The Story of X: An Erotic Tale (4 page)

C
HAPTER
F
OUR

“H
OW MANY COPS?”
Jessica asks.

“Maybe three . . . I was, you know . . .
confused
.”

We are sitting on the floor in her apartment, next door to mine. The heady scent of
nail polish carries in the air: we are doing a restorative DIY pedicure for both of
us. This is the first time we have properly talked about What Happened in the Palazzo
since I fled, two days ago.

“Well, like I said, there are rumors he is
involved
.” She airily gestures at the tall French window and the city beyond. “Half the stuff
that comes through the port is contraband. And that’s what he does, isn’t it, import-export?”
She nods, answering herself. “But it’s bloody hard to be a successful businessman
in Naples without some contact with the Mob. Everybody is involved in some way. Even
the pigeons on Via Dante look a bit dodgy sometimes. The way they stare at you, like
they are
plotting
something. God, is this ever going to dry?”

She grabs a magazine and uses it as a fan to dry the polish on her toenails. Cotton
swabs are scattered everywhere among the magazines and paperbacks. Jessica’s apartment
is, as usual, something of a mess. When we roomed together in Hanover she used to
exasperate me with her untidiness; now that I am living
next
door
I find her slovenliness amiable, even lovable. Best of all, it is unchanging. In
a confusing world, Jessica is the same, my best friend, my smart, funny, sane, and
lovable friend. I really don’t mind if
bloody
Marcus Roscarrick desires her, not me.

Her.

Our thoughts are duetting; Jessica looks up from her newly cerise toenails and says,
“So he really said I was beautiful, huh?”

I can’t stifle the slight pang of jealousy in my heart, even though I love Jessica.
She can’t hide the flash of sly delight in her cynical eyes.

“Yes. He really said you were beautiful . . .” My smile is brave and maybe less than
convincing.

“Jessica Rushton. Apple of a billionaire’s eye? Better get my hair cut.”

“What are you going to do?”

“Dunno. Shag him?”

“Jess . . .”

She giggles, and then she stops giggling as she looks in the mirror tilted against
a bare, painted wall.

“Seriously, I soooooo need a haircut if I am gonna start appearing in celeb magazines.”
She twists a few split ends between her examining fingers, then says, in a different
voice, “The beautiful Jessica Rushton tells us about her lovely fitted kitchen, following
her hundred-trillion-dollar divorce from Lord Roscarrick.” She glances my way. “We
can get a Ferrari. I’ll buy you a Ferrari. Babes, I’m sorry, I know you fancied him.”

“No, not at all—don’t be idiotic—please, Jessica.” This is again ridiculous. I am
actually holding back tears. How can one stupid man turn me into such a pathetic mess?
I hardly know him. He was faintly menacing. Yet I did yearn for him. I did. For that
moment. My soul called, and there was a response, or so I thought. Now I feel a bit
lonely. Ugh.

Slipping on my sandals, I summon up my common sense.

“No. I’m fine. I am in Naples. I am twenty-one. I have an excellent education.
Avanti!
”

“Attagirl.”

“I am going to work. I’m here to work.”

And so I do: I work.

F
OR THE NEXT
fortnight I settle into a satisfactory and rewarding rhythm of hard work and just
a little partying. In the mornings I study in my sunlit apartment. I study hard. I
am good at studying.

Amid my scattered books, laptop, and takeout cups of weirdly unsatisfactory cappuccino,
I drive away thoughts of men with conjugations of the verbs
credere
and
partire,
and the precise structure of the
futuro semplice.

Tomorrow you will prepare pasta puttanesca.

Domani prepari la pasta alla puttanesca.

This lasts, on average, for about two hours.

After the language learning comes the thesis. Between the hours of eleven
A.M.
and one
P.M
., I blot out the memory of
his Tyrrhenian blue eyes
by rehearsing facts about the crime syndicates of south Italy, especially the Camorra,
though I am also drawn to the even more sinister and mysterious
’Ndrangheta
, the mafia of the toe of Italy.

The ’Ndrangheta is a criminal organization in Italy, centered in Calabria. Though
not as famous as the Sicilian Cosa Nostra, or the Neapolitan Camorra, the ’Ndrangheta
is probably the most powerful crime syndicate in Italy, as of the early twenty-first
century . . .

There is something about the ’Ndrang that intrigues me. Maybe it is just the apostrophe
before their name? Like the
The
in The Palazzo Roscarrick.

No. Study. Come on, Alex. Study.

