Solitaria (9 page)

Mamma was waiting by the door. She was barefoot, in a white blouse and a three-tiered skirt in reds and blues, cinched at the waist with a wide, red elastic. Her hair was tight in a bun at the back of her head, though strands had escaped and now curled down her back, around her cheekbones. Mamma pushed them away from her eyes, impatient. Behind her, Clarissa was crying. “Where have you been?” Mamma said to me. “You're supposed to look after your sister.” She stared at us both. “What's the matter?” she said.

A black bird circled above us, teasing and tempting a stray cat. Vito was breathless, his face flushed. “Nothing,” he said. “We've been running, that's all.”

Mamma's eyes narrowed. She frowned and pursed her lips. “It is
not
nothing,” she said. “What's the matter? Did something happen?”

“No,” I said. “We didn't see anything.”

Mamma squatted down and took my arm. “What didn't you see?” she asked. Her skirt formed a half-circle on the ground.

I shook my head. Vito stood a little apart. He picked up pebbles and threw them one by one on the railway tracks.

“All right. Fine,” Mamma said. “We'll get to the bottom of this when your father comes home.” She stood up.

“Please don't tell Papà,” I begged. “We didn't see anything.” I was near tears. Clarissa was still crying, and Mamma had to raise her voice to be heard.

“Where have you been?” she said, turning to Vito. I ducked under her arm, and went inside to soothe Clarissa.

“In the field,” he said, defiantly. He was almost as tall as she was. “And you better not tell Papà,” he said, “because it's Papà we saw, lying on that woman, Agata.”

Mamma shrieked, as if she'd been hit. She slapped Vito. “Don't you
ever
say anything like that again!” she said.

“It's true,” he said. “Piera saw it too.”

Mamma pummelled Vito about his head and shoulders, shouting, “Liar, liar!”

“Don't, Mamma,” I said. “Vito didn't do anything.” I began to cry. “Stop, Mamma. Stop.”

Mamma looked up, her eyes wild. She stared from me to Vito, took a deep breath, and smoothed her dress. Then she seized Clarissa and walked toward the village.

Vito sat on a stone and lit another cigarette. He acted as if nothing had happened. I touched his shoulder and he winced. “I'm sorry,” I said.

He stared after Mamma. The town rose above us in the distance like a fairy-tale castle buttressed high on a hilltop. Mamma would follow the railway tracks to the bottom, then climb the hill up to the town. It would take her at least an hour, with Clarissa slowing her down. “She must be going to the church,” he said. “Or maybe to that woman's house.”

I sat down beside him. The wind had abated, but left the hut, the door, the stoop, the metal bars of the windows, shovels, leaves and flowers, stone and earth, trees and brush, all in a soft saffron hue. I ran my finger along the ground, spelled my name in the yellow dust. Vito watched, cigarette between long thin fingers.

“What was it like?” I asked. “Living with Uncle?”

Vito shrugged.

“But did they treat you well?” I said.

“I'm all here, aren't I?” Vito said. He flicked the ash into the indentation of a rock.

“But didn't you miss us?” I asked.

“I didn't even know you,” he said. “How could I miss you?” He took another drag of the cigarette. “But I would miss you now if I went away.”

“You're not going away, are you?” I turned to him.

Vito shrugged again. He leaned down and began to draw circles and lines in the dust, a random scattering.

“I've never been anywhere,” I said.

“You've been to town,” Vito reminded me.

“One day, I'm going to go all over the world and see everything.”

“No you're not,” Aldo said, and we turned towards him. “Unless you make a lot of money.” He stood in the doorway, an open book against his chest.

“Mamma's gone to town,” I said. “I'm going to go and pick some flowers for her.”

Aldo nodded and went back inside.

Vito stubbed out his cigarette and hid the butt in his pocket.

When I arrived home with a bunch of wildflowers, Mamma and Papà were already there, acting as if nothing had happened, only Mamma did not speak to Papà. I looked at them for signs. I could not reconcile this Papà with the man I'd seen earlier. Vito sat, reading, by the open door.

