The Incorrigible Optimists Club Read Online Free PDF

father Marcusot, who would get them ready; he piled up his tray with a jumble of plates, glassesand bottles, he served without spilling a drop, he worked out the sums in his head from memory without making any mistakes, and all with a smile and attentiveness that earned him generous tips. Jacky had only one passion in life: football. A dedicated supporter of Stade de Reims, he vowed undying hatred for Racing Club de Paris, which was a ‘queers’ club’, the ultimate insult. The world was arranged around this confrontation. You were either for one side or the other. And it did not do to talk lightly about his heroes: Fontaine, Piantoni, and Kopa, whom he did not easily forgive for his ‘treachery’ in leaving for Real Madrid. When they lost against Racing or Real Madrid, it was a day of mourning, and no one could revive him, not even the Racing supporters, who were the most numerous. Samy shared this passion for Stade de Reims with his pal Jacky. It was in honour of their strip that he played with the red team at baby-foot. When he won comfortably, he never said a word to the loser; he merely picked up the twenty centimes piece placed in the ashtray by those who were awaiting their turn and inserted it disdainfully in the slot to bring back the balls. When he had been hard pressed, and obliged to make an effort to win, he marked his victory with a cry of ‘Reims has screwed you!’
    The Balto was a vast establishment on the corner of two boulevards. On avenue Denfert-Rochereau, the side with the bar and tobacco counter, there were the baby-foot tables, the pinball machines and the juke-box, and on the boulevard Raspail side there was a restaurant that seated sixty customers. Between the furthest tables, I had noticed a door behind a green velvet curtain. Men of a certain age would disappear through this doorway, but I didn’t see anyone come out again. This intrigued me. I often wondered what was behind it. It never occurred to me to go and look. None of my baby-foot chums knew. It didn’t interest them. For a long time I didn’t bother about it. When it was crowded and I had to wait a long time, I took a book and, without buying a drink, I would sit at a table outside in the sun. Jacky left me alone. He had seen my disappointment when Reims had been beaten in the final by Real. Ever since then, he no longer thought of me as a customer.
    The Balto, in those days, with the Marcusots, Nicolas, Samy, Jacky and the regulars, was like a second family. I spent an incredible amount of timethere, but I had to be home before my mother returned from work. Every evening I got back just before seven o’clock, and spread out my textbooks and exercise books on my desk. When she returned home with my father, she found me working. Woe betide me if she should get back first and not find me there. When it happened, I managed to reassure her by swearing that I had been working at Nicolas’s home. I lied with an audacity that delighted me.

    I carried my Brownie around with me and practised taking photographs. The results were poor. People were lost in the background or stood there like dummies. You could not see their faces. My photographs didn’t portray anything. I drew closer to the subjects. Occasionally, I succeeded in capturing an expression or a feeling. How to take photos without being seen? I had to cope with an unexpected enemy: Juliette, my little sister, who was three years younger than me. She didn’t have to choose which side she was on. She was a Delaunay to her fingertips. She was very much aware of her looks, and her cupboards were stuffed with clothes, though she maintained that she had nothing to wear and she spent her time asking what she should put on when she went out. With her ingenuous air, she obtained whatever she wanted from my parents. But her innocent, artless countenance was merely a façade. My mother, who had complete trust in her, would often ask her whether