The principal difference from the Mafia is in recruitment methods. The ’Ndrangheta
recruits members on the basis of blood relationships. This makes the gangs extremely
clannish, and therefore impenetrable to police investigation. Sons of ’Ndranghetisti
are expected to follow in their fathers’ footsteps . . .

Gang membership descends by blood. It is hereditary?

Inevitably I think of Roscarrick and his tales of the crazy ninth lord. Marc fits
the picture, maybe. But then it is all blood here, the descent of blood, the ties
of blood. Everything is related to everyone. I am the pure outsider. I want to know
more.

By lunchtime my mind is fried so I change my focus. Every afternoon I put on some
little sports socks and my sneakers, and in my innocent summer dresses from Zara I
go exploring the intricate and historic suburbs of inner Naples. Whence the Camorra
derive their strength, where they recruit their killers and hunt their enemies.

Am I naïve, just wandering around these supposedly dreadful places? I would never
do this in the States: go wandering in the bad neighborhood of a big city alone. And
yet I do not feel menaced. Why? Perhaps it is because these slums are so seductive,
so charming in their dark and chaotic and sun-dashed poverty—it is hard to feel threatened.

Walking the narrow, vivacious, operetta-singing lanes of Spaccanapoli or the Quartieri
Spagnoli is like having a bit part in an Italian movie, made just for God, a movie
called
Italy
. It is all so
authentic
: the women sitting outdoors in the narrow alleys washing potatoes over buckets, trimming
bearded blue mussels, and gossiping loudly about sex; the old ladies in black, changing
flowers and lightbulbs in glazed roadside shrines to Holy Mother Mary; the pretty
boys eating drooping triangles of pizza as they sit on their sky blue Lambretta scooters,
leaning forward so they don’t drip
pomodoro
on their expensive pants; the over-tall
feminelli
—the transsexuals—skittering on the black lava-stone cobbles from Vesuvius as they
walk down to the ferry port in heels, heading for sexual assignations with the rich
on Ischia and Capri.

Less pleasing are the inexplicably silent, garbage-filled piazzas of Materdei, where
tubby, half-shaven men in business suits disappear around the corner as soon as I
show up—leaving me all alone in the eerie, siesta-quiet sunlight in my Zara dress,
staring at a peeling old poster of Diego Maradona.

And then, of course, the unthinkable happens.

It is day fourteen of my work-hard-and-don’t-brood-about-him regime. It is all going
well. I have a slight hangover. I am in the Quartieri Spagnoli. I spent the previous
night drinking cheap Peronis and Raffis with Jessica and a couple of her Italian friends
in a bar near the university. We had a nice night. It was fun. We didn’t talk about
him and we have diligently avoided the Caffè Gambrinus—and the other fashionable and
pricey places where he might be encountered.

But my head is slightly fuzzy this morning. And I am rather lost. I have wandered
down an empty and yawning cul-de-sac. I look up at the strip of blue sky, caged between
the high slum buildings. It is very hot. Laundry flutters in a desperately weak midday
breeze. I am dehydrated. I stare at the lurid panties and erotic lingerie, red and
blue and black, swinging in the gasp of breeze, the anarchic and drooping flags of
sexuality.

“Hey.”

I turn.

“Soldi.”

“Dacci i soldi!”

Four kids—no, youths—are standing at the end of the alley. Five meters away. They
are tall and skinny and walking toward me, and they want money. My Italian is good
enough to understand
that.

Give us money.

I swivel, and then I despair. I forgot. I am in a damn cul-de-sac. Desperate now,
I look up—maybe someone is at a window, taking some air. But all I sense is a shutter
being closed. People turning away, retreating. Don’t watch, don’t witness, don’t tell.
Omerta
.

“Dacci i soldi!”

“But I don’t have any money!”

Why am I doing this? Why am I resisting? These kids are surely junkies—four of the
thousands of smack addicts of Naples, enslaved by the drugs of the Camorra. Dirty
jeans, yellow faces, bloodshot eyes, entirely bad news. They just want some euro to
score. Right?

But I have so little money, and I have worked so hard for it. I want to fight them.

“I don’t have any money! Leave me alone.”

“Vacca,”
one says with a sneer; he is the tallest and skinniest.
“Vacca Americana!”

American cow.

Fuck them! I get ready to run past them—screaming, screaming for my life—just barge
through them. That’s what I must do. Just run and thrust my way into the main drag
of the Spanish Quarters, where the fishmongers stand in their gumboots, hosing silver
scales and fish blood down the dark cobbles, like sequins in red surf.

