I never knew it, actually. «Whats your name?»
The little crook smiles: «I wont tell you!»
«Come on, tell me.»
«And what will you give me?» he says all proud.
And my parents wonder why I do not want kids: «A candy?»
«Mum says not to accept candies from strangers»
«But I am no stranger, I live upstairs.»
The kid then puts out his right hand, I give him the honey and mint candy that luckily I had in my pocket.
«Now, will you tell me your name?»
He crosses his arms and bends his head: «Gianluca».
«Very well, Gianluca, is grandma home?»
«Well, apart from the fact that you didnt say please» he specifies «Whats my grandmas name?»
I knew he would ask that, but I really cant keep her name in mind: «Federica?»
«No.»
«Elisabetta?» I try.
«Almost» he smiles, happy with this new game.
«Elisa?»
«Got it!»
«Ok, listen carefully: Dear Gianluca, is your grandma Elisa at home please?»
«Nope» and he slams the door in my face.
While standing stunned in front of the door, I think about a scene from the movie Caro diario of Nanni Moretti: hes on holiday in Salina and when ringing a friend, a kid picks up and before passing the phone to his parents, he forces him to imitate several animal sounds.
Luckily Elisa overheard everything: «Francesco, welcome back. How was it?»
«Well, bureaucracy aside» I cut short.
She smiles: «Pallino behaved very well, here he comes: he heard you.»
A fluffy white cat comes out from behind my neighbours legs and welcomes me with whim, almost reproachful.
«Thanks again, I wouldnt know where else to leave him.»
I go back home, with the feline in my arms. After a nice dinner, we both tired go to bed; it has surely been an adventure for him too, these days in a strangers house.
Tuesday 20 July
«Welcome back to work, had a nice holiday?» asks me the director, as soon as I enter the Montepulciano station branch.
Well, yeah, I didnt mention it yet: after finishing my professor contract at the University, I ended up working as a bank counter clerk. Not the best, but its a permanent contract at least!
I didnt tell anyone the real reasons of my trip, actually the two reasons: the research of the professor and the emperor.
«All good a bit tiring.»
It is harder to get out of Vito Darinos questions, hes the cashier on the desk next to mine. As we say around here, hes a weird fish: hes generally quiet and gentle, but gets upset out of nothing, becoming all red, then purple and suddenly deflates. He is against the whole world, thinking no one understands a thing and, thats the reason they get promoted, while he has always remained stuck. He claims to be single; Id say more of a bachelor: he hasnt had a girlfriend in ten years I think, always talking about women, but in a very misogyny way.
«Did you have fun? Have you met any nice Turk darlings?» is his first question.
«No, I just had some rest.» Couldnt be falser.
«Ive also visited some touristic places.»
«Where exactly have you been?» he insists.
I try to remain vague: «Well an archaeological site: you know its my passion».
«Sure, sorry professor» he says ironically.
«After all» I try to debate «it is the job Ive been doing for ten years, before starting here.»
Vito charges back again, fantasising about unreal erotic adventures: «So no women?»
«What should I tell you: I will start chasing men then.»
I found out that this is always a brilliant way to end the conversation.
Once again, glued to my PC, I switch on my autopilot for the cash register routine. Some of the operations are long and boring, whilst others slip away lightly, as the clients do: as soon as I finish, I forget the account number along with the face that I had in front of me.
That same evening, before leaving the bank, I receive an email from the Literature Facultys director:
Dear colleagues,
This is to inform you that the obsequies of our eminent professor Luigi Maria Barbarino, prematurely passed due to a tragic fatality, will be held on Thursday 22nd at 16.30, at Poppis abbey
Thursday 22 July
Arezzos countryside is nothing like Sienas. Around the Palios city you find so many to-good-to-be-real little villages and then the hills: endless, small and all with one only farmhouse surrounded by trees on top. In the Arezzo area all is flat, the crops less diversified: houses are not isolated and far, but one next to the other, leaving wide empty spaces in between. The roads as well are different: over there they go up and down, with many curves, humps and slopes, here there is just a long straight way, seemingly leading to nothing.
At 15.00 Im already in Poppi, and I take advantage to visit the magnificent series of frescos in the Guidi counts castle. This way I find out that, when he was young, Dante took part as a knight in the famous battle fought in the plane under the castle: I always figured the sommo poeta shut in his room imagining celestial worlds, I really cant imagine him in an armour, piercing and cutting enemies throats.
I walk down from the fortress to San Fedeles abbey. While I admire its ashlar stone facade, two professors come along tailed by their disciples. Professor Alessandri comes towards me and offers his condolences; I thank him somehow perplexed: I am not a family member, but probably for them I am the closest one to Barbarino, as Ive been his assistant for years. When three more researchers do the same, I answer like I was at an old aunts funeral, the one that you havent seen in years and that, on top of it all, wasnt that nice either: «Thank you, thank you, unfortunately thats life.»
Finally, his family arrives: I send everyone to them, and get inside the church. After some interesting insights mixed with banalities from the priest, it is the directors turn to speak. He stands from the right-hand side group of benches; the ones where all professors are dying of heat in their jackets and duty suits. While the lecturer walks between the lines, the general thought is only one: that he finishes soon. The director, with a wide dramatic gesture, puts the tocco (a black squared academic cap, given to honour the departed professor) on the casket. Once hes on the podium, he takes out of his breast pocket three sheets, unfolds and refolds them in a dramatic act, all with a half-smile such as to say: I prepared a speech, but I will be magnanimous and spare you by improvising. A shared relief sigh follows this act.
«Dear colleagues, we are here reunited to represent the whole academic staff in expressing our participation to the heart-felt mourning of the family.»
[Translated from the academic language it means: how can the staff care, if even his own family doesnt? Thats why there is so few of us.]
«We were all struck by the sudden and premature departure of our respected colleague»
[= We immediately rejoiced when the old baron, finally, croaked]
«His loss leaves a hole, in the staff, that will be very hard to fill.»