Authors: Niccolo Ammaniti
Cristiano looked at him. "Why?"
"Just come here."
Hesitantly, Cristiano obeyed.
"Head-butt me. Show me how you'd do it."
"What?"
"I said head-butt me."
Cristiano was incredulous. "Me? You want me to head-butt you?"
His father grabbed his wrist. "Who else? Get on with it, for fuck's
sake."
Cristiano tried to break away. "No ... Please ... I don't want to ... I
can't."
Rino gripped his arm more tightly. "Now listen to me carefully.
Nobody's allowed to beat you up ever again. Nobody is going to
even think about doing it. You're not a little faggot who gets kicked
around by the first asshole he meets. I wish I could help you-you
don't know how much I wish I could-but I can't. You've got to
fight your own battles. And there's only one way of doing that:
you've got to become mean." He felt his arm. "You're too nice.
You're soft. You're not angry enough. You're made of cotton wool.
Where are your balls?" He shook him, as if he was a rag doll. "So
head-butt me. Don't think about me being your father, don't think
about anything, just think that you're going to hurt me and that
I'm going to spend the rest of my days regretting that I once had
the fucked up idea of picking a fight with you. Don't you see that
once you've destroyed a couple of the bastards word will get round
that you're a son of a bitch and nobody will ever try fucking with
you again? I'm doing it for your sake. If you can't head-butt me
you'll never be able to do it to anyone else." He pointed to his nose
with both forefingers and said: "So let me have it!"
There was no alternative. Cristiano knew it. He was going to
have to give him that head-butt.
He pointed his foot forward, drew back his head, shut his eyes
and jerked his head forward. He hit his father on the bridge of the
nose and heard a nasty sound, like that of teeth crunching on chicken
bones. All he felt was a slight tingling in the middle of his forehead.
Rino took a step backward, like a boxer who's taken an uppercut
to the jaw, put his hand to his nose, stifled a yell and went purple
in the face. When he took his hand away there were two trickles of
blood coming out of his nostrils.
Cristiano embraced him. "I'm sorry, papa, I'm sorry..."
Rino hugged him tightly, stroked his hair and said in a strangled
voice: "Congratulations! I think you broke my nose."
While Rino Zena was stuffing two bits of cotton wool up his nostrils, Cristiano sat on the toilet watching him, and reflected that
the problem, all things considered, remained exactly the same as
before.
Okay, he had learned to give a head-butt, but if after vandalizing
Tekken's motorbike he had gone on to give him a head-butt, the
rest of the gang would have grabbed him and dragged him up and
down the highway to their hearts content.
But what he found most amazing was that his father hadn't asked
him what the fight had been about. The question hadn't even crossed
his mind.
All he cares about is that nobody hits his son.
To be honest, the beating he had taken had been richly deserved.
Cristiano would have done exactly the same if someone had wrecked
his motorbike.
He put his hand on his forehead.
What if I tell him about the thousand euros?
It would mean telling him the whole story. He just didn't know
what to do.
"Are you ready?" said his father in a Donald Duck-like voice, as
he dried his face.
"What for?"
Rino changed his T-shirt. "What do you mean, what for? We're
going to find your kick-boxing champion and show him what a big
fucking mistake he made when he beat you up."
Cristiano felt like throwing up. It wasn't possible. "You are
joking, right?"
"No way. You must never let these things drag on. If someone
hits you, you have to hit back straight away. And, as the Bible says,
seven times harder."
"Do we really have do it right now?"
"Don't tell me you want to be the guy who takes a beating and
keeps his mouth shut... This kind of problem has to be dealt with
immediately."
Cristiano objected disconsolately: "But he'll be with the others..."
Rino started jumping up and down like a boxer who's about to
enter the ring. "So much the better. They'll all see that nobody
messes with Cristiano Zena."
"But what if the others defend him?"
"Don't worry about that... I'll be with you." A wild elation shone
in his father's eyes.
"Suppose he reports me to the police... ? I'll be in the shit..."