“Papà, Papà!” Clarissa said, “Vito had a cigarette. He's not supposed to, is he, Papà?” She climbed into his lap, put her arms around his neck, and leaned her face against his.

Papà kissed her cheek, then set her down gently. “No, he is not,” Papà said. “And cigarettes cost money in a time when we do not even have enough food.” He stared sternly at Vito, who looked away defiantly.

Later, after we girls and Mamma had gone upstairs to bed, Papà asked, “Where did you get money for cigarettes?”

“I found it,” Vito replied. He crossed his arms.

“You found it,” Papà repeated. “You found what? The money? Where did you find the money?” He leaned forward, his mouth inches from Vito's face.

“I found the cigarette,” Vito said, his voice now more confident. He leaned back, away from Papà.

“Empty your pockets,” Papà said. He stood up and pointed to Vito's pockets.

“I told you, I found the cigarette.”

“Empty your pockets now, or I'll do it for you!” Papà shouted.

“Shhhhhhhhhhh,” Mamma said in the darkness.

Vito shrugged, pulled a pack of cigarettes out of his pant pocket, and set it with a bang on the table.

Papà reached down and slapped Vito, hard. “What do you call these?” he said. “I will not have my children lying!”

“I hate you!” Vito said. “You're not my father!”

Papà undid his buckle and slid the belt out of its hoops. “I'll teach you to lie,” he said, snapping it onto Vito's back.

Vito flinched but did not cry out.

Papà cracked it down, lifting it high over his head, cracked it as if he were riding a stubborn mule, cracked the belt over Vito's back until he was wheezing and spent.

Upstairs, I covered my ears, alarmed by this new Papà whose rage was thick and frantic, and left me breathless and afraid.

Later that night, I awakened to Mamma and Papà sitting on their bed. Papà was sobbing. “Please forgive me. Margherita, you must forgive me.”

“But why?” Mamma cried. “What does she give you that I can't? Have I not been a good wife?” She buried her face in her hands and began to weep.

“I lost my head,” Papà said. “She was sitting at the edge of the well… without underpants. I lost my head.”

“She's a serpent. Sent by the devil to tempt you,” Mamma wailed in a new rush of tears. “Oh, you'll burn in hell!” And she lay down, and turned away from him, her shoulders heaving into the bed.

I listened to the words and conjured Jesus, the Devil, Adam and Eve naked, the missing underpants, Papà's buttocks, the apple, the snake, shame. I had heard all this at church and in catechism classes.

“Mamma, please. Think of the children —”

”How can you mention the children?” Mamma sat up and crossed herself. “Don't you ever mention the children in the same breath as that… that…
demon
!”

And so they continued, night after night for about three weeks. They had no idea that Vito and I were awake and listening, both terrified and thrilled at the way Mamma and Papà spoke about snakes and demons, at the way Papà stroked the back of Mamma's neck, at the way Mamma pushed him away while declaring love.

In the daytime, Papà went to work, we children to school, Clarissa played in the yellow dirt outside the door, in front of the railway tracks, and after school I helped Mamma, and read from the book Vito had given me. It was all normal, except that Mamma never spoke to Papà. But after dark, when Aldo and Clarissa and Vito and I were in bed, these torturous scenes continued, until one night, I awakened to Papà holding a butcher knife in his hand.

“Here,” he said to Mamma. “Take it and kill me. I can't go on like this any longer. Kill me.”

I caught my breath, and Mamma and Papà turned, and saw me awake. Papà hid the knife in the sheet, and Mamma hurried to me, stroked my face, and kissed my forehead.

“Mamma, you're not going to kill Papà, are you?” I whispered fearfully.

“No one is going to kill anyone,” she said. “You've been having a nightmare, that's all. Everything is fine.” She tucked in the blanket and stroked my forehead, before returning to bed and Papà.

I lay with my eyes open, shivering. Clarissa was asleep beside me, her breath escaping in small puffs against my arm. I waited for Mamma and Papà to settle down, and counted to a hundred. In the darkness, Vito reached for my hand and squeezed it.

