did.
But I don’t know how it happened…
That very evening, on an enormous Empire-style bed, Claudio lay on top of me and I halfheartedly opened my legs. By now I was wearing nothing but a black silk bra.
The smell of old wood gave me a comforting sense of warmth. The darkness engulfed everything. I was wearing the necklace with the pearl that you gave me, the only spark of light in the room. My thoughts were like long, long shooting stars whose tips I couldn’t find. Claudio’s attitude toward me was a mixture of jealousy and envy, and if I didn’t dedicate enough time to him he was hurt and made me feel guilty. He cried on the phone, begging me not to leave him, mortifying my happiness. “I can’t wait for this dust cloud to settle,” he said. “I want to have you all to myself. And don’t kid yourself, they’ll forget about you soon enough.”
No, Claudio, I’m not kidding myself. I hope deeply that they do forget me, that no one remembers me…and you, Claudio, you’ve got to forget me, too.
Claudio entered me and started moving back and forth. I felt my swollen belly, and felt his penis as something strange now, something unfamiliar. I turned my head to one side as I felt his abdomen rubbing against my pubic bone.
With my nipples erect I wanted to torture him.
After five or six thrusts he usually started sweating, water pouring from his forehead. When he was on top of me, the drips ran along his face and reached my lips, and I licked them wearily away with my tongue: they were very salty and bitter, with a vague taste of sperm.
That night he didn’t get as far as perspiration, because at the third thrust I stopped him and said, “I’m in love with someone else. I can’t do this.”
He broke away from me without a word, and I turned to face the other side of the bed. In front of me there was a huge mirror framed in an old wardrobe, and I stared at myself for a few moments that felt like an eternity. I studied myself and saw once again that same lost, passive expression that has accompanied me throughout my life.
“You aren’t in love with someone else, you’re in love with your success, and you think I’m a hopeless fool who’s barely capable of satisfying your whims,” he whispered a few minutes later.
“Please stop,” I said quietly, tired of hearing him say that success had altered me. The only thing that had changed was his vision of me; I felt that he was hostile and saw me now as something that belonged not to him but to everyone. I was starting to despise him — not hate him, but despise him.
“It’s the writer you met at that party, isn’t it?”
“If that’s what you want to think, go ahead and think it,” I replied indifferently. “I’m stupid as always…I always tell you everything. But things are going to change from now on, you’ll see,” I said, facing away from him and speaking very quietly.
I heard him crying but shut my eyes. I couldn’t have cared less about his victimhood.
He just cried for a while and soon worked out that it wasn’t going to move me. His tears flowed whenever he needed someone to give him a little understanding. I wished him black with bruises from my fists, white from my withheld caresses. With my nipples erect, I wanted to torture him.
The sheets rustled faintly, and before I realized what was happening I heard a croaking sound. I looked at the mirror on the wall in front of me and saw in its reflection that the sheet behind me was slightly raised, and that his hand was gripping his penis. Lying in bed next to me he was masturbating, partly in order to come, but also partly, perhaps, to take his revenge on me.
I felt him touching himself and shut my eyes; I tried to sleep and feel nothing more.
With my nipples erect, I wanted to torture him.
He got up and went to the bathroom, from which I heard his final, long moan of pleasure.
The next morning we had breakfast in silence. I never saw him again.
In a sense I felt like an orphan, though one with two fathers: a natural one, for whom I have never felt anything, not rancor, rage, or love; and one whom I had taken it upon myself to love and on whom I had imposed the task of loving me.
With my nipples soft, freedom arrived.
Thirteen
I’m naked at the computer; he’s in the kitchen washing the dishes and whistling. I like noise when I’m writing — I like a racket. He puts on a CD and I, still writing, find myself moving my hips and making my revolving chair move back and forth. The curtains aren’t closed yet and the windows are high, typical of a seventeenth-century palazzo. Everybody can see us, and we’re happy for anyone to watch us making love. Perhaps that’s typical of people in love: showing everyone you love each other. I wander along the corridor, brushing the walls with my fingers. I enter the sitting room and stroke the bonsai tree, standing on tiptoes. He has his back to me, and I wrap my arms around his chest and start rubbing my pelvis against him. I turn him resolutely around, look at him coyly, aware that I’ve made a movement he likes. I turn around, rub my ass against him, and he delicately strokes my back; I sit down on the edge of the cold, wet sink, the contact makes my whole skin shiver, and my body swells upward.
He takes me there and then, grandiosely stretches his body out on top of mine, and whispers words I like into my ear, warming my earlobe with his breath.
Then I hear a coughing fit and open my eyes: I see a woman leaning over the table, coughing convulsively; she looks up and smiles wickedly at me. She’s blond, wearing a flower-patterned dress, and she’s thin and coarse. I look at her for a moment longer, then I look at him, close my eyes, open them again, look back at the woman and see that she’s disappeared. I can still hear her coughing. I draw him toward me and devour him.
His tongue bleeds, dripping red on my neck.
Fourteen
Lovely, absolutely lovely — that film was fantastic. A touch of genius in that shot.
And what do you think of the new director in competition at the Berlin festival? And Cannes? And Venice?
Well…I…
And what do you think about Edgar Allan Poe, about Celine, about the fin de siecle poets? Don’t you think their words blend perfectly with their ideas?
Yes, of course…but…
And did you see the Paul Klee exhibition? And the Tintoretto? Did you see Tarantino’s latest, and Bunuel’s first?
No…
Your brains are in a state of collapse. You all know how to know. I don’t.
I’m a Homo sapiens who hasn’t evolved yet. I’m still in the initial phase and I intend to stay here.
They’re all motionless pillars of ash. Compacted ash, impossible to break. I’d so love to walk on their soot. Their stillness frightens me yet, at the same time, fascinates me.
Someone once said that we’re surrounded by dead people. Dead people walk in the street, eat, drink, make love and read lots of books and see lots of films and know lots of important people. But dead people, unlike living people, can’t have palpitations; they can’t have emotions. They use only their intellects, their minds, and they tend to show off their own culture.
I’m scared of dead people.
I’m scared of the thought that one day I will die, too.
