GERMAIMAINE

A few years ago, back when the BX was still on the road, I’d worked all summer at Monoprix so that, when term started, I could treat myself to a membership at a Gymnase Club near Mouton-Duvernet station, in Paris’s 14th arrondissement. I was thrilled: I’d be able to build a body like Jeannie Longo’s, a six-pack like Bruce Lee’s and shoulders like the Terminator’s. At the time, I was enrolled at the Sorbonne, studying modern and ancient literature. In reality, I spent my time at the cinema on Rue des Écoles or in bookshops devoted to the seventh art, drooling over the bound Cahiers du cinéma, reissued in encyclopedic form.

When I’d finished, I’d dash off to the gym to pump iron and watch myself in the mirror, admiring how clearly each of my muscles was taking shape. Then I’d head to the hammam, followed by kung fu classes, because from a very young age I knew I had to defend myself against the alpha male, the one who thinks he can do whatever he likes: the Polanski, the Bruel, the Darmanin. I loved launching myself into the air and throwing high kicks, imagining I was dishing them out to those who sometimes made our lives so complicated. And when I reckoned I’d sweated the equivalent of a champagne bucket’s worth, I’d go shower and then head to visit my boyfriend at the time.

I'd met him through mutual friends from high school. He went to François-Villon, a school near Porte de Vanves. Unlike most of the kids who attended that school, he was quiet and never showed off. He kept a low profile in every situation, but he knew how to fight, and had proved it when he stood up to a young Roma man who wouldn't take no for an answer and kept trying to date me, swiftly knocking him to the ground. This boyfriend of mine was called Anatol. I adored his long chestnut fringe and his brown eyes, worthy of a beach boy in Saint-Tropez.

He came from a very modest single-parent family. They lived in a tower block near Pernety metro station. Despite having very little money, they invited me over for dinner every single evening. His mother insisted on it. And I must say, she was incredibly welcoming. She adored me, or so she said.
As you've probably guessed, this remarkable woman was called Germaine. And because she couldn't stand her name, she asked those closest to her to call her Germaimaine instead. I happily obliged, as I found it hilarious.

Germaimaine was a tall blonde woman with short hair, a sort of Jean Seberg meets the Little Mermaid, who smoked cigarettes as enthusiastically as she knocked back cheap whisky from the local Félix Potin.
And when she was as thoroughly buttered as a kouign-amann, she became wonderfully affectionate and outrageously funny, firing off affectionate little verbal missiles at anyone who crossed her path.
She would often wrap me in her arms and squeeze me until I could barely breathe, telling me I was her favourite and that if her darling Anatol ever had the terrible idea of straying, she'd personally see to it that he was castrated. With her own teeth.