Who is Lou Sciortino? (23 page)

Lou turns red and looks down.

“What are you doing, looking at my feet?” Mindy asks.

“What?” Lou says curtly.

Cettina smiles and gives Mindy a look that says,
You're gorgeous.
Then she signals to Agatino, who's moving among the guests with a tray full of the triad of aperitifs. Agatino approaches and whispers in her ear, “Signora, your husband's looking desperately for you.”

“Are you having anything, kids?” Cettina says. “You'll have to excuse me. Apparently my husband's looking for me.”

Mindy shifts her weight, trying to free her right heel, which is caught in the grass. “A Brancamenta,” she says to Agatino with a slightly pained tone.

Fuck,
Lou thinks,
just like my grandfather!

She's spent years playing the saint,
Agatino thinks,
and now look at the whore.

“Make that two, please,” Lou says, looking straight at Rosamunda, or Mindy, or whatever the fuck she's called.

Sì, principessa, ascoltami!

Tu che di gel sei cinta,

da tanta fiamma vinta,

l'amerai anche tu!

The voice of Violetta Leonardi, a soprano from the Teatro Massimo, rings out loud and clear, reaching every corner of the garden. It wasn't difficult for Senator Zappulla to get the soprano to grace Tony's barbecue, along with the tenor Pippo Del Gaudio, the two first violins, a cellist, and a pianist from the Massimo. They're performing a program of
chinoiserie et orientalisme,
according to Tony's instructions: mainly
Turandot
and
Butterfly … Tu che di gel sei cinta, Bimba dagli occhi pieni de malia, Un bel dì vedremo, Il cannone del porto, Tu, tu piccolo Iddio …

The performance ought to have gone off without a hitch, but unfortunately Salvatore Attigliano, the first violin, grabbed all the amaretti for himself, and now he's having trouble keeping time.

*   *   *

Nick looks right and left, and then goes back and hides behind the garden gate.
Minchia,
opera, Americans, and Chinese dragons! All that's missing is for a coffin with Saint Agata's relics to pass by in procession.

Nick is terrified, because he's sure that as soon as he enters everybody will stop what they're doing and start applauding the fiancé's arrival.

Because it's one thing to take Mindy aside, although he's still not sure what she looks like because when they introduced her he felt faint, anyway it's one thing to take Mindy aside and say, “I'm sorry, Mindy, let's forget this.” It's quite another thing to say to everybody, “Thanks a lot, but let's forget it” when her relatives are applauding you, the invitations are printed, the church is booked, the house is furnished, and Uncle Sal's as happy as could be.

As if that weren't enough, now he's got this fucking allergy to deal with! Never mind Uncle Sal, even Tony's plants bust your balls!

Nick is coughing and swearing at the top of his lungs when he becomes aware of a presence behind him. He turns abruptly and sees Valentina.

“Wipe your nose, it's running!” Valentina says, smiling, and hands him a Kleenex.

*   *   *

Tony approaches the girls on the wicker couch.

“Have you seen the amaretti?” he asks, in a sharp, angry voice.

“Huh?” Rosy says.

Tony folds his arms and drums with his foot.

“They gotta be here, Tony. There were trays of them,” Alessia says.

“Oh, there were trays of them,” Tony says, turning with legs apart and hands on hips and looking all around the barbecue. “Have you seen Cettina?” he asks, even more angrily.

Cinzia opens her eyes wide. “Fuck, Tony, you're firing off questions like a machine gun. We haven't seen her, but here's Nunzio, why don't you ask him?”

Tony glances down at the big rings of sweat under his armpits, swears, and grabs Nunzio's arm.

“Have you seen Cettina?”

“She was just talking to the
americano
and her cousin Mindy.”

Shading his eyes with his hand, Tony looks around, and spots Lou talking to Mindy. No sign of Cettina.

“Listen, have you seen the amaretti?” Tony screws up his eyes very small.

“No. There was a box, but that was an hour ago.”

“What do you mean … an hour ago? That director just asked me for amaretti. What am I going to give him, fried dicks?”

Nunzio smiles wickedly. “Maybe your wife hid them! Of course, if they don't turn up, you'll have to get more from Corso Italia!”

