I am Luc of the Street

Fighting for My Life

Got the union behind me now. They’re putting pressure on the brass to put up or shut up: bring a case against me, or drop the charges. Enough of this bullshit.

I’m stoked. My whole body’s vibrating. I haven’t felt this good in a long time. No matter what the outcome, I’m not going down without a fight.

It feels good to stretch my fighting muscles. For too long I’ve stood passively on the outside looking in at the world. I let them shut me out, make me a nothing, their shadow. I holed up and licked my wounds—poor little Luc, little homeless bum; nobody loves him. Like I said before: enough of this bullshit. My bullshit.

Guess I’m the dope who’s the last to know I'm stigmatized by my life on the streets. I never thought I was; I’ve always crowed about those days—how I survived, how tough it made me. I wore it like a badge of honor. But deep inside, Little Luc has been gnawing on a bone of contention: he feels shame.

I'm ashamed of my past.

That’s a kick in the head, huh? But yeah, as a street rat I longed to be loved and accepted by the People. When they rejected me, I guess I rejected myself, shamed myself—same as I did when I got suspended. It makes sense now. It all makes sense.

I thought I learned to get on without the People, told myself I didn’t need them. But I do.

Now this scrappy homeless kid is gonna come out of his hole and fight for himself. Like I did when I was on the street, I’m gonna fight for my life—but this time, it’s not for a scrap of turf; it’s for my rightful place in the great big world.

No Rest for the Wicked

"Give it a rest," Henri told me today. "You'll kill yourself if you keep at it like this." He was referring to my relentless search for the killer. But I can't rest now. I have to keep searching, even without my badge. If I can get a good lead, catch a break, maybe I can get my badge back.

Truth is, I don't know how to rest, never have. That's what the streets of Paris did to me. On the street, rest equals death, and restlessness is in my DNA. I don't sleep more than a few hours at a time; never sit still for long. Even when I am sitting still, my mind is working; my eyes are watching. It's how the streets formed me: wiry and ready.

"Sit. Relax," Henri said, pouring me a whisky. Relax? Just the sound of the word makes me angry. How can I relax when there is so much to do? Is the killer relaxing? The families of his victims?

The police shrink says my restlessness is related to my inability to make peace with my past. She says I haven’t forgiven myself, or some such crap. I dunno, maybe she’s right. I did do some pretty bad things, I suppose, in the name of survival. I have to live with that, but I don’t know if I’ll ever really be at peace with it, or even deserve to be.

Like the killer. He shouldn’t be allowed to rest, either. Even if I have to run myself into the ground. No rest for the wicked.

My Mother's Son

You know the story of my sad childhood by now. My mom was a prostitute. A john cut her up and I found her. I was maybe three, or four. I don’t remember much about that day, but I can still see her tiny hand hanging over the edge of the bed. Cold and blue. There’s some part of my brain permanently transfixed on that tiny blue hand.

After that, the streets of Montmartre became my mother. While most kids sat on their flesh-and-blood mothers’ laps, I cozied up to the steps of Rue Mont Cenis. Those streets nurtured me, taught me all I know about life. Made me the man I am today. Like any good mother should.

Sometimes, though, I try to remember my real mother. Not her shape and form, but the feeling of belonging; the sensation of clinging to someone. The safeness; the closeness. It takes work, real focus, but if I let myself drift into that state between wakefulness and dream, I can almost sense her. It is a rare moment of bliss, of peace. Followed immediately by dread and rage, loss and pain.

There’s a reason I prefer my memories of the street. The street is eternal. It can’t leave you. You can control it, make it stay with you. It doesn’t get sick, it doesn’t weaken, never dies. The street is the constant mother my fickle mortal mother could never be.

Still, what have I missed, who would I have been, if I had had my mother all these years? I may have been softer, more patient, more loving. Maybe had a family by now. I might have been a better man instead of the antisocial miscreant I have become. But then, my mom wasn’t exactly a law-abiding model citizen herself. Maybe I am my mother’s son after all.

My friend Henri has said many times it’s no accident I'm a homicide detective. He says I’m subconsciously trying to avenge my mother’s murder. Maybe that’s so, but given the choice, I’d find a swifter, more effective way to get even with the man who robbed me of the most important woman in my life. And before you judge me, search your soul and ask yourself, if you could save your mother’s life, wouldn’t you do anything? Pay any price? Wouldn’t you?

