Viper

21

Centro di Visitatore, Pompeii Franco Castellani and his cousin Paolo Falconi slipped past the glass-screened kiosk without paying. Within seconds they'd vanished in the labyrinthine ruins of Pompeii.

They were serial non-payers and knew the place like the back of their hands. Pompeii was their playground. First stop, as usual, Forum Olitorio. Through iron bars, Franco stared into the old granary, studying every inch of the plaster casts of victims engulfed in the torrent of lava that erupted from Vesuvius back in 79@C.

When the site had been excavated in the 1800s, imprints of the dead had been found in the hardened lava. By pouring plaster into cavities left in the bed of ashes by the gradual decomposition of a corpse, it had been possible to recreate a near perfect replica of the victim's form.

The figure that always fascinated Franco was that of a young man, sitting with his knees tucked up and his hands on his chin, his moment of thought preserved forever by the awful lava flow that had consumed him.

Franco stared intently at Ash Boy, as he called him. He had the frame of a youth, but the plaster and the pose suggested someone older. Someone old before his time.

Dead before his time.

The observation resonated with Franco. The disease that had engulfed his own body – slower but just as deadly as the lava – had already stolen his youth. It had cruelly taken the years in which he should have been most attractive to women, the years in which he should find his soulmate.

Inevitably it would kill him. Just like Ash Boy. He would be dead before his time.

Franco walked with his hood up. Dark sunglasses not only hid his face from prejudiced eyes, they also made him feel safer and calmer. His doctor had recommended them. Partly as a cosmetic aid. But also to help rein in his explosive temper. He'd once almost beaten to death a teenager who'd made the mistake of taunting him. It had resulted in a suspended prison sentence for Franco and a long stay in intensive care for the mocking youth.

Five feral dogs followed them as they stopped at the junction of Via del Tempio d'Iside and Via del Teatri. The cousins sat on the cobbles that had once been stepping stones over Pompeii's open sewers. They drank water and ate the cheese, ham and bread they'd brought with them.

'Get lost, go away!' Franco kicked out at the dogs as they hassled for scraps.

'Hey, they're okay, let them be.' Paolo tore off some of his bread and threw it to the pack.

The dogs scavenged as the boys ate. Crowds flowed past, heading to the Doric Temple and Great Theatre. A group of schoolgirls sauntered by. Multicoloured rucksacks swung low over tight blue jeans. Pretty hands marked off worksheets.

'Francesi,' whispered Franco, picking up their accents as they gabbled to each other.

'Bonjour,' shouted Paolo in poor French, then added in English. 'You ladies need a guide?'

The girls giggled.

Franco's Anglo-Saxon was less subtle. 'Show us your cunts and we'll do your schoolwork for you.'

The giggling stopped. A young male teacher appeared from the back of the group. The cousins hadn't spotted him. He was suntanned, fashionably dressed and had the kind of confidence that only teachers have. As he strode over he'd probably weighed up the two young men and, being several inches taller and far more muscular than either of them, no doubt felt confident about his task.

He shouldn't have done.

Franco got to his feet. Before the teacher had uttered a word he adjusted his balance and thundered a kick between the man's legs. More followed. Rapid, vicious kicks, delivered with all Franco's hatred for the world and for what good-looking young men like this one stood for.

The teacher doubled over, hands clutching his groin. Franco drop-kicked him in the chest. The impact made a dull and muffled sound. Ribs cracked like ice on a lake.

The girls screamed. Franco felt jolts of power and energy surge through him. Violence made him feel good. Feel complete.

'Bastardo! ' swore Franco. He took a final kick at the man's head as he lay unconcious on the ancient cobbles.

Everyone looked away. A collective wave of nausea washed over them. Paolo pulled at his cousin.

'Now, we go. It's done. Come on!'

Franco was in a trance. Fixated by the sight of the pain and chaos that he'd created.

'Now!' shouted Paolo. Finally he got Franco to move. Dragged him down Vicolo del Menandro. Through an ancient block of houses that pre-dated Christ, then right into the wide, ancient thoroughfare known as Via dell'Abbondanza. At the end of it they ducked out of sight and Paolo exploded. 'What the fuck was that for? Why did you do that?'

'Because I wanted to,' wheezed Franco. 'Because he's a French cunt and he deserved to have his French cunt-face beaten to a pulp.'

'Hell, the guy hadn't even said anything.'

'He didn't have to. You saw the way those bitches looked at us.'

Paolo let out a sigh. 'Stupido, they only looked at us because we spoke to them. Nothing would have kicked off if you hadn't asked to see their cunts.'

The criticism stung Franco. 'It was a joke. If you'd have said it they'd have laughed. But because I said it, they looked like they were going to be sick.'

