Steal You Away (3 page)

Sometimes, while Erica is having lessons, Graziano puts Antoine in the car and drives to Villa Borghese. He walks across the deer park to Piazza di Siena and then down towards the Pincio. He walks fast. He enjoys these rambles in the park.

Antoine limps along behind him. With those great big paws he finds it hard to keep up. Graziano pulls him by the lead. ‘Come on, keep moving. You lazy mutt. Hurry up!’ But to no avail. So he sits down on a bench and smokes a cigarette and Antoine starts chewing at his shoes.

Graziano no longer resembles the Latin lover of the Carillon del Mare. The guy who made the German girls swoon.

He looks ten years older. He’s pale, with bags under his eyes, black roots in his hair, a tracksuit, a bristly white beard, and he is unhappy.

Desperately unhappy.

It’s all going wrong.

Erica doesn’t love him.

The only reason she stays with him is that he pays for her lessons, the rent, her clothes, the photographer, everything. Because he chauffeurs her around. Because in the evenings he goes to get the fried chicken from the takeaway.

Erica doesn’t love him and she never will.

She doesn’t give a shit about him, let’s be honest.

What am I doing here? I hate this town. I hate this traffic. I
hate Erica. I’ve got to get out of here. I’ve got to get out of here
.
I’ve got to get out of here
. It’s a kind of mantra which he repeats obsessively.

So why doesn’t he do it?

There’s nothing difficult about it, all you have to do is get on a plane. And away you go.

If only he could.

There’s a problem: if he stays away from Erica for half a day, he feels sick. He gets gastritis. Can’t breathe. Starts burping.

How wonderful it would be to be able to press a button and wipe his brain clean. Get those soft lips, that fine hair, those wicked, bewitching eyes out of his head. A complete brainwashing. If Erica were in his brain.

But that’s not where she is.

She has lodged like a fragment of glass in his stomach.

He’s in love with a spoiled child.

She’s a bitch. And completely devoid of talent. She may be good at dancing, but she’s hopeless at acting, at standing in front of a TV camera. She fluffs her lines. The words die in her mouth.

In three months all she’s been given is a couple of walk-on appearances in a TV film.

But Graziano loves her even though she’s a failure. Even though she’s the worst actress in the world.

Shit
…

And worst of all, the more of a bitch she is, the more he loves her.

When there are no auditions to do, Erica spends the whole day in front of the TV eating frozen pizzas and Algida Viennettas. She doesn’t want to do anything. Doesn’t want to go out. Doesn’t want to see anyone. She’s too depressed, she says, to go out.

The house is a mess.

The heaps of dirty clothes thrown to one side. Rubbish. Piles of plates encrusted with sauce. Antoine pissing and crapping on the carpet. Erica seems to be in her element in filth. Graziano isn’t, he loses his temper, shouts that he’s fed up with living this way,
like a bum, that that’s it, he’s off to Jamaica, but instead he takes the dog for a walk in the park.

How could anyone live with her? She’d try the patience of a Zen monk. She cries over nothing. And flies into rages. And when she’s angry terrible things come out of her mouth. Projectiles that sink into Graziano’s heart as if it were butter. She’s bursting with poison and as soon as she gets a chance she spits it out.

You’re a shit. You disgust me! I don’t love you, can’t you get
that into your head? Do you want to know why I stay with you?
Out of pity. That’s why. I hate you. And do you know why I hate
you? Because you hope I’m going to fail
.

This is true.

Every time an audition goes badly Graziano secretly rejoices. It is one small step towards Ischiano Scalo. But then he feels guilty.

They don’t have sex.

He points this out to her. She opens her legs and arms and says: ‘Help yourself. Fuck me like this, if you want.’ And a couple of times, in desperation, he does, and it’s like screwing a corpse. A warm corpse which every now and then, when there’s a commercial break, picks up the remote control and changes channel.

All this lasts until 8th December.

On 8th December Antoine dies.

Erica is in a parfumerie with Antoine. The shop assistant tells her dogs are not admitted. Erica leaves him outside, she has to buy some lipstick, she’ll only be a minute. But a minute is long enough for Antoine to see a German shepherd on the opposite pavement, run across the street and get knocked down by a car.

Erica goes home in tears. She tells Graziano she didn’t have the courage to go and see. The dog is still there. Graziano rushes out.

