The Breaking of a Wave

by Fabio Genovesi

  Thank God they did. Because now he’s here and there’s this girl with an enormous nose but with everything else slamming, who’s rubbing up on him and he’s had his hands all over her already and the time has come to make the most important move, what Maestro Hugo Rose taught him and him alone, during the last lesson, when he was the only one left in the class.

  “Daniele, drive the woman wild. Make her bailar. And when she is really hot, you lift your leg and you stick it between her thighs. Hard. And keep it there. You keep it there hard and fast, intiendes? She needs to feel la presencia. The woman worries siempre. She never know where to go. She go here y she go there y she only want un hombre to take her and hold her firm, with a hard, strong thing between her thighs. Tu. Make her feel la presencia. That is the most important move, Daniele. It’s called ‘El Cocktail del Amor.’ If you serve her the right cocktail, you can be seguro there’ll be dinner after. Intiendes?”

  Daniele gets it, he gets it perfecto. And he has shown her a dance, twirled her this way and that, and she’s laughing and shaking and letting out little squeals, but then all of a sudden she stops and becomes very serious, paralyzed, when he sticks his leg between hers and lifts both it and her dress all the way up into the warmth of that magic spot where her thighs meet. Daniele serves up El Cocktail del Amor and kisses her neck. She pulls her head back and stops breathing. Daniele stops breathing too, trying to figure out whether she’s going to slap him in the face or press charges. But then he watches her draw near again, stare at him slit-eyed behind that gigantic nose, and shove all the tongue she’s got down his throat. And they go at it for at least five minutes, continuing to kiss as he drags her away from the dance floor toward the little sofas.

  They sit down, at which point Daniele wonders if he should offer her a drink. He disentangles his tongue from hers. “What do you want to do?”

  And she replies, panting warmly, “Can I see what it’s like?”

  “Huh?”

  “Can I see what your dick looks like?”

  Just like that. Straight and to the point. A little slurred from the alcohol is all. Then she closes her eyes and goes back to kissing his neck. After that, Daniele can’t see straight. He lifts her up and carries her to the ladies’ room. And thank God, thank the Lord for granting him an unforgettable night tonight: as soon as they enter, the only other chick in the bathroom leaves. Daniele props her against the wall, unbuckles his python-skin belt, drops his jeans, and whips it out.

  She stands there, motionless, her eyes crossed, one hand over her mouth and muffling her voice a bit, but he can still make out what she says:

  “Is that normal?”

  Daniele doesn’t know what to say. So it’s not huge, okay? It’s not so small as to warrant making a scene like this.

  “Whatever,” he says, his voice wavering between horniness and humiliation, “it’s not enormous, but it’s all right. It’s about average, see, not—”

  “Are you telling me there are bigger ones than that?”

  Daniele looks at her, sees the surprise and excitement in her eyes, and realizes there’s no need to defend himself; what he needs to do is attack. “Bigger? Nah. This is as good as it gets.”

  She nods, bites her lip, and lowers her gaze again. She places her hand on top of it and rubs it slowly, as if she were scared it might bite her, and then—

  And then all of a sudden the door swings opens and in come these girls singing and screaming. She recoils, almost falls backward. He buttons up his jeans. They hug one another again to hide their faces from these blue-ballers. And while they’re hugging, Daniele racks his brain for a solution, a place to go—

  “Are we close to the beach?” she asks him.

  Daniele doesn’t understand. “I dunno. I mean, yeah, it’s just on the other side of the club.”

  “Do you know how to get there?”

  “No. I’m not from around here, I never come here.” He looks at her. Way to look like a doofus, like someone who doesn’t even know how to get to the beach. Next thing you know she’ll be turned off, this beast of an erection drilling a hole in your jeans will get no relief, and Maestro Hugo Rose will catch wind of what happened and disown you as his student.

  But she keeps looking at him with those half-closed eyes. “You don’t have a car?” she asks.

  Yes, godzunkle, yes! The car!

  He wraps an arm around her and walks her outside. They hold each other tightly, both tottering, she from too much drink and he from the pinch in his underwear. But all is well, Daniele knows that soon this discomfort will become comfortable, will become marvelous. And with their hearts beating faster than the music and pumping blood into every inch of their bodies, Cristina and Daniele step out of the club and into the arms of the warm night air, thumping with promise.

