Escape (15 page)

'James 'Eartacher is a plumber from Manchester,' Guido said
heavily. He folded the letter in two and put it back in its envelope, in
the second drawer of his bedside table. As I peeked into the square
of darkness I glimpsed another Leopardi anthology and a stack of old
exercise books.

'How did you meet him?'

'When I was on vacation, in Ischia, or was it Capri. I don
remember well. We were teenagers. It was 'is first grand tour of the
continent. I think 'e wanted to practise his Italian. Rachel, is all very
boring. This James still writes to me after so many years. I do not find
ever 'e 'as anything interesting to say.'

'But Guido, you brought the letter with you from Italy! That was
last year's postmark. It must mean something to you, he must—'

'I use it as a bookmark,' Guido said. His mouth tightened into a
reproving line.

'But . . . but you've known him since you were teenagers! He must
be so fond of you. And it must take him a long time to write in Italian
– you know, he'd have to do it with a dictionary and all, wouldn't he,
with only schoolboy Italian? There were several pages, weren't there?
Do you write back to him?'

'I don reply,' said Guido.

I gaped at him. He got up to pour a glass of warm sweet wine.

'But don't you feel guilty? God, I would. Every time I looked
at that letter, any letter, I'd think of James Heartacher and cringe.' I
wondered if he was going to pour me a glass of wine, too. 'I mean, I'd
imagine him going to the empty postbox, the feeling of rejection and
hurt growing—'

'Life is too short,' said Guido, swallowing the wine, 'for collecting
things you don need.'

James Heartacher wasn't a
thing
.

'Could I have a glass, too?' I asked. Guido poured the wine and
handed it to me. 'But why has he written to you for so long?' I took a
long sip. 'What was so special about the holiday, do you think?'

Guido looked out the window but I saw his eyebrow sneer in
profile. 'I don remember well, Rachel, I told you.'

'But it's so strange, I mean, so many years writing with no response.
What was he like, his personali—'

Guido crashed his glass down on the bedside table. '
Porca miseria
,
you really want to know? James was like a slug, Rachel, or what it is,
that thing that sucks blood from you.'

'A leech.'

'Yes, that one. 'E followed me everywhere I went, always asking
questions, running after me, sweating.'

I stared into my glass. 'He might have been lonely,' I whispered.

''E 'ad a problem with sweating. 'E was fat, and 'e sweated like a
slug. Have you ever touched a slug, Rachel? In Latin is
limax, limacis
.
The slug is disgusting, it 'as slime outside its body as well as inside.
James was like this. 'E would sweat at anything.
Quando ha stretto la
mano, l'ha lasciata bagnata
.'

'Pardon?'

'
Niente
. When 'e shook your hand, 'e left it wet.'

'Well, he couldn't help that.' I wrung my own hands. 'He was
just made that way. I mean, some people just
feel
a lot.' A prickle of
moisture started above my lip. 'Maybe he had a bad heart. That makes
exercise difficult.'

'
Uffa
, Rachel, not with the 'eart again.' Guido leant over my
shoulder and tapped the Leopardi translation in my lap. 'This is
someone who understands the 'uman 'eart. Listen, I read it to you:
"Silvia, do you remember still that time of your mortal life" – you
see the way 'e places "mortal" in there to insinuate already the idea of
death . . .'

Guido's arm brushed against my breast as he pointed to the
line. I moved in so that I could breathe the skin of his neck, and
the short hairs curling slightly under his ear. It was strange that no
matter what uncomfortable things he said, Guido's words never
dulled the electric effect of his presence. I wondered if all the
women he'd known had felt like this. As Guido talked he drew my
breast from my bra and absently stroked the nipple. He pulled at it
lightly, shaping it.

'You see here Leopardi protests, he is crying why does nature not
deliver its promises, why does nature cheat its sons?'

I glanced up at Guido, startled by a sudden change of tone. His
hand had stopped moving. He sat, arrested by Leopardi. There were
tears in his eyes.

His voice came back into focus. I wished I had been listening. My
nipples were hard, the porous flesh of them opening, a million little
mouths, starving for touch. I stirred and my breast flopped out of his
hand.

