The Neapolitan Novels

118.

Feeling did not return to her; rather, a sense of alienation increased. The heavy air of the rooms. The dirty clothes. The bathroom door that didn’t close properly. I imagine that San Giovanni seemed to her an abyss on the edge of our neighborhood. Although she had reached safety, she hadn’t been careful where she put her feet down, and had fallen into a deep hole.

Rinuccio immediately worried her. The child, in general serene, began to have tantrums during the day, calling for Stefano, and to wake up crying at night. The attentions of his mother, her way of playing, calmed him, yes, but no longer fascinated him, in fact began to annoy him. Lila invented new games, his eyes lighted up, the child kissed her, he wanted to put his hands on her chest, he shrieked with joy. But then he pushed her away, he played by himself or napped on a blanket on the floor. And on the street he got tired after ten steps, he said his knee hurt, he demanded to be picked up, and if she refused he fell on the ground screaming.

At first Lila resisted, then slowly she began to give in. Since at night he would quiet down only if she let him come into her bed, she let him sleep with her. When they went out to do the shopping she carried him, even though he was a well nourished, heavy child: on one side the bags, on the other him. She returned exhausted.

She rediscovered what life without money was. No books, no journals or newspapers. Rinuccio grew before her eyes, and the things she had brought no longer fit him. She herself had very few clothes. But she pretended it was nothing. Enzo worked all day, he gave her the money she needed, but he didn’t earn much, and besides he had to give money to the relatives who were taking care of his siblings. So they barely managed to pay the rent, the electricity, and the gas. But Lila didn’t seem worried. The money she had had and had wasted were all one, in her imagination, with the poverty of childhood, it was without substance when it was there and when it wasn’t. She was much more worried about the possible undoing of the education she had given her son and she devoted herself to making him energetic, eager, receptive, as he had been until recently. But Rinuccio now seemed to be content only when she left him on the landing to play with the neighbor’s child. He fought, got dirty, laughed, ate junk, appeared happy. Lila observed him from the kitchen, from there she could see him and his friend framed by the door to the stairs. He’s smart, she thought, he’s smarter than the other child, who’s a little older: maybe I should accept that I can’t coddle him, that I’ve given him what’s necessary but from now on he’ll manage by himself, now he needs to hit, take things away from other children, get dirty.

One day, Stefano appeared on the landing. He had left the grocery and decided to come and see his son. Rinuccio greeted him joyfully, Stefano played with him for a while. But Lila saw that her husband was bored, he couldn’t wait to leave. In the past it had seemed that he couldn’t live without her and the child; instead here he was, looking at his watch, yawning, almost certainly he had come because his mother or even Ada had sent him. As for love, jealousy, it had all passed, he wasn’t agitated anymore.

“I’ll take the child for a walk.”

“Watch out, he always wants to be picked up.”

“I’ll carry him.”

“No, make him walk.”

“I’ll do as I like.”

They went out, he returned half an hour later, he said he had to hurry back to the grocery. He swore that Rinuccio hadn’t complained, hadn’t asked to be picked up. Before he left he said, “I see that here you’re known as Signora Cerullo.”

“That’s what I am.”

“I didn’t kill you and I won’t kill you only because you’re the mother of my son. But you and that shit friend of yours are taking a big risk.”

Lila laughed, she provoked him, saying, “You’re only tough with people who can’t crack your head open, you bastard.”

Then she realized that her husband was alluding to Solara and she yelled at him from the landing, as he was going down the stairs: “Tell Michele that if he shows up here I’ll spit in his face.”

Stefano didn’t answer, he disappeared into the street. He returned, I think, at most four or five more times. That last time he met his wife he yelled at her, furiously, “You are the shame of your family. Even your mother doesn’t want to see you anymore.”

“It’s clear that they never understood what a life I had with you.”

“I treated you like a queen.”

“Better a beggar, then.”

“If you have another child you’d better abort it, because you have my surname and I don’t want it to be my child.”

“I’m not going to have any more children.”

“Why? Have you decided not to screw anymore?”

“Fuck off.”

“Anyway, I warned you.”

“Rinuccio isn’t your son, and yet he has your surname.”

“Whore, you keep saying it so it must be true. I don’t want to see you or him anymore.”

He never really believed her. But he pretended, because it was convenient. He preferred a peaceful life that would vanquish the emotional chaos she caused him.