His father went through into the sitting room without replying.
Cristiano followed, imploring him. "Please, papa. You know
Trecca ... He's just looking for an excuse to put me into care."
Rino went over to the stove, where there was a pile of firewood.
He selected a piece about two feet long and swung it approvingly
through the air like a baseball bat.
"Good! Now you're going to give him this prime piece of beechwood smack in the teeth."
"I'm not coming, papa." Cristiano shook his head dejectedly and
threw himself on the sofa. "You're always saying we shouldn't do
anything stupid. I'm staying at home ... I'm not interested. You can
go if you want to ... You said I've got to solve my own problems ... I
will. Please put down that stick. So embarrassing..."
"Listen to me. Do you think your father's a fuckwit? Your father
may not look like a thinker, but he is." He tapped his temple with
his finger. "This brain still works pretty well, so you've got to do
as I say. Relax. Don't worry. Leave everything to me." He gripped
his son's arms. "He's eighteen and you're thirteen. He's an adult
and you're a minor. He's the one who'll be in the shit. And he
started it ... The way I see it, you're simply sticking up for yourself. And afterward, if he has any problem..." he took the pistol
out of the drawer in the dresser, "we'll introduce him to this young
lady here. One sight of her pointing right at his face would be
enough."
"But ...
"No buts!"
Rino picked up the bottle of grappa from the table, gulped down
a quarter of it and uttered a kind of roar. "Drink some of this. It'll
give you courage."
Cristiano took a swig. He felt the alcohol burning his guts and
realized that Tekken was in for it.
Three times, on the way to Varrano, Cristiano felt the urge to
come clean, and three times he did no more than imagine his
confession.
Papa, there's something I've got to tell you.... Look, I wrecked
his motorbike ... That's why he beat me up. I did a thousand euros
worth of damage to his bike, when he hadn't done anything to me.
It was the truth. Tekken had never touched him. He had picked
on a lot of other people outside the school, but never him. He had
never even spoken to him. Until that evening Tekken probably hadn't
even known he existed.
When they caught up with him, Tekken would say Cristiano had
wrecked his motorbike and his father would find out.
What a fucking mess.
But when they got to the mall it was closed. The gates locked.
The lights switched off. The towers black. The expanse of asphalt
lashed by the rain, which had started dancing in the beams from
the spotlights again. Tekken had even removed his motorbike.
Cristiano heaved a sigh of relief. "He's not here. Let's go home."
But the only reply was: "Don't worry. I'll find him."
They started driving around the village. The bar. The main street.
The other main roads. It was only a quarter past nine, but there
wasn't a soul to be seen.
His father drove in fits and starts, wrenched the gears, broke all
the rules in the highway code. "Where the fuck has he got to?"
"He's probably gone home. Why don't we just forget it? It's
late."
The streets were empty and the rain was drumming on the roof
of the van.
They stopped at the side of the highway. Rino lit his umpteenth
cigarette. "What shall we do?" he asked.
"I don't know."
His father sat in silence, touching his swollen nose.
"Come on, let's go home," Cristiano advised him.
So they set off, but just to make quite sure, Rino decided to do
one more circuit around the village. He passed the church, went along the residential streets with their rows of illuminated cottages with tidy
gardens and with station wagons and four-by-fours parked outside,
and then, finally, drove back out onto the deserted highway. Every
hundred yards the streetlamps threw yellow rings on the asphalt and
the windshield wipers worked frantically to keep the glass dry.
Cristiano was about to tell him to head for the exit when he saw,
on the other side of the highway, a black-clad figure pushing a
motorbike in the rain.
Tekken.
His windproof jacket soaked. His tires slashed. What a struggle
he must be having. He was all alone on the highway ... There wasn't
even the risk of looking stupid, let alone of being caught by the
police.
Tekken would shit himself and withdraw his demand for the
money. But Cristiano would have to be quick-jump out of the van
and hit him with the club before he had time to react.
He counted up to three and then shouted, bouncing up and down
on the seat: "I saw him! Papa, I saw him!"
