Eva Sleeps

by Francesca Melandri

  We remain in each other’s arms between the linen sheets. White ones. I can’t bear to have my sleep—scarce enough as it is—surrounded by colors. Carlo turns on his side and wraps me from behind. He smells my hair.

  “You travel too much, you,” he says.

  I smile. When he talks like that, I know he means it. The phone rings. Carlo holds me tight. Don’t go, his arms are saying. I don’t go, and the Telecom answerphone kicks in. “This is the answering service for zero, four, seven . . . ”

  An excited, adolescent voice with a strong Roman accent, says, “Listen, it’s coming now . . . ”

  The answerphone continues, unperturbed, in German now, “Hier spricht der Anrufbeantworter der Nummer Null Vier Sieben Vier . . . ”

  “What’s that—German?” a second voice says. A slightly clucking voice that hesitates between high and low tones. Fourteen—fifteen years old at most. Perhaps younger.

  “Hey, how long does it go on for?”

  “ . . . Hinterlassen Sie bitte eine Nachricht nach dem Signal.”

  At this point the two boys are guffawing and the first one has started screaming into the receiver, “Krauts! Krauts!”

  “Actùn, cartoffen, capùt . . . !”

  The other one has joined in but is laughing so hard he can’t carry on. My back remains glued to Carlo’s stomach, his arms around my chest. We stay there, listening without moving.

  “Go back to Germany!” the first one screams, then hangs up.

  “Again!” I say. “Don’t they ever get fed up?”

  There’s a scene in all the TV soaps my mother watches every day after lunch. The married man knots his tie while standing at the foot of his mistress’s bed, gives her a kiss on the forehead, then leaves, while she remains lying on an unmade bed, staring sadly at the door that has closed behind him. Often, she’ll hug her knees and put her chin on them, always modestly covered by the sheet. In eleven years, it’s never been like that with Carlo. Before he says goodbye, even if he’s in a rush, he always takes the time to move from the bed to the sofa, or the kitchen, or balcony, in other words somewhere that isn’t the place of pleasure, to allow me also to get dressed or at least put on a robe. Then we have a coffee, a chat, a laugh. I feel that’s quite a lot.

  This time, before leaving, he helps me unpack my bags. Together, we leaf through the catalogues of the exhibitions I saw in New York. Gerhard Richter at MOMA. A young Korean artist in a gallery in Chelsea—twenty-two years old and he’s already selling his paintings to billionaires on the East Side. An exhibition of wood art by the people of Dogon. I’ve seen more than one African statue in my clients’ homes, often family castles redecorated with skillful additions of glass and steel. The South Tyrol rich like ethnic art. It makes them feel like citizens of the world.

  Before he leaves, Carlo says, “After Easter Monday, if you like, I’ll come inside.”

  “That would be great,” I answer.

  Don’t panic. We haven’t suddenly decided, on the spur of the moment, to have a child together. All he’s saying is that, after the holidays, he’ll come back to me, inside my valley, from Bolzano, where he lives. If you’re from Alto Adige—even if, like him, you have Venetian and Calabrian blood—you translate into Italian many of our German dialect idioms. You go inside—inni—when you go into valleys that run outside—aussi—towards the plains and the big wide world.

  Last summer, for instance, I was in Positano. Carlo phoned me. His wife and children had gone away and he was free to fly out of Bolzano.

  “I’m coming out tonight,” he said, meaning he was going to join me, not that he would be using a form of contraception approved by the Church.

  And now Carlo gives me a kiss (not on my forehead!), then goes home. To his home.

  Of course, every so often I get questions. There’s always someone—generally a woman—who feels it her duty to communicate that she feels sorry for me. “How can you bear it—so many years with a married man?” they ask. Many, almost all of them, add, “I could never do it.”

  Every time, it takes me a little while to remember that there are people out there to whom my situation seems untenable. Sad, if not desperate. Ulli, however, would never have asked me that. He knew there’s only one person I can accept being bound to. The only one I can belong to without feeling that I’m sinking into sticky mud, into an unknown marsh. The only one I could, if need be, look after and take care of without feeling trapped. And it’s not a man.