Guido made no sign of recognition. A tear spilled over his lid,
hovering in the well above his cheek. He stared out the window.

What should I do? My heart was hammering in my chest.
Tentatively, I put out my hand. I touched his neck with the back of my
fingers. He brushed me away.

'No, no,' he tutted impatiently. He jabbed at the sheet on my lap,
explaining. This last stanza – did I see it? – was the most dramatic of all.

He talked on, to the air in the still room, to the grevillea bushes
and azalea shrubs slowly dying outside. As I listened, I watched the
way he burrowed back inside himself, inside the poem. He was like
those tiny crabs at low tide moving invisibly down inside the wet sand
until there is only the merest ruffle left on the surface.

Later, when we were married, I noticed how naturally these tears
accompanied the poems of Leopardi: they were like punctuation,
indicating where to pause. I grew to think of Guido's tears as members
of the family he didn't have, marks of sorrow left by people I would
never know.

An extended silence told me the poem was finished. A car tooted
outside.

I picked up the papers in my lap. 'Do you ever write what you see,
Guido? You know, write down what happens in your life, what you feel
about it?'

Guido stood up and went to pour another glass of wine. 'Yes, I
'ave written little things all my life. I keep them in many notebooks.
But they are not interesting I think to anyone else.'

The sweet warm wine helped me get up and put my arms around
his waist, standing behind him. I could hear my blood thudding in my
ears. 'I'd love to read them, if you would translate,' I whispered into his
back.

He didn't move. He didn't sigh or shrug me off . But the muscles
across his spine tensed, as if waiting, or struggling.

I pulled him around to face me. 'You're such a loving reader, Guido.
You understand so much from the poet's point of view. Why don't you
write about your feelings, your experience, as Leopardi does?'

Guido stiffened. 'Feelings,' he spat. 'When a person talked about
feelings, my father walked out of the room. "
Che palle!
" he said. He
would do this stupid dance of boredom. Yawning, 'is eyebrows going
up and down, like 'e was in agony.'

'But that seems so . . . so un-Italian! I mean, aren't Italians
supposed to be—'

But Guido had gone. After a moment I heard the toilet flush.

That evening, after I learnt to make
spaghetti aglio e olio
, we lay
together in the narrow single bed. I urged Guido to tell me about his
poems, and he chose a couple to read from the exercise book he kept
in his drawer under the dresser. The poems were mainly descriptions
– winter mornings, the icy church of his school. There weren't many
feelings in the poems, but the environment took on the flavour of a
character, merciless, austere, unforgiving. It was easy to enthuse; the
images of cold soaking up through the boys' feet and the stern faces of
the priests were strikingly good.

'If you want, I translate more for you to read,' Guido said.

His eyes were glowing in the oval of light from the bedside lamp.
His face looked soft and young. I leant over and kissed him. I told him I
would love to read everything he wrote and that he was a very beautiful
writer. He smiled and began to stroke me, the tips of his fingers drifting
across my chest. I pulled his hand down between my legs. Breathless
at my own daring, I kept my hand clamped over his, showing him the
way I liked, moving in a circle, lightly, over and over. In the stark light
of the lamp I saw his watch moving up and down, seconds ticking off ,
minutes. His watch glinted, shifting position under the light. My eyes
were fixed on the glass face. I couldn't read the time. I heard him sigh.
Under the sheet he scratched one foot with the other. His hand must
be getting tired, he's bored out of his mind, but oh, it was quicker now,
harder, his thumb deep inside, his fingers playing along the top, my
whole being concentrated in his hand, he would save me, he was going
to save me and I was flying through folds of air, oh I was almost there.
Please, god! 'Thank you!' I shouted as I exploded in his hand, my belly
burning.

'I am very tired,' Guido said, turning over. He looked at his watch.
'Now we must sleep.' He wiped his hand on the bedspread.

I lay on my back. My heart was pounding. I hugged myself, staring
into the dark. Rubbing my thighs together, I relished the last tingles,
like embers glowing. He'd done that for me, just for me.

For years afterwards, the sight of Guido's watch prompted a stir
of excitement in my stomach. I only had to glimpse the gold trim, the
manly brown leather band, a little scuff ed, and a dissolving sensation,
like hot metal, ran down my thighs.