A Warm Gift

Paris is suspended in icy cold. Endlessly trapped. I haven't felt relentless cold like this since I was a boy.

They called that winter the worst in years, and we lost one of our little tribe to pneumonia that year. You can tough out a few days of cold, but weeks on end? Only the strongest survive.

This winter shows signs of being the same as that one. By now, you know how cold and snow make me itchy, anxious. Maybe I can't rest because I know there are kids out there, my kids, the ones who call me "Papa Lion," and expect me to look after them. In the warmer months, it's easy to keep track of them, but in cold like this, they're hidden away. There are twelve kids I know of, so I better get looking, get them to a warm, safe place. Sure, there are more out there I don't know, who I may never find, but I'm only one man. I can only do what I can do.

What can you do? This is the season for giving, yeah? Wasn't baby Jesus out in the cold on Christmas, too? Think of the cold babies out there right now and give the gift of warmth.

The Rookie

In the DRPJ, you’re considered a rookie until you serve five years. Five. Maybe, if you take a bullet before that, they’ll give you a Get Out of Rookie Status Early Pass. Me, I was never considered a rookie because I served my time on the streets. I would have liked a rookie period; it might have taken the pressure off, given me a chance to ask questions, make a few mistakes. But I had more experience with crime and violence than guys with ten years on the force, so they threw me in the deep end and said, "Walk on water."

I was slated for the BRI right out of the academy, but I balked. I wanted to get my feet wet first, in vice. And let's face it: there's nothing worse than some snip of a kid zooming up the ladder past guys working their asses off for years. I wanted to make friends on the force, you know? I had to pay my dues.

Fifi is still a rookie. He was put on the fast track, too, because he has friends in high places. But he doesn't want to pay his dues, doesn't care if he makes friends; his ambition is all. He struts around like he owns the place and would never admit to what he doesn't know.

I feel sorry for him.

When I look at Fifi, I see a scared man under extreme pressure. His father was Jacques Poliveau, Internal Affairs, and it's clear Fifi's course is being charted for him. Including a stint with me. But he hasn't been put on my team to learn; he's been put here to shine—shine, or else. That's too bad. If they'd let Fifi be the rookie he is, he'd end up twice the cop—and liked by his peers. Instead, he wraps himself in an arrogant, uptight, know-it-all shell while he goes it alone. I know what it's like to go it alone, which is why I feel sorry for him.

Being a rookie is hard enough, not being allowed to be one is much harder.

Born in a Garden

Bruno used to joke that the seeds of my career were sewn in a garden. It’s true, in fact. My first case—as an apprentice before the Academy—involved Le Jardin des Plantes.

It was 21 April 1978. I know the exact date because it was the day after Bruno arrested me for swiping money from a table at one of the little tourist traps in Place du Tertre—which was the same day he took me off the streets. You don't forget the moment that changed your life.

I was just a pup, and Bruno had brought me home to live with him and his family. He neglected to run the plan by his wife, Matilde. As she examined the filthy street tough in her living room, the look in her eyes said it all: shock, terror, disgust, rage—but duly restrained, as her lady’s breeding dictated, and offset by a tight smile of forced politeness. That smile was wasted on me. I felt much more welcomed by her eyes, which mirrored my sentiments exactly. What the hell was I doing there?

But while I passed the night in foreign territory, in the morning when Bruno and I stood over the body of a man in front of the Hotel de France near Gare de Lyon, I felt I'd come home. Blood and death? Now that I could understand.

It was still dark, about 5:45 a.m., and there was a small group assembled at the scene by the time Bruno and I got there. Bruno was the lead investigator. He presented me as his protege, and let me have first crack at it. I didn't understand how monumental this moment was, but Bruno knew; he stood beaming at me. "Go to it," he said, giving me a nudge. Go to it, as if I already knew what I was doing.

I remember it perfectly: the body was face down but twisted, with one arm tucked underneath and one across his back. His legs were flopped every which way. He'd been stabbed, but there wasn't as much blood as you'd expect. I had seen boys stabbed before and blood usually gushed everywhere, even from small wounds. I wanted to touch the body right away, but Bruno coached me to observe first—to consider the victim's expression, the way he was lying, his age, mode of dress, etc. "You know how to read people, Luc. A dead man can tell you as much as a living one, if you know what questions to ask."