Then one of the junkies pulls a knife. It is long and evil and it glitters in the
hard southern sun that slants down from the strip of slummy sky.

He smiles.

Too late I realize this is much worse than a mugging.

C
HAPTER
F
IVE

H
ELL.
I
F
I
fight back they might kill me, they might not even mean to do it—but that knife. It
glitters, malevolent and long.

The first lean guy, with a bad and raw tattoo on his neck like a case of shingles,
moves toward me. He is cornering me; like I am just another rat in a Neapolitan alley.

The knife is phallic and stiff. I glance up at the helpless sky, then down the merciless
darkness of the alley beyond the boys. No. There is no hope there. Or here. Or anywhere.
I am on my own.

Maybe I can beg my way out of this, utilize what pitiful Italian I possess. Staring
at the leader of the gang, I implore him.

“
Per l’amore del cielo
”—for the love of God, I beg you—“
ti prego di tutto cuore
.” He laughs and his laugh is like some horrible, diseased cackle.

“Ah,
bellezza, bellezza
.” He turns to his grinning accomplices, then turns back to me, “Fucking sexy.
Sì?
Sexy girl.”

It is maybe the only English he knows.

Fucking sexy girl.

My fear rages. And my fury. He is two meters away: two seconds from touching me, and
groping me. I am pressed flat to the damp old wall behind. A wall so dark and sheltered
and cold it feels like it has never been warmed by the sun. The sun has never reached
this deep into the slums—nor into the minds of these men. One of the other youths
grins and says, “
Divertiamoci . . .”

The word is something like
play
. It seems they are going to play with me, and I know what this
really
means.

I feel the first grubby hands on my arms, tugging at my dress, trying to rip it away.
The dress is casually and gleefully torn from my shoulder, exposing my bra. A second
hand feels for my breasts, lifts at my bra strap, and then the strap is severed with
a knife.

I swear at them, crouching and covering myself. Swearing again.

But the boys just laugh. They are all around me; it feels like there are dozens of
them, hands everywhere, feeling my hair, touching my arms, trying to pull my fists
away.

“Stop!”

I start to kick and to flail; I don’t care if I am outnumbered and cornered,
to hell with them
. I am not going to let them touch me. Not going to let them
play
with me.

Now I am writhing in their grasp, wrenching myself free—but they are simply too many—four
lanky and grinning Italian youths. I sense I could probably take one of these junkie
bastards—knee him in the groin, knock him to the ground—but four? It is too much.
I am drowning under their hands as they pull at the fabric, feel for my thighs—

“No, stop! Stop! Please stop!
Please!
”

They just laugh, and their laughter echoes down the empty lane, down the alley with
the shuttered windows and the crumbling walls. A cold hand claps over my mouth, silencing
my words. I wonder somehow if I should pray. I haven’t prayed in years; maybe now
is the time. But then I have an idea. One last chance? Biting the hand that covers
my mouth, so it is whipped away, I yell, as loudly as possible: “I know
Marcus Roscarrick
. He is my friend.
Lui è mio amico!
”

The reaction is intense. The boys freeze. The hands pull back. The leader squints
at me, looking deep in my eyes, as if to see if I am lying. Another one shakes his
head.

“
Guappo
.” The others nod, pale, ugly faces in the dark of the alley. I shout the word again.

“I know him. Roscarrick!
E un buon amico!
”

But it’s not working. They are unconvinced. Either they think I am lying or they just
don’t care. Maybe Roscarrick means nothing. The grins become snarls. Now they come
at me again—with renewed intent.

A dirty hand slaps over my mouth once more; another hand is groping, and now I begin
to succumb. This is it, I think, this is how it happens, this is how you get raped.
My mind is almost detached. I close my eyes as I sink under the ocean of pain and
humiliation—

“Lasciala sola.”

What?

The voice is new.

Leave her alone.

“Coniglio!”

Coward
.

Who is this?

I see a strong fist, flying. One of the youths is physically wrenched away—as though
he has been plucked up by some deity, by a giant. He is virtually lifted off his feet
and thrown to the floor. The leader of the gang swivels and yells, but a fist strikes
him hard; his tattooed face rips left and right as he is punched twice, and again,
blood squirting everywhere, like scarlet ink.

