Born Twice (Vintage International)

by Giuseppe Pontiggia

  Her blond hair is gathered in a bun at the nape of her neck. She moves with ease and elegance and is as attractive as she is reserved, more athletic than sensual. She’s pretty but her focus is uneven. She can seem cold, typical of women who are afraid of showing their emotions.

  While we take turns telling her about our child, she keeps her eyes downcast. We’ve become experts at describing him in the most charming terms. We smile cheerfully. But it’s the wrong strategy. I fear she’s starting to think that our child is a monster. She asked what he suffered from and the answer— dystonic spastic quadriparesis—left her stunned.

  I close my eyes for a moment while Franca clarifies some of Paolo’s difficulties. We always make the mistake of trying to minimize them, even with doctors. Especially with doctors. We try not to tire him out before his appointments. We tell him to be that which we lack most: calm. We get upset each time he makes a mistake and then he makes more mistakes than usual, as if wanting to justify our panic. I’m afraid we’re a monstrous couple, overwrought with fear and united only in the absurd hope of overcoming it. If anything, we should present him in the worst light possible, so as to avoid a comfortable diagnosis and obtain a more plausible one.

  When the doctors become aware of our circumlocutions, they react with poorly concealed impatience. We go to great lengths to try to show them that our child is more normal than they might believe. The truth is never quite so elusive and distressing as in those moments.

  The mute resistance of Miss Bauer is suffocating me. So without turning to look at Franca, who sits on my right, even though I can imagine what her reaction will be, I speak up.

  “You have a difficult task ahead of you. We know how hard it can be. You will have to devote yourself to it entirely. At times you might even regret having wanted him in your class.”

  I don’t really believe what I’m saying, but when she looks up at me her gaze is calm.

  “Now don’t exaggerate,” Franca says. I squeeze her arm until it hurts and we stare at each other with reciprocal rage.

  “That sounds like a constructive approach. That’s what I wanted to hear,” Miss Bauer says, without noticing a thing. She looks down again.

  Franca rubs her arm. I know what waits for me later. So does she. We both know. Maybe that’s what marriage is all about.

  “I’d rather be prepared for the worst, not for the best,” Miss Bauer adds.

  “How right you are!” I exclaim, as if discovering this as a newly minted truth.

  Miss Bauer looks up; her eyes are misty with emotion. “That’s the way I am. So far it’s been a strong point in my work. Don’t you think it’s a good thing?”

  “Definitely!” I say, with the prodigal enthusiasm that we have when it doesn’t cost anything. It’s what differentiates visitors to an artist’s studio from buyers.

  Bit by bit, as she speaks, she loses her charm. She’s reasonable, focused, and enthusiastic. I’m relieved for Paolo but a little concerned for her. It’s as if, in a game of chess, the player with the advantage were suddenly to surrender. I wonder whether she’d be upset by this comparison. She’d probably be more upset with me.

  “Look at Paolo’s photographs,” Franca says, getting up from the sofa and taking down one of the frames in the hallway in which she’s collected some of his most successful pictures. She’s incorrigible, and yet she obtains what she wants, even if she does go further than I would. In any case, I’ve noticed that the legitimacy of the goal, however difficult, makes one ethically cynical.

  Miss Bauer is looking at me with a knowing smile, as if she knows she can count on me to help her resist kindness. Franca talks about Paolo. She makes him out to be a communicative and easygoing person. By the end Miss Bauer is laughing at the story of how, when someone asks Paolo on the intercom, “Is that you?” he replies from the lobby, “No!”

  “He takes advantage of the linguistic tools available to him,” I comment. “Like in arte povera.”

  She shows her appreciation for the linguistic reference with a professional nod. Franca feels momentarily excluded but then picks up again.

  “Don’t mind him! He only pays attention to language,” she says with a laugh. “So much is communicated without words.”

  Miss Bauer smiles. I smile too. It will take me at least twenty years to figure out that Franca is right.