Bruno had me call out every detail as I noticed it, then encouraged me to ask the victim questions. "Where's your blood?" I asked the corpse. "Why is there fresh mud on your clothes, but dry dirt under your fingernails?" There were other odd things, too. For example, there was a trail of blood from the body to the curb, but the trail grew weaker as it neared the body. And there were two distinct sets of footprints in the blood, but they went toward the body, not away in escape.

It felt incredible, this exploration; every one of my senses was cranked up. I gave over to it completely, my mind filling with questions and a deep desire to know. Bruno just stood there, smiling. He understood I was meant for this work, that my life on the streets had prepared me for it—and I was validating him. At one point, I sniffed at the mud on the victim's clothes then followed the trail of blood, like a hound, to the curb. I didn't know why I was doing this; it was the need to know driving me. Sure enough, the same mud was curbside, too. It was fresh and earthy, a rare thing in the middle of this neighborhood. I lived on the streets and knew my dirt—the Champs de Mars smelled like rock; the parks along the Seine: piss; the cemeteries: moss and mold. There were only a few places in Paris where the earth smelled fresh: les bois and les jardins. 

What was this mud doing here on Rue de Lyon and why this strange, bloodless corpse? I had all these pieces; now, I just had to put them together. It occurred to me, if I could ask a dead man questions, why not an invisible one—the killer?

"I know," I said.

I told them the lack of blood meant the victim was killed somewhere else and transported to the hotel site. I pointed out the fresh muddy tire marks. "It's the same mud that's on the dead guy." The body had been wrapped in something then carried from the vehicle and spun out of its wrapper onto the pavement. I pantomimed the act. "Comme ça." It explained the twisted condition of the body. It was a hasty job, bold but sloppy. "Someone is making a point," I said. I'd seen it before.

Bruno was so proud, he looked like he might pop.

The other cops just smiled politely. They were all seasoned, and had quickly assessed the same thing. But now, I was game to impress, so I told them I knew where the murder took place. "The mud," I said. "I know where it came from."

At that, even Bruno's eyes bugged out.

I didn't really know exactly, but I'd stuck my neck out, so I quickly ran through the short list of places with real earth, somewhere you could access with a vehicle. Bois de Boulogne? Too far, I thought. Bois de Vincennes? Maybe. Then I thought of the Jardin des Plantes. It was just across the river. I don't know why I felt the place had to be close; there was no real reason. It was just a lucky guess. Or fate.

When we arrived at the Jardins, we found the scene of a struggle in a garden bed, dirt and mud kicked up everywhere. No attempt was made to hide the crime. This was a heated act. A tarp had been pulled off a nearby bed; we could still see its imprint in the damp soil. This was used to wrap the body, which accounted for the mud on the victim's clothes. There were muddy tire marks leading out of the site in the direction of Pont d'Austerlitz and Gare de Lyon. Turned out, the murderer used the victim's own truck to transport him.

The interview with the hotel staff led to a female tenant who knew the victim. She told us the tale of two men—one, her ex-boyfriend from Rouen, and the other, her new lover, a horticulturalist at the Jardin, which explained the dry dirt under his nails. Jealousy, passion—et voilà—my first murder case. 

Word of my auspicious debut traveled through the force on wings. Soon, everyone started to take me on their cases. By the time I entered the Academy, I'd logged in more hard hours than some of my instructors. Those were some of my most cherished months, the only time I would work with Bruno, side by side.

My life started in the gutter; my career, in a garden. Seems I’m formed from the very dirt of Paris.

The People

France belongs to the people. We're a republic, a body united, tous pour un, un pour tous. That is, unless you're a sixteen-year-old homeless kid. Then, you're on your own.

"The People" doesn't apply to you when you grow up outside the system. There's no net the People cast to draw the stragglers to their bosom. Stragglers are unsightly, so much debris to be swept outside the inner circle. Just ask someone who lives on the wrong side of the city's péripherique.

A child on the street is a shock to the delicate sensibilities of the People. He doesn't inspire sympathy, he creates shame. No one wants to be shamed on the way to the market.

The People looked past me. I was a defect, an ugly scar. It was a good day when I was shooed away; at least they acknowledged my existence. After a while, I started to turn on the People. If they were going to put me on the outside, I was going to hack my way back in.