"Where? Where?" Rino roused himself from his lethargy.
"On the other side of the road. We just passed him. He's on foot.
Turn around! Turn around!"
"Fantastic! You son of a bitch, we found you in the end!"
shouted Rino, and without so much as a glance in the mirror he
did a U-turn, with screeching tires. "Is he alone?"
"Yes. He's pushing a motorbike."
"A motorbike?"
"Yes."
Rino registered the information without any comment.
Cristiano felt his excitement rising and his breathing getting faster.
He gripped the club. It was nice and heavy. All the saliva had gone
from his mouth. "What shall we do, papa?"
"First of all we'll switch off the lights so he won't notice we're
behind him. When we get to within fifty yards you get out, creep
up on him quietly so he doesn't hear you, then you call out his
name, and when he turns around you give him just long enough to
recognize you, then you hit him. Just once. If you get him good,
that'll be enough. Then I'll come along and pick you up."
"Where do I hit him?"
Rino thought for a moment, then touched his jaw. "Here."
A car overtook them and lit up the motorbike's rear reflector.
"There he is. Go." Rino stopped the Ducato.
Cristiano got out of the van, holding the club tightly. Now that
son of a bitch would learn what it meant to mess with Cristiano Zena.
I'll smash your head in, you bastard.
He looked back. There were no cars in sight.
He started running, club in hand. The black figure of Tekken
pushing the motorbike grew bigger at every step. The flat tires
flapped on the asphalt. When he was about ten yards away he
slowed down abruptly and started tiptoeing forward till he was
about a yard away from him.
Make it accurate, he said to himself.
He lifted the club and shouted: "Tekken! Fuck you!"
Tekken turned his head and hadn't even had time to realize what
was happening before Cristiano unleashed a blow straight at his
temple which would have killed him or put him in a coma, if he
hadn't, at the last moment, through instinct or through the habit
of fighting, moved his head just far enough for the club to miss
his cheekbone and land between his neck and collarbone.
Without so much as a groan Tekken let go of his motorbike,
which fell on the ground, smashing a mirror. He teetered for a
moment and then, as if in slow motion, put his hand on the place
where he had been hit and, shocked and silent, fell back with a
crash on top of his motorbike.
"Bastard! Leave me alone, okay? You don't know me, so leave
me alone." Cristiano raised the club again. "If you don't leave me
alone, I'll kill you." He felt an overwhelming urge to hit him, to
smash his fucking head in. "You think you're special, but you're
nobody." He swallowed. "You're nothing."
Then he saw in Tekken's terrified eyes the belief that he was going
to die and he realized that all his anger, as quickly as it had ignited
every fibre of his being, had vanished. He had only had to look into
his eyes and ...
I was going to kill him.
... it had gone, as if someone had pulled out a plug and all his
pent-up fury, like evaporating gas, had whooshed out of him. Now
he felt nothing but nausea and a terrible weariness.
"Why? I've never done anything to you...I've never..." stammered Tekken, with his hands raised.
At that moment the van pulled up behind Cristiano and the door
opened.
"Get in! Get in, quick!" Rino beckoned to him.
Cristiano lowered his arm, dropped the club on the ground and
jumped into the Ducato.
The Frecce Tricolori were coming.
At two o'clock in the afternoon the three hundred and thirteenth
display team of the Italian Air Force would circle in the skies above
Murelle, painting them red, white and green.
At eight o'clock in the morning Danilo Aprea phoned Rino Zena
in great excitement. "What a show! The best pilots in the world.
The pride of Italy. And I'm not just saying that because I saw them
ten years ago ... They're world-famous. And it's free."
Rino asked Cristiano if he wanted to go and Cristiano said he did.
So it was settled.
They would go to see the Frecce.
Quattro Formaggi was called too, and since the display would
be taking place above a big field they decided to have a picnic, with
grilled sausages, bruschetta and wine.
Like a gray blanket, a layer of cloud had spread over the field where
the Frecce Tricolori were to pass.