  Our conversation gets interrupted. Franca has gone to make sure that Paolo’s room is tidy before showing it.

  Miss Bauer takes a sip of orange soda from her yellow glass. The whole apartment is brightly colored. The physiotherapist recommended strong colors for Paolo’s room but gradually Franca has extended the color scheme to the whole apartment. Sofas, armchairs, dining chairs, closets, blocks, balls, and toys— all are brightly colored. Together they form what looks like the background for a cartoon. I’ve noticed this unreal and festive quality in the homes of other families with similar problems (though no two cases are alike, both within and outside of the norm). Space is given over to childhood with a freedom that childhood itself doesn’t know, so used to making do with whatever bits of the serious adult world it can obtain. It’s a sad reversal: order makes itself felt in artificial disorder; the pleasure of games vanishes with the awareness of their function.

  “Would you like to see Paolo’s room?” Franca says from the doorway.

  Miss Bauer places her drink on the glass table. “Your wife is absolutely wonderful,” she says with a smile, getting to her feet.

  “I know.” I nod. “But it shouldn’t have happened to her.”

  “Why her in particular?” she asks. “It shouldn’t happen to anyone.”

  “She’s been wounded in the place where she is the weakest.”

  “Or perhaps the strongest,” Miss Bauer comments.

  I can hear them talking. It’s too bad she came to visit while Paolo isn’t here, but when she called Paolo had already left with my father-in-law for a drive. But maybe it’s better this way: Miss Bauer is taking careful inventory of his difficulties. She’s convinced that only by distributing them evenly across time will she be able to overcome them.

  I’m beginning to feel more certain that she’ll be the right teacher for him: She actually seems only reluctantly enthusiastic, a trait she must have learned the hard way, but at the same time she’s a stranger to discouragement, which is a no-less-frightening adversary.

  Once I never would have used the adjective “right.” It seems to neutralize all efforts of the common aspiration to perfection. Now, instead, I’ve adopted the protective language of the majority, much in the same way that surrendering to the use of medical jargon in the hospital allows you to join the anonymous ranks of the sick and, in turn, affirms your dependence on an authority figure for assistance. Even handicaps are defined by words that placate an immediate anxiety, that of knowing what it is. The next phase is discovering that the definition doesn’t really define it. Still, a step has been taken in the right direction.

  It’s getting dark. I stand at the living room window and look out at the rooftops and skyscrapers and the brightly lit streets. The same landscape that on other occasions fills me with disquiet now gives me a sense of intimacy. Another obstacle has been overcome.

  Miss Bauer comes out of Paolo’s room. She looks radiant; her cheeks are bright from conversation.

  “I have to run,” she says.

  Maybe I’m too attentive to words, like Franca says, but run is a verb that bothers me right now, even if she is right to want to escape that crowded room, its joyless toys, optimistic despair, and anguished hopes.

  “I’m glad you came to see us.”

  “It was my duty,” she says, suddenly growing serious.

  She’s worried that we’ll exchange it for a favor. It occurs to me that many people make their duties pass as favors. Real schools are made of exceptions, and they’re as rare as apologetic teachers.

  “I’ll accompany you,” I say.

  We ride down in the brightly lit elev
ator. She stands in the corner.

  “How long have you been teaching here?” I ask.

  “Six years.”

  “Do you like it?”

  “Yes, except for the principal, at first.”

  She stops herself. She’s already said too much.

  “Meaning?”

  “He was a little insistent.”

  She offers no more.

  “Where did you teach before?”

  “In Bolzano, for three years.”

  “Why did you leave Bolzano?”

  She hesitates for a moment.

  “Because of a person. Bad judgment,” she says.

  I nod as if I knew who she was talking about.

  “The wrong person,” she adds.

  Perhaps I too am a wrong person. We never stop discovering that others are the wrong people in the belief that we can extricate ourselves from a common destiny. But it’s never a good idea to delve into these details with our closest relatives; we are always badly surprised.

