Crying like (a) Madeleine

 
By Céleste Peters
(started may 2022-) 
Warning to the reader.

This book contains descriptions of sexual assault,

child abuse, self-harm, suicide, and mental illness.
 Foreword

I was never supposed to write this book. Never, if,

of course, my history teacher, Mr. Brugmans, had
not asked me to do so. This book is, in fact, the fruit
of a school assignment carried out when I was in
fifth secondary at the Léonie de Waha school. The
task was simple: write a notebook about a person
born in the nineteenth and having lived in the
twentieth century. We had the choice of the gender
of the person, their skin color, their country, their
year of birth, their class, their political positions and
so on. I had several ideas but it was a white French
woman born in 1892 of bourgeois background with
a leftist leaning who finally emanated from my pen.
I must admit, however, that the book you are
holding in your hands at the moment is absolutely
not the same notebook that I returned to my teacher
one day in May 2022. Far from it, although this
book was mostly inspired, it's not the final version
and I'm very happy about it. I still don't understand
how my teacher gave me an 'A'. Reading it again, I
could only point out the grammatical errors,
punctuation errors, and gibberish that I had written.
However, my mom reassured me and told me that
my notebook was quite remarkable and that it was
not a few spelling mistakes that were going to
change the situation. I still wasn't sure if she was
saying that because she meant it or if it was because
she was my mom. So I had several people close to
me read it – some asked me without my asking
them, and their responses to my book inspired me to
improve it and make a book out of it.
For an inspiring history teacher, a reassuring mum,
an encouraging dad and fellow students who will
probably never read it to upset me.
 Prologue

January 11, 1957

My Mum had trouble giving birth, that's what she

told me much later. When I was born, my parents
were delighted. Of course, a boy would have been
better. They were still happy to have me, I never
stopped smiling. My smile was contagious, they
said. When Mother was crying, I remember going to
her and smiling at her. She smiled back at me as she
wiped away her tears. Many things have changed
over time. Now I don't smile anymore.

I don't have much but I have this notebook. This

notebook that I have carried with me for more than
fifty years. This notebook, I bequeath it to you. I
don't want the thoughts and memories I wrote there
to go with me. Because yes, Maurice, I will leave. I
will join them. All.
You have just arrived dear friend, and you see me
sorry for abandoning you in this way. I hope that
somewhere within you you will find the strength to
forgive me. However, after the revelations you
shared with me last night, I cannot, in good
conscience, continue to live. I've been planning to
leave for a while now, so you're not my reason for
leaving, just know that. I see you more as a
deliverance.
I would have liked so much to know you a little
more, according to him, you were one of the best
things that ever happened to him. In the letters he
wrote to me, your name was often mentioned,
almost always, I must admit. Oh how I would have
loved to give them to you. If only I still had them, if
only I had hidden them better, if only my husband
hadn't burned them. . . I wish you had read them to
see how much he loved you. So tenderly. So deeply.