  Shortly before dinner, Zhou comes by to say hello. Ten years old, two pigtails from which small pink plastic strawberries hang, and a dangling molar. Almond-shaped eyes, like a Chinese girl. Well, she is Chinese. She’s very clever at school. Her favorite subject: Geometry.

  “I saw the light on, so I knew you were back.”

  I haven’t seen her for a couple of weeks and looking at her face as she talks makes me feel as disorientated as I did the first time. It’s like watching a Bruce Lee movie dubbed by a choir of yodeling Alpini.

  Signor Song, her father, was the owner of a shoe factory in Shandong, in Southern China. In the late eighties, he sold it to a party official. The total proceeds obtained from the sale of the establishment, including warehouses, machinery, and goods ready to be shipped: two passports with authorization to leave the country—one for himself, and one for his wife. As a memento of China and of his family, which, for a time, was very prominent in the area, he managed to take with him just an ornate wooden box containing the instruments necessary for raising fighting grasshoppers, an activity typical of Shandong, and in which his father was an expert.

  After a few months, the Songs arrived in Italy, first in Trieste, then Padua, where their children were born, and, finally, in South Tyrol. That’s where Signor Song was living when, during the 2001 census, they asked him to tick one of the following boxes: Italian, German, or Ladin. There was no room for any other option, since these are they only three ethnic groups recognized in South Tyrol. In order to receive the benefits of the Region with special status you had to fill in and sign a declaration of belonging to the language group. The heading on the form said, in German, Sprachgruppenzugehörigkeitserklärung.

  Signor Song told me he stared at that word for a long time. Thirty-six letters. Eleven syllables.

  Although he is a polyglot (Italian, English, Mandarin, and now also some German), his mother-tongue is Shandong dialect: a tonal and especially monosyllabic language. For the first and perhaps only time in his life, he skipped over the practical side of the question and experienced a gut reaction: he could never even have started to speak a language which can form a single word with thirty-six letters and eleven syllables. He considered the possibility of ticking “Ladin.” He knew little about those somewhat marginal people but felt a vague kind of warmth toward them. However, he wasn’t planning to relocate to Val Gardena or Val Badia, the only places where that would carry a distinct advantage.

  So now, Zhou, as well as her parents and older siblings, is to all intents and purposes ethnically Italian. She keeps me company with her accent that smacks of a North East tavern, while I finish unpacking my bags. When it’s time for dinner, she leaves.

  On the bookcase, I keep two two photos in pale wooden frames. One is that of a boy with eyelashes that are too long, like those of roebuck, and an apologetic smile: Ulli. The other one is in slightly yellowed black and white. A ten-year-old girl stands between two slightly older children—not sure if they’re cousins or more distant relatives. They’re on a sunny mountain pasture, slightly against the light. They’re minding the cows grazing behind them. The little girl’s dress is too short, clearly handed down several times, and exposes bare legs filthy with mud. There are blades of grass and a daisy sprouting between her toes. She looks straight in the eyes of whoever is taking the picture. She’s the only one doing so—the other two children are staring at her, stealing a glance, mouths open, in thei
r eyes the terror and awe of someone witnessing a wonder of nature.

  My mother, as a little girl.

  It’s pointless trying to sleep after crossing six time zones—and in the wrong direction at that. I spend the night awake, tidying up. Now I open the window.

  Even though it’s April, the air still smells of snow in the middle of the night. Yet the larches are starting to awaken, the resin is already rising from the dark depths of the trunks, and its oily essence is beginning to spread through the air. I breathe in deeply. On sleepless nights like this, I remember how lucky I am to be living somewhere that smells good. The pale blue stars are throbbing, promising a fine but still chilly day.

