The First True Lie

by Marina Mander

  I care for her for free, but it must not be enough.

  It may be that she doesn’t want to confess her darkest thoughts to me directly. Sometimes she writes them down using tiny, tiny letters, then forgets the pieces of paper on the kitchen table; or else she talks about them to somebody in a low voice. She talks slowly and she moves slowly.

  She did it the other night too.

  At times Mama moves in slow motion.

  When she slows down more than usual she decides not to go to work for a few days.

  “One of these days they’ll end up firing me.”

  I think one of these days came.

  So she took a day or two to sleep.

  When normal people don’t work they go on vacation.

  Last year even Mama took a week for a real vacation, and we went to Venice.

  “Do you know that if you go to Venice with a man before you’re married, then you won’t ever marry him? It happened to me once.”

  Or more than once.

  More than a city, Venice seems like one of those books with three-dimensional objects that pop out of the pages, suddenly spreading out before your eyes. You turn the corner and you feel as if you’re turning a page, as if you’re falling into another fantastic story. Venice is all hand-drawn. The houses are ancient and every detail seems specially designed by an architect in a wizard’s hat. There are no cars and you can walk everywhere. Gondolas slip by on the water, each one steered by a single sailor with a striped shirt like mine.

  Mama and I took a ride around like the couples do.

  “Don’t you think this city’s magical? Isn’t it incredible that places like this still exist in the world?”

  We went to visit the churches and the museums with their paintings that are hundreds of years old, where you have to whisper so you don’t disturb the other people; we also discovered a special place under an arch where everyone sticks their gum. We stopped and played under the portico of a palazzo on the canal: If you walk around the base of one of the columns without falling, you get to make a wish. Almost nobody makes it, but it’s fun to try.

  “Don’t say it, don’t tell me the wish. If you say it, then it won’t come true.”

  We bought a glass ashtray and sat at a little café table with the glittering sea in front of us and to one side a church with a golden ball on top. We wrote postcards: to Giulia, to Grandma, to Davide and Chubby Broccolo, plus I sent Antonella the one with a gondola. I wrote “Greetings from Venice”—I wanted to write “I love you” but was too embarrassed.

  We had some really good gelato. It was like a bar of chocolate dipped in whipped cream. The waiter recommended it to us and Mama said: “Sure, let’s try it. We’re on vacation, and it’s always a good idea to try the local specialty.”

  It must be wonderful to live in a place like Venice. I wonder how it would have been if my stork had been rerouted and I’d been born in Venice.

  “In winter, though, Venice is depressing.”

  So no, then, I think it’s better how it is, for us to be where we are.

  Mama says that in winter Venice is like a cold: The world outside is even more muffled and far away, and your head pounds for no reason while your nose runs, like those stray cats with heart-shaped noses that nobody has the heart to clean.

  But the thing I remember most about Venice is that it’s either extremely noisy or extremely quiet. You’re either walking in the middle of millions of people who are stepping on your feet and getting stuck in the really narrow streets or on the bridges, everyone’s shouting in different languages and the gondoliers are singing and the boats’ motors are roaring, and there’s always someone hammering somewhere or a radio going or people calling out to each other from one place to another; or else you take a random turn and maybe you find an open space with nobody there, and the only thing you can hear is the water in the canals and the echo of your own footsteps and the calls of seagulls chasing one another. It’s like suddenly being in another world, but all this happens by chance, because you don’t really know where you are, you’re just lost again. It’s a happy silence, though, not like the one now.

  I’m listening to the silence when suddenly my periaudio picks up a signal: a shuffle of footsteps behind the door. Waves of blood crash in my head, whipping up a storm. I listen some more: There’s someone moving around. I hear a creak like when Mama gets out of bed and scrapes her feet on the ground in search of her slippers, which is like the flapping of a moth caught inside a lampshade.

  It can’t be true. I hope so much that it is true. I hope with all my might that it’s Mama, Mama who’s finally decided to get up and return to us. Like the people who remember their entire past life a moment before they die, in a second I see the rest of my life to come, now that we’re about to go back to living. Like when I heard a friendly, cracking voice booming from the apartment next door and hoped it wasn’t our neighbor but someone much nearer, the nearest kind of neighbor, one who sings in the shower or while shaving, sings love songs or opera for Mama but also for me.

  I listen again.

  The noises become clearer. I make out two voices, voices of people I don’t know. The neighbor who loved opera moved away two years ago.

  I pray to Mama for it to be true, but it’s not true.

  The noises aren’t coming from Mama’s room. There’s someone muttering behind the front door.

  I don’t even have time to think before I hear someone ringing the doorbell.

  Once, twice.

  Who could it be at this hour? How did they get into the building? How’d they find me out? I’ve been silent as a mouse the whole time.

  I hold my breath as I put my eye to the peephole, as slowly as I can, like a burglar in reverse, one who’s afraid of being discovered living in his own apartment.

  I see two decrepit old women, all bundled up against the cold. Blue starts to meow.

  “We’re Jehovah’s Witnesses. Is anyone home?”

  “No, it’s just a cat. Let’s go.”

  3

  Today Antonella has a ponytail.