  “Are you over it?” I ask.

  “Yes, but only recently.”

  She’s not over it yet.

  “It must have been very important for you.”

  Important is an adjective that people like because it makes something seem important per se when actually it’s important only for them.

  “Yes,” she answers quickly. “Teaching saved me.”

  So there’s the road to salvation, I think. Ultimately, her misadventures will be important for Paolo too.

  “What a delusion,” she adds.

  “I bet,” I reply.

  Vague images run through my mind of contemporary stories, as well as of stories that happened hundreds of years ago. Miss Bauer runs a hand through her hair as if she wants to distance a thought.

  “Do you help your wife?” she asks.

  “At times, yes,” I reply, looking down.

  “What do you mean, ‘at times’?”

  We’re on the ground floor. I open the elevator door for her, and she steps out into the unlit lobby.

  “Sometimes I’m absent,” I add.

  “Physically, you mean?”

  “Physically and mentally.”

  “And you say so without remorse?” she asks, turning to look at me.

  “No, I say it with remorse.”

  “Why don’t you do something about it?”

  We go down the three steps toward the front door.

  “I suppose because I’m egocentric,” I reply, opening the glass door for her. I know it’s too simple an answer. To admit one’s errors is the first alibi for repeating them.

  In fact, Miss Bauer doesn’t let herself be distracted. “Maybe there’s some other reason?”

  I get the clear feeling that I am being put on trial. Who gives her the right? Me, probably. There’s nothing like feeling guilty for having someone attribute it to you.

  “It’s a question of strong points,” I reply. “I, for example, would be a terrible teacher for Paolo.”

  “Really?” she asks incredulously.

  Miss Bauer is becoming incredibly oppressive. She’s avenging herself on me for the wrongs that she has suffered.

  “Yes, I’ve tried. I become aggressive, nervous, and impatient.”

  “Couldn’t you change?”

  “You can’t. Or rather, you can but the other person suffers as a consequence. The results are negative for both of us.”

  We’re walking down the sidewalk. It’s a warm evening.

  “Which way are you going, Miss Bauer?”

  “To the subway station.” After a few steps, she turns to me and asks, “So what are some of your strong points?”

  “I didn’t mean it that way,” I say with a smile.

  It’s odd to find myself at sunset on the crowded sidewalks of Corso Buenos Aires defending myself to my son’s teacher.

  “What did you mean then?” she asks, without letting up.

  “That I only do a portion of what I could do. I know the alternative would be a failure.”

  “And your wife?”

  “She does practically everything.”

  I avoid looking at her so I don’t have to see her triumphant smile. I know about female solidarity and how it has the notinsignificant advantage of reason. That’s why I usually cling to the remnants.

  “And she doesn’t ask you to do more?”

  “No. It would just make things worse.”

  Miss Bauer attracts indiscreet glances; people turn to look at her. She defends herself with a show of indifference, typical of someone who sets too much store by this sort of thing.

  “Your wife is happy.”

  It’s impossible to tell whether it’s a question or a reluctant affirmation.

  “No. But you see, that’s not the point.” It’s getting hard to speak; I’m discovering what I think. “The point is that we are always at our extreme limits. If I carve out spaces for myself—we can even call them privileges—I can manage to hold up—”

  “Otherwise you’d run away from it all,” she interrupts. “Is that what you want to say?” She doesn’t even give me time to answer. “Many men would act the same way in similar situations.”

  “Why do you think so poorly of me?” I ask.

  “I don’t think poorly of you.”

  “You mustn’t forget about the institution that doubles our neuroses.”

  “And what would that be?”

  “Marriage, Miss Bauer. And don’t laugh.”

  There, I got her. I feel better now.

  “I didn’t think you had those kind of feelings about marriage,” she says.

  “Sure you did!” I exclaim. “Otherwise you wouldn’t have piled up so many accusations against me.”