He finds him at the side of the road. In a pool of blood. Hardly breathing. A trickle of dark blood runs out of his nostrils and mouth. He takes him to the vet, who puts him to sleep with an injection.

Graziano returns home.

He can’t bring himself to talk. He loved that dog. He was a funny old creature. And they kept each other company.

Erica says it wasn’t her fault. She had only been a minute buying the lipstick. And the bastard driving the car hadn’t braked.

Graziano goes out again. He takes the Uno and, to calm himself down, does a complete circuit of the orbital at a hundred and eighty kilometres an hour.

It was a mistake to come to Rome.

A terrible mistake.

He’s made a complete mess of things. She’s not a woman, she’s a plague sent by God to destroy his life.

In the past month they’ve quarrelled almost every day.

Graziano can’t believe the things she says to him. She wounds him deeply. Sometimes attacks him so violently that he can’t defend himself. Give tit for tat. Tell her she couldn’t act to save her life.

The other day, for example, she accused him of jinxing her and said that if Madonna had been saddled with a guy like him she’d still be just plain Madonna Louise Veronica Ciccone. And she added that in Riccione everyone said he was a crap guitar player and that all he was good for was selling stale pills. And finally, to cap it all, she said the Gipsy Kings were a bunch of poofs.

That does it! I’m leaving her
.

He must succeed in doing it.

It won’t kill him. He’ll survive. Even junkies survive without drugs. You do cold turkey, you go through hell, you think you’ll never make it, but in the end you do and you’re clean.

At least Antoine’s death has served to bring him to his senses.

He must leave her. And the best way to do it is with a calm, detached speech, without any anger, the speech of a strong man with a broken heart. Like Robert De Niro in
Love Letters
when he dumps Jane Fonda.

Yes, that’s all that’s needed
.

He goes home. Erica is watching
Lupin III
and eating a cheese sandwich.

‘Do you mind turning off the TV?’

Erica does so.

Graziano sits down, clears his throat and begins. ‘I’ve got something to say to you. I think it’s time you and I called it a day. You know it and I know it. Let’s be honest.’

Erica looks at him.

Graziano resumes. ‘I give up on this relationship. I believed in it. I really did. But I can’t go on. I haven’t got a lira left. We quarrel all day long. And I’ve had all I can take of Rome. It disgusts me, it depresses me. I’m like the seagulls, if I don’t migrate, I die. At this poi …’

‘Seagulls don’t migrate.’

‘Okay. Like the fucking swallows, does that make you any happier? I should have been in Jamaica by this time. Tomorrow I’m going to Ischiano. I’m going to borrow some money, then I’m leaving. And we’ll never see each other again. I’m sorry things …’ Here the De Niro-style speech dies.

Erica listens in silence.

How is Graziano talking?

What a strange tone there is in his voice. Usually he kicks up a row, shouts, raves. Not now, he’s cold, resigned. He sounds like an American actor. Antoine’s death must have really upset him.

All at once she suspects that he’s not just making the usual melodramatic scene. That this time he means it.

If he leaves, what will happen?

It’ll be a holy mess.

Everything looks black to Erica. A future without him is something she can’t even imagine. Life sucks as it is, but without Graziano it would be shit. Who will pay the rent for the flat? Who’ll go and buy the chicken at the takeaway? Who’ll pay the fees for the drama course?

Besides, she’s no longer so sure that she’s really going to make it. All the signs seem to be that she hasn’t got a chance. Since she arrived in Rome she’s done dozens of auditions and never landed a decent part. Maybe Graziano’s right. She’s not cut out for TV. She hasn’t got what it takes.

She feels a pressure below her throat, a prelude to tears.

Without a lira she’d be forced to return to Castello Tesino, and rather than go back to that icy cold place with those parents of hers, she’d go on the street.

She tries to swallow a mouthful of sandwich. But it remains there, in her mouth, as bitter as gall. ‘Do you mean it?’

‘Yes.’

‘You’re leaving?’

‘Yes.’

‘What am I going to do?’

‘I really don’t know.’

Silence.

‘Have you made up your mind?’

‘Yes.’

‘Really?’

‘Yes.’

Erica starts crying. Very quietly. The sandwich between her teeth. The tears dissolving her make-up.

