About Time

by Simona Sparaco

  It’s colder today than it was a few days ago. Clouds heavy with rain are moving quickly to obscure the last slivers of sky. They’re racing, but not a breath of wind is blowing.

  Maybe Isabelle is here somewhere, hidden amid the crowd in the market. She may even have passed close to me, with Giulia in her arms, and in the speed of the moment I didn’t even notice. With every step I take to look for her, another few minutes go by, flying up like splinters out of control. The confusion sets my heart pounding. I can hear my heartbeats everywhere, in my ears, my muscles, my bones. The voices merge in my head, until they become ever more cacophonous and incomprehensible. “That street there. What size? The biggest, thanks. Was it really the day before yesterday? Ten, thanks. There aren’t any cherry tomatoes… Which pasta? No, the pizza. How many kilometres? I told him I… My father would like to see… How old? I haven’t set foot… There must be one… In what context?… To lunch. I’m not there. I wouldn’t be able… How many? That moon. A piano. A pound of bananas… Onion. There are ten… Here. Pasta. Butter. Kitchen… I’m…” Enough! I put my hands over my ears, I can’t stand it any more. I can’t stand the noise of the crowd when time is racing like this.

  I’d like to get down on my knees, to surrender, to beg for mercy, to know what I’ve done to deserve all this. But I stand there, stiff-backed, my feet solidly planted on the paving stones. You’ll never destroy me.

  I don’t know what time it is, but I know it’s late, because suddenly the crowd disperses, the van doors are closed, the square empties.

  The sky has grown darker. Soon, in fact very soon, it’ll start to rain. I zip up my jacket and raise the collar. It’s damp, and the cold penetrates my bones like the sharp nails of an old witch. Then the first drops of rain start to fall, heavy and fast. The black sky, shaken by constant rumbling, is stormy and fascinating. For a few minutes the rain comes down with unusual intensity. And I stand alone in the middle of the square and raise my face to the sky in an act of defiance. I want to feel the force of that rain on my face, I want to be struck and scarred by Your anger.

  I can’t manage by myself. I need to see her again, I have to find a way to make it up with her. I go to a bar on the square to wait for my clothes to dry out. I must look terrible, I can see it in people’s eyes.

  I keep phoning her, but she never answers. In the end I decide to call Luca, our only mutual acquaintance, the only bridge still standing between us.

  He answers.

  He sounds a bit wary, although he doesn’t seem to know what’s been going on. “I’m sorry I haven’t been in touch,” he says. “I’ve been very busy.”

  What he means is that he didn’t like the idea of helping me with Isabelle, but now doesn’t seem the time to point that out, it would be a waste of breath. Besides, I need to be friends with him again, I need to gain his trust and get him to arrange a dinner, an excursion, anything. “It’s been a difficult time,” I say. “Getting out of the scene… You know what I mean, I can talk to you because I know you understand. How about meeting for a coffee, or maybe we can have dinner one of these evenings…”

  Immediately his attitude changes. “I can tell from your voice that you’re not well,” he says sadly. “We could have met tonight, but it’s Giorgio’s birthday and we’re going to the Prime.” He pauses for a moment, and when he starts speaking again I get the feeling he’s smiling. “I’d ask you to join us, but the last time you weren’t very friendly to him.”

  I smile, too. As far as I’m concerned, the fact that it’s Giorgio’s birthday this evening and that he may also have invited Isabelle suits me down to the ground. “The Prime? I didn’t think you still liked places like that.”

  “Just because I left that whole scene doesn’t mean I only go to out-of-town restaurants,” he replies, amused, but he’s in a hurry to say goodbye. God alone knows how many precious minutes I’ve made him waste.

  When I hang up, Elena calls me again. I have no time for the hassles of work, outside it’s already dark. I manage to get in a taxi and rush to the restaurant. If all goes well, I might get there by the time they’re having dessert.

  The last time I set foot in this place, Gaëlle was in Rome. She and I and Federico had booked a table at the back, the most isolated. Thinking back on that evening now, I can imagine the two of them seeking out each other’s hands when I wasn’t looking.

  The people here are the ones I’ve known for years, have spent endless evenings with. They say hello, a little surprised, some ask what’s become of me, others ask me, “Everything all right?” My clothes are still wet, and I probably look a bit suspicious.

