The Day Before Happiness

by Erri De Luca

  • • •

  Don Gaetano came back and we started hanging the lights. On the outside door and on the loge window the blinking lights winked at the holiday. With this Don Gaetano freed himself of the obligation to celebrate the recurrence. He didn’t put up the crèche.

  “The crèche is for persons with children and are teaching them to love the holy story.”

  We did not have nor were we a family.

  Those who had a social position used Christmas to flaunt it. At the loge baskets arrived for them filled with an abundance of things to eat, a feast for the eyes. Those who had nothing dug themselves into debt so they, too, could show off. La Capa took his family to the theater in a taxi. Then he dropped by to talk about it. His wife, a tub, went out in a party dress, but she was still a tub wrapped in a curtain with a lampshade on top. She called the taxi driver scioffè—chauffeur. La Capa was both mortified and proud, so he kept Don Gaetano informed.

  “The other night at the San Carlo opera they were performing ‘o Fallesta’.”

  “Falle sta’ come—Make him stay what? Make him stay quiet?”

  “Don Gaeta’, the opera ‘o Fallesta’.”

  “What do you mean Falle sta’? Make him stay good?”

  “Gnernò, it’s just plain Fallesta’.

  “Why? Didn’t he want to stay?”

  Don Gaetano was scared of La Capa but he didn’t let him get away with anything. La Capa couldn’t manage to say Falstaff.

  “Don Gaetano, I can’t believe with all your schooling, you don’t know the operas of maestro Ver—, Ver—, what’s the guy’s name?”

  “Verme”—Worm?

  “Nun me saccio arricurda’ ’o nome ’e stu maestro—I can’t remember the maestro’s name, Ver, Ver …”

  “Verza”—Cabbage?

  “Gnernò, nun era verza—No, it wasn’t cabbage. To make a long story short, all the best society was there, ’o prefetto, ’o quistore, ’o sinnaco—the prefect, the police chief, the mayor—con tutt’a giubba comunale—with the whole town gowncil.”

  “Ah, he wanted to put it on.”

  “Put what on?”

  “ ’A giubba”—The gown.

  “What gown? Don Gaetano, you’re getting me confused with these details.”

  With La Capa you could never finish a story, he gave up.

  The latest was that his wife had got him to buy her a barboncino (poodle). “Perché fa scicco”—because it’s “sheik”—she had told her husband. They had taken a white one home. La Capa had a consultation with Don Gaetano.

  “What do you say, Don Gaetano, are we doing the right thing to get this Bourbon dog?”

  “You have to call it Ferdinand.”

  “Do you think?”

  “Of course, the Bourbons have to be called Ferdinand. If it’s a Savoia it has to be called Umberto.”

  “No, it’s a Bourbon, through and through.”

  I asked Don Gaetano why a serious and hardworking man like La Capa allowed himself to be made a fool of, and willingly. A man who had known the gravity of misery, now he had a few conveniences and ruined himself by his obsession with passing for a gentleman.

  “For a poor guy with money the first thing is to buy himself a suit. He puts on an expensive fabric and thinks he’s another person. But that’s all money can do, make you seem. La Capa wants to seem and that’s why he stumbles. When he was bent over to get a shoe size no one laughed. They say money doesn’t stink, but it does stink and it makes the people who wear it stink, too.”

  At the beginning of the month come the visits of Signorina Scafarèa, promptly behind in her rent payment. Every day she makes an appearance: “Has the money order arrived?” She is waiting for the remittance from her brother in America. She gets by on that money. With one half she pays the rent and with the other she struggles for a month. She’s as dry as a prune, a garlic breath that could make flies drop. When she finds our window open she never fails to pop her head in with a question, leaving her signature on the air.

  She drops by at lunchtime, she can ruin your appetite. When the money order arrives Don Gaetano rushes to bring it to her.

  • • •

  I see Anna again outside the school. She’s sitting at the cafe across from the gate with her bottle-blond friend. It was a day for lizards to crawl out from under the rocks to console themselves in the sun. After the pounding of the north wind the sirocco was a caress. The cafes had set up the tables outdoors.

