The Past is a Foreign Country (14 page)

IT WAS AUGUST and the days were all the same. The heat was heavy and unsettling. Even at night the air had an almost physical texture, like a hot, wet blanket that clung to your body.

One afternoon we were walking on the beach, close to where the fishermen pulled their boats onto dry land and sold their catch. It was about a week before the mid-August bank holiday. As usual Francesco was doing the talking. Every now and again he would pause and let me say something, although he didn’t listen to a word. When he started again, he would simply pick up where he had left off, or else change the subject.

After a while, he said he thought we should take a holiday. We could take the car – mine, he said, was more suitable – and just go. Maybe we could drive all the way to Spain. We didn’t need to book anything.

We would stop in two or three places along the way, or even more if we felt it. And if we felt like it, we could stop somewhere for a longer time – in France, for example. In other words, we could do whatever we liked.

I immediately said yes. With a sudden vague sense of euphoria, it occurred to me that this could be a kind of heroic farewell.

Fine, I told myself, I’ve had these crazy few months. I’ve done some incredible things. Things I never dreamed I could do. I’ve walked a tightrope and fortunately haven’t fallen off. Now we’ll have this holiday and then I’ll start my new life. Which in fact will be my
old life, though a little different. I’ve seen what it’s like on the other side. I’ve had that experience. Soon it’ll be time to go back home.

I remembered
On The Road
and that famous exchange, which I’d learned by heart a few years earlier.

We gotta go and never stop going till we get there, Dean says.

Where we going, man? Sal-Kerouac asks.

I don’t know but we gotta go.

Yes, we had to go and then, at last, I would come home again. Whatever that meant.

Thinking these things made me feel good. As if I’d been running in a tough race and now was within sight of the finishing line. It was nearly over. When we came back I’d tell Francesco I’d had enough. It had been an extraordinary thing to live through this adventure with him but now, for me, it was finished. I would always be his friend, but our roads were about to diverge.

When we came back, I was sure I’d find the words and the
courage
to say what I had to say.

‘So when are we leaving?’

Francesco smiled. It wasn’t his usual controlled, innuendo-laden smile. The one that always left me feeling I didn’t quite know what it meant. This was like a normal smile. And I felt a twinge of sadness. He was my friend and I’d just made up my mind to dump him. I felt guilty about it, and about the doubts I’d been having more and more frequently about him, and about the two of us.

‘Tomorrow. Tomorrow morning. Let’s go and pack now. I’ll work out a bit of an itinerary. Come and pick me up early tomorrow
morning
, that way we can leave before it gets too hot. Let’s say seven.’

I went home. I’d been alone there for the past few days. My
parents
had gone to stay on a farm belonging to some friends of theirs, over towards Ostuni. The first thing I did when I got in was look for the telephone number of those friends. I wanted to talk to Mum and Dad. I suddenly felt anxious to talk to them. Our relations had
been frosty ever since that Sunday lunch, but now I had the
impression
the ice was starting to thaw. I wanted to tell them I was going away for a short holiday, a week, maybe a little more. I needed the break, but when I came back I would get down to my studies again. I was sorry for the way I’d behaved in the last few months. I’d been through a rough time, but it was over now. For a moment I actually thought of telling them what had really been happening to me these past few months. Then I told myself, maybe it was better not to, for the moment. Maybe later. As I dialled the number I felt a bit emotional, but light-hearted. I felt fine. Everything was going to be all right.

The telephone rang for a long time, but no one answered.

They probably hadn’t got back from the seaside. My mother liked to stay on the beach after the crowds had gone and read until the sun went down. She liked bathing late in the afternoon or early in the morning. My father didn’t, but he adapted.

I felt bad about it and told myself I would call again later, after I’d packed my bag.

But that took longer than I’d expected.

I took a shirt from the wardrobe in my room and put it down on the table in the living room. I don’t know why I had decided to use that table, which wasn’t near my room, as somewhere to lay things I was planning to pack. Then I took out two more shirts. Then I took out two different ones and put back one of the ones I’d already chosen. As I walked from my room to the living room I wondered which trousers I ought to take, and how many. Two pairs should be enough. One pair of light jeans and one of khaki trousers. Then, of course, I added another pair. A cotton sweater. Or would a
sweatshirt
be better? Or both? Bloody hell, it’s hot in Spain, all you need is a thin cotton sweater. But which one? And what about a jacket? I’d need one if we went to a smart restaurant or a casino. But you can’t put a jacket in a bag. I’d better take a proper suitcase. But Mum and
Dad had taken all the suitcases. Forget about the jacket. That was a stupid idea anyway, about going to a casino. What would we do in a casino? Though maybe I could carry the jacket and hang it up in the car. Two pairs of shoes. Or just one pair, the ones I was wearing. Ten pairs of pants. That way I wouldn’t have to do any washing. No, I’d have to wash anyway, because I didn’t think we’d be back in less than ten days. So should I take a box of washing powder? Don’t talk rubbish, if I need it I’ll buy it there, or else use the soap from the hotel to do the laundry. And what about socks? People don’t usually wear socks in summer. Five pairs should be enough. But would they be enough? Should I put the trousers in first, then the shirts and sweaters and then the pants and socks? Or would the other way round be better?

