“Thank you,” Maria says when she gets back to the room. She heads straight for the bed and lies down. I pull the bedclothes up to her shoulder, but she extracts out her arm so I can hold her hand. “I washed my hands,” she says, and smiles. Her breathing sounds easier and it doesn’t seem like she’ll have a coughing fit every time she tries to speak. “I’ll probably fall asleep now.”
“Well, I’ll be here until Ines gets back.”
“You don’t mind?”
“No.”
“You’ll be bored.”
“I can read one of your books.”
“Oops.”
“Go to sleep.”
“You’re not mad at me?”
“No – go to sleep, and get well.”
“You can listen to my iPod if you like,” she says, and laughs at the blank look on my face. “My music? Here, I’ll show you.”
“No,” I repeat. “Go to sleep,” I repeat.
I lean over and kiss Maria’s forehead in the way I saw Ines do earlier. There’s a slight sheen of sweat on her face, so I wipe it gently with the cloth. She’s already asleep. I cover her again with the bedclothes and sit back in the chair. I watch her sleep and it doesn’t feel wrong. She wheezes, pretty much as I heard her wheeze that first time she was reaching for a book in the library. Watching Maria, I’m anything but bored. In truth, I feel a contentment I haven’t known in a long time; that whatever troubles I might have had are nothing compared to what this girl/child/woman has to live with each and every day. I think about the support base provided by Ines and Giovanni and how they’ve taken it upon themselves to look after myself and Maria – the latest in a succession of people who are determined to see me well.
I scroll through the list of albums on Maria’s iPod. Most of the names mean nothing to me, and I guess this is how it should be for a woman of Maria’s age and an old fart like me. A Morrissey album surprises me, whereas Blondie’s Greatest Hits doesn’t for some reason. I select Best of Bowie but there’s a problem: even the gentle opening bars of A Space Oddity put me in mind of Eminem being blasted repeatedly into my cell. It’s so disturbing I have to take the headphones out my ears. I wait a few minutes, telling myself this is okay; it’s just David Bowie singing songs from a happier time. I’m not going to let them take that away from me. I click the play button again and put the headphones back in my ears. If only the Padre had known: all he had to do was play the right music to have me feel like a human being again. So many Bowie songs, all from such a short period of time; songs from a different lifetime now it seems.
When I turn up for work the next morning, Giovanni tells me to forget the gardens and spend the day with Maria – like I don’t know what he’s up to. Maria is sat up in bed and looking much improved. She’s had a wash and brushed her hair through. I’ve a feeling Ines has helped Maria freshen up, though she’s also left strict instructions for Maria to stay in bed for the whole day.
I try to explain to Maria how the music made me feel last night, but I don’t have the words.
“I’ve made such a mess of my life,” I tell her.
She gives me a look that’s older than her years.
“It’s not too late to put it right.”
“Odds are I’m likely to fuck it up all over again.”
“You can’t help the things that have happened to you.”
“There are things I’ve done, things that I regret.”
I don’t know how much Maria knows about me, and I don’t know how much I want her to know. It feels like full-disclosure time, whatever that might mean. I don’t want her to underestimate what she’s dealing with here and I need her to realise that I’m someone who can do her harm. But she counters by telling me about herself.
“I behave badly,” she says, “when I get frustrated at being so sick. And I wish I didn’t, but I know I’ll probably do it again.”
“There’s behaving badly and behaving badly. Besides, maybe you’re right to be raging about the cards you’ve been dealt?”
“And you’re not, after what’s happened to you?”
“What I do – what I’ve done in the past – seems to be out of all proportion. And out of control. I think I lose my mind.”
“Everybody feels like that at some time in their lives.”
“But I can’t remember what . . . the thought processes . . . I can’t recall the thought processes I went through to make me act in that way. I can’t even remember the names of some of the people I’ve hurt.”
“Do you have to?”
“I think I do, if I want the same thing not to happen again.”
“If it’s that important, why not write it all down?”
“What good would that do?”
“Write it out in Italian and I can correct your homework each evening.”
“This isn’t a joke, you know.”
“Who’s joking? It’ll improve your Italian and get you writing again.”
I hesitate, but only for a second.
“There was a girl in Brighton. I’ve tried to forget her name – because I’m so ashamed – but she’s important because you remind me of her in some way. You’re a similar age, I guess, and so trusting – she had the same misplaced trust in me. I deliberately created that trust in her, from nothing, so she’d fall in love with me. I wanted her to fall in love with me so I could get to her sister – so I could find a way of hurting her sister. The only reason I can think of for this is that her sister – whose name I try to forget as well – had what looked like a perfect little family, and I wanted to break up that family. By the time I realised that I wanted to be with the younger sister – that I might have had a shot at living a normal life – it was too late because I was arrested and the police must have told her all about me. When I got out, I went after her sister again, sending her a present of a perfume bottle filled with sulphuric acid. The woman who’d worked to get me released – I remember her name, it was Juliette – she eventually fell in love with me too. For a reason I can’t explain, I killed her dog. I slit her dog’s throat with a razor – a cut-throat razor. Max – that was her dog’s name. I loved Juliette and I loved Max and they loved me, so I don’t understand why I did that. I wish I hadn’t. I haven’t found a way to hurt the Padre yet for getting me out and bringing me here, but no doubt I will. And Giovanni, and Ines, and you – I’ll get around to you all in the end.”