Paolo let it rest. When his cousin was in this kind of mood there was no point trying to explain that the world wasn't always against him.

Franco's temper was snapping again. 'Bitches. Fucking little bitches. They think they're too good for me. Too pretty for me, all because of this!' He slapped his hands on either side of his face then scratched up and down at his wrinkled and mottled skin.

Paolo saw blood coming from his cousin's cheeks. 'Hey, stop it! Come on. Don't do that.' He pulled his cousin's hands away from his face.

'Too good? Huh!' said Franco. 'They're no better than the bags of trash we burn every day. That's what they are – trash. I'd like to take them down to Grandfather's pit, fuck them one by one and then burn them all.'

The pit was Franco's private place. No one went there but him. And nothing seemed to calm him more than spending time alone there, burning things.

'Fine. Whatever,' said Paolo, 'but unless we get moving again, the only burning you're going to be doing is your backside on a prison bench.' He put his hand on his cousin's shoulder and tried to push him into a jog. 'C'mon, let's move.'

'I'm not coming.'

'What?'

'I'm not running any more. I'm going to the Orto.'

'Don't be crazy. You nearly killed that French guy. Come on!'

'No.'

'Yes!' Paolo tried again to move him, but Franco wheeled away from his hand. 'Those kids will have told another teacher by now. The guards and polizia will be all over us in a minute. C'mon.'

'No! I don't give a fuck. I'm going where I want to go. I always go to the Orto and I'm not leaving today until I've been.'

Paolo stopped and thought for a brief moment. 'Well, I'm not. Crazy fucker! You get caught by the polizia if you want. I'm gone.'

Franco didn't even watch him head off. Instead, he cut slowly back through Vicolo dei Fuggiaschi and wandered towards an area of Pompeii that had been a vineyard before Vesuvius erupted.

Franco Castellani looked at the haunting sprawl and tangle of plaster mummies lying in the grey stony dirt of the Orto dei Fuggiaschi, the Garden of the Fugitives. More than a dozen adults and children had been found dead, huddled together, seeking the solace of human touch in the last moment of life.

Human touch. Something he craved.

He raised his eyes to the sky and felt a strange spiritual connection with the dead.

What had killed them? The boiling flow of lava and the billowing fires? Or the choking whirlwind of pumice, ash and volcanic dust?

Had they been good people? Bad people? Had they deserved to die? He doubted it. No one deserved to die such a horrible death. No one but those little French bitches. Such an end would have been perfect for them.

Franco took his time wandering around. Paolo was right, the cops were soon everywhere. Swarming all over the place, like roaches. No problem, though. He knew the ruins like the back of his hand. He slipped outside the gates into the town of Pompeii. Disappeared down by the railway line heading east. He curled up behind a giant old hoarding advertising sanitary towels, and slept for several hours.

It was dark and late when Franco Castellani crept back into the rusty caravan he shared with his cousin.

Paolo looked up from his bunk, an old football magazine on his lap. 'You okay?'

'Yeah,' mumbled Franco, his head down in shame.

'Grandpa brought us two beers. I saved them till you came.' Paolo nodded at the small second-hand fridge that buzzed and clanked beneath a worktop in the tiny galley kitchen.

'Fuck!' swore Franco as he opened the door and sharp white light blazed into his face. 'Why does it have to be so bright?'

'Opener's on the top. Come sit with me.'

'Peroni. He spoils us.' Franco popped the caps. Foam fizzed over the bottle necks. 'He say anything to you about the Camorristi?'

Paolo took a beer from his cousin's hand and clinked bottles. 'Salute! They want the place. Plan to move us out. They're going to build here, or something.'

'What? You fucking joking?'

'No. That's what they say. They are going to send the guys round. Grandpa has to sign, and that's it.'

'The guys. I hate the fucking guys. Where we supposed to go?'

'Like they give a fuck? It would have been different if we were guys.'

Franco started to peel the label off the bottle. He always tried to get it off without tearing, but never managed. 'Camorra soldiers. Us? You think so?'

'Why not? We can do stuff. We can run messages, do deals, scare the shit out of people and that.'

'Well, at least, I can. I'm not sure you can scare a fish.'

Paolo laughed and took a long swig of the beer. It wasn't as cold as it should have been; the fridge was playing up again. 'Grandpa would never let us work for the System, you know his feelings.'

Franco knew them well. The Camorra was the thing that he hated most. The thing that had ruined his life.

'You going to stay in tonight?'

'No. I'll have another beer with you, then I'm going out. You know I have to.'

Paolo avoided his eyes. He never knew where his cousin went, or what he got up to. He just understood that sometimes he had to be on his own. It was better that way.