Minchia,
Nunzio really loves stirring things up between Tony and his wife!

DON GIORGINO'S
ORZATA
IS A RITUAL, A WAY OF SHOWING OFF

Don Giorgino's
orzata
is a ritual, a way of showing off. He used to buy it from the stands on Piazza Umberto when he was young. At the time he had torn pants, but there were lots of torn pants in those days. Your shoes, though, had to be good and shiny. And you kept the nail on your little finger really long to emphasize your ruby ring, because going to the stand in those days with the ring in clear view was like saying to everybody,
You're all dying of starvation, but I can afford an
orzata,
and when I buy it I've got a ring on my little finger, because Giorgino Favarotta isn't dying of starvation like all of you, and doesn't need to pawn things.

He still has the same ring. A woman's ring, with a ruby, that he got from a pawnbroker. It used to belong to a baroness whose carob orchards had burned down in 1926 and who pawned the ring to pay for a dinner she was giving.

Now, though, Don Giorgino drinks his
orzata
at the Hollywood, a bar on Piazza Europa with small tables outside, where the local bad boys drive up in their convertibles at aperitif time. And where they keep
orzata
specially for him.

Don Giorgino arrives with a
picciotto,
sits down, leans on his cane, and remains still, looking behind his sunglasses at the hookers with their bare midriffs, while the
picciotto
orders for him.

*   *   *

You can either reach Piazza Europa from the seaside promenade, which is crowded with people coming back from the sea, or from Corso Italia, which crosses the city, and is deserted on Sunday, when all the shops are closed.

Pippino is coming from Corso Italia.

On foot, in his brown suit and black polo shirt. Walking fast and seeming resolute. To tell the truth, Pippino isn't the kind of guy who has to walk fast to seem resolute. Pippino doesn't even know what the fuck it means to be resolute. He was born that way and, like all men who are born a certain way, doesn't even know he is. Pippino is walking fast because he wants to be sweating when he arrives.

*   *   *

Fuck, how many hookers there are here,
Don Giorgino is thinking as he waits for his
orzata. Look at them, plastic tits, fashionable shoes, they go to beauty salons, and they can't wait to suck the cocks of the guys in the convertibles!

Don Giorgino bursts into a wild laugh. The
picciotto
sitting next to him doesn't turn a hair. Every now and again Giorgino starts laughing like a moron.

*   *   *

Pippino is walking with his head down. Faster than ever. He can feel the first beads of sweat dropping from his forehead. His stomach, though, is still dry.

When Pippino is tense, time slows down for him, and then he sees everything: he can see if a fly is passing close to your ear, if you've lied to your wife, if your feet are sweating in your shoes—everything. But when he relaxes, like now that he's walking fast, then time speeds up, and Pippino sees only what he wants to see and nothing else.

*   *   *

The waiter arrives with the
orzata.
Don Giorgino appears to be asleep. He's absolutely still, with his mouth half open, the tip of his tongue sticking out, and his breath coming out in a wheeze, rising from his throat. The waiter puts the glass down on a little silver dish in front of Don Giorgino.

Nothing for the
picciotto.
He's here to work, not drink coffee.

Don Giorgino, dozing off constantly, takes an hour to drink the
orzata.
His hand shakes and he sips his drink like a little bird. Every now and then he laughs … his usual wild laugh.

*   *   *

Pippino reaches Piazza Europa. He walks toward the Hollywood. He looks at the customers in the bar and spots Don Giorgino. As he approaches the table, he stumbles and overturns the
orzata.

The waiter sees a man who's bathed in sweat apologizing to Don Giorgino, then putting his hand on the
picciotto
's back and apologizing to him, too. The waiter comes running.

“I'm sorry, I'm sorry,” Pippino's saying. “
Maria,
I'm sorry! Bring another one straightaway, the same thing, I'll pay, I'll pay, I'm sorry, I'm so sorry.”

The young guys in the convertibles laugh, so do the hookers.

The waiter doesn't know what to do. He runs inside to order another
orzata
and to get a cloth to wipe the floor.

