Trafika Europe 6 - Arabesque

MEN DON’T CRY chapter ii - dounia Translated by Sarah Ardizzone

D uring her teenage years, Dounia had a best friend: Julie Guérin. That was when the troubles began. Julie set in motion the psychological process of my sister ’s ‘ Christine-isation’. Julie was popular with all the boys at the lycée: she was skinny, wore designer clothes and kept a diary. Her parents sent her to summer camp in the Languedoc-Roussillon. Her mum let her go to night-time concerts and pin up posters of an American boy band in her bedroom. I don’t remember the singers’ names, but they were black and bare-chested. Julie also had platform shoes,

a boyfriend, a cat, a bedroom she didn’t share with anybody else, and she got to throw parties in her dad’s garage on her birthday. AsfarasDouniawasconcerned, Julie was living the dream. My sister was mesmerised by this, to the point that she was happy to play the-friend- in-the-shadows, the one who gets told: “Hey! Look after my bag!” I should point out that my sister’s life was the exact opposite of Julie Guérin’s. Dounia wore a brace for the three years she was at the lycée, as well as a pair of glasses. She didn’t know

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