Portrait : Fallen Santa

« Are they still here ? » he shyly enquires. Standing ten meters away from his usual spot, half-hidden behind a wall, Jean glances nervously at the RATP agents. They are stopping passengers to verify their tickets on the very spot where Jean stands all year long to beg, in the corridor between line 3 and 4 at the Réaumur-Sébastopol station. « It’s the third day in a row they’re here », he adds, slowly shaking his head, resignedly putting his shoulders back against the wall. Even tough it is obvious by the look on his face, he will not dare say aloud that this disruption of his routine upsets him. His movements are slow, his words scarce. Head bowed, his chin on his chest, his eyes cast downward, he holds a piece of cardboard. Just one word, neatly written in block letters : “Merci”. He seems oblivious of the flow of people passing by. With his white beard, round belly and the worn red coat he always wears, he looks like a fallen Santa.

A young woman in a suit approaches, smiling as she comes closer. He raises his head and stretches out a lightly shaking hand she kindly takes in both hers. “Good morning, how are you today? The agents keep bothering you, don’t they?”, she inquires, slipping a coin in his hands. A shy smile wrinkles his face, his eyes meet hers for no more than a few seconds, his voice is a whisper : “I’m fine, thank you. Have a good day miss”. “He is so nice and polite, he reminds me of my grand father, the young woman explains, it breaks my heart to see him here. You can tell that he is ashamed of having to beg. I don’t know his story, he is really shy. I stop by every day on my way to work, sometimes to give him something, sometimes just to exchange a few words.”

Jean won’t tell his age, but he seems to be around sixty. Twenty years in the streets have made him hard to win over. He does not complain, leaving to guess what his life is through his silences, or what he doesn’t tell, more than through his words. His routine is what keeps him going. “The shelter closes at a quarter to six, just around the time the metro opens, he explains. If I have any money left from the day before, I have a coffee in a bar. But I don’t linger. The best hours are when people go to work.” He does not acknowledge it plainly, but Jean never has lunch, preferring to save money in case the shelter is too packed and he has to find a hotel. Managing to sleep in a bed and have a shower every day are his unspoken pride. “I prefer not eat much but sleep in a bed”, he admits. With few words, he infers that sleeping in the streets is too dangerous for a man of his age. “The young regroup, they have dogs. I’m not very strong...” he confesses. But shelters are sometimes not much better. “You are supposed not to drink to be allowed to sleep here, but they manage to sneak bottles inside.” “I don’t drink” he adds, a glint of pride in his eyes. He doesn’t want to tell what led him here, but a few pieces of the puzzle slip through as he speaks. The death of a teenage girl, a broken marriage, the loss of his job. An ex-wife and an other daughter, somewhere. “I try not to think of my old life. You have to go on.”

Finding out that the RATP agents have finally left, he goes and takes his favourite spot. “I don’t blame people for not paying attention to me, he says. When I stand here, I myself try to forget about them and think of anything but what I am actually doing.” “Beg” is a word he will never utter. “Some are actually very nice, they say ‘hello’, even when they don’t have money to give, or they bring me something to eat when they are afraid I would spend the money on wine. I would never, but I don’t blame them for thinking that, stereotypes are sometimes founded. This one is”, he simply states.

It is around ten, the number of people is now scarce. “Time to go”, he says as he leaves, “thank you for the conversation.” Jean will be back at his spot around five, as the crowd fills the metro on its way home. What he does during the day, like many aspects of his life, past and present, remains a mystery.