This program, via satellite, is seen simultaneously in all the countries of Europe and the Mediterranean basin.

Our answering machine receives approximately 40,000 responses a year.

July 31, 2002

Update

(Episode of July 17, 2002)

The human remains discovered in Fregene on July 12, 2002 have been identified as Vito Salvatore Santoro, brother of now retired, world-famous soprano Clarissa Santoro.

Vito Salvatore Santoro's murder remains a mystery. The family believed he was living in Argentina, and thus have never declared him missing.

Police are hoping someone will come forward who knew Mr. Santoro during the mid-1950s, and/or particularly anyone who remembers him in Fregene.

Tune in next week, on August 7
th
, and watch our in-depth interview with Clarissa Santoro.

If you have any information regarding this victim, as well as any information regarding the circumstances of his death, please call the number at the bottom of your screen.

Belisolano, Italy, August 1, 2002

“David,” Clarissa calls. “David, are you awake? We're going down.”

“Ok,” he says, his voice groggy
.
“I'll be right there.” However, instead of springing up, he sinks back into the mattress and buries his head in the pillow.

A nagging guilt keeps him from falling back asleep. He was with Piera past 3:00 a.m., until finally, she swallowed her drops and closed her eyes. Downstairs, they're all anxious to hear what Piera has told him.

He struggles out of bed, plugs his computer into the phone line, and dials the Bari access number for Internet dial-up. Once connected, he googles the
Chi L'Ha Visto?
site, copies the link, and sends it to Bernette in an email that begins with
FYI
and ends with
See you soon. I miss you.

He showers and puts on his running clothes. On his way out, he stops in front of Piera's door and listens, but there is only silence. He would like to wake her up, to lifeline her out of her self-imposed isolation, her solitary confinement. How easy it is, he thinks, to go from
a loner
to
alone
. One letter away.
Dear —.

He takes the stairs to the inner garden, where they're eating all their meals now. In the hall, a shard of sun highlights the pots of geraniums beside the glass doors, extends across the white marble floor in a geometry of angles and triangles, between leaf shapes and blooms turned to the light. He slides open the doors. Though it's early morning, the heat is already cloying, the temperature near forty degrees. In the garden, he's catapulted into a fairy tale,
Alice in Wonderland
— the surprise of inner gardens beyond the stone walls of Italian streetscapes. Here, flowers spill out of large urns, fruit trees stretch in the sun, and in one corner, at the edge of an ancient fountain, a cherub perches, peeing a steady stream of water into a fluted basin below.

The table and chairs are set in the shade of the stone walls. On the table, two large plates are heaped with croissants and biscotti which they'll dip into their caffelatte. He is greeted by wafts of espresso mingled with the sweet fragrance of jasmine.

“Look who's here!” Clarissa exclaims, motioning to the man beside her. He is impeccably dressed in knee-length walking shorts and crisp white shirt, sleeves rolled to mid-forearm.

“Zio Aldo,” David says, springing forward to shake his uncle's hand.

“I can't believe this is the boy I met years ago,” Aldo says, smiling widely, his voice a rich baritone. “So, this is what it takes to get you here.”

David is about to object when he hears a rustle in the leaves behind him. He turns and finds himself staring into the lens of a Canon XL2 Camcorder.

The young woman holding the camcorder raises her eyebrow and makes a circular motion with her hand. “Carry on. Carry on,” she says. “Just be natural.”

“Who on earth is that?” David says. “What's going on?”

“Don't worry. It's only Oriana,” Mimí says. “My daughter.” She nods at the young woman, who now turns the camera on her mother. “Oriana! Don't be rude. Come and at least meet your cousin before you immortalize him.”

Oriana continues to film, but advances towards the table, until Fazio puts his hand in front of her lens. “Stop,” he says.

“I take full responsibility for Oriana,” Aldo says, teasing. “I couldn't bear the drive alone.”

“Ha!” Oriana says, moving to her uncle's side. She is a slender girl, mid-thirties, all dark eyes, pale skin, and mahogany hair tumbling to her waist. She's wearing jeans and a yellow halter top that reveals the curve of her breasts. “You call what you did driving?”