  The Nightly Trials of Traffic Cops

  Mustard pants, blue-short, sleeved shirt, orange vest and cap, reflective tape top-to-toe: Marino pedals down the dark coastal road, peering into every car window and trembling, because on a Saturday night in September this uniform makes him look like a Christmas tree, and for a traffic cop that’s a death sentence.

  The crazy thing is that the municipality makes them dress this way for their safety, so that cars can see them clearly and avoid running them over. But it’s like hanging a stone around a scuba diver’s neck so he can get to the bottom quicker, like dumping gas from a plane mid-flight so that it won’t catch fire. If the municipality really cared about its traffic cops, they would send them out in black flight suits and ski masks, like parking lot ninjas, and they could creep in the shadows with their citation holders, sling a ticket at your windshield, and disappear in the dark. Because for traffic cops, the real threat isn’t being hit by accident but spotted by drivers who want to run him over on purpose.

  Just read the dispatches from this past summer’s war. There may be no mention of traffic cops being hit by cars, but four wound up in the emergency room with contusions and fractures, and last week a colleague was rushed to the hospital with third-degree burns after a tourist took a lighter to his synthetic orange vest—one spark and the vest burst into flames.

  All told, the life of a traffic cop is demanding and risky. He’s a destitute mercenary who risks his life for a few bucks while making a killing for the municipality. Like municipal cops. Actually, scratch that, a hundred times worse than municipal cops, since those guys get paid well and have a serious uniform, a radio if they need help, a sidearm if help can’t wait. They may not be real policemen but you think twice before laying a hand on a municipal cop.

  A traffic cop, on the other hand, is cannon fodder. Armed with a pen and citation pad and forced to go around dressed like a clown in a mash of factory overstock: they get their pants from bus inspectors and their shirts from plumbers. Their wide-brimmed caps are freebies from the annual senior citizen celebration; in fact, written across the front are the words “Forte dei Marmi Grandparent” with a patch over the word “Grandparent” that says “Traffic Cop.” And seeing as this overstock is scraped together, everything comes in two sizes only—extra small and extra large—so that Marino is riding his bike around downtown tonight in socks as snug as tights and an enormous shirt blowing in the wind that makes him look like a kite on wheels.

  And the image of his colleague on fire continues to torment him in the dark—lit up like a bonfire, like a pile of dry leaves, and left to burn. What is the world coming to? What is it coming to? Marino shakes his head and tries to muster some courage, gripping the handlebar and pedaling down the coastal road alongside the sweep of cars in the paid parking lots outside the nightclubs. But every shout, every horn, every set of high beams slapped across the dark makes him catch his breath.

  Now, hey, tragedy may be inevitable, but if one struck him it wouldn’t be fair. He’s a catechist and has to shepherd kids through confirmation. God has to protect him, at least a little.
But God has a lot on his mind, and maybe even he can’t save you if you’re tooling around in a uniform this bright.

  Small wonder Marino is now pretending not to hear these shouts coming from the sidewalk. He keeps pedaling—speeds up a little, actually—as if the wind in his ears silenced the words of the citizen on the curb. “Get over here, dweeb! Stop!”

  But Marino can hear those words. He can even hear the footsteps coming toward him on the sidewalk. So he springs up on his pedals and pumps with all his might to get out of there, only he’s restrained by his tight pants, his shirt inflates like a blue parachute, he decelerates, and a hand snatches him, bringing an end to his flight.

  Marino puts one foot on the ground, trying to steady himself and maintain a calm, professional tone, but his heart is beating in his throat. “Yes? May I help you?”

  “Where the hell is my car?”

  The guy’s in his thirties. Not big but tall—check. And pissed off—double check. Behind him is a blond girl, her eyes down, tucked into a short, tight-fitting, and totally transparent dress. She’s very pretty. Except for that gigantic nose.

  “Hey, I’m talking to you, godzunkle, where the hell is my car!”

  “Me, I don’t . . . I don’t know, sir. Sorry, I’m not a valet.” Marino addresses him as sir—it’s not like you’re going to hit a guy who calls you sir, right? There’s not enough intimacy. “Did you forget where you parked?”