  On the mountain across from the balcony, snowcat lights go up and down, as they do every night. All in line, like obedient little spaceships. With the advance of spring, the upkeep of the snowy slopes for end-of-season skiers becomes an increasingly thankless task, since the snow melts quicker and there’s less of it falling. Watching those lights climbing up and down, there are many things I don’t think about. About the warmth inside the driver’s cab of Marlene, the snowcat with a woman’s name, thoroughly heated during icy winter nights; about the music wars between Ulli and me—my Eurythmics against his Simply Red, shot through the stereo he had installed in the cab by himself; about the absurd, zebra-striped covers on the seats, as though Marlene was a Texan truck and the ski slope US Route 163 in Monument Valley. I don’t think about these things. At least not every night.

  Up on the summit, in the crisp air 2,000 meters, right beneath Orion’s Belt, the permanently lit beams of the factory glisten as relentlessly as those of a prison. I look at them for a long time. Another thought that doesn’t even brush past me: the factory could have been mine one day. Instead, it will never be so.

  I take in another breath, and close the window.

  I sip my first coffee before dawn. It’s not to wake me up, I’m not sleepy yet—not even tired—but what else can you drink at six o’clock in the morning? The night is wasted anyway, I tell myself, so no point in trying to sleep anymore. I’ll go to bed early this evening and tomorrow I’ll get to my mother’s rested. At least I hope so. I know she’s been preparing Easter lunch for three days with Ruthi and the other relatives. Schlutza, Tirtlan, Mohnstrudl, Strauchln. And Topfentaschen, Rollade and grappa made of last summer’s cranberries. I wouldn’t wish to fail in my duty to pay homage to the treats they’re preparing but if I don’t get enough sleep, I don’t have an appetite.

  The mountain still looks black against the opalescent sky while in the east a lonely little cloud stands out, glowing pink—almost orange. The snowcats are now asleep in the hangars dug out of the rock. The factory is still lit up but not for much longer. Two hours from now, the steel cables, taut between pylons, will start transporting the thousand, ten thousand, one hundred billion skiers on which our valley depends to perpetuate its own wealth. I’m the first to agree: without the factory, there’d be no tourists. Without tourists, no hotels. Without hotels, no wellbeing. Without wellbeing, no events to organize. For me that would mean no trips, no Prada shoes, no previews in Chelsea full of promises of Asiatic art, no trips to Indonesia or Yucatan. Not even Jack Radcliffe from Bridgeport, Connecticut, with his perplexed beady expression, or his thwarted erotic hopes.

  God bless the factory for generating happy skiers for us all.

  I sip my coffee, wrapped in the blanket my mother gave me: a patchwork of knitted squares made from the leftovers of my childhood pullovers. It has subdued, ill-matched colors. The sign of a time when if you were lucky enough to have any clothes at all, the way they looked was the least of your concerns. Loden blue, apple red, mousey gray, forest green. An orange square (I’ve no idea which pullover this one comes from) sticks out like a sore thumb. This blanket is totally out of place in my elegant home, all in lime green and aquamarine shades. It’s also rough, like barbed wire, and feels like wool that hasn’t been carded. I can still remember how that coarse kind of wool used to make my arms itch. How did I ever put up with it? No wonder I have only cashmere or mohair sweaters now.

  The telephone rings.

  In the stillness of dawn, that sharp sound makes me jump and I almost spill my coffee. I’m about to answer but freeze. Who’d be calling me at this hour? It’s probably a wrong number. I let the answering machine start.

  “This is number . . . /Hier spricht der Anrufbeantworter . . . ”

  I let Signorina Telecom/Fräulein Telekom finish her elaborate homage to bilingualism, and keep listening. There’s a protracted silence. There’s a presence on the other end of the line. Then, a little louder, comes the faint sound of breathing. I can’t believe they play tricks even at this hour! Before even going to school! Maybe it’s the sleepless night, or perhaps the jet lag but the adrenaline starts pumping in my veins. I grab the receiver. “Stop it! I’m fed up with this!”

  “Eva . . . Is that you?”

  It’s a man’s voice. Not a young man. Perhaps he’s tired or ill, or both. Taken aback, I say, “Who’s that?”

  A pause.

  “My Sisiduzza . . . May I still call you that?”

  I stare at the absurd square in the blanket. The orange one. I really must ask my mother which pullover it comes from. Perhaps it wasn’t mine but one of Ruthi’s.