Graziano toys with his cigarette lighter. He flicks it on and off. ‘I’m sorry. But it’s much better this way. At least we’ll have pleasant mem …’

‘I wa … wa … want to co … come with you,’ Erica sobs.

‘What?’

‘I wa … want to come with you.’

‘Where?’

‘To Ischiano.’

‘What the hell for? Didn’t you say you loathed the idea?’

‘I want to meet your mother.’

‘You want to meet my mother?’ Graziano repeats, parrot-fashion.

‘Yes, I want to meet Gina. But then we’ll go to Jamaica for a holiday.’

Graziano says nothing.

‘Don’t you want me to come?’

‘No. I’d rather you didn’t.’

‘Graziano, don’t leave me. Please.’ She grasps his hand.

‘It’s better this way … You know it yourself … It’s no use …’

‘You can’t leave me in Rome, Grazi.’

Graziano feels his innards melting.
What does she want?

She can’t do this. It’s not fair. Now she wants to go with him.

‘Graziano, come here,’ says Erica in a sad, sad little voice.

Graziano gets up. He sits down beside her. She kisses his hands and clings to him. She rests her face on his chest. And starts crying again.

Graziano now feels his guts reviving. A boa constrictor has come out of hibernation. His windpipe is suddenly unblocked. He breathes in and out.

He puts his arms round her.

She sobs. ‘I’m sorry. I’m sorry.’

She’s so small. Defenceless. Like a little girl. A little girl who needs him. The most beautiful little girl in the world. His little girl. ‘Okay. All right. Let’s get out of this damned city. I won’t leave you. Don’t worry. Come away with me.’

‘Yes, Graziano … Take me with you.’

They kiss. Saliva and tears. He wipes away her dripping mascara with his T-shirt.

‘Yes, we’ll leave tomorrow morning. But I must call my mother. So she can get the room ready.’

Erica smiles. ‘Okay.’ Then her face clouds over. ‘Yes, let’s go … Oh, but wait a minute, the day after tomorrow, shit, I’ve got to do something.’

Graziano is instantly suspicious. ‘What?’

‘An audition.’

‘Erica, it’s the same old …’

‘Wait! Listen. I promised my agent I’d go. He needs some of the girls on his books to go through the motions of doing an audition, the director has already decided who he’s going to choose, a girl with influential backers, but it’s all got to seem fair and above board. The usual bullshit.’

‘Don’t go. Tell him to get lost, the bastard.’

‘I must go. I’ve promised. After all he’s done for me.’

‘What has he done for you? Nothing. He’s tapped us for money. Tell him to get lost. We’ve got to go.’

Erica takes both his hands. ‘Listen, let’s do this. You leave tomorrow. I’ll go to the audition, lock up the flat, pack our bags and join you the next day.’

‘Wouldn’t you like me to wait for you?’

‘No, you go. Rome has stressed you out. I’ll come up by train. So by the time I get there you’ll have prepared everything. Make sure you buy lots of fish. I love fish.’

‘Okay. Do you like toad’s tail?’

‘I don’t know. Is it good?’

‘Delicious. What about clams, shall I get some of those?’

‘Clams, Grazi. Pasta with clams. I love them.’ Erica gives a smile that lights up the whole flat.

‘That’s one of my mother’s specialities. You’ll see. We’ll be well looked after.’

Erica leaps into his arms.

That night they make love.

And for the first time since they have been together, Erica goes down on him.

Graziano is lying on that unmade bed strewn with sweaters, smelly T-shirts, CD sleeves and breadcrumbs and watches Erica there, between his legs, sucking his pecker.

Why has she decided to go down on him?

She’s always said she found it disgusting.

What is she trying to tell him?

Simple. That she loves you
.

Graziano is overcome by emotion and comes.

Erica falls asleep naked in his arms. Graziano, keeping quite still so as not to wake her, holds her in his arms and can’t believe that this beautiful girl is really his.

His eyes never tire of looking at her, his hands of caressing her or his nose of smelling her.

How often he has wondered how such a perfect creature could have been born in that godforsaken little village. She’s a miracle of nature.

And that miracle is his. Despite their rows, despite Erica’s
character, despite their different outlooks on life, despite Graziano’s faults. They are linked together. Linked by a bond that will never break.