  There’s also the risk I might run into Federico. Wednesday’s a busy night, they might have booked a table in one of these rooms. I realize it doesn’t bother me. This evening I’m here for her. I want to look her in the eye and take her away with me.

  Obviously I’m not really ready to see her again. When her beautiful freckled face appears in my field of vision, I immediately freeze.

  That Giorgio is talking into her ear. I doubt it’s anything amusing, but she’s smiling. Not very naturally, of course, but she is smiling. Then he pours a little wine in her glass and Isabelle pretends to be flattered, which doesn’t suit her at all. When she turns in my direction, maybe responding to the appeal in my eyes, she abruptly changes expression.

  I’d like to get into her head, now that I’m doing the round of the tables, greeting people without taking my eyes off her, not even for a moment, I’d like to be able to feel what she’s feeling, know if she too, like me, is trembling inside.

  Luca is surprised, but greets me in a friendly manner. We exchange knowing glances, he must have assumed I’d put in an appearance, deep down I’m still the same Svevo, the one who never gives up.

  Isabelle gets to her feet, saying she has to go to the toilet, and I immediately follow her.

  She realizes I’m behind her and she keeps moving quickly along the corridor. A waitress in a kimono gets in my way. “Isabelle, please,” I cry, but she doesn’t slow down.

  When she gets to the door she turns, and her eyes tell me to leave her alone. But I don’t give up. I follow her into the Ladies.

  A couple of girls are fixing their make-up in front of the mirror. Seeing me, they turn as pale as the powder puffs in their hands.

  “Can I talk to you?”

  “To say what?”

  “Not here.”

  She’s agitated, she begs me to leave.

  “So that you can go back to the table with that man?”

  Our two spectators have got their colour back and walk out without saying anything, leaving us alone.

  “His name is Giorgio, he’s a good man.”

  “Please, listen to me. Let me at least explain.”

  “Explain then, but hurry up about it.”

  I thought it would be easier, that the magic of what we’ve been through together would soften her. But time is still racing, it won’t slow down, and Isabelle is just as impatient with me as everyone else is. She doesn’t give me time to speak.

  “They warned me about you,” she says, turning her back on me. “I don’t want to fall for it, I can’t afford to. We’re too different. Please go away.”

  I go to her and grab her by the elbow. At last I smell her perfume, hear her breathing. I’d like to be able to kiss her once again. “You can’t believe what people say. That’s not like you.”

  Isabelle is upset, impatient. “I believe what I saw,” she says, walking away. “And it’s not for me. Leave me alone, please.”

  “I can’t. You’re in my blood.”

  The door of one of the cubicles opens, and who should come out but Gaëlle, her sinuous body held tightly in a black sheath dress. “Svevo,” she calls to me. She looks surprised and annoyed.

  Isabelle takes the opportunity to leave.

  I don’t have time to stop her, because Gaëlle has already come and stood in front of me. “Have you been reduced to following women in
to the ladies’ toilet?” she says in that haughty tone of hers.

  “The kind of place you shouldn’t even set foot in,” I say, taking out all my anger on her as I try to leave.

  But she grabs me again. “Are you trying to tell me I’m not a lady?”

  “A lady doesn’t use the toilet to do what you do.” I don’t have time to try and disguise my disgust.

  Gaëlle grabs me by the wrist. “Wait.”

  “What do you want? You should be in Paris.”

  “Who is that woman?”

  “That’s none of your business.”

  “I need to talk to you,” she insists.

  “We have nothing else to say to each other.”

  “Do you know why I’m still in Rome?”

  Her eyes are soft, yielding, a long way from her usual demeanour. She’s beautiful, but decadent, like one of those expensive designer objects that go out of fashion after a while and end up forgotten in some old warehouse. I’m not interested in what she has to tell me. I finally manage to free myself from her grasp and leave the toilet. I’m deaf to her calls. I have to find Isabelle.

  As I walk back along the corridor, I see, in an adjacent room, Federico and some of my old friends having dinner, surrounded by glasses of vodka and attractive women. When they see me they fall silent. Federico is embarrassed, he stands up and comes towards me. I feel as if I’ve never really seen him before now: he’s so drunk, he can barely keep on his feet.