  “No, I know exactly where I parked.”

  “Then what’s the problem?”

  “The problem is it’s not there anymore, asshole!”

  The coastal road is one endless line of cars gunning for the nightclubs, people going in and out on foot, and this guy’s shouts are drawing the attention of the Saturday night crowd who, deprived of love and sex and real fun, place what dreary hopes they have in assault and battery.

  But not Marino. No, all Marino wants is to return home alive, and he tries to come off as meek as a medieval pageboy or a farrier greeting his lord atop a horse, riding crop in hand. He takes off his cap and holds it to his chest. “I’m really very sorry but I don’t know how I can help you, sir.”

  “What do you mean? Aren’t you supposed to keep an eye on the cars?”

  “No, that’s the job of a parking valet. A municipal cop at best. I’m just a traffic cop.”

  He tries to smile but clearly this is no laughing matter, so he apologizes another two or three times and remarks how scandalous it is, and if he keeps this up maybe he can calm the guy down while the girl in the red dress is touching his shoulder and telling him to drop it, to let it be.

  “Help me understand a sec, dickhead,” says the guy. “I work my ass off all week. I work. Godzunkle, I’m Italian.” (Cue the applause, a couple “Right on”s and a faint chorus chanting, “Italia, Italia.”) “Then I come here on Saturday night, I fork over all the money I’ve earned, and if I’m five minutes late you slap me with a ticket. But if some thieving Albanian or Romanian steals my car, you don’t do anything to him? Is that it?”

  “Like I said, I’m not a municipal cop. I cannot intervene. Besides, I didn’t see anything, I just came on duty.”

  “Of course you didn’t see anything, of course not. The car was right over there, how is it possible you didn’t see anything?”

  “Sorry, where?”

  “There, dickhead, how many times do I have to tell you? There!”

  The guy points to the only empty space in the line of cars parked along the edge of the road. Right in front of a large wrought-iron gate leading to a villa.

  “Ah, I see,” says Marino, continuing to turn his hat in his hands. “There’s a gate over there. That’s a driveway.”

  “So what?”

  “So my guess is your car wasn’t stolen. It was towed.”

  “Towed how?”

  “Um, by a tow truck?”

  The guy repeats the words “tow truck,” and you can tell he has a whole slew of other things to say, which may be logical or may just be more insults to shower Marino with, but they catch in his throat. He stays like that, his mouth open, his eyes two pinballs bouncing around at random amid a thousand monstrosities, while the cars on the road honk their horns, trying to wheel past the knot of people.

  The girl with the big nose comes up to him again and in a soft voice says she’s cold, that maybe it’d be better if she went back to her friends. He whips around and shouts, “No! Wait! No, no—” He unbuttons his lily-white shirt, takes it off, and wraps it around her shoulders. He asks her if that’s any better. She scoffs. “Not really,” she says and stares back down at the ground. He looks at her for a minute, and then turns back, bare-chested, to face Marino.

  And the people around start cheering again, as if by removing his shirt they were inching closer to a fight.

  “You motherfucker. You had them tow my car, huh?”

  “Me? What do I have to do with that? Towing’s none of my—”

  “Yeah, that’s what you thought!” shouts someone from the crowd; by now a real crowd has formed and they expect a show. Applause. Someone smashes a bottle at Marino’s feet.

  Someone else shouts, “Kick that fucker’s ass!”

  The shouts grow louder and are so numerous they blur together, and rather than complete sentences they’re an increasingly large welter of voices from which, every once and a while, a “shit” or an “ass” or a “dickhead” escapes. The girl with the big nose raises her eyes again, and only now seems to realize how many people have gathered around, guys who are loaded, kids with their hair shooting this way and that, plenty of girls like her looking on, looking at her, judging. She pulls her skirt down as far as she can, buttons his shirt to the neck, and says softly, “I’m going back to my friends, sorry,” before stumbling off on her high heels.

  “No, wait! Just a minute! I’m going to get the car back in just a minute, come on!” But she’s already running and doesn’t answer. “Or we could get a room. There are hella hotels! There are hella hotels!” But she doesn’t turn around or stop, and this bare-chested guy watches her disappear. She’s even more beautiful from behind: her butt lean yet round, her waist narrow, her soft hair swaying with each step. Plus, from the back you can’t see that gigantic nose.

  Just like the night’s momentous opportunity, the woman ambles off and vanishes, materializing from nothing and retreating into nothing. It isn’t fair, godzunkle, it’s totally unfair! In a matter of minutes he’d lost his car and a hot date and, it was gradually dawning on him, his shirt too. No, nothing is fair in this life, it’s one long spate of things that could go well but turn out for the worse. So, if other folks occasionally meet with a little injustice, tough shit. Tough shit, Marino.

  “Happy now, motherfucker?” The bare-chested guy stares Marino straight in the eye, and after that everything happens with swift precision, like one of those chemistry formulas where you plug in everything they ask you to and it works. Take the late hour, the fatigue. Add excessive quantities of alcohol at the end of the night when the euphoric effect has worn off and all that’s left is the bitter aftertaste. Add roused but ungratified hormones. Add people hanging around waiting for something big to happen. Add this guy’s friends, who are just now arriving and discover him shirtless and themselves out a ride . . . If you don’t want to see what spews from that nastiness you have to shut your eyes tight and keep them shut till you feel the first blow.

  But it doesn’t come. Marino feels no punches, no kicks, just the hands of this guy’s friends pulling him off his bike. He tries to retain his grip on the handlebar but the bike drops to the ground. One of them jumps on it and the wheels cave, a fender cracks.

  “Easy, guys, you’re taking things a bit far,” he says, trying to maintain a professional tone even in the hands of four or five guys who treat him like an old throwaway carpet. “That bike belongs to the town. It’s public property.”


  Meanwhile Bare-Chest’s friends hold Marino still. People kick him a couple of times. Someone from the crowd snatches the cap off his head.

  “There’s still time. You’re an inch shy of the point of no return, but if you stop now there’ll be no trouble,” he says. But they must have misheard him. They strip off his neon vest and use it as a whip while Marino tries to shield himself. “Not my vest, guys! It’s part of my uniform! Don’t mess with it! You’re assaulting a public officer!”

  Bare-Chest bursts out laughing, and because he’s a foot from Marino’s face, it’s a combo of laughter and spit. Marino smells the alcohol, feels little bubbles of acidic saliva hit his eyes. He’s shoved on the ground like his bike before him, only now it’s his bones making that clanking, cracking sound.

  The cries of the crowd float up. Someone suggests kicking him. Another calls for a generic beating. “Hit ‘em! Hi ‘em!” Then comes a girl’s voice, high and almost sweet, rising above the others: “Piss on him! Piss on that fag!”

  Silence. Everything, even the road, even the world stops spinning for a moment and turns with the crowd to see where that voice is coming from. And there stands this tiny girl in a half-gray, half-pink dress, her hair pulled back, and a smile fading from her face.

  Bare-Chest looks at his friends, at the wide- and red-eyed public beginning to cheer again. They collar Marino and hold him down on the ground, faceup in the middle of the road, the cars honking to get by, pebbles and shards of glass underneath his back, and above him Bare-Chest, a leg on either side of him. Pulling down his zipper.

  The crowd screams. And, after tossing various epithets into the welter of that night, now they all scream the same thing. Clear, simple, urgent. “Piss on him! Piss on him!”

  A prone Marino hears them but doesn’t understand. His head hurts and he can barely lift it because Bare-Chest’s friends are holding down his arms and legs. And he doesn’t think or decide to speak himself; there must be an autopilot deep inside us that, when it sees we’re about to crash and don’t know what to do, takes the wheel without asking our permission. It opens his mouth and forces out the words. “Guys, I’m begging you, I have nothing to do with this! They pay me slave wages! While you guys are having a good time I’m outside doing this shitty job! I’m one of the kind ones, too. When I see a meter’s expired, I wait. I make my rounds and don’t come back till after a half hour, I swear! There are others who get a kick out of it, who write up tickets in advance, who lie about the time! If you’d like I can name names. They’re here right now. One of them is Roberbluuurrgrrgrrgrgrrgh . . . ”