I'm Not Scared (16 page)

W
e had woken up and everything was veiled with grey. It was cold, it was damp, and sudden gusts of wind shifted the sultry air. In the night some large restless clouds had piled up on the horizon and started to advance on Acqua Traverse.

We watched them spellbound. We had forgotten that water could fall from the sky.

Now we were under the shed. I was stretched out on the sacks of wheat, with my head in my hands, quite relaxed, watching the wasps build a nest. The others had sat down in a circle by the plough. Salvatore was lounging on the iron seat of the tractor, with his feet on the steering wheel.

I loved those wasps. Remo had knocked their house down at least ten times by throwing stones at it, but those stubborn little creatures always came back to rebuild it in the same spot, at the meeting point of two metal posts and a gutter. They stuck the straw and wood together with their saliva and built a nest that looked as if it was made of cardboard.

The others were chatting, but I wasn't paying attention. Skull as usual was talking in a loud voice and Salvatore was listening in silence.

I wished it would start raining, everyone was fed up with the drought.

I heard Barbara say: ‘Why don't we go to Lucignano and have an ice-cream? I've got the money.'

‘Have you got the money for us, too?'

‘No. It's not enough. Might be enough for two tubs.'

‘What are we supposed to do in Lucignano, then? Watch you stuffing yourself with ice-cream and getting even fatter?'

Why did those wasps make the nest? Who had taught them to do it?

‘They just know. It's in their nature,' papa had replied once when I had asked him.

My sister came over to me and said: ‘I'm going home. What are you going to do?'

‘I'm staying here.'

‘All right. I'm going to make myself some bread and butter and sugar. Bye.' She went off followed by Togo.

And what was in my nature? What could I do?

‘Well?' asked Remo. ‘What about a game of steal-the-flag?'

I could climb the carob. I was very good at that and nobody had taught me how to do it.

Skull got up, kicked the ball and sent it across to the other side of the road.

‘Hey, I've got a great idea. Why don't we go where we went that time?'

Maybe I could go and join Maria and make myself a slice of bread and butter and sugar as well, but I wasn't hungry.

‘Where?'

‘Up on the mountain.'

‘What mountain?'

‘To the abandoned house. Near Melichetti's farm.'

I turned. My body suddenly awoke, my heart started marching in my chest and my stomach tightened.

Barbara wasn't convinced. ‘What do you want to go there for? It's a long way. And what if it starts raining?'

Skull mimicked her: ‘And what if it starts raining? We'll get
wet! Nobody asked you to come anyway.'

Remo didn't seem very keen either. ‘What could we do there?'

‘Explore the house. Last time only Michele went in.'

Remo said something to me.

I looked at him. ‘Sorry? I didn't catch that.'

‘What's inside the house?' he asked me.

‘Eh?'

‘What's inside the house?'

I couldn't speak, I had no saliva. I stammered. ‘Nothing … I don't know …' I felt as if an icy liquid was running down from my head, into my neck and down my sides. ‘Some old furniture, a cooker, that sort of thing.'

Skull asked Salvatore: ‘Shall we go?'

‘No, I don't feel like it,' Salvatore shook his head. ‘Barbara's right, it's a long way.'

‘I'm going. We can make it our secret base.' Skull got his bike, which was leaning against the tractor. ‘Anyone who wants to come, come. Anyone who doesn't want to come, don't come.' He asked Remo: ‘What are you going to do?'

‘I'll come.' Remo got up and asked Barbara: ‘Are you coming?'

‘As long as there are no races.'

‘No races,' Skull assured her and asked Salvatore again: ‘Aren't you coming then?'

I waited, without saying anything.

‘I'll do whatever Michele does,' said Salvatore and, looking me in the eyes, he asked: ‘Well, are you going?'

I got to my feet and said: ‘Yes, I'll go.'

Salvatore jumped down from the tractor. ‘Right, let's go then.'

* * *

We were cycling, all of us, just like the first time, towards the hill.

We rode in single file. Only my sister was missing.