After an hour, I’d only packed a few things, there was a whole load of stuff on the table, and I felt exhausted. And stupid. I stood there at the table, not knowing what to do.

Eventually I told myself I was going soft in the head. I picked up items at random and threw them in until the bag was almost full. Before I closed it, I added a dozen cassettes, and two new packs of French cards.

Now I didn’t know what to do. I again tried phoning my parents, and again no one answered. I ate tuna out of a tin, along with a roll left over from the day before that tasted like rubber. I had a beer. I went and sat down on the terrace with a book, but couldn’t read more than half a page. I thought of going to bed but immediately realised it was a very bad idea. I wasn’t tired and it was still very hot. I’d only toss and turn between the damp sheets. The very idea of it made me feel suffocated.

So I went out. There was no one about, and the empty street seemed disturbing, almost sinister. The way places that are too familiar can sometimes be sinister, if only you look around instead of passing by as usual. 

When had they boarded up that door? The building was unsafe, but I’d never noticed before. And what about the old woman who lived in a one-room apartment giving directly onto the street less than a hundred metres from our building? Where was she? She was usually sitting outside, taking the air. But that night she was nowhere to be seen and the door stood closed, like a blind, fearful eye.

I felt an unpleasant shudder that started at the back of my neck and spread through my whole body. I couldn’t resist the impulse to look over my shoulder. There was no one there, but that didn’t put my mind at rest. I wished my parents were in. Why weren’t they answering the phone? I had a premonition that something had
happened
. Or maybe something was happening at that very moment. For years I would remember that evening, the stupid things I did, that sense of imminent disaster. A road accident. A heart attack. Everything gone, shattered, just when I’d decided to turn over a new leaf. I tried to recall when exactly I’d last seen my parents. It had only been a few days before, but I couldn’t remember. I did remember the last time we’d talked – and quarrelled – and I didn’t like it. If something bad had happened to my mother and father, I thought, or even to just one of them, I’d spend the rest of my life feeling an unbearable sense of guilt. I was on the verge of tears, and for a couple of minutes I toyed with the idea of taking the car and driving to Ostuni. I quickly changed my mind, not because it was a stupid idea, but because I didn’t know exactly where the farm was, so I hadn’t a clue where to go.

I had been walking for at least a quarter of an hour when I passed a man of about forty who was walking his dog, a fat, ugly mongrel. The man, in contrast, was very thin and was wearing a long-sleeved white shirt, with the collar and cuffs buttoned up. He had an
expressionless
face. As I passed him, I could smell the sweat on him.

I wondered what he’d been like twenty years earlier, when he was more or less the age I was now. What had he expected of the future?
Had he had dreams? Had he ever imagined he would end up
walking
his sad-looking mongrel, with his shirt all buttoned up, on an August night, between anonymous houses and cars parked on the pavement? When had he realised the way things were going? Had he realised? And what about me? What would I be like in twenty years’ time?

As I walked along the Via Putignani I heard a car with a noisy exhaust coming down the Via Manzoni.

I told myself: if the driver of that car is a man, everything will be fine, not only the trip, but everything else, too. We reached the junction at the same time. I held my breath. The car – a Fiat Duna estate car – turned slowly into the Via Putignani.

The driver was a fat lady with gathered-up hair, wearing a t-shirt, her face exhausted by the heat. She leaned forward as she drove, as if she was going to collapse onto the wheel at any moment.

As the Duna drove away towards the centre of town, I made an effort to smile. ‘Fuck your stupid prophecies, Giorgio Cipriani,’ I said out loud.

There was no one to hear me.

When I got back home it was too late to try and call my parents again. I would do it the following morning, somewhere along the motorway. I went to bed, leaving the window wide open to alleviate the heat.

I tossed and turned for a long time without getting to sleep. I fell asleep as the dawn light was filtering through the cracks in the
shutter
, and had a dream.

I was driving along some kind of motorway, across a deserted landscape as grey and sad as a winter morning. I was anxious as I drove. I had the impression I was fleeing from something very
important. Then I saw objects coming towards me from the distance, rushing towards me, faster and faster, and I realised the objects were cars and I was going in the wrong direction.

