Cressy’s tree retains the dignity of the old fella. There’s a soothing energy comes up from the roots like it wants to chat. I sat out there one morning and wrote a new composition – ‘Sorry’s Just a Word’。 It wrote itself.
At my audition for the tour of Annie Get Your Gun they didn’t like my version of ‘There’s No Business Like Show Business’ and I guess I was a bit down that day. Bitter, was the word they used. So I’m back at the beginners’ tap class. I found the stoat, by the way, out back by the bins. Back legs were missing. It’s just a torso and a bandaged jaw. I reckon a rat got to it. I carried it into the bar and wedged it next to a bottle of Fernet-Branca. Hard not to see myself, sometimes, in that annexed life.
Life’s not the same since you all left, but you’re better off out of it.
If I don’t get the Rosemary Clooney, you know where I’ll be in December. Drink a bicicletta or two for me.
Take care, Temps.
Your friend,
Pete
PS. Watch your back. August’s heat’s got fangs. Near took the skin off my shoulders when I was in Palermo.
August came and still no word from Peg. The heat ratcheted up as Pete said it would and brought out the unwashed tang of people. Hot nights made sleep impossible and a perpetual feeling of somnolence took hold. The sounds of lovemaking ceased because no one wanted to get that close. Ice cream melted before it got near mouths and tourists cursed that they hadn’t come in May. Massimo disappeared to his family home on the island of Giglio and was missed. Claude moped and developed a wheeze from the mosquito deterrents that burned day and night. Men screamed at women and women screamed at children and children kicked dogs for no other reason than that their blood ran hot. Then every few days, clouds billowed over the hills and arms rose exultantly as violent storms rolled in. And for a brief moment there was respite.
As the month crept towards its midpoint, Ulysses grew restless. The heat was getting to him, and both Cress and the kid could see that, and every day he checked for a letter from Peg. Even sent her a postcard that said, Remember us? Cress said he shouldn’t have done it, and he knew he shouldn’t have, and he regretted it straight away but what could he do? Cress said it was probably the unreliable Italian postal system. Ulysses said he was thinking about the kid and Cress said the kid was all right. She’ll tell us what she needs. You reckon? I know, said Cress.
And one afternoon outside Michele’s, Ulysses happened to say, I wonder if it’s as hot back home as it is here. And Cress put down his Baedeker, noting the context and subtle use of the word home. This was the first chink in the boy’s docile armour.
Come on, said Cress, smoothing down the crumpled legs of his shorts. Let’s go for a walk. He left a handful of lire on the table and Ulysses called out to the kid. She was talking with a boy by the fountain.
Of course it’s my parrot! she said and spat on the ground. Claude flew down and landed on her arm.
Kid was chatty all the way to the Pitti Palace. She said Signora Giulia wanted to know what they did at night.
What did you say? said Ulysses.
I said we sang songs and played cards for money.
You told her that? said Ulysses.
And sometimes we talked about life, about good times and bad times, and we drank hard liquor.
You have all the Italian words for that? said Cress, a little envious.
Yep.
Kid was balancing on a ledge now. I said you’re clean and lonely.
Cress and Ulysses stopped. Which one?
Kid pointed to Ulysses. Lonely, she said.
You told her that?
Yep, and she ran out of ledge and jumped down.
Why’d you tell her that? said Ulysses.
Because you are, she said.
A tourist passed by and threw coins at them.
Grazie! said the kid and she bent down and picked up the lire.
Through the courtyard of the Pitti Palace, at the top of the stone stairs, they met the breeze. Swallows and swifts and bells on the air. Florentines out in their droves – it’s what they did in the summer months, here or Cascine Park. To be away from the streets and the dust and smells and the niggling disputes was everything in that moment. Time moved differently, as if it, too, had buckled with the heat, and past and present shifted into one sultry indomitable dance.
They climbed the slope up to the highest point to the Casino del Cavaliere, as storm clouds crested but didn’t break. How beautiful the light! To their left, the old circuit walls carved through olive groves, and the sky was a ponderous violet grey. All around, art and life entwined. Cress held up his doorstop of a book and said, Baedeker! as if it was a new religion. And with their sight drawn across the cityscape he said, That’s our home down there, Temps. Who would’ve believed it?