  “Svevo, listen, I… I think we ought to talk…”

  I don’t know what comes over me. My arm moves of its own accord. To everyone’s amazement, I land him a punch that sends him crashing into one of the nearby tables. A plate of steamed vegetables ends up on his head, like a hat, and the woman who was eating it finds Federico lying at her feet.

  The punch has attracted attention. In an instant, we’re surrounded by curious faces. Among them I see Isabelle. She looks really dejected. Giorgio is behind her. He puts a hand on her shoulder and together they walk away and disappear from my sight.

  A couple of young men intervene to hold me back, but there’s no need: I’ve already vented my anger, and Federico doesn’t seem in any fit state to retaliate.

  At a certain point I realize I’m not the only one staring at him mercilessly. Gaëlle is standing beside me, and there’s something diabolical and pleased in her expression.

  The manager, who knows me, asks me to leave the restaurant, and he doesn’t have to insist, because I want to get out of this place as soon as possible. Maybe Luca was right, Isabelle deserves better.

  A moment before getting in the taxi, I turn and see Gaëlle in the entrance. I knew she would follow me.

  She reaches me in the twinkling of an eye and says, “Federico’s your friend. It’s all my fault.”

  I don’t know what role she’s playing, or what her next move is, I only know that that punch wasn’t only for Federico. It was for all the sordid reasons that kept us together until a short time ago.

  “Leave it alone, Gaëlle,” I reply, opening the door.

  From the window of the moving car I see her rearranging her hair in front of the door, then, in a moment, she is again swallowed up by the fashionable riff-raff still proliferating behind me. Simultaneously, the telephone starts ringing. It’s Elena again. I have to answer.

  “It’s your father.”

  I don’t even have time to think of an excuse.

  “I’m sorry, Signor Romano. He’s had a heart attack.”

  17

  THERE’S NOTHING SO HUMILIATING as arriving late to your own father’s funeral.

  I missed the first plane, the one I managed to catch landed on time, but the taxi ride ate up two hours. I wasn’t worried until we drew up outside the church and I saw my cousins, who have suddenly become adults, carrying the mahogany coffin down the steps to the hearse.

  Although I may have spent the night awake repeating it to myself, it still hasn’t sunk in, and now I’m barricading myself behind the absurd belief that it isn’t his body inside that coffin, that at any moment he’ll come up behind me and say in his usual resentful tone, “Finally made it, eh?”

  I can’t feel my legs or my hands any more. I walk, but I don’t feel anything, just a slight sensation of pins and needles. As if I’m dreaming. I recognize a lot of people, some of whom I haven’t seen since I was a child: grey hair, lined faces, serious and composed for the occasion. Dark glasses, vague suggestions of smiles. They are still all here, as if in some way life in this city has been waiting for me. No revolutions, no disasters. Everything is more or less as I left it. Except those who have grown up until they have become other people: my cousin gives me such a tight hug he takes my breath away. My aunt, on the other hand, is more distant. Her eyes are hard, like a reprimand, not so much for what I’ve done, for my unjustifiable delay, as for what I should have done. And she has my mother’s eyes.

  “It would have been difficult to put off the funeral until tomorrow,” she says as she gets in the car. “I’m sorry you didn’t get the opportunity to see him one last time. We’ll talk at the cemetery, are you following us?”

  Predictably, I lose them on the way and by the time I arrive the coffin has practically already been buried. My aunt looks at me with a resigned air and raised eyebrows.

  I approach the grave with the detachment of someone who just happened to be in the area. Obviously there are no names, dates or photographs yet, and as far as I’m concerned, there could be anybody in there.

  “Do you remember Anna? Your father’s colleague.”

  A little woman, hidden behind a pair of glasses that are bigger than her, greets me with a hug. “We met the last time you came.”

  I nod, returning her embrace. “A couple of years ago.”

  “Nearly seven, actually,” my aunt corrects me, with a slight shake of the head.