Even now, after having been off the streets for two-thirds of my life, I still find it hard to bond with the People. I've never found the same oneness I had with my street brothers. I crave that. But there's something that keeps me from being one with the People, something that still separates me, like a man cut off by the ring road.

Danger of Death

When I lived on the street, we used to hang around the train yards near Rue Riquet and Rue Ordener. There were a lot of good spots for camping out, little abandoned huts and substations that were warm in the winter. My best friend and I would watch the trains come and go, and he would tell me about all the places we'd visit together on those trains. "You and me, Lulu," he'd say. "One day." One day never came because one day he disappeared and left me on my own to look after our little tribe. Maybe he got on one of those trains without me. Maybe he's far away now, living a better life. Or maybe, he's long dead.

Today, on the way to see someone in the projects in the north of the city, I crossed over those train yards on Rue Riquet. I paused a moment on the overpass and watched the TGV trains easing out of the yard, off to faraway destinations. I thought of him, of those days. As I stood there dreaming, my eyes fell on an old enamel sign screwed to the fencing: DO NOT TOUCH THE ELECTRICAL WIRE. DANGER OF DEATH. A funny expression to be sure. Danger of Death. I looked up at the projects in the distance. Death isn't the problem. It's life that's a danger. 

My mind went again to a memory of us boys huddled together in the train yard during one of the worst winters in decades. One of us would die that winter. That's the danger of life on the street. Tant pis. I chose that life and I don't regret it. My best friend chose it, too, eyes wide. He seemed to thrive on the danger of death. He egged it on all the time. That's why I think he's probably dead now. But I'm sure when he saw it coming, he smiled and threw his arms open. He was incredible like that.

It's useless to fear death. It comes and there's nothing you can do about it. Sooner or later, it comes. Me, I made my peace with death long before I left adolescence behind. It's life I still tussle with.

 

Absence

There's a song by a pretty-boy pop singer that's called, "Par Absence." It goes something like, "If I bleed, if I ache, it is no doubt from the absence of love." Sans doubt par absence d'amour. He's always singing about loneliness and longing, that guy. Sure complains a lot for someone with a pretty young wife. He should walk a while in my shoes. Frigging pop stars—what do they know of suffering?

I've bled. I've ached. For real. And I'm no stranger to absence. Since the beginning, I've suffered from it: absence of my mother; absence of a home; absence of my best friend on the street who ditched me after six years together. And now, absence of my boy.

You'd think, by now, I would be used to absence; that it would be no more painful than a dull toothache. But the thing about a hole is that once it's filled, you forget there ever was a hole. When someone fills the hole in your life, you get used to it pretty quick and it's all you know until they leave you. And when they leave, they don't void the old hole; they rip a fresh one. The pain gets somehow sharper each time.

I've got a lot of holes by now. I fill them with work. And drink, I suppose. Sex. Cigarette smoke, for sure. And football. Football always helps. Maybe I should go outside and kick a ball around. Except the problem is, I got used to doing that with Jean-Paul and now he's gone. See there, I just ripped myself a new hole.

On Loan

I've been loaned out. Since there's nothing to do in my new department, they're loaning me out to my old one. Funny, huh? I would have thought they were rethinking my promotion but they let me take Haddad with me. That was the condition I gave. As security. I figure they wouldn't let Moudie go if they were just trying to get rid of me. Anyway, the upside is that now I have a murder case. Three, in fact. You gotta love a good turf war.

It's good to be back in my old squad, like coming home. I didn't even realize how homesick I was until I saw my old colleagues again—or I should say, my brothers. My family. I say "family" because for me, family is anyone who's earned my devotion. Other than a short stint with my ill-fated mother, I never had any blood relatives to speak of, so I've always had to borrow family from others. Like Jean Paul and Henri. Like the boys I lived with on the street. And of course, Bruno. I wouldn't trade in any of them for blood kin. Ever.

When you're an old street kid like me, you're used to things being on loan, and you don't complain. I learned young how to get by with things borrowed—or stolen, if necessary. I take what I need anyway it comes and suck it dry. I'm not greedy; I've gone without and I don't fear going without again. I'm just grateful for whatever I have in my life. For as long as I'm allowed to have it.