Pippino runs into the bar. “
Maria,
I'm so sorry … Give me a glass of water, please.
Maria,
I'm so sorry. Let me pay … What was it, an
orzata?
Please let me pay.”

Pippino puts his hand in his pocket and takes out a wad of hundred-euro bills. Nancy, the cashier, who's wearing a white blouse with lace trimmings and has very big tits—quite obviously not the ones God gave her—looks him up and down: brown suit, long sleeves, wide trouser cuffs … a peasant in from some buttfuck village to chase after whores.

“Don't worry,” she says, smiling.

“You must excuse me.
Maria,
I'm so sorry. Listen … is there a gas station open around here? My Mercedes broke down on Piazza Trento.”

“Sure, there's a twenty-four-hour place on Piazza Trento, didn't you see it?”

“On Piazza Trento!
Maria,
I thought it was closed. It's Sunday.
Maria,
it's twenty-four hours.
Maria
 … I'll be right back, okay?”

Pippino runs out. Nancy watches him, smiling.

“Hurry up,” Nancy says to the waiter.

Nancy doesn't own the bar, she's just the cashier. But she likes telling the waiter to hurry up. Those who don't know often mistake her for the owner's wife.

The waiter has the tray with the
orzata
in one hand, and the bucket and cloth in the other.
Why don't you hurry up and suck my dick, whore?
he thinks. He places the
orzata
in front of Don Giorgino, picks up the remains of the broken glass from the ground, and starts to clean up.

“I'm sorry, Don Giorgino, I've got to clean it up now, before the flies get to it,” he says.

The hookers and the young guys in the convertibles are still laughing, looking at the table.

The waiter wrings out the cloth inside the bucket. He notices Don Giorgino is bleeding from his nose. His mouth is half open, and the tip of his tongue is sticking out.
He's an old man, he shouldn't come out in this heat.
But it doesn't seem right to speak to Don Giorgino with all that blood coming out of his nose. So he touches the
picciotto
on the shoulder, and the
picciotto
slowly drops his head until his forehead hits the table. The mother-of-pearl handle of a knife eight inches long is sticking out from under his armpit.

*   *   *

Pippino felt it when the knife touched the
picciotto'
s heart, just like he felt the soft bone on the bridge of the old man's nose yield abruptly. A trained hand is just like a knife that can think and feel.

Pippino goes down to the rocks below Piazza Europa. He takes off his shoes, his suit, and his polo shirt, and without a moment's hesitation dives into the water.

“CETTINA, YOU'RE A DISGRACE TO BOTH HOUSES!”

“Cettina, you're a disgrace to both houses!”

The barbecue is at its height and he expects to be understood without further explanation. Cettina tries to understand him. She really concentrates. Because when Cettina doesn't understand him, Tony loses his temper. And when Tony loses his temper, Cettina doesn't understand a fucking thing.

“What do you mean, both houses?” Cettina asks, while all around the barbecue is raging like a storm at sea.

Tony raises his eyes to heaven. “This one and your mother's, which you couldn't wait to get away from, that's why you married me … Where the fuck did you hide the amaretti?”

Cettina looks around. “What do you mean, where did I hide them? I didn't hide them!”

Tony sways. He raises his hands and moves his head from side to side.

Cettina gets frightened.

“So you're telling me you didn't hide the amaretti? You're informing me that all the amaretti in the house are already gone?”

Now he really is losing his temper! And when Tony loses his temper he acts like a puppet: he says something, rushes off, has second thoughts, comes back, curses, and rushes off again. It's like his strings are being pulled by an invisible demon.

*   *   *

Pippino is sitting on the rocks, smoking a cigarette, drying himself in the sun. The solarium on Piazza Europa has already been taken apart. There are two injured seagulls perched on the rocks, keeping him company.

*   *   *

Tony is sitting in his car, staring into space. When he got in, he slammed the door of the purple Fiat 127 hard, and the scented rubber flying saucer is still swaying on the rearview mirror. Tony had hurried across the ring road, looking right and left, raising his hands to stop the cars, even though there wasn't any fucking traffic. But Tony knows you shouldn't cross the ring road on foot, it's dangerous, that's why they built the elevated walkway.