  On the ride home, the grief at last hits me. More than grief, a sense of powerlessness at the thought that he really isn’t here any more. It’s like punching the wind, a rage that finds no outlet. It will backfire on me. And in fact, the first blow soon surprises me, it comes straight to the pit of my stomach and takes my breath away, so that I have to stop on the road, even though I know that this means keeping my relatives, who must be at my father’s apartment by now, waiting even longer.

  I get out of the car and vomit. All that comes out is water. It gushes out of me, until the cramp puts a stop to it. The sky is clear, one of those smiling skies that Turin manages to come up with every now and again, the mountains can be seen on the horizon and the air is fresh. I allow myself just a few mouthfuls of it, then get back in the car and set off again.

  It’s Anna who opens the door to me. She has taken her glasses off and her red, swollen eyes tell me she’s been crying continuously and may start again at any moment.

  My first impression—that everything in this city is just the way it was—is belied by my father’s apartment. There’s something different, not so much in the furnishings, as in the photographs, in the colours. It’s alive. It’s the home of a dead man, but it’s alive.

  I haven’t been to see him for seven years. Seven years. In my head only a couple, at most. I wonder when it was that my perception of time really started to become distorted.

  My relatives are talking among themselves, they share moments, memories. I’m not here. I’m cut out. They long ago stopped waiting for me.

  When Anna and my aunt tell me about all the bureaucratic formalities I’ll need to deal with, I lose the thread of what they’re saying. Just one thing hits me in the face, like a slap: “Your father had been ill for months,” my aunt says. “He wanted to tell you, it was the thing that mattered most to him. And then, just when he seemed to be responding to the treatment, he had his attack.”

  I barely have time to recover when I receive another blow, an even more violent one. “He left you a trust,” Anna says, taking me aside. “It’s a lot of money, more than he could really afford. He made s
acrifices all his life to put it aside for you. I know you don’t need it, he was so proud of you, and your professional success. But he also said that you were his greatest sorrow. He was always very worried about you.”

  “How long are you stopping?” my aunt asks, her bag already over her shoulder.

  “I have to leave tomorrow, I have an important meeting. But I’ll come back soon.”

  She raises her eyebrows again, but doesn’t say anything. Soon afterwards the house rapidly empties. Once I’m alone, surrounded by half-empty wine glasses and extinguished cigarettes, all I can think about is that worry he never expressed, all those cowardly bank transfers which seemed like some kind of solution at the time. Then the excruciating feeling of remorse at the fact that I was never able to talk to him, not even once, about anything, that all I ever did was put things off, thinking that maybe one day… Without realizing that I was filling my life with postponements. With so many unforgivable not nows.

  I look at him there, posing in the last photographs, framed in the old way. He doesn’t even seem to be the same person: a calmer man, a man at peace with his conscience. Only now do I realize that in his way he was trying to break through the wall of ill feeling that had built up between us. I can’t say he didn’t try. In his own way, of course, but I can’t say he didn’t do it.

  How could I have imagined an outcome like this? Standing here alone in the apartment where my father lived, the man whose love, respect and understanding I kept looking for all through my childhood. A man overwhelmed with grief and inadequate to the role that had descended on him without warning. And now that he’s no longer here, everything appears so different. Around my stooped exhausted body, a line of photographs. Of course, I’m in some of them: the day of my graduation, a few birthdays or family meals. I always look so absent, many of those occasions I don’t even remember. I was looking at the camera, but I was looking somewhere else, looking ahead to what I still had to do, to all those things that would have to fill my little days. And then, seven years pass, like a flash, and he goes, without my even giving him time to tell me. The last thing he wanted to tell me is all in those silences, in the heavy breathing that fills the last messages in my voicemail. Now, unexpectedly, he smiles to me from these photographs, and among these objects, tidily collected over the years, I discover something more about his life: the journeys he took, the money he put aside, without ever telling me that he never did anything with the money I sent him. Maybe he was too embarrassed. Or maybe he was just trying to humour me. In his study, there’s a wall covered in papers, notes, photographs. My father wrote thoughts, read novels, had a companion. I would never have imagined it. There’s a photograph showing him together with Anna in Guatemala. The wind is blowing hard, they are smiling and holding hands. Anna seems about to fly away. Behind them, a stormy sea, a wave almost a couple of metres high is about to crash on the beach. On the back of the photograph, a pencilled note: