The Book of Hidden Things

by Francesco Dimitri

  ‘Yes, Art, we did.’

  ‘So why wouldn’t you want to come with me? Mauro, you can bring Anna and the girls if you want. They’ll love it.’

  Tony, Fabio and I exchange a look. ‘Art,’ Tony says. ‘You need help.’

  ‘You guys think I’m crazy?’

  ‘To sum it up, yeah,’ I say.

  ‘And you won’t give your buddy a fighting chance.’

  Tony says, ‘Michele promised they won’t harm you. We can go through Elena to be sure it’s safe…?’

  ‘What, you think I’m afraid of Michele? Come on! I know they won’t touch a hair on my head. They’re after my magic. If I had more time, I would go and have coffee with that fellow, for old times’ sake. But we must go back to the Hidden Things in the next,’ he checks his plastic wristwatch, ‘fifteen hours, give or take, or the Time won’t be right anymore. The next good window opens in no less than five years. Did I tell you that? And I won’t spend five years in this dump, nope, not me.’

  Fabio offers the joint to Tony, who refuses it, so it goes back to Art.

  Tony asks, ‘Why did you even get in touch with someone like Michele?’

  ‘Duh, to learn the Dance of the Swords.’

  ‘Which you wanted to learn because…?’

  ‘When danced properly, it attunes you to the things Michele would call saints. It brings you to the edge of sanity, and makes you feel their presence.’ Art lifts the marijuana cigarette to show it to us. ‘All part of my research project.’

  ‘The weed too?’

  ‘Dealing was a no-stress day job.’

  I say, ‘You met Silvana when you talked to her mother.’

  Art nods. ‘Bright girl, that one. She was curious, and I satisfied her curiosity.’

  ‘We saw your gear,’ Tony says.

  ‘The trullo or the basement?’

  ‘Both.’

  ‘It was a long research project, requiring more than a few experiments.’

  ‘You got a stockpile of posh dog food too.’

  ‘That was for Ged.’

  ‘Where’s Ged, then?’

  ‘Ged!’ Art sighs, and shakes his head. He stands up. ‘Come.’ He leaves the chapel, with us on his tail, and walks round to the back. He stops at a dog-sized mound of dirt in a small spot surrounded by wild prickly pears, a recent mound, the sort of mound we prayed not to find when we searched his fields. ‘Ged’s a cracked egg,’ Art says.

  The wound in my side throbs. It feels as if a swarm of small living creatures are trying to undo the stitches to escape. I bring a hand to my stomach. I won’t get sick here. ‘You need help,’ I whisper.

  Art puffs out a cloud of smoke. ‘Listen to me, guys. Give me a chance to show you I’m right, and if I fail, I promise I’ll go and talk to Michele, and to a shrink, whatever.’

  ‘Art…’

  He says, ‘Did I ever let you down?’

  Nobody replies.

  ‘Did I ever let you down?’ Art repeats. ‘An answer, guys, I deserve that.’

  Fabio says, ‘No.’

  ‘Humour me then. Or you’ll have to hit me, physically I mean, and drag me to Michele, kicking and screaming all the way down. Your choice.’

  Fabio takes me by surprise when he says, ‘All right.’

  FABIO

  1

  I say goodbye to my father with something akin to guilt, as if I wasn’t coming back. It is just after eight, and the sun is setting – in London I would still have a few hours of light. I Skyped Lara earlier, and though I didn’t tell her about me and Anna, it felt like a farewell call. She picked up and asked, laughing, if I’m planning to fly to the moon and never come back. I hope I made a good job of my pretend laugh. I’ll have to be honest with her, and tell her what I did (with the guys, and with Anna), if I go back to London.

  When.

  When I go back to London.

  Art might be many things, but he didn’t forget how to be convincing. Here we are, three grown-ups following him to another, better world, in this role-playing game of his gone out of hand. I wish his fantasy were true.

  If I have to be honest, I am not entirely sure it is not. Art said it himself: he never let us down. I suspect that Tony, and even Mauro, agree with me; but the idea that Art could be right this time is too strange, too wild, to speak aloud.

  The meeting is at the olive grove. Right Time, right Place, Art said. Was it a surprise? Certainly not, considering the sick romantic logic our friend has spiralled into. Mauro drives Tony and me there, following, as he did this afternoon, a complicated route. Only when we are sure we have nobody on our tail, we take the road to the olive grove.

  ‘I can’t believe what we’re doing,’ Tony says.

  ‘It was the easiest way. Or did you want to start a fight with Art?’

  ‘You know what freaks me out?’

  ‘Yes,’ I say, ‘the action.’

  ‘I won’t break any eggs. I won’t start killing dogs.’

  I don’t reply and neither does Mauro. Tony offers us a cigarette, and we all light one. It shouldn’t feel like a last one. It really shouldn’t.

  We leave the car at the side of the road, where we had left our mopeds that night twenty-two years ago, and we walk to the olive grove. The moon is smaller than it was that night, the countryside much darker. We didn’t think to bring a torch. I’m terrified. I’m like a kid who got lost in the woods and knows that wolves, and stranger creatures, are after him.

  My mates are with me, and the entire thing won’t last very long – I assume – but the sort of fear that grips me goes deeper than rational thoughts. Once we accept that Art didn’t trespass into another world that night that means we still don’t know what happened. The bad people are still out there, and are they watching us? Or is a hidden world of promiscuous saints spying on us?

  Art’s moped is nowhere to be seen. Orange light flickers from inside the grove. It gives me a scare, before I notice it is candlelight. Tony enters the grove first, then Mauro, and I get in last. We follow a trail of tea-lights leading to the centre of the grove, where Art waits for us, standing in a dignified pose, as a bishop at the end of a church nave. There are four pillar candles on the bare earth in front of him, delimiting a square. The thick chatter of crickets fills the air, and perhaps magic is real, tonight, magic will happen.

  ‘Is this a fucking black mass?’ Tony laughs.

  Art says, ‘I wanted to create a modicum of atmosphere.’

  ‘That’s so gay.’

  ‘I did it for you, my fairy.’

  I ask, ‘What are we doing, exactly?’

  With a conjurer’s skill, Art produces an immense joint. ‘We shall relax, to begin with.’

  2

  Tony and I met on the first day of secondary school. Mauro was in class with us too. Mauro and I had been in class together since first grade, never becoming friends, for no specific reason. In Italy, you pick a desk on the first day of school, and that will be your desk until the last day; you never change class, and you only change place when some teacher feels especially daring and forces you to.

  On the first day of school Tony sat next to me. ‘You have a funny face,’ he said, which was the highest praise anyone ever paid to me. The boys from Casalfranco found me too bland to be fun, and girls hadn’t entered my horizon yet.

  Tony was the first friend I ever made. It was with some pride that I invited him for dinner by the end of the second week of school. Having friends for dinner seemed almost too cosmopolitan to bear, the sort of thing country gentlemen did in the English novels I had already started reading. When he said, ‘May I bring another friend?’ my heart sank. Tony needed a sidekick to waddle through an evening with me. I asked who he wanted to bring, and Tony replied, Art.

  I’d heard of Art – me and every other kid at school. He was a very small kid with very big ears in our year. The week before, a boy three or four classes above us had called him Dumbo. Art had replied, Better to have big ears than a small dick, and whe
n the other boy jumped on him, Art had bitten him on the neck. The viciousness of the bite varied wildly, depending on who told the story, but Tony was there and assured me it wasn’t as big as some of the kids said (Art definitely hadn’t taken a chunk of flesh out of the other boy’s neck and munched it). Tony had put himself between the two, separating them before anybody was seriously hurt. It had only been a scrap; an unusual one though.

  I told Tony that, sure, he could bring Art, the more the merrier, though jealousy was eating me from the inside out. When they came for dinner, as I kept repeating, my father took an immediate dislike to Art. Even before we sat at the table he overhead Art telling a dirty joke about a nun and a penguin, and he stormed amongst us, saying he wouldn’t have that sort of thing under his roof. Art politely apologised. But when Art apologises, he looks like he’s taking the piss, which is exactly what he is doing.

  That way, Art and I became friends.

  So now I had, in one stroke, an entire crew of two. I couldn’t believe my luck.

  Some months later (I remember it was the first warm day of the year, so probably March), Art brought Mauro in. He had single-handedly decided that Mauro and I were more like each other than any of you realise and thus we had to be friends. I strongly disagreed, not because I had anything against Mauro, but because two friends were already a treasure beyond my wildest dreams, and I was superstitiously afraid that any change in the balance of our little group would ruin it. Art didn’t give me a chance to choose; he invited Tony and me to play at his place, and, without telling us, he invited Mauro too. I was suspicious, at first, and Mauro was even more suspicious of me.

  ‘Then I mentioned the X-Men,’ Mauro says. We all laugh.

  We are towards the end of the second joint, telling stories we’ve told a thousand times. I don’t know if it is the marijuana or the familiarity we share, but I can easily forget what we are doing. I can forget that such a long time has passed (where has it gone?) and that Art is sick and vicious. I can easily go back to that spring day when I discovered that Mauro knew the X-Men too, which was outstanding for Casalfranco in the early nineties. We bonded over four-colour rejects.

  ‘How long ago was that?’ Tony asks.

  ‘Long enough for people to die in the meantime,’ Art replies. ‘Do you remember Carla? Curly hair, not the sharpest tool in the box?’

  ‘Yeah.’

  ‘Lung cancer, last year.’

  We receive the news in silence. I haven’t seen Carla since school, and I wasn’t even her friend on Facebook; this feeling in my stomach is about me, not her. We are old enough to have friends dying of lung cancer. When did that happen?

  ‘Spoilsport,’ Tony says.

  ‘That’s what I’m saving you from.’ Art turns to Mauro. ‘Last chance here. Do you want to call your family, or are you leaving them behind?’

  Mauro makes a sad sigh. ‘We’re not going anywhere.’

  ‘As you wish,’ says Art, jumping to his feet. ‘I’ll go get the tools.’

  He disappears between the gnarled olive trees. This is not a four-colour world anymore. We were happy, life was easy. I wonder if everybody slips that far from their golden years, or if it is just us.

  Tony sees something and brings his hands to his head. ‘Oh, no,’ he says. ‘Oh, no, no, no…’

  I follow his gaze. Art is coming back. The candles, illuminating him from beneath, give him the appearance of a demon. In one hand, he has a kitchen knife.

  In the other, a kitten.

  3

  Knowing that this moment would come hasn’t made us ready for it. Tony scrambles to his feet. ‘No way,’ he says. ‘No way, dude.’

  ‘You read The Book of Hidden Things; you know what we need to do to trespass.’

  ‘Sick fucker…’ Tony’s voice is not angry. It is disappointed.

  ‘Easy, Tony, I won’t ask you to sacrifice this little treasure.’

  I have smoked too much, or Art’s stuff is stronger than I thought. I wobble. I am unstable on my feet. As if coming from afar, I hear Tony’s voice say, ‘I won’t let you kill it either.’

  The kitten is a small, marmalade affair purring in Art’s arms. Pets are supposed to pick up the emotions around them. This one is far too comfortable for one who is going to be slain. He might be under a spell.

  ‘Have you even read what I wrote?’ Art says, annoyed. ‘I made it clear that the sacrifice required depends on the person making it. When I trespassed the last time, I had to offer my own dog, a pet that I had been treating as a friend, as a peer, for months, grooming myself for the sacrifice as much as him. The entire notion of sacrifice is that you are renouncing something of yourself, shedding old skin to get a new one. This cat? I got it today. I could break his neck without feeling anything at all. It wouldn’t hurt.’

  ‘Then, what…?’

  Art points the knife at me. ‘Fabio has to do it.’

  ‘No way,’ I say.

  ‘I’m not the person to do it,’ says Art. ‘Tony? You’re a tougher cookie than you give yourself credit for. And Mauro, well, Mauro is a lawyer,’ Art chuckles. ‘No: to trespass, the best of us, the weakest, the dreamer, must push his boundaries.’ He offers me the kitten and the knife. ‘Please, Fabio, do the honours.’

  I feel sick. The floor underfoot is unsteady.

  What if he’s right?

  ‘If nothing happens I’ll come with you straight away,’ Art says. ‘But think about it! Think if it were true! An entire new world, where you will live and fuck, immortal, forever young. Forever big. In the kingdom of Hidden Things, life can’t chip away at you.’

  ‘The real world doesn’t work that way,’ Mauro says, in a soft voice.

  ‘Reality is overrated.’

  I reach out to Art. I have to take the knife and the kitten from him – he could strike at any moment, just to make a point. Art smiles, and hands them over. ‘All yours.’

  I hear Tony breathe out, now that the kitten is safe. I see Mauro shift on his feet, coming closer.

  What if he’s right?

  What if Art could save my father, could save us, could save me? It wouldn’t be the first time. He made us the men we are, for better or worse. And sure, what he is saying now, those are things no sane person would say. But what if he is right? Am I ready to refuse this last chance at doing something big, something wonderful, with my life? At being big and wonderful? In a magic kingdom where time can’t chip away at me.

  It is only a kitten.

  Art has folded his arms, looking at me expectantly.

  ‘What’s your problem, dude?’ Tony asks, watching my face.

  My problem is that I am a fucker, and I am tired of it.

  I take the kitten in one hand. He is so small I barely feel his weight. I lift the knife.

  ‘Go,’ Art says.

  I sink the knife into the kitten’s warm body.

  4

  The shadows shift; a better world opens for me. My body – somewhere, somehow – is falling to its knees, and my throat is screaming so loudly that it burns, but it doesn’t matter, because I am calm. Deep inside, I am happy.

  A familiar flavour fills my mouth, one I haven’t tasted since I was a boy: it is pasta, Mum’s secret recipe. It would take an entire day to make, with ragu sauce, prosciutto, tiny meatballs, and I don’t know what else. The last time she made that pasta, she already had her diagnosis, and she hadn’t told me yet. She would die three months later. I didn’t savour the pasta as much as I should have. I didn’t keep it with me. She should have told me it was the last time. I had a right to know. The flavour brings tears to my eyes. Only Mum knows how to make that pasta. That pasta is hers, it is her.

  I feel so safe, so loved, that it is almost too much, overwhelming. Grown-up life is never this wonderful. I remember Sunday visits to my parents’ friends in the country, smoky old houses, Mum walking through olive trees like these.

  Is it just a memory, or am I seeing her now?

  Not right now, but I will see
her soon.

  The shadows are shifting, and one of them will be Mum’s. I am perfectly clear, as I fall to my knees and I scream with blood on my hands, that she is dead but not gone, that she is somewhere else, with the Hidden Things, and I can’t really see her yet, but I remember her so vividly, the sense of her presence is so strong that she can’t be far, she is coming, and I will see her in a moment. I can scent her in the wind, the inexpensive cologne she liked so much. She is drawing closer.

  Yes. I will see her in a moment.

  5

  I realise I am kneeling and the kitten is dead. I have never taken a life before. I couldn’t imagine it was so easy. The blood is flowing freely from the cat to my hand. The creature didn’t let out a whimper, and if he did, I covered it with my cry. I throw its body on the ground, disgusted. I let go of the knife too.

  My cry dies out. The olive grove is the same as always, and my friends too. Mauro and Tony are petrified. Art is furrowing his brow.

  ‘It didn’t work!’ he whispers. ‘Why didn’t it work?’ He crouches, to look me in the eye. ‘I misjudged!’ he says. ‘What happened to your face, Fabio?’

  I bring a bloodied hand to my face. I killed a living being. I killed a living being because I thought it would take me to another world.

  Did it?

  ‘WHAT HAPPENED TO YOUR FACE? What have you done that has changed you?’

  ‘I slept with Anna,’ I whisper.

  Art is taken aback. ‘Life has hardened you,’ he says. ‘I get it. I get it! Killing a kitten wasn’t enough for you. I thought it was, but no, I should’ve made you torture him before, and then, oh, then surely we would’ve trespassed.’ He turns to Tony. ‘We’ll try again. I know where to get other kittens. All the kittens we’ll need!’

  Tony steps forward. ‘That’s not going to happen.’

  ‘The window will last only a few more hours!’

  ‘I swear to God, Art, this ends here.’

  Art looks afraid. ‘I see,’ he says. With a jerk, he takes the knife and stands up. He points the knife at Tony. ‘You ungrateful bastards. I came back for you! I had everything, and I risked it all for you! And you want to trap me here now? Oh, that is not going to happen.’