  “They’re not accusations,” she says, reacting in the way that she, Miss Bauer, knows she has to react. “They’re questions so I can understand how the work with Paolo gets distributed.”

  “Unevenly,” I reply. “That’s the truth. I’m not happy about it, but that’s the way it is.”

  I’ve reacquired a resigned pride in my wrongdoings. She has moderated her tone. As long as she was judging me she felt invulnerable. But to be judged as an accuser has made her slightly more cautious.

  “It’s a very complicated situation,” I go on to say. “Very hard. Luckily, I don’t think Paolo has suffered because of it. However, if you feel the need, you can talk to me about it any time.”

  “Fine,” she says, stopping at the stairwell that leads down to the subway. Her cheeks are bright and there is a soft expression in her eyes.

  I reach out and shake her hand, pausing to squeeze it for a moment.

  “I think we can use the tu form,” I say. And then with vertiginous perception, but late, almost comically, I add, “Between colleagues.”

  “We’ll see,” she replies.

  She’s become Miss Bauer again.

  She starts to go down the stairs, then turns to wave goodbye. From where I stand on the sidewalk I watch her disappear into the darkness.

  A rosy light radiates over Corso Buenos Aires, illuminating the faces of passersby as they emerge from the shadows.

  I turn toward home. My mind is confused. I am tired and stunned. It’s as if I had been fighting, first for Paolo and then for myself.

  Paolo’s cause has been won, at least for now. But what about mine? I tried to persuade Miss Bauer, but who was I really trying to convince? Now, on this glowing evening, I am tearfully certain that I’ll never succeed.

  The Go-Cart

  He goes to school by go-cart. The go-cart was one of Franca’s ideas.

  I used to take him to the park in his stroller. He would sit on a bench by the fountain and watch the ice-cream vendors and the balloon salesmen, the children rolling on the grass and the joggers on the crunching gravel, always the same panorama. Only now can I imagine the torture. Back then I just couldn’t bring myself to think about it. I was too worried: about my own personal survival and—without surrendering to
the moralistic complacency of self-abnegation—my family’s. I was forced to be cruelly selective in how I distributed my energies (at least that was my alibi at the time). In that luminous festive park landscape, though, the pedal-powered go-carts always caught Paolo’s eye. The children behind the wheel were exultant; they cruised between people and crossed easily over the paths. You could rent them from the parking attendant under the plane trees, near the entrance to the Planetarium. At first the man wouldn’t tell us where he had bought them, fearing who knows what kind of competition. Fearful people see danger in everything; they practically invent dangers in order to intensify the pleasure of avoiding them. All in vain, too, because fear is born on the inside, like the insatiable thirst of a person suffering from dropsy.

  When questioned by my father-in-law, however, the coarse repugnant man revealed the name of the mechanic who repaired the go-carts for him. From there it was easy to trace the factory where they were made.

  When Alfredo saw the shiny red go-cart with its sculpted rubber racing wheels in the courtyard of our building he couldn’t hide his intolerance. For two consecutive Christmases, when he was six and seven, he had asked for one. Now he was too big. He couldn’t fit into it. When his mother saw him trying to squeeze into it from the balcony, she scolded him, telling him he was too old for such things now. He probably suffered because of it, as if we had confiscated a childhood he had not been able to enjoy. Once I even saw him kick the tires; I smacked the back of his neck in the very same place my father had smacked me when I had knocked over a fishbowl. Then, when he started crying miserably, I observed how we repeat on our own children the very same acts of violence we ourselves were subjected to, albeit unwillingly. (How the unconscious assists us!) Criminology texts talk about such things, but Renaissance documents on the family do not.

  Paolo, on the other hand, could easily be lowered into the go-cart from above, but at first he could barely make it move. To push one foot and then the other in alternation did not come instinctively to him; it was a conquest. From the window of our apartment I’d watch him in the courtyard below, lurching forward with irregular movements. At times I’d curse at life in a whisper, even if there was no one around to hear me.