In the week before school broke up for the summer holidays, I won a
trip to Fiji.

Since the age of twelve I'd been sending off coupons supplied
with cornflakes packets, washing powder, soft drinks. But I had never
expected to win anything. I'd done it in secret. The idea of going on
some extraordinary luxury holiday or winning a diamond ring was
like being invited into a story. You could happily be a princess while
reading the advertisements, which provided a magnificent array of
settings and characters. The infinitesimal chance of being chosen gave
the story that necessary twist of authenticity, the way light brings a
three-dimensional quality to a painting. Once a person asked me if I'd
ever been to London and without thinking I said
Ye
s
!
because I could
remember so clearly making faces at the Buckingham Palace guards in
my mind.

I'd never won anything, but it didn't matter. Winning would have
been a brutal intrusion of real life, anyway, and how could I have told
my mother? When she caught me snatching the coupon booklet from
the new washing powder she shook her head. 'Oh Rachel, don't tell
me you still fall for those advertising tricks? Have you ever heard of
anyone winning a prize?'

I could see her point. Mostly I agreed, and every time I sent in a
coupon the voice told me I ought to be ashamed of myself and why
didn't I have the sense I was born with?

It was at the dentist's surgery that I'd found the full page ad about
Fiji. Most people complain about visiting the dentist but I never
minded, because Dr Crown provided a stack of wicked capitalist
magazines for his patients to peruse. Patients usually had to wait at
least half an hour to be seen and when my name was finally called I
always experienced a little lurch of disappointment. I would never
know if Jane Fonda had finally found love or how Robert Redford
liked his women.

At Dr Crown's surgery, three months before I met Guido, I was
struck by a picture of dark slender palm trees against a fruit-tingle
sky. The water beamed fluorescent turquoise from the page, and the
title, written in sweet, wispy clouds like cotton wool pulled into lacy
strands, announced:
Fiji, to be Free!
You and your partner had a chance
to go there for a week, all flight and accommodation expenses paid if
you wrote just one paragraph about why you should go to Fiji and stay
at Rainbow Villas.

At home I spent an entire evening on my paragraph. (The
receptionist had kindly said I could take the whole magazine, not
just the one page, as Dr Crown had made me wait fifty minutes.) It
wasn't so much the need to perfect the words so that I could win, it
was more that I discovered that writing about what I would do in Free
Fiji was so unexpectedly enjoyable. While I wrote and imagined, I was
there. I could feel the hot sand burning under my feet, the sky tasted
like blueberries, and a dark-eyed stranger sat at my table, sipping
something dangerous.

I must have been able to infuse some of the genuine excitement of
my fantasies into my paragraph because after arriving home late from
Guido's place one evening, there was a letter on my bed from Rainbow
Villas. The envelope was bright pink (I don't know what my mother
thought) with a full rainbow spanning the letter inside, in which the
director of Rainbow Villas, Mr Hope, said he trusted we would enjoy
the magnificent treasures of his tropical paradise.

I read the letter three times. Surely there had been some mistake.
How could it be true that I, Rachel Lambert with the concrete shoes,
could be lift ed out of my life, light as fairy bread? It was like magic.
How was I going to sleep?

Of course I wouldn't go. Guido couldn't leave the theatre for a
week, he was under contract. The rules at Rainbow said that winners
should select any of the holiday packages within the next month. My
school break did fall within this time but I didn't think, even for a
heartbeat, of going without him.

The next day at school I floated from story time to mummification
in the ancient world, from staffroom to classroom. It didn't matter that
I wasn't actually going to Fiji. This time yesterday it hadn't even been a
possibility. Once I had finished writing my paragraph, I hadn't thought
about it again. Like all my coupon sending and competition writing
and radio calling, the picture of paradise had ebbed back to the dream
world, where it belonged.

But that day, just the idea that I had won, that my life could be
changed by some miraculous gong of fortune, gave me a new kind of
courage. It was like drinking two whiskies before breakfast. The magic
had come to me with Guido, I was convinced of it. Such a piece of luck
could never have happened to the ordinary grey Rachel.