  And a hair clip shaped like a ladybug. If a ladybug lands on you, it’s a sign of good luck. I’d like to be older, to be able to go to the movies with her alone, to sit in the back row and give her a kiss. Usually when I think of something impossible, it distracts me, and then everything goes back to normal: peace, amen.

  But today’s different.

  It’s like with a toothache. If it goes away for five minutes it seems like you never had it at all. But then the pain yanks you back, and it seems like all you have is teeth, like you’re just one giant tooth and you can’t think of anything else. You become your tooth; nothing else is important to you. You’d like to have dentures and put them in a glass on the bedside table like Grandpa did. The dentures smile all on their own and you don’t have to think about it anymore. You don’t even have to try.

  It’s like the rain, the kind of rain that gives you no hope it’ll ever stop.

  The trees have disappeared in some kind of fuzzy mist. They’re plane trees, the kind that drivers smash into.

  Chubby Broccolo is looking out the window too.

  Chubby is great, but never ask him for a bite of his sandwich.

  Chubby’s real name is Francesco, but only the grown-ups call him Francesco, when they have to tell him off.

  Mama says that obese children will have millions of problems when they grow up. I’m not obese, but I have millions of problems right now.

  I think I’m fairly good-looking, because everyone says so.

  “You’re the spitting image of your mother.”

  Davide asks me if I’ll go to the movies with him that afternoon.

  “It’s Elisabetta’s birthday, so we’re all going to the movies.”

  “I’d like to. I’ll call you after lunch.”

  “Will your mother let you?”

  “I think I can convince her.”

  “I’ll tell my mother to call yours,” he says.r />
  Fucking shit, I think.

  “Okay,” I say.

  I’ll make up something later, I think.

  It’s hard to behave so that no one knows anything, when they really don’t know anything.

  With one part of my brain I listen to the lesson about hominids, all the stages of the evolution of man leading up to Homo sapiens, which are us now. With the other part I think of a solution, because I’d like to go to the movies; if nothing else it would distract me.

  I don’t even know if I really want to go to the movies with them, but I do want everything to be normal. And it would be normal to go to the movies with Davide and his pain in the ass of a sister.

  I wonder what it’s like to have a sister and if it’s better to have an older or a younger one, like Elisabetta. I’ve thought about it so many times without reaching any conclusion. There are pros and cons.

  Right now, for example, it would be a disaster. Sisters don’t know how to keep their mouths shut, because they’re girls and they think they know how to do everything. Davide’s sister is always butting in, always acting like she knows more about things than you do. Then if you figure out that seven times eight equals fifty-six before she does, she starts to scream the house down because she can’t stand losing. When she makes cookies, we all have to eat them and they’re awful, superhard, like a nougat bar without the nougat flavor. It’s like munching on a pencil, and I hate pencils, even when they’re shaped like cookies. I hate pencils because even if you erase what you’ve written, there’ll always still be a dark mark underneath. Then again, if I had a smart, well-trained sister, a sister who was all mine, it would be better because at least then I’d have someone to talk to.

  I can’t decide about this sister thing. Maybe a brother would be better, I don’t know. But even then it would depend on the brother. Maybe a twin—a twin would definitely think about things the same way I do.

  To distract myself I do the breathing exercise, seeing how long I can go without breathing, each time a little longer.

  I hold my breath until I almost suffocate, while looking at the hands of the clock. It’s kind of like a videogame, except that you play it just with yourself. Each time, you try to beat the last time. The great thing is that you can do it at school and nobody notices.

  Once when I was doing the breathing exercise Mrs. Squarzetti asked me, “What is the capital of France?” I looked at her with my eyes popping out of my head because I was about to explode, but I couldn’t give up.

  “Are you feeling all right?”

  I beat the old record and shouted: “Paris!”

  Spitting on my notebook, saying “Paris” as if it had lots of Ps. There’s still a mark where my spit dissolved the ink.

  “Well done!” she said, terribly pleased with herself.

  I know, I know, I thought.

  I’d like to have a stopwatch so that I could time myself more accurately. I’d also like to be able to write with my left hand. I’m training myself to write with both hands like Leonardo da Vinci, who was a genius.

  But the writing I do with my left hand looks like it’s Blue’s, or maybe the doctor’s. If I write with it, you won’t understand anything.

  “Yeah, you’re right. Absolutely nothing’s going right today.”

  But can I go to the movies with Davide and his mother and his sister anyway? Today’s Elisabetta’s birthday. Can I? It’s true that you can’t go, but what about me, can I? Please let me go. It’s an amazing movie, it could even help me with school. If I go, you won’t be mad? And you’re not just saying you won’t get mad, but then you’ll get mad anyway? Because I’m a little mad too, you know. I know it’s not your fault. But I don’t like to come home to this; the apartment is too quiet when you don’t talk. I can’t talk to anyone. Maybe I could talk with Giulia. Do you think that’s a good idea? That she’d understand? That she could help us? That we can trust her? That she knows how to keep a secret? That she’d be able to understand us? That if she understood us she’d find a solution? That there is a solution? That it will be over soon? That Giulia will call while she’s on vacation? That you’re worth something to her? That it’s better if we sort things out on our own, like always? That we’ll know how to sort things out? That we don’t need anyone else? That I can do it? Do you think so?