The atmosphere was close and the sky was an unnatural scarlet colour. The clouds, previously massed on the horizon, were now gathering above us and jostling each other like hordes of Huns before a battle. They were large and sombre. The sun was opaque and turbid as if a filter was screening it. The air was neither hot nor cold, but it was windy. At the sides of the road and on the fields the hay was packed up in bales, which were arranged like pawns on a chessboard. Where the combine harvester hadn't passed, long waves formed, ruffling the wheat.

Remo eyed the horizon anxiously. ‘It's going to rain any moment.'

The closer I got to the hill the worse I felt. A weight pressed on my stomach. The remains of breakfast rolled around in my stomach. I felt breathless and a veil of sweat bathed my back and my neck.

What was I doing? Every turn of the pedal was a piece of oath crumbling away.

‘Listen to me, Michele, you mustn't go back there ever again. If you go back they'll kill him. And it'll be your fault.'

‘I won't go back there again.'

‘Swear it on my head.'

‘I swear.'

‘Say, I swear on your head that I won't go back there again.'

‘I swear on your head that I won't go back there again.'

I was breaking the oath, I was going to see Filippo and if they found me they would kill him.

I wanted to turn back, but my legs pedalled and an irresistible force dragged me towards the hill.

A distant rumble of thunder ripped the silence.

‘Let's go home,' said Barbara as if she had heard my thoughts.

I panted: ‘Yes, let's go home.'

Skull passed us guffawing. ‘If a few drops of rain scare the shit out of you, you better had go home.'

Barbara and I looked at each other and kept pedalling.

The wind increased. It blew on the fields and raised the chaff in the air. It was hard to keep the bikes on line, the gusts drove us off the road.

‘Here we are. A long way, was it?' said Skull, braking to make his wheels skid on the grit.

The path leading to the house was there in front of us.

Salvatore looked at me and asked: ‘Shall we go?'

‘Yes, let's go.'

We started the climb. I had trouble keeping up with the others. Red Dragon was a rip-off. I didn't want to admit it, but it was. If you stood up on the pedals you got the handlebars in your mouth and if you changed gear the chain came off. The only way to avoid being left behind was to stay in top gear.

From the fields, on our right, a flock of rooks rose. They cawed and wheeled with outspread wings, borne on the air currents.

The sun was swallowed up by the grey and suddenly it seemed like evening. A clap of thunder. Another. I looked at the clouds as they rolled and wrapped over each other. Now and then one of them lit up as if a firework had exploded inside it.

The thunderstorm was coming.

What if Filippo was dead?

A white corpse huddled at the bottom of a hole. Covered with flies and swollen with grubs and worms, its hands withered and its lips hard and grey.

No, he wasn't dead.

What if he didn't recognize me? If he wouldn't speak to me any more?

‘Filippo, it's Michele. I've come back. I swore to you I would, I've come back.'

‘You're not Michele. Michele's dead. And he lives in a hole like me. Go away.'

In front of us the valley opened up. It was sombre and silent. The birds and the crickets were mute.

When we arrived at the oaks a big heavy drop hit my forehead, another my arm and another my shoulder and the storm broke over us. The rain teemed down. The downpour lashed the tree-tops and the wind blew among the branches, whistled among the leaves, and the earth sucked up the water like a dry sponge and the drops rebounded on the hard earth and vanished and the lightning struck on the fields.

‘We'd better get some shelter!' shouted Skull. ‘Run!'

We ran, but we were already drenched. I slowed down. If I saw the 127 or anything strange I was going to leg it.

There were no cars around and I couldn't see anything strange.

They went into the cow-shed. The hole was there, behind the brambles. I wanted to run and uncover it and see Filippo, but I forced myself to follow them.

The others were standing there, jumping up and down, excited by the thunderstorm. We took off our T-shirts and wrung them out. Barbara had to pull hers forward, otherwise her tits would have shown.

Everyone was laughing nervously and rubbing cold arms and looking outside. It was as if the sky had been riddled with holes. As the thunder crashed the lightning joined the clouds to the earth. The clearing, in a few minutes, filled with puddles and from the sides of the valley dirty streams of red earth flowed down.