How could it have happened? How had I ended up in this
situation
? The motorway wasn’t very wide. In fact, it got narrower and narrower as the cars approached. I didn’t want to die: I still had so much to do. It couldn’t really be my turn yet. Things like this
happen
to other people. The road wasn’t a motorway any more, just a narrow lane. My movements were becoming slower and slower, and my fear stronger and stronger. I could hear a siren coming closer, piercing the air.

I didn’t want to die.

Because I didn’t know if there was anything after death.

The alarm clock was ringing. That was all it was. I opened my eyes. For a few seconds I lay there looking at my shoes beside the bed, still hovering between one world and the other.

Half an hour later I was outside Francesco’s building, ringing his entryphone. We were on our way.  

I DON’T REMEMBER where it was I read that during the day ghosts go into hiding. It’s not even a particularly perceptive or
original
idea. But it’s true. That morning, despite the fact that I’d had not much more than an hour’s sleep, despite the nightmares, despite the ghost-filled streets I’d walked along during the night, I felt fine.

Everything seemed so simple again as I drove my BMW at a
hundred
and eighty kilometres an hour. I didn’t feel so sure any more of the meanings I’d read into our journey the evening before. On the contrary, when I recalled all those good intentions of mine, they just made me feel uncomfortable. I didn’t want to think. I could do that another time. It was a beautiful day, not too hot, and we sped along with the music blasting the interior of the car, and everything was possible. I wasn’t just happy, I was euphoric. I was acutely aware of everything, as if my senses had become more powerful. Everything was very straightforward, very simple. There was something
primitive
about seeing the colours more intensely, hearing songs I knew very well as if for the first time, touching the wheel and the gear shift, pressing down on the pedals.

About ten o’clock we stopped at a service station. I didn’t know if we were in the Abruzzi, or already in the Marches. We had two cappuccinos and two slices of lemon pie. I really don’t know why I remember that so clearly. I even remember picking up the crumbs that were still on my plate after I’d finished the pie. I remember the
texture of the crust and the taste of the cream as it mingled with the taste of the cappuccino.

Before we set off again, I phoned my parents, but I wasn’t in the same mood I’d been in last night, and would happily have done without that call. Talking to them now would only depress me just when I was feeling so light-hearted. It would remind me that I had – or should have had – responsibilities. It would force me to think. And that was something I had no intention of doing. But obviously I had to call. I couldn’t just vanish without a trace.

It went just as I’d expected. In fact, worse. Where was I going? Spain? Why hadn’t I told them before? What car was I using? I remembered at that moment that they didn’t know I had a car. So I told a whole lot of senseless lies and they must have known they were lies, even if they didn’t know what the truth was. Again, I lost my temper because I knew I was in the wrong and was being stupid. Again, I said some nasty things. It ended as badly as it
possibly
could, with both of us slamming the phone down and not even saying goodbye.

It was like a shutter coming down.

‘Who gives a fuck?’ I said, staring as the machine spat out my phonecard. I shot a look full of hatred and contempt at a fat lady who was standing there, waiting to phone, and had obviously heard everything. She turned her head away in terror and I felt a wicked pleasure. ‘Who gives a fuck?’ I said again as I walked back to the car.

What happened next was all very confused. The last clear
memory
I have of the journey is that lemon pie and that cappuccino. We drove across Italy and the south of France almost without
stopping
, taking turns at the wheel. When we’d started out, we’d said we could do whatever we liked. Stop wherever we wanted, maybe somewhere by the sea, and stay there a day or two. Take it easy, in other words, because we were on holiday. But now we were on the
road, it was obvious this was a stupid idea. Francesco had said he knew some people in Valencia.

Valencia became our goal. We were going to Valencia, and that was it. So now there followed a sequence of blinding sun, a sunset with the universe drowning in red light, darkness, half an hour’s sleep in a service station with the windows open. A lorry driver
getting
out of his lorry and peeing in a bush, then belching and
getting
back in to have a good sleep. Cigarettes, rolls, coffee, more cigarettes, cappuccinos, service station toilets, border posts, signs in different languages. Light, half-light, darkness, light again, and that feeling of urgency driving us on. Music. Springsteen, Dire Straits, Neil Young. Plus some tapes of Francesco’s: heavy metal, violent and hypnotic. The further we went, the less we talked, as if we were both intent on a mission that had to be accomplished. Except that I had no idea what the mission was.

We got to Valencia more or less a day after we’d set out. We found a room in an unlikely-looking hotel and fell asleep without even getting undressed.

Outside, the air was red hot.