He puts his arm around her waist. “I brought you here to meet David.”

“
My American Cousin
,” she says.

“Canadian,” David says, unable to stop staring at her.

“It's a film. A
Canadian
film. Sandy Wilson.” She flips one side of her hair back.

“Oh,” he says, blood rushing to his face.

“He blushes too,” she says, laughing.

“Oriana is a filmmaker/producer for La Rai,” Mimí says. “She lives in Rome and we hardly ever see her.”

“Mamma, don't start,” Oriana says.

“Oriana wants to film our family drama,” Fazio says. “All family dramas are the same.”

“Happy families are all alike,” Oriana says, “but every unhappy family is unhappy in its own way.”

David smiles. “Tolstoy.”

“And he reads, too,” Oriana says.

“Stop teasing him; he'll get the wrong idea,” Marco says. “Come and sit here with me. I'm much more interesting, not to mention younger, than Zio Aldo.”

“I'm not promising anything.” Oriana slides into a chair next to Marco and pecks him on the cheek. “I like to film everything and later decide if I can make something of it.”

“You'll let us see it first, Oriana, won't you, before you air it?” Clarissa says. “I mean, we should have the right to decide if we want this made public or not.”

Oriana gaily wags her finger at Clarissa. “Are you the artistic director here?” she asks. “Or are you the censor?” She shakes her head. “Censorship, censorship everywhere these days. How can an artist create?”

Mimí slaps her lightly on the arm. “
Basta
! Be serious for a moment.”

Oriana turns to David. “Hello, Canadian cousin,” she says, her eyes twinkling. She holds out her hand.

He shakes it, all the while smiling.

Clarissa taps the back of the chair at the head of the table. “Come sit here, David,” she says. “And let's get started.”

“May I film?” Oriana asks.

They're all nervous, unsure.

“I promise I won't use it unless you okay it.” She gets up and reaches for the camcorder.

“I guess it's all right,” Teresa says.

David recounts what Piera has explained and read to him. Oriana circles around them, filming from different angles, capturing reaction shots. Now and then, David thinks he sees a shadow moving across the window on the top floor. Is Piera spying on them? Is he being faithful to her telling? What can she hear through the open window?

When he's done, they're all quiet for a moment. Oriana films their silence.

“Be pleased if the wind that enters the orchard / brings back the surge of life: / here where a dead tangle of memories
/
sinks and founders,/ there was no garden, only a reliquary,” Aldo says, quoting Montale.

“She's embellishing it for your sake,” Clarissa says finally.

“Zia Piera tells the stories the same way every time,” Marco says. “She's amazing.”

“How can she remember all the dialogue?” Mimí says. “She's made it up to suit her.”

“I've heard her tell stories since I was a child, and they never vary,” Marco says.

“She's the elephant who never forgets.” Teresa looks better today, composed, as if their presence alone has calmed her. “Or maybe, she's brooded over it all so much that she's forgotten what is real and what she invented.”

“Actually, it sounds very much like it was,” Aldo says quietly. “It's certainly what I recall, maybe not the minute details, but the events, the life, yes.”

They all reflect on that for a moment.

“I wasn't born,” Mimí says finally, “so I can't comment one way or the other.” She uses her spoon to sweep crumbs in front of her. “But it sounds right to me. Everyone said Vito was bad, but I bet he wasn't. He was only reflecting the bad in others.”

Clarissa raises her eyebrows. “How perceptive of you, Mimí,” she says sarcastically.

“Mom,” David says, frowning.

“Anyway, as always, Piera is making this her story instead of Vito's,” Clarissa says. “Self-centred as ever.”

“Let's not be unfair,” Fazio says in a soft voice. “Piera has done so much for all of us. Perhaps all she wants is to be heard.”

Teresa reaches for the aluminium espresso maker, and pours herself half a cup. Then she fills the rest from the jug of hot milk and adds a spoon of sugar.