  Otherwise I could call the vet, who is a kind of doctor at least, but I don’t know if that’s a good idea.

  I’m really not sure what to do. I’ll end up doing nothing.

  I could talk to a friend, but I don’t know if I have such a friendly friend. Anyway, friends are crawling with parents. If they let anything slip out, I’m finished.

  “It’s all right, Mama, don’t worry. Everything went fine at school as usual.”

  I head down the hall.

  “Do you think it’s my fault you died?”

  I have to call Davide, to tell him about the movies.

  “My mother said it’s fine, she’ll drop me off. What time?”

  “At four.”

  “Okay, see you at your place.”

  Luckily I know where Davide lives. I’ll have to take the tram there, but it’s easy.

  The people on the tram stink. It’s always that way when it rains. Their coats smell like wet dogs. Or car seats when people have smoked there. Every once in a while adults stink. They’ve got bad breath, or hair that smells like unmade beds. Old people stink of old people. My grandpa stunk of really old people. He was really old. Grandma smells like violets and lilies of the valley, like napkins forgotten in a drawer. Mama was born by accident when Grandma thought she couldn’t have any more kids because she was already on pause.

  “It was a miracle I was born, or a joke, you know? A joke of nature.”

  At the third stop I get off.

  I arrive at Davide’s house and ring the bell.

  “My mother was in a hurry because she had to go to the doctor.”

  I go up.

  Davide’s house isn’t bad. It’s always a bit crazy. Better than Marco’s house, where right away the maid makes you feel uncomfortable and everything is in its place, with the newspapers and books on the tables fanned out like in doctors’ waiting rooms and you already feel sick, already sure they’ll find something wrong with you: Hmmm, exactly as I suspected; try to cough a little. People who are perfect always make you feel like trash.

  Davide’s mother, on the other hand, always seems a bit disorganized. She wears long scarves and never goes to the hairdresser. She’s always waving her arms around as if she’s chasing away flies. She’s agitated now too, so she’s not worried about Mama not being able to come up. We have a Coke and then go to the movies to see Ice Age.

  The movie isn’t bad, it’s just that all I can think about is what I’ll do afterward; I have to make sure I get a lift without making them suspicious. During the intermission, Davide tells me that tomorrow he’s going to come to my place to do homework. This sends me into total panic, so after that I don’t catch much of what happens to the prehistoric animals, and I couldn’t care less if the dodo becomes extinct. For me a new age has come: We’ve entered the Late Liar era.

  They always say that you shouldn’t tell lies, but without lies I’d already be in an orphanage.

  This, in any case, is my first true lie.

  It’s no use crossing my fingers or my toes or touching my nose for luck. I don’t have any choice. It’s just that in the movies at least you always have someone to face the tough times with. There’s a main character in difficulty, and at a certain point someone appears to get him out of trouble. Maybe I shouldn’t have come to the movies, but it was for the sake of the details: Someone who goes to the movies surely can’t have a mother dead in her bed.

  Luckily, when we leave, Davide’s sister is wailing that she wants to go and eat hamburgers right away. She makes such a racket that no one wonders why I’m so quiet.

  “Do you want to come with us?”

  “No, I can’t. My mother’s waiting
for me. Actually, she asked if you could give me a ride since she didn’t know what time she’d be done at the doctor’s.”

  “Do you want us to call her?”

  “No, when she’s at the doctor’s she turns her phone off.”

  I feel like a genius. A genius who has just fallen from the eighth floor and landed without a scratch because they were moving mattresses below, like one of those crazy news stories that pop up in the papers every so often, when reality is stranger than fantasy.

  “CHILD FALLS FROM WINDOW, LANDS ON GUIDE DOG, NEARLY PULLS BLIND MAN UNDER TRAM: NO ONE HURT.” Grandma loves that kind of thing.

  Or else I’m like cats with their nine lives; they leap off the balcony to catch a pigeon and miraculously survive.

  We get in their car and five minutes later we’re in front of my building. Elisabetta says to me, “Too bad for you, you can’t come eat with us.”

  I stick my tongue out at her.

  Davide says, “See you tomorrow.”

  His mother: “Bye, dear.”

  And then she says some dirty word to a guy complaining because we’re double-parked.

  They wait for me to go in the front door. I don’t turn to wave good-bye.

  When I hear the car leaving, I think maybe I’ve gone too far. Someone goes to the movies and then comes home, and at home there’s still Mama—dead in her bed.

  It’s not possible.

  It doesn’t make sense.

  It’s just a story I made up to frighten myself.

  I like to read. I read without stumbling over the words, even when I have to read out loud, even when Grandma would make me get up on the chair and Mama would scold her.

  “For heaven’s sake, we’re not at the circus.”

  I would stand there in my pajamas barefoot, like a parrot clutching his perch, and recite Manzoni—“He has passed. As stark and still”—and I really was still, until the end of the poem.

  Words are wonderful because there are so many.

  Best of all I like difficult words and long ones, like antidisestablishmentarianism.