Filippo must be scared to death. All that water was draining into the hole and if it didn't stop soon it might drown him.
The sound of the rain on the corrugated sheet was deafening him.

I must go to him.

‘Upstairs there's a motorbike,' I heard my voice saying.

They all turned to look at me.

‘Yes, there's a motorbike …'

Skull jumped to his feet as if he had sat on an ants' nest. ‘A motorbike?'

‘Yes.'

‘Where is it?'

‘Upstairs. In the last room.'

‘What's it doing there?'

I shrugged. ‘I don't know.'

‘Do you reckon it still works?'

‘It might.'

Salvatore looked at me, he had a mocking smile on his face. ‘Why did you never tell us?'

Skull cocked his head. ‘Right! Why did you never tell us, eh?'

I swallowed. ‘Because I didn't want to. I'd done the forfeit.'

A flash of understanding went through his eyes. ‘Let's go and have a look at it. Wow, if it works …'

Skull, Salvatore and Remo rushed out of the cow-shed, sheltering their heads with their hands and shoving each other into the puddles.

Barbara set off, but stopped in the rain. ‘Aren't you coming?'

‘In a minute. You go on.'

The water had slicked her hair which hung down like dirty spaghetti. ‘Don't you want me to wait for you?'

‘No, you go on. I won't be a minute.'

‘All right.' She ran off.

I went round the house and made my way through the brambles. My heart was beating in my eardrums and my legs
were giving at the knees. I reached the clearing. It had turned into a rain-lashed bog.

The hole was open.

The green fibre-glass sheet wasn't there any more, neither was the mattress.

The water was dripping down me, trickling inside my shorts and pants, and my hair clung to my forehead and the hole was there, a black mouth in the dark earth, and I went towards it. I was hardly breathing, I clenched my fists, while around me the sky was falling and waves of incandescent pain wrapped round my throat.

I closed my eyes and opened them again hoping something would change.

The hole was still there. Black as the plughole in a sink.

I staggered closer. My feet in the mud. I wiped one hand across my face to dry it. I was almost collapsing on the ground, but I kept going forward.

He's not there. Don't look. Go away.

I stopped.

Go on. Go and look.

I can't.

I looked at my sandals covered in muck. Take one step, I told myself. I did. Take another. I did. Good boy. Another and then another. And I saw the edge of the hole in front of my feet.

You're there.

Now all I had to do was look into it.

I suddenly felt certain there was nobody in there any more.

I raised my head and looked.

I was right. There was nothing there. Not even the bucket and the little saucepan. Only dirty water and a sodden blanket.

They had taken him away. Without telling me anything. Without letting me know.

He had gone away and I hadn't even said goodbye.

Where was he? I didn't know, but I knew that he was mine and that they had taken him away from me.

‘Where are you?' I shouted into the rain.

I fell on my knees. I dug my fingers in the mud and squeezed it in my hands.

‘There isn't any motorbike.'

I turned round.

Salvatore.

He was standing there. A few metres away from me, his T-shirt soaked, his trousers spattered with mud. ‘There isn't any motorbike, is there?'

I gurgled no.

He pointed towards the hole. ‘Is that where he was?'

I nodded, and stammered: ‘They've taken him away.'

Salvatore came over, looked inside and stared at me. ‘I know where he is.'

I slowly raised my head. ‘Where is he?'

‘He's at Melichetti's. Down in the gravina.'

‘How do you know?'

‘I heard yesterday. Papa was talking to your papa and that guy from Rome. I hid behind the study door and heard them. They moved him. The exchange didn't work out, they said.' He swept back his wet fringe. ‘They said this place wasn't safe any more.'

The thunderstorm passed.

Quickly, just as it had started.

It was a long way off now. A dark mass advancing over the countryside, drenching it and continuing on its way.

We were going down the path.

The air was so clean that far away, beyond the ochre plain, you could see a thin green strip. The sea. It was the first time I had ever seen it from Acqua Traverse.