Maria’s crying.
“See – that’s what words can do for you,” I say.
“I’m not crying because of your words. I’m not crying because of what you’ve done, but because of what’s been done to you.”
“Anything that’s been done to me I more than had coming.”
“You miss your baby girl, that’s all. You miss your baby girl.”
Maria’s words hit me hard.
“I gave my baby girl away,” I say.
See what I can do? My words can make Maria cry. She doesn’t need this, today or any other day. She needs rest and love and care. She needs to get better, even if she’ll never be well again, and all I do is to make her cry. I’m tempted to leave her room – for her sake, not mine – only I suspect that might hurt her even more. I’m poison, and I haven’t even got started yet – these are just the words.
I sit and stare without really seeing: the things on Maria’s desk, maybe, or my work shoes that I took off when I came into Maria’s room this morning. I should be in my own cell. I should be in a real cell. I curse the Padre for having got me out. Things are so much simpler when there’s just a regular routine of twenty-three hours and one in the yard. Is this what the Padre hoped for – that I should carry on from where I left off, fucking up everything and everybody? I doubt it.
“I knew all those things about you,” Maria says.
She’s laying on her side, with her hands beneath her cheek on the pillow, palms together.
“Things you read on the Internet – you think that’s getting to know someone?”
“I
’m not saying that. I’m saying I knew those things about you, those things that you’ve done. You don’t have to go through all that for my sake – to shock me into disliking you. I can tell you the names of those girls, if you like – would it make a difference? It might – to you, I guess. Laura and Paula – there you go. Get it down on paper and then throw it away. What use is it? Everybody knows you’re sorry for what you did; everybody that counts, that is. You can talk to me about it all day long if that’s what you want. Or talk about it whenever you feel the need to – I don’t care – but I do care about you. I know that I want to be with you and for you to want to be with me.”
“Why?”
“Why?”
“Yes, why, when you know what you know about me, and I’m here telling you I might well do the same thing again?”
“Well, I have to believe you won’t –”
“You see – that’s it right there. I know I’ll mess up again – mess up big-time – and yet you choose to believe otherwise.”
“I’m not alone. Giovanni and Ines know all about you, and they still believe in you; and Brother Michael and Brother Paul.”
“Yes, but they might all be wrong. There’s none of you can know all about me. I don’t know all about me.”
“Sorry, yes – you’re right. I meant we all know certain things about you – the things you’ve done and the things that have happened to you – and still we believe in you.”
“That doesn’t make sense.”
“No, but it’s our choice. It’s my choice.”
“Believers,” I say, quietly – too quiet for Maria to hear. She lifts her head off the pillow, and looks up for me to repeat what I said.
“The Padre,” I explain. “He has faith. He might have a hard time with the Church, but he has faith – and I don’t.”
“You don’t have to believe in God to believe in a person. Do you think I believe in some entity that has done this to me? And if he did exist, do you think I’d want anything from him but to see him suffer in pain for making me the way I am? He can hang on his cross for all I care. But I can choose to believe in certain other things. I believe it’s worth my while fighting for the right to study in Pisa, even though it means falling out with Papa; even if there’s every chance I won’t live to finish the course. And when you turned up at the Villa – when I learnt who you were and the shit-load of grief that you were likely to bring along with you, all that fucking history you drag around with you wherever you go – how come something in me told me I wanted to be with you? I don’t need any extra troubles, thank you, but I made a choice and that choice was to believe in you.”
“Again – why?”
“Because life’s too short; my life’s too short.” She waits a second or two before adding, “Plus, I have to admit, there’s something about you having lived with Siobhan McGovern. I wanted to know what it would feel like to be with one of her old boyfriends.”
“Be with?”
“Be with.”
I ask Maria what the story is today with her medication. She tells me Ines is going to stop by again with some lunch, after which it’s the usual routine of enzymes, food and antibiotics.
“And then I might well get sleepy again.”
“Explain to me again about the food.”
“My body can’t break down the goodness in the food I eat, so that’s what the enzymes are for.”
“And are there specific foods you should be sticking to?”
“All the good stuff really, but I just need to eat lots of everything.”
“And that gets tiresome?”
“Now and then, like when you can’t taste the food for all the mucus. It helps if you have someone like Ines watching your diet. I’m going to miss her care and attention when I move to Pisa.”
“You’ll have to shop and cook for yourself?”
“Yes, and that’s Papa’s big concern about my being there alone.”
“Because he’s seen what happens when you don’t eat properly?”