  She waved and signaled for me to come over. I was ashamed to stand in front of the two of them like a schoolboy with books under my arm.

  “I think I will take the apartment. One day soon I’ll come by to take the measurements, can you give me a hand?”

  “At your service.” I remained stiff and nothing more came out of me. The other girl mimicked my “at your service” and laughed. She was right, was that any way for me to reply? I wasn’t even expecting Anna, never mind her being so formal with me. I took my leave, embarrassed. As if she’d said “thee,” I thought. A smile at my own expense broke out. There are days devoted to being ridiculous, even without La Capa’s money. Facing the two of them at the cafe I couldn’t put on the veneer of seriousness I had at the loge. Maybe I was ridiculous there, too, without realizing it.

  The meeting had not happened by chance. It must have been Anna who found me, chose the place, and feigned surprise. Did she mean to reassure me that she would come back? I asked deep within myself and heard Anna’s thoughts answering: yes. I ran smack into a man who was standing there.

  “Mind your manners, young man.”

  “Excuse me, I’m sorry, I didn’t see you.”

  “Yeah, right, so now I’ve become invisible?”

  Anna’s laughter came to me from inside.

  Why did she have to pretend? Was she being spied on, was the other girl checking up on her? No answer came.

  Was I also receiving thoughts, like Don Gaetano? Anna’s had come to me and mine had gone to her. I tried again, nothing, the line had dropped.

  Sometimes a move succeeds and you don’t know how. Try it again, it doesn’t come.

  Things happen to me by mistake. I tried to reconstruct the circumstances: what had I been like the day before happiness? How had I been five minutes before when I was asking Anna for confirmation and I smacked into someone? I had already forgotten and I couldn’t redo it.

  I got to the loge to find Don Gaetano already at the table.

  “Don Gaetano, I brought you the baccalà already spongy, the way you like it.”

  “You shouldn’t have gone to the trouble, anyone could smell from the door that you were bringing baccalà. Come in and have a seat.”

  “And anyone can smell from the door you’re cooking pasta with potatoes, what a treat.”

  I washed my hands, which were seasoned with baccalà, and from the bathroom I said I had seen Anna.

  “She says she wants to come live here.”

  “She’s lying.”

  “So what do you think Anna wants?”

  Don Gaetano let me sit down and start to chew on the first few spoonfuls.

  “Anna wants to see blood.”

  I couldn’t wait and asked with my mouth still full.

  “And what’s she going to do once she’s seen it?”

  Don Gaetano cleaned his mouth, drank a sip of wine.

  “Blood is truth. It doesn’t lie when it goes out and it doesn’t come back. That’s the way words should be, after you say them you can’t take them back. Anna wants to see the truth bleed out.”

  He spoke softly. He was saying something simple, I didn’t understand it. I preferred to keep my mouth closed around the pasta and potatoes. You could see that happiness was a truth and that its price was blood.

  “Anna will come back,” I said, to indicate there was nothing I could do about it.

  Don Gaetano nodded yes with his head. I wiped my bowl clean.

  “She was pretty outside the school. She was wearing nylon
stockings, shaking her hair in the sunlight. She’s interested in me, the most ordinary guy in town, a guy who doesn’t count for anything.”

  “Don’t put yourself down before anyone. You’re good stuff and you’ll show them.” Don Gaetano had my back. “A guy who grew up alone inside a little room and behaves well by instinct has a special life. You have to defend it, even through trial by blood.”

  • • •

  What he said didn’t surprise me. Before Anna I used to think blood belonged in the body circulating in the dark. It had nothing to gain from coming out and drying in the light. Outside the body it was useless. Now I knew that it was useful to Anna, maybe she would be healed to see blood let out in front of her. I knew I was ready, it didn’t matter when. “Yes”: Anna’s voice reached me again. Then yes, I promise I will obey the yeses, I will say yes more than no, in my life my moves will be ruled by a majority of yeses. The no, even if I have to say it, will be subservient to the yeses. Will I spare my blood before Anna? No.