“
For
all of us?” Clarissa says. “What about all she has done
to
us?” The sentence hangs in the air, suspended above them all.

“It's not a competition,” David says.

“Ha!” Clarissa says. “Piera's the one who keeps a running total of every imagined injustice against her.”

“Maybe it's a bit of a judgement day,” Mimí says, sneering. She pours herself half a cup of espresso, adds a generous portion of milk and sugar, and stirs it with one of the biscotti. “Weigh the good against the bad and see how Piera makes out.”

“Aldo, you're our only hope,” Clarissa says. “Please go and see if you can get Piera to stop this nonsense. We all have busy lives. We can't sit around waiting. It's inhuman.”

Aldo shrugs and goes in. Teresa and Mimí get up and begin clearing the table.

The doorbell sounds; it's the couple who live across the hall, shyly wondering if they can give their regards to
La Clarissa
.

“It won't be long,” Oriana tells David, “before the entire town will show up on this doorstep, on some pretence or other, to get a look at your mother. She is legendary here.”

David smiles. “I'm sure she'll enjoy every minute of it.”

“I would like to interview Zia Clarissa. Maybe intersperse her life story into the larger narrative of the family.”

“I don't know if Mom would like that. For a very public person, she's very private.”

“That's what makes her intriguing,” Oriana says. “The mystery.” Her eyes twinkle. “She can be the metaphor for the larger mystery of Zio Vito, of Zia Piera, for the mystery of all families.” She sets her camcorder down, takes out a notebook, and starts to write.

“Good luck,” David says, watching her, trying not to be obvious, fascinated by his own fascination. He is like a schoolboy in the throes of his first crush.
My Italian Cousin
, he thinks, catapulting them into a movie. Marco and Fazio go out for a walk and to buy a newspaper. Clarissa flits around the garden with a watering can, ooing and ahhing over red bougainvilleas she wishes she could grow at home. Only David and Oriana remain at the table.

“What kind of films do you make?” David asks her.

She continues to write. “Docs mostly.”

“Like what?”

She stops writing and looks up. “The last thing I did was a
TV
series about the cataclysmic nature of Mother Earth,” she says. “The myriad ways she can destroy us — earthquakes, floods, cyclones, avalanches, spewing volcanoes, meteors, etc.” She smiles. “It's a miracle we're not walking around in a state of terror.”

“You make it sound worse than it is,” he says.

“Do you know that at this very moment, while we sit here, the earth could suddenly open up and swallow us?” She widens her eyes in mock fear.

“We could be struck by a flying saucer too,” he says.

“I'm serious. This is karst territory. Last year, a couple of blocks from here, someone's house suddenly caved in.”

“Did you film it?” he asks.

“It's not something you can plan,” she says. “Nature doesn't work like that.”

He says nothing, and she returns to her notebook. He watches her for a moment longer, thinking how true it is, how what's memorable is often unplanned. A tug of guilt. Bernette. He pushes back his chair. Oriana looks up.

“Are you going in to Zia Piera?” she asks. “Can I come?”

“You'll have to ask her,” he says. “I'm going for my run first.”

When he returns forty minutes later, he finds Mimí, Aldo, and Teresa in the kitchen.

“Is everything all right?” he asks. “Have you seen Zia Piera?”

“I'm afraid she's impervious even to me this time,” Aldo says. “She's calling for you, though.”

David nods. He goes to his room, hooks up the cable, and connects to the Internet. He finds an elaborate florist in Chicago and wires Bernette flowers, all the while trying to concentrate on her face, while his mind sees the young woman outside, bent over her notebook.

Oriana follows David down the hall, her camcorder rolling. Piera opens the door a crack, and on seeing Oriana, quickly retreats, despite her entreaties: “Zia, you can trust me,” and “Haven't I always taken your side?” and “I'll film you so your words can't be distorted.”

David steps into the room and firmly shuts the door.

He hands her the espresso and sits down. Piera is a petite woman — four-foot ten — a size 000, with feet so tiny, she has her shoes made to measure.
Botte piccola fa vino buono.
A small cask makes good wine.