“There’s been the odd occasion when I use not eating as a way of hitting back – though it’s always me that ends up paying the price.”
“Hitting back at your papa?”
“At Papa, and at being like this.”
“What about your chest?” I blush when I ask this. “Your lungs, I mean.”
“I thought you’d never ask.”
“You know what I mean.”
“My lungs are the main event. My body creates too much mucus and it just sits there in my lungs and pancreas, affecting my digestive system. It’s never good, but once it becomes infected I take a turn for the worse.”
“And that’s what the antibiotics are for?”
“Yes.”
“And there’s no cure?”
“Not yet. They’ll probably wait until I’m dead.”
“Stop – don’t say that.”
“I’m serious – we don’t tend to hang around.” She lets this comment hang around, though. “Not much of a come-on for the boys, is it?”
“What will happen?”
“As in – what does the future hold for me? A lung transplant possibly, if I’m lucky and they can find a suitable donor, followed by an early death.”
“And there’s nothing you can do about it?”
“There’s plenty, but most of it adds up to fresh air and exercise.” Maria’s flippancy is obviously her get-out clause, her safety net and self-protection. She sees this doesn’t work for me and so gives me a fuller explanation. “There are lots of exercises I can be doing, and physiotherapy – Pisa will be good for all that because the facilities at the hospital are so good. Running up and down stairs is perfect, particularly up the stairs – anything to get that mucus moving – and there’s a special vest they’ve invented that constantly jogs your lungs, only I’ve yet to try it out. I believe it’s only available in the States, but they might have one in Pisa by the time I get there. In fact, you can make yourself useful and give me a massage.”
Maria flips her body over on to her other side, with her back facing me. She pulls the bedclothes down away from her, and wraps her arms around her body so she can show me what to do. She moves her hands in a circular motion up and down her side, underneath her arms and round towards her breasts.
“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I say.
She turns round and smiles.
“I can show you the leaflet with the instructions, if you don’t believe me.”
I get down on to my knees so I’m at a better angle.
“Here,” she says, and she guides my hand to her right side. Just to touch her through her cotton nightdress is enough to know exactly what she’s at, and enough to know she’s got me good. She moves my hand along her side and of course I can feel her breasts with my fingertips each time my hand goes round. “You have to press firmly with your fingers – not too hard, but firmly enough to get that stuff moving inside me. And here –” She shows me her other hand underneath her body. “On this side too; at the same time, so you’re really manipulating my lungs.”
I know which of us is doing the manipulating here, but I’m not complaining. I get into a steady rhythm and feel the give in Maria’s body. I do this for about ten minutes, until my hands and fingers begin to cramp.
She looks back at me over her shoulder.
“It’s a dirty job, isn’t it?” I pull away and she turns to face me. “What do you think – are you interested, on a trial basis, maybe? There are perks.” She reaches for my right hand and holds it between her own and to her breasts. Nothing I have can hold out against her.
I know Ines senses the change in the room when she arrives after her lunchtime shift. One look from Maria to me and back to Maria is enough for her to know. She’s brought food for me too but asks if I’d prefer her to stay with Maria while I get some rest. I tell her I’m fine.
“You’re fine too?” she asks Maria.
“Much better, thanks.”
“Yes, I see
. Work tomorrow, I think – yes?”
Maria does a mock pout and Ines puts on her stern face. The mood in the room is so much lighter than the day before – relief, I guess, that Maria’s not heading back to the hospital. Ines reminds me about Maria’s tablets, as though it’s still my responsibility, and says she’ll be back again this evening. Maria and I eat our lunch – soup in mugs and salami and cheese ciabatta – and Maria takes her tablets. I clear the tray away and leave it to the side on the desk.
“Will you sleep now?”
“Maybe – you don’t mind?”
“No.”
Hours – years – spent alone in a cell much smaller than this room have left me perfectly equipped to handle stillness and quiet. Compared to solitary confinement, there’s a riot going on in this cell.
“Lock the door,” Maria says.
I do so, and when I turn round she’s pushed back against the wall to make space for me on the bed.
“Lie down,” she says.
I can see where her nightdress has climbed up her thigh.
“You won’t get much sleep with me in there.”
“We can rest – please?”
Years of solitary haven’t prepared me for lying still next to a woman in her bed, but I do my best. I lie there fully clothed, on my side with Maria curled up behind me. It’s a narrow bed, probably designed to deter this very thing happening, but I do rest, and I hear Maria’s breathing steady into a deep sleep. Of course, I can feel her breasts pressed into my back and they give me plenty to think about. Her bare knees are curled into the backs of my thighs, and her left arm is wrapped around my chest.
So this is it, I think. This is how it happens, once again.
I must doze for a while, because I wake up with the knowledge that Maria is awake behind me. Her breathing is different and she moves her hand from my chest to my shoulder and through my hair.
“I’m an old man,” I say.
“You’re an older man, but you’re not old.”
Dancing to the End of Love Page 25