: six splendid children.”
    â€œHave you tried celery? Parsley? The moment I got engaged I started on a diet of celery and parsley, they encourage gestation. My sisters made fun of me, the youngest one would say ‘Moo’ whenever she saw me, she said I was grazing like a cow . . . I shrugged my shoulders and I was right: four children during the first five years of our marriage. What more could you want? What do my sisters know, after all? Oh, and by the way, Hanna, you must make sure it is wild parsley, and not coriander. As for the celery, it must be the stalks, of course!”
    â€œThe moon! A woman comes into bud during the full moon. Like the forests! Like the fields! Like oysters! There are certain nights when it is pointless to wear yourself out; you must make the most of the full moon. Why should we be any less influenced than the tides, which are governed by the moon? That would be nonsense! Here, you never know, this lunar calendar might come in handy. Oh, you’ve seen it . . . but do you consult it regularly?”
    â€œI know this is none of my business, Hanna, but I brought you some amber. The savages in America and Siberia use it for other purposes, not only cosmetic. Naturally I’m too good a Catholic to subscribe to such superstition . . . However, my mother gave me amber the night before my wedding, and then I passed it on to my daughters, and we all have felt the better for it! Please accept this gift, I would be so delighted. You’ll see, it’s simple, just touch it and sniff it in the evening before you go to bed.”
    Dear Gretchen, need I tell you anything more?
    In a short while Franz will come back from his club, we will have dinner just the two of us, and he will desire me. Imagine what is going on inside my head: I have more chores to see to than a general leading his troops into battle! I am supposed to eat a bowl of parsley soup and some celery gratin, then check on the moon, and go fiddling with this amber without him noticing, then I have to make him fall asleep on top of me without withdrawing, and when he does move to one side I have to stay with my pelvis flat against the mattress. Oh yes, I was about to forget: and during all this high-wire act, I’m supposed to relax and think only of myself and try to attain ecstasy!
    The end result is that all I want to do is run away. Even though I adore Franz, I would almost rather avoid him. I did not know that in marrying him I was also marrying all these women who swarm around him and conspire to make me just like them. They will harass me until I give in to them. Yes, I did not know that by becoming his wife I would be espousing a condition that fills me with horror.
    I hold you tight, my Gretchen, and now I shall run off to weep in the music room until Franz returns.
    Â 
    Your Hanna

6
    At the medical center in Beverly Hills, the sun was shining through two sets of Venetian blinds, the real ones hanging in the window, and their shadow on the wall.
    When at last she regained consciousness, lulled by tranquilizers in a state between sleep and wakefulness, Anny fastened onto these two elements. Her body was drowsy with anesthesia and her mind was confused, so she clung to the light as though it were the only solid, tangible substance on earth; if she concentrated, she could become one of the motes of dust dancing in the gilded beam that slanted across the room, connecting the material blinds to the projected ones. Where did she