  “Is this a joke?” I whisper.

  “No, it’s me—Vito.”

  I look up. The sun has risen. A golden light is bathing my kilim.

  Woe betide the daughters of loveless fathers: their fate is that of the unloved. Only once in my life has my mother, Gerda, been sure of a man’s love, and I of a father’s. All the other times have been like summer downpours: they came, made our shoes all muddy, but left the fields dry. With Vito, though, it was the real thing. Both for her and me, his presence was like a rainfall in June, like water that makes the hay grow and refills the springs. But even then we weren’t spared the drought, before and after.

  In a tired voice, Vito tells me he hasn’t got long left to live.

  He also says, “I’d like to see you again.”

  A few hours later, I’m already on my way. I’m going South, I’m going to him.

  1925 - 1961

  Vofluicht no amol!” Hermann burst out in a loud voice. “Vofluicht, scheisszoig!”4

  The basket his master had given him to take to the market had fallen on the ground. All the wheels of gray cheese had rolled on the ground.

  He hadn’t sworn in Italian, as demanded by the Fascist laws now in force, which dictated that only Italian be used in public. He hadn’t even used a blasphemy, which would have been frowned upon but not considered illegal, as long as it was in Italian. He had sworn, and sworn in German. And, to be more precise, in dialect. An employee of the Fascist land registry office, who was walking past, heard him and, wishing to defend the Roman spirit of Südtirol, now Alto Adige, struck Hermann right across the face with his ink-stained open hand, then decisively tore off his Bauernschurtz, the blue work apron.

  No German to be spoken in public, no Tyrolean clothes, no dirndl or Tracht or Lederhosen. Nothing to imply that the new Brenner border wasn’t the holy limit of Italic land. It was the Fascist law. Among the peasants and Knechte at the market, nobody looked up or defended him.

  Some time later, despite the slap and the humiliation, or perhaps for that very reason, the badge, the fasces pin of party members began to gleam on Hermann’s collar. The local party officials looked on this favorably and taught him to drive a truck. They entrusted him with the transportation of timber between the valleys, and turned a blind eye if he spoke dialect with the lumberjacks. In any case, up there among those forgotten crags, even il Duce wouldn’t have been able to hear them.

  The years passed and one day, Hermann saw on the main road of the main town a group of Golden Pheasants—it was what they called the SA. Their eyes were like blades ready to cut down any obst
acle to the creation of the magnificent Thousand Year Reich. They walked straight, impeccable, Aryan, infinitely German. Hermann thought they were beautiful demi-gods.

  He decided to become one of them.

  Maybe Hermann lost love completely just as he was deluding himself that he’d found it—when he saw Johanna, an eighteen-year-old girl with black hair, thin and pale, who never spoke but walked with her head down as though wishing the world would overlook her existence. Maybe having at his side a woman whose every gesture apologized for her being alive would make him forget the shame, powerlessness, anger, and loneliness. That’s what Hermann sensed, although he could not have said it. Therefore, even though he didn’t love Johanna, he asked her to marry him. She immediately saw the coldness in his pale eyes. However, she also thought she saw a hint of concealed tenderness convinced herself that she had discovered, in this tall man who walked so rigidly, an all-consuming truth that was reserved for her alone. It wasn’t true, or perhaps it could have been true, but that’s not what happened. In any case, she married him.

  The first child, Peter, was born with his father’s saturnine temperament and his mother’s dark eyes. He was three years old when Hermann lifted him onto his bony shoulders and joined the crowd gathered where the highway met a valley-bound road. Perched up there, the child felt important, almost as important as Crown Prince Umberto, guest of honor at the unveiling of the monument to the Italian Alpine troops, which had been so keenly desired by the podestà. The statue was covered with a white cloth that was being lifted and lowered by the summer wind, like giant breaths. Peter thought it looked like a huge ghost, something inhuman yet alive, throbbing. After the formal speeches and the band playing, the cloth fell with an almost animal rustling sound, in a sinuous ectoplasmic movement. But there was nothing evanescent about what it revealed: that was very solid—almost obtuse—matter.