An incredible silence filled the room. Marchini looked at the girl, she was seated exactly as she had been six hours earlier, when she was summoned to come in and “talk” to the DA.
Dr. Vanni sat down in front of the girl and leaned toward her. Talking can only do you good, she murmured, her voice hoarse from exhaustion.
The girl looked at her, opened her mouth slightly as if to speak... but didn’t...
I remember that night, you couldn’t see even a few inches in front of you. I remember all of it. Almost all. You were afraid, you were trembling, you kept asking: Are you sure? You lowered your gaze like a small, spent sun. I watched you, I watched your eyes and I said to myself: Is that all? A man in the making, an overgrown child, an accomplice, a weapon. Take that thing off, I whispered, indicating your bright white sweater, take off your shoes too. And so we spent the minutes in silence while you removed your shoes and sweater. The problem was filling that silence, those long, empty minutes loaded with unasked questions. Outside the windows it was pitch black, a dark curtain covered everything. Don’t scream, I said, lightly brushing your lips, don’t scream. Are you hungry? I asked you at a certain point, toying with your hair. You shook your head no, but you tightened your arms around my hips. Strong as a sun at its zenith, you offered your mouth. For the kiss you closed your eyes and breathed through your nose. You entered the dark, you entered the moonless night. I broke away, bringing you back to the light: Are you afraid? I asked, breathing against your lips. A little, you said, offering another kiss. You mimed a small pain, a kind of intense suffering, but it was a desire to return to the dark. For there are things we women have always known and you men have always been unaware of. It had to have happened that way, as soon as we saw each other in the corridor at school, between classes, in the video game arcade, at the parish cinema, who knows? It had to have happened that way: I knew who you were.
— Look, if you continue acting like that it will be harder to find a way to help you. Dr. Vanni’s voice was a sequence of peaks and valleys like the graph of an electrocardiogram. Marchini hurried to fill a glass of water from the cooler. He handed it to the DA and she thanked him with a smile.
— We know you weren’t alone, Curreli ventured, taking advantage of the pause while Dr. Vanni swallowed.
For a moment the commissioner’s voice seemed to rouse the girl. Her eyes moved in perfect accord, like a cat hearing a suspicious sound, or an owl detecting the squeak of a mouse... but it was just for an instant. Then the girl reentered her mute state. She nestled there, she hunkered down there.
— We’ll be here all night. Dr. Vanni spoke her words with just a thread of a voice.
II
You should see her...
I knew you forever, I knew every single inch of your skin as soon as it was exposed to life. I knew things about you that even you didn’t know. I could stare at you unseen, waiting for my gaze to surround you. I knew that you would turn around looking for me among the others. I knew that you would turn to your friend and ask: Do you know that girl? That girl was me.
On the other end of the line, Commissioner Curreli’s wife took care to let him know that she no longer took anything for granted, far from it, she said, it was normaclass="underline" When on earth had he ever come home when he said he was going to? Still, she said, she had heard the news on TV and had gotten really frightened. Curreli nodded his head as if his wife could see him. She went on: Hardly more than a child, dear God, such a cruel act.
— You should see her, Curreli interrupted. You should see her, he repeated. You wouldn’t believe she could do what she did.
The commissioner’s wife sighed over the line.
Curreli wanted to tell her that she was the same age as their oldest daughter, but he remembered that if his wife had seen the news broadcast she already knew that.
— She’s a child, the woman remarked as if reading his mind.
— Sure, a “child” who massacred an entire family. Curreli imagined seeing his wife cross herself in fear.
— My God, she whispered. And now?
— And now we’ll see what happens...
— Did you eat anything?
— With this heat?
— Of course, what, when it’s hot you stop eating? Order something cool, and eat a lot of fruit, will you? You always forget to eat...
— Hmm, we’ll see, Dr. Vanni gave us a two-hour break, since the girl isn’t talking... Marchini says he knows a place that has pretty good food... Incidentally, let me talk to Manuela.
A few seconds passed during which it became clear that the commissioner’s wife and Manuela were discussing whether his daughter would come to the phone.
Finally, in a hurried voice: Hi, Dad...
— Sweetheart, everything all right? Curreli asked.
At least ten seconds of silence from the receiver... Well, Manuela finally grumbled. Look, Dad, I’m in the middle of something. She broke off, and before Curreli could say goodbye the receiver had already been handed back to his wife.
— What’s wrong with her now? Curreli asked.
— Ah, what’s wrong, Giacomo! She’s seventeen, that’s what’s wrong... God help us... Nothing pleases her... One day she’s too fat, the next day she’s too short... Nothing fits her... What do I know...?
— Put her back on.
— Giacomo... she doesn’t want to, you know how she is... I’ll talk to her...
— Don’t tell me it’s still because of that earring! Curreli snapped.
— I’ll talk to her, his wife repeated. Go and eat something.
There was a full moon that absorbed your light. And you a rising star. The first time I took your hand, you looked straight ahead and continued walking, you didn’t do a thing, you left it up to me. You barely responded to the pressure of my fingers. I studied you: You were stunning, with a beauty all your own. You were attractive like the beginning of a world can be attractive. Nothing more. And that wasn’t why I chose you. You could have stopped me if you were a man, but you aren’t, you’ve never been, and who knows if you will ever become one at this point.
— I’ve always wondered what goes through people’s minds to make them commit such acts, Marchini said, sucking the meat of a clam directly from the shell... Fuckin’ heat, it won’t even cool off at night.
Curreli was stabbing an excessively oily seafood salad with his fork.
I was born on a luminous night; I struggled because I knew. I didn’t want to come out: too much light, too much exertion, too much terror. Everyone looked so extraordinarily happy: What a magnificent baby, what expressive eyes, what delicate hands. The rest is lived in silence, because my life has been coals beneath the ashes. My life has been trying to exist; it’s been an indigestion; it’s been seeing and hearing something that I was unable to grasp.
You’re in too much of a hurry, they said, you’ll recognize that eventually... How many times I screamed at my image in the mirror without opening my mouth: I hate you, I hate you, I hate you! I screamed this, because my life felt like a pair of tight shoes.