  “Her boyfriend, the gangster, has been released from prison. At Christmastime they let them out.”

  “I knew she had a boyfriend. I’m happy for Anna he’s free.”

  Don Gaetano started clearing, I washed the dishes.

  “Someone has to go up to the widow’s, do you want to go?”

  “Did she ask you to send me?”

  “Don’t ask questions when women are involved. Do you want to go?”

  A warmth descended from my stomach downward. “OK.”

  • • •

  The months of sweaty embraces had passed. Anna, who had wanted me, had passed. She has sucked the stone and spit it out. I looked for the changes in the mirror. My face was the same: long, easily bewildered, with blurry eyes. My nose was more swollen, a gloomy purple still on my cheekbones. My body was sharper, there was more emphasis to the ribs, the curves of my chest, and small rounded muscles were moving over my stomach. By her there was warmth, she opened in a dressing gown, took my hand, and I followed her into the bedroom. Haste came over me and I forcefully embraced her. Rather than the bed I pushed her against the wall and without getting undressed we did the thrusts standing. Rather than let her do the moves, I did my own, improvised. I was taller, she grabbed hold of me, lifting first one leg, then the other. I found her in my arms, her feet behind my back. I held her this way until I emptied myself, finished. I carried her away from the wall and laid her on the bed. She smoothed my sweaty hair, kissed me all over my face. Then she made coffee and wanted to bring it to me in bed. Such attentions from her were new. I saw a smile I had never seen when she entered with the tray. Our embraces were silent, her smile replaced the missing words. I drank the coffee of a gratified man. She accompanied me and lifted the toolbox up to my shoulders.

  The door closed after I had arrived at the first landing.

  • • •

  Something had happened that made me different to others. The respect of the world arrived in an instant. You don’t expect it and can’t explain it. Something had happened at the loge, too. The window had been broken. Don Gaetano had called the master glazier, who was taking measurements. I didn’t ask, there were strangers. Professor Cotico issued the sentence: “Damage to window and loge, twenty-seven and sixty-eight, good numbers.” Don Gaetano left me in charge and went off with the glazier. Tenants dropped by and said hello the same way they did with Don Gaetano. The count came by: “My dear sir, you owe me a rematch, don’t forget.” He had addressed me formally. I was dumbfounded, a dizziness passed through my body and demanded sleep.

  The glazier came back an hour later without Don Gaetano. I helped him to mount the new glass, to attach it with putty. It was a little crooked.

  • • •

  Don Gaetano found the work all done and the loge in order. I asked how it had happened.

  “You didn’t hear anything while you were at the widow’s?”

  “Nothing.”

  “Anna’s boyfriend dropped by, he was looking for you. He played the tough guy, knocked the table over. He wanted to know where you were. People started staring. He punched his gloved hand through the glass, someone started screaming, ‘le guardie—call the cops, and he left. He said he’d be back and where he finds you, he’ll leave you.”

  “And you, did he do anything to you, did he touch you? Did he insult you?”

  My voice was loud, I was surprised at myself, overcome by anger toward the man who had threatened him in my place.

  “He didn’t do a thing to me, only the bravado of the table and the glass.”

  This is why people had changed toward me from one minute to the next. The rumor had spread. Don Gaetano asked me what I wanted to do.

  “Nothing, this is where Anna will find me, this is where he will find me.” The words came out by themselves, they decided for me. Once said, they couldn’t be taken back.

  When I heard them, I knew they were right. Was this the blood that Anna needed? The blood of two young guys facing off? Was this what Don Gaetano had warned me of? A man realizes things when they hit him over the head. I smiled at Don Gaetano, a smile of appreciation for the knife. He indicated yes with his head, a solemn yes, slightly embarrassed.

  “It won’t be today,” I said. “Let’s go on about our business, I’ll start cooking potatoes, onions, and tomatoes, then I’ll lower the baccalà into it. And we’ll play another hand of scopa.”