I can see a dark, handsome face in the gloom of the alley. Who is this? Not Roscarrick,
not someone I know. But this man is intervening: he is with friends—young allies—well
dressed. They are brawling with the youths; one of the junkies is already on the dirty
cobblestones, groaning, but the others are fighting back. I gather my shredded clothes
to myself and look for escape. This is horrible. The brawl is intense. Someone is
going to get knifed.

And then another voice calls across the cobblestones, masculine, older, arrogant,
and everyone is silenced.

“Cazzo! Porco demonio—”

This
is
Roscarrick. Unmistakable. His white teeth, his dark face, running toward us. That
anger in his blue, blue eyes.

The reaction of the youths is quite astonishing. As soon as they see Marc, their violent
defiance drops utterly away. They stare at one another, then at Marc—in desperation.
They look like kids, like terrified toddlers. Marc approaches the leader of the gang.
And punches him in the face. Just once, but very hard.

And then he smiles.

Marc
smiles
. And the smile is so menacing, so much more frightening than the punch, the youth
starts to whimper. He is crying, slumping away, his back to a wall, nose copiously
bleeding. He looks terrified.
Terrified of Marc Roscarrick
. It is a look I have never seen on a man before: the look of someone who thinks he
is about to die.

Why is he so frightened? Who is Marc Roscarrick, that he could so terrify this boy?

There are too many questions in my mind. I am blinking away my tears of horror, and
pulling my clothes back into place, yet still watching. The kids are now being dragged
from the scene, hoisted by their collars like schoolboys being led to their punishment.
I hear car doors slamming shut; I hear the vivid ripple of expensive tires on old
cobbles. Then I hear silence.

Now it is just me and Marc Roscarrick in the alley. He is in a cream linen suit with
a blue shirt; I am in a tattered dress. Vulnerable and forlorn, yet rescued.

His gaze is intense: there is anger in the searching blue of his eyes, and compassion.

“Are you all right? X? I am so sorry. So so sorry.”

“But . . . but . . .”

I have already felt myself for injuries. I am all right. Just a few bruises and scratches.
But my mind is hurting, furious, bewildered. Who is this man who dismisses me one
day, then rescues me the next?

I need to know.

“
How did you know where I was? How? How did . . . ?
I don’t understand what is happening
.”

Marc is looking me up and down, but not sexually—more like a doctor, assessing. My
bare knees are grazed. I look down at my stomach; I realize I have a faint sprinkle
of blood on what remains of my blue summer dress. But it isn’t
my
blood. It is the blood of the boy who led the assault on me. The boy who was punched
so clinically by Marc.

There was savagery there. I look at Roscarrick anew. This man may be an aristocrat,
but he is also, what, primitive? No, not primitive. But certainly not entirely refined.
I recall the rip in his jeans when I last met him, the dark, hard skin beneath; the
glimpse of the animal inside the urban male. His very presence terrified these boys.

I don’t know what I think.

“Do you want to see a doctor, Alexandra?”

My wits begin to reassemble.

“No. I am . . . okay, I think. They didn’t . . . They didn’t get very far . . . You
got here in time . . . but I don’t—”

“How about the police? Would you like to go to the police?”

I vacillate. Part of me wants to scream my anger from the top of Mount Vesuvius. Part
of me wants to totally and immediately forget what just happened, because it was,
of course, my own stupidity that got me into the situation in the first place. Wandering
around the worst slums of a challenging city, a city known for its crime as well as
its swooning beauty—wandering like some damn foolish girl, a naïve and silly Yank
abroad.

“Let me think about the police. I don’t know.”

His smile is grave, even apologetic. I ask the real question: “But how . . . ?” I
really need to know now. “
How did you find me?
”

He nods, as if this is a very sensible question. Which it is.

“Sorry, X, you must be confused. Since you came to see me in the palazzo—I have been
thinking about you.”

Is that a faint blush? No, it is not. But his normal certitude is momentarily flawed.
Marc gestures away his own embarrassment.

“Let me get you away from here, let you clean up, buy you lunch? Please. Then I will
explain everything.”

Who is Marc Roscarrick? What is happening?

I don’t care.
I don’t care
. A very handsome young man has just saved me from my own stupidity, and from something
worse—something I don’t care to relive right now—and he wants to help me. I am too
weak to resist; I want to surrender.

“Yes,” I say. “Please. I’d like to go home.”

There is a tingle of silence. He nods, takes my hand and raises it to his lips, and
he kisses it delicately. The silence between us lingers. I know I want him to kiss
my hand again; just
kiss it again
 . . .