Scars

Today, when I was walking around the apartment shirtless, my scarred torso caught Jean-Paul’s eye. “Where did you get that?” he asked, pointing to my belly where a bullet had to be cut out. “And that?” Another bullet from the same day, near my shoulder. “What about THAT?" Jean-Paul saved the best for last: a long, horizontal scar across my neck. I was wondering when he'd get around to asking about it. “Oh, that,” I said as casually as I could. “I just sort of ran into something.” I ran into something, alright. A wire—strung between the hands of an assassin. That was back when I was in vice. Pas grave. No big deal. I survived. Now I have a permanent reminder to watch my back.

There are other scars, too. Like the one between my shoulder blades, long since tattooed over. Three letters: B-R-I, the initials of a special unit I was once in, carved into my skin by my fellow officers. They held me down and did it to me. I thought it was some kind of sick hazing until they each showed me theirs—one guy had it on his chest, another on his arm, and so on. That’s when I knew I was in, I was accepted. Funny how they put mine where I could never see it, could even forget about it. But some scars you never forget, especially the ones you can’t see.

Like the ones carved into JP's screwed up little mind. I have those, too. We’re screwed up together. I guess that’s why we found each other, why we stick together. You might think the street did that to us, but the truth is, we were scarred long before we ran away to the streets, at least on the inside. The physical scars come later when you try to avenge the mental ones.

The Dead of August

Henri reminded me that he was taking off for the seaside with his wife and kids, and that Girard’s Bar Tabac will be shut until the end of the month. I was not happy about it. I hate August when all of Paris goes on vacation. Life stops. What about those who have to stay behind? What happens to us? How are we supposed to live?

August to me is like a kind of death. When I was on the street, August was the worst time. Everything slowed down and the usual human activity that sustained us gutter rats would dwindle to nothing. Like Lagache’s Grocerette—a place I frequented with my sticky fingers—would close for the whole month. We lived on the food I used to swipe from that old guy, but no shop meant no food. It would get worse and worse as the month wore on and we would be forced to move further down into the city—into the 8th and the Champs-Elysées—where there were at least some tourists. The problem was, that area was also crawling with cops. And unlike the cops in Montmartre who knew us and would often look the other way, these guys loved to round us up in their little wagons. You had to be really desperate and hungry to take chances in that neighborhood, and by the end of August, we were.

Salvation only came with the rentrée in September, when everyone returned to Paris for the new school year. Our lives would improve immediately. Girard’s Bar Tabac would open up again and Henri’s papa would feed me regular. The hunger of August would be gone at last.

Yeah, I suppose I know why I hate August. All these years later, a part of me still feels the dread, the abandonment. Still feels hungry.

On Being A Father

First, let me say, I'm terrible at it. Being a father. What do I know about it? I never had a father, a real father. And my mom died when I was still very small. I suppose the closest thing I had to a parent was Bruno de Lappe, that old cop who took me in, and Henri's father. But if I were to say there was one man who was the truest thing to a papa, I'd have to give that to Bruno. I miss him so much every day. He was still sort of young when he died, about 57. I barely had 15 years with him, but his impact on my life—and my work—is immeasurable. I hear him talking to me all the time, calling me "kid" like he used to. "Take your time, kid." "Do the work, kid."

Now that Jean-Paul is back with me, and I'm searching for the right words to turn that boy around, Bruno is in my head more than ever—especially, our first conversation on that fateful day we met. The day he arrested me. The day that changed my life.

At that time I'd been on the street nearly eight or nine years but I was still only 17 or so. “What do you want for your life, kid?" I remember he asked as he typed up my arrest report. "Don't you have any dreams beyond life on the street?" I honestly had no idea what he was talking about. I lived purely in the moment then; I had no sense of the future. My brain was wired for survival not planning or hoping. And dreaming—was this guy nuts?

Back then I thought he was just mocking me, torturing me; I remember how the click-clack of the old typewriter was driving me mad. Now, of course, I understand he was reaching out, and during the hours that followed, he would work my mind over and eventually break me down. Like only a good cop can.

Bruno was better at it than me. I still haven't found the tipping point with JP. How do I get him off the streets for good? When I talk to him he just stares blankly. Even when I try some of the same lines Bruno used on me. Maybe JP isn't as smart as I was. Or maybe, because he knows I'm always here like a stupid safety net, he doesn't feel compelled to make up his mind. Me, I had no choice, really. Bruno phrased it like a choice, made it seem like it was completely up to me, but honestly, if you had to choose between apprenticing as a cop or being locked up, which would you pick?