  • • •

  Don Gaetano let me be. I could see clearly around myself, outside was the early darkness of December. The fresh putty on the new window smelled of wax and rubber. The baccalà smoked fragrantly, thoughts were the clothes on the line. The scopa cards told me the sequence in which to play them. I could guess the ones in Don Gaetano’s hand. Or else he was telling me.

  “Don Gaetano, can you transmit your thoughts to another person?”

  “No, I receive them, that’s all there is to it.”

  “Don Gaetano, tonight you’re distracted, I don’t know you, you let me take a seven and I’m holding denari.”

  “I was forced. I’m not distracted, you’re the one who’s playing tonight as if you were in heaven. I don’t think I can win.”

  “The broken glass and the nasty visit have put you out of sorts.”

  “I’m the same player I am every night, you’re the one who’s changed and don’t realize it.”

  I didn’t realize. I wasn’t surprised even to win two hands in a row. I didn’t see the difference from the usual times when I lost. I stood up to flip the baccalà over in the pan together with the rest. They knocked on the window. Don Gaetano stood up in a flash and went to the door. Rather than let the person enter he went out. I looked at them from the other side of the window while tasting the cooking. I couldn’t see their faces. The gentleman was dressed elegantly, a nice tan overcoat, he made short movements with his hands. Don Gaetano kept his behind his back, leaning slightly forward to listen. The man made a gesture that concluded the conversation. He placed his hand on his wallet, Don Gaetano stopped his arm, the man insisted on giving him money. He was forced to take it, the man pressed it into his hand. It must have been the money for the new glass. The man placed a hand on Don Gaetano’s shoulder, they embraced. He came back in and I asked with my eyes what it was. He let the money fall to the table.

  “This is worth the life that is played heads or tails, a windowpane reimbursed and the verdict of the neighborhood boss: Nun pozzo fa’ niente—there’s nothing I can do about it—’o bbrito se pava, l’annore no e se lava’.”

  ’O bbrito—it had been a long time since I’d heard the name for glass in dialect. Glass you pay for, not honor. Dialect was special for verdicts, better than the Latin mass.

  “You asked him to intercede, Don Gaetano? Forget about it, we’ll take care of it between ourselves and maybe no one will get hurt. Don’t give it a second thought.”

  He nodded a defeated yes.

  • • •

  That night we savored a baccalà fit for
kings, we drank the wine and Don Gaetano told me the war stories that opened my ears and expanded my heart.

  The Germans had mined the aqueduct to blow it up. A group of them were taken prisoner by the Neapolitans, and to save their lives they said they knew the locations of the explosives. Don Gaetano and the other had been ordered to go with the prisoners to defuse the charges.

  The Neapolitans had taken guns from the barracks. Sometimes with a little persuasion, the carabinieri had distributed their equipment out of loyalty to the king. At other barracks the fear of German reprisals made them refuse requests for guns. Then the people came back a little more roughly to requisition them. There was a second front, the Fascists shooting down on the rebellious crowd from the houses. There were battles along the staircases of buildings, on the roofs, summary executions. One of our men was captured by the Germans and placed against the wall, but at that moment a German officer arrived, pursued by our guys, so he shielded himself with the body of the man against the wall. This is how the Germans tried to open up an escape route, but everywhere they were surrounded and attacked. Our man, a brave guy, managed to save himself. His name was Schettini, an acquaintance of Don Gaetano.

  I listened to the stories of the city and I recognized it as my own. Don Gaetano had delivered to me, in teaspoons, his belonging to the city. It was the story of many who had banded together to become a people. It had been quickly forgotten. It was good like the baccalà in the pan. At moments of greatness we happen to fight in waves of the southwest wind against the barriers, persist for three days and leave an air of cleanliness in the lungs.

  • • •

  “On Via Foria the streetcar barricades held back the Panzer tanks for hours. In the end they managed to get through but not to Via Roma. From the hillside alleys men and boys descended on the attack, throwing bombs and fire between the tracks of the tanks. Against those legions of the possessed, there was nothing the armored tanks could do, they retreated.”