At lunchtime, as I ate my chicken liver sandwiches, I felt that my
luck must be showing, perhaps like one of those orange auras that
Maria talked about. I'd have liked to share my news with Maria, who
would explore the issue of luck and synchronicity with enthusiasm,
but I was afraid she might suggest that she come in Guido's place and
I couldn't imagine how I would survive being away from him for an
entire week.

'It's a shame there are these time stipulations,' I said levelly
to Guido when I showed him the letter, 'but it's great just to win
something, isn't it?' and I couldn't help twirling around on the point
of my toes near his bed.

Guido insisted we must go. One must always make use of good
fortune, he claimed, or the luck will come back as a curse. He would
resign from his contract with Maurizio. 'Magic makes me tired,' he
said. 'I have been working too hard, for too long.'

I felt faint. I couldn't conceive of Guido without his magic.
Examining his face, I saw that he was weary. I'd often noticed how
his skin paled after the evening performance, greenish with fatigue.
And then, he had made a huge transition, leaving the country of his
childhood, coming to the other side of the world where he knew no
one. Perhaps he just needed a rest, and feeding up. I could hear my
mother's tone in my ear, crisp and decisive. Deborah had always sized
up the malnourished boys from the refuge like that, and then gone to
get fresh sheets for them from the linen cupboard.

Something was shifting in my head, the world running like egg
yolk, downhill. Guido's shoes became smaller and shabbier on the
pavement, and the line of his trouser cuff wavered. 'You'd resign?' I
said.

'I will ask someone to take my place,' Guido explained. 'There
is this possibility mentioned in my contract. Illness, or incapacity, is
okay to leave. Is the same for Maurizio.' He gazed at me, smiling.

I must have looked shocked, because he went on. 'I met a man
at the theatre, Dave da Greco, is good. Dave is American, 'e wants to
work 'ere, and 'e 'as much more
esperienza
than me. So, you see, I give
someone a chance, and I am doing nothing bad for Maurizio.'

'But what about loyalty,' I whispered, 'friendship – what about
how Maurizio will feel, the only person left in the world who knows
you?'

'You know me now,' grinned Guido. 'You take care of me, no?'

Over the next couple of days there was a fullness in my chest like
a rising tide. It was hard to keep it all inside. I had to walk stiffly,
carefully, particularly at home. I had such a need to talk. Sometimes I
looked at my mother or father and began sentences that floated right
out of my mouth, uncensored, but I always stopped myself. What
would they make of this decision of Guido's? Was it as wrong as I
thought? I knew, deep in my heart, how they would judge him. So
how would
I
?

On the following Friday, Guido asked me to accompany him
when he went to tell Maurizio. Walking towards the theatre, I felt sharp
pains in my chest. My lungs were tight, as if iron bands were closing in
around my heart.

'Is not an 'eart attack, you are much too young,' laughed Guido. 'Is
just anxiety. You worry too much, Rachel. If you 'ad seen the things I
'ave, you would not concern yourself so much. Is all okay,' and he led
the way into the dark staleness of the theatre.

We found Maurizio on stage, packing away his props.

He went white when Guido told him the news. His face reminded
me of Robert Sanford when he fell off the swings. He remained silent
for minutes after Guido stopped talking. Perhaps he'd frozen with
shock. In a cowardly way I hoped Maurizio wouldn't unfreeze until we
had left the theatre.

But he emerged from his paralysis suddenly and explosively.
'
What?
' he shouted. 'You can't be serious! This is another of your
absurd ideas. You can't throw away your career like this, leaving me
alone with all . . . I can't train someone now, you know that! Don't you
have any sense of honour? You are no longer a
ragazzo
, Guido!
Egoista
pazzesca!
'

His face filled with crimson and spray flew from his lips, hitting
Guido on the side of his nose. If his saliva had hit me I would have let
it stay there, pretending not to notice. But Guido's left eyebrow shot
up almost to his hairline and he got out his handkerchief and scrubbed
at his nose and cheek ostentatiously, as if his face had been drenched.