“Listen, kid,” Bruno said, “I’m offering you a chance to change your life.” Those words run over and over in my head as I look at JP, sitting right now on the balcony off the living room. A chance to change your life. How do you get a kid to understand that his life needs changing when he's happy with it just as it is? How do you convince a 17-year-old that he should be concerned about a future that doesn't exist?

Bruno, I wish you could whisper the words in my ear because I'm about to walk out onto that balcony and give it another shot.

Finding Old Ghosts in the Cemetery

Jean-Paul was seen hanging around Montmartre Cemetery today. I headed over there as fast as I could, but I knew he would be gone before I was anywhere near the place. Still, the father’s heart in me held out hope.

It’s not a really big cemetery, not like Père Lachaise, so it didn’t take long for me to make a full search. The only living people I found were the man at the guard station and a pretty woman taking photos. She smiled at me. At least I think she did. If I had been in a better mood, I might have chatted her up. Yeah, maybe.

Instead, I wandered silently around the old sepulchres. Soon, ghosts from my past started to take shape. I didn’t want to see them; they just came—the boys I lived with, the little tribe. This cemetery was one of our places back then; we used to sleep inside the sepulchres to keep warm. Well, the ones with doors we could open. There was one in particular that was mine and his. He was the chief of our tribe and my whole world. He looked out for me, taught me how to survive the streets. We were inseparable. Fiercely devoted comrades. I haven’t felt a bond like that since then, except maybe when I was in the BRI. One day he disappeared just like that, and then I was the chief. Just like that. I didn’t like being chief then, either.

Being in the cemetery today brought it all back—the good and the bad. The loss. I imagine they’re all dead now, those boys I lived with. Ghosts for real. I had Bruno to save my ass; who did they have? Nobody. Not even me because I got arrested and Bruno pulled me off the street for good. Some chief I was. I let them down.

But I won’t let Jean-Paul down. I can't. Can't let him die in the street like a dog. If he would just come home to stay, let me take care of him like Bruno did for me, he would see how much better it could be. I have to find him. I have to. T ou, mon fils ? Don’t you disappear on me, too!

Taking Leave (of My Senses)

I just had two days leave. It was the Bastille Day weekend so I should have been pleased that I didn't have to do patrol, but the timing is bad; I just started my new position. My chief insisted I take it. Said I looked tired. Maybe they just wanted time to reconsider my promotion.

I don’t know, maybe I was tired. I slept straight through the night, which is unlike me, so yeah, I suppose I was. It was a heavy sleep filled with tedious dreams. In one, I was trying to get to my new department but kept losing my way over and over. It grinded on endlessly, and I woke up wanting to scream.

So I got in my car and drove.

I don’t know where I was going but I just headed south—through the city, then out of the city, then out of the area. I got on the Autoroute du Soleil and kept on driving. It was like a crazy itch. Get me out! Out of what or where exactly, I don’t know, but I kept on. I drove nearly three hours then somewhere near Beaune, I finally stopped myself. Where was I going anyway?

Back in Paris, my insides quiet again, it's clear now where I was headed: Marseille.

Marseille was the place I ran last time I was at a crossroads. That was a long time ago; I was maybe 25. It was a bad time, much worse than now. There was an ambush on my squad, but I don’t want to talk about that now. The point is, I got three weeks mandatory leave. My mentor, Bruno, arranged a place in Marseille through a friend, said the sea would do me good. I had never seen the sea before; never been out of Paris. I didn’t want to go, in fact. It felt strange, like I was being shunned. The mandatory leave, maybe.

I was miserable at first, but then I met a guy—a tattoo artist named Emile—and everything changed. He was a wild spirit like me and we fell into an immediate friendship. I have happy memories of those weeks, and a tattoo across my back as a permanent memento. It took four straight days for Emile to complete it—that needle digging in over and over. I didn’t mind the pain; it was physical and focused, and I could wrap myself around it, work out the deeper pain in my heart. After the tattoo was finished, I felt myself healed. I was all torn up inside and Emile sewed me back together with that needle.

I don’t know why I’m writing about this now, or why I needed Marseille again after all these years. Do I feel torn up? I don’t know. I don’t feel like myself, that much I know. Maybe I need to feel the needle again. The pain. Just so I know I’m still me. I’m still Luc de la Rue.