Maurizio continued to shout. His beard wobbled tremulously.
I closed my eyes, wishing myself away, wishing I could vanish like
Houdini behind the curtain, into the darkness of the trunk, anywhere.
Guido nudged me and I blinked. Perhaps he wanted help from me,
thought I could soothe Maurizio, explain. It was impossible. I could
barely stand. I concentrated on Maurizio's beard. It was the only way
I could remain there. The beard was actually like a mask, such a neat
black triangle so cleanly etched around the jaw it seemed almost
painted on. I couldn't help imagining the care and time Maurizio must
have taken with his little nail scissors, clipping and styling the hair
towards that perfect vanishing point. In his beard was the extent of his
need to impress, the depth of his vulnerability. As he shook his head
at Guido, pointing a shaky, manicured finger, my bowels twisted like a
wrung-out towel.

Out of the corner of my eye I saw Guido glancing around at the
Crystal Box, the smooth silver sides of the Smoke Chamber, the
linking finger rings lying on the table. He slipped his thumb through
one of the rings, and idly let it fall. Was he taking a last look? It was a
relief, at least, that all the shouting was now in Italian. Maybe I could
retreat under it and let the tidal wave flow over me. Like all natural
disasters, there was nothing I could do about it. But then Maurizio
suddenly swung around and looked at me, his black eyes glinting, and
the iron bands tightened around my chest.

'And this is the sort of man you will marry? You will let him do
this? Just run away, like a . . . like a little boy? I thought better of you,
Rachel.'

I said nothing. I took one of the hands he held out to me and
tried to press it. The flesh was hot and damp. I looked down at the
floor, but 'marry' was the word blazing across my mind as Maurizio
gave a sudden grunt of pain and turned and strode off the stage. Had
Guido said something about us to Maurizio? Was he thinking about
it? Getting
married?

Maurizio stopped at the stairs. He was looking at me. 'This man is
not who you think he is,' he hissed, 'this
Guido
!' and he stamped away
down the aisle.

Guido fiddled with the hinges on the Crystal Box, then closed the
lid, giving it a final pat.

'Don worry,' he said, coming over and stroking my cheek, 'is okay
now, everything.' He grabbed my waist with both hands and lift ed me
up like a ballet dancer, placing me on the box.

'Look out, it might break!' I cried.

He gave me a blinding smile, his face fractured with squares of
stage light. He whisked me off the box and swung me down on the
stage.

'Now we are free,' he whispered, and kissed me loudly on the ear.

He laughed, the first unrestrained laugh I'd heard from him, and
he took my hands, pulling me down the steps. At the bottom he kissed
me, open-mouthed. I could feel his heart beating against my chest, the
smile in his kiss, and his excitement trickled into me.

We ran out of the darkened theatre with its smell of stale chips
and spilt lemonade and the air was suddenly fresher than it had ever
been; it was sparkling, fizzy like cheap champagne and I began to
laugh guiltily. People
could
make wild decisions – they could leave bad
situations, escape with their lives! I tried not to think of Maurizio's
pallor at hearing the news, and the trembly hand he'd placed on
Guido's shoulder. I glanced at Guido as we swept down the street and
his mouth was open with a kind of eagerness I hadn't seen before. He
was unguarded, the shuttered look gone, and he grabbed my hand and
pulled me towards him. We clanged together, his teeth in my hair, my
foot on his, and we laughed and then we couldn't stop. I felt wicked
and scared and ready for anything.

Free, he'd said. We can go now. Where? Fiji, Italy, the moon!

'Maurizio's magic is the old world,' Guido said as I pulled him to a
stop at the lights. 'Let's forget it – I am in the new world now. I want to
try something different! I want to be free!' And he jumped into the air
and clicked his heels like Fred Astaire.

'But what will we do about money?' I asked as we crossed Market
Street into King. 'I mean, what work will you do, where will you live?'

'Oh,' Guido shrugged, 'there is some money I brought with me.
What is the goodness of being in a new country, if I do not reinvent
myself, take the opportunity to become my dreams? You talk of poetry.
I 'ave written much poetry. I would like to make more. And you, you
are lucky. You 'ave a good job with a regular salary. One of us is enough
for a while, no?'

Something flipped in my stomach. Did he mean we would live
together? This was the first time he had said anything about us being
together, about the future. Imagine, a man like Guido, a magician who
could make coins leap out of the air, who melted my flesh, wanting
me. Wanting to
marry
me!