Andrea Canobbio - Three Light-Years

When he got there he found Marta in her robe in front of the closets, which were all open; for half an hour she’d been giving instructions to the two women, who were shifting clothes and blankets from one section to another. The emergency had faded. “Good for you, Mama,” he said, resting an arm around her shoulders, “every so often you have to straighten things up,” and he kissed her on the forehead. On the bed lay an open suitcase, still empty and perhaps forgotten. Leaving the room, the women told him about the ID card found accidentally in the bottom of a drawer during one of the general clean-ups that for some time had become Marta’s chief occupation. Angélica showed Viberti the document, pointing out the name, “Maria Rita,” and Signora Marta’s extraordinary resemblance to the woman in the black-and-white photo. It wasn’t a passport photo, but a real portrait shot in a studio where a photographer had taken pains to pose his model, looking for the best angle and the best lighting, completely unnecessarily since the forty-year-old woman was beautiful regardless.

Viberti explained that Maria Rita was Marta’s real name, which she had always hated; all her life she had insisted on being called by that diminutive of sorts (which was also a real name). “ Así que no es su hermana ,” Angélica said, suddenly understanding. “ Niente hermana ,” no, not her sister. Viberti shook his head. The new twist was that Marta hadn’t remembered the name recorded on her birth certificate and was convinced she’d found a sister’s ID. “Wait,” Viberti said, “let’s do a test.”

He went back to his mother and told her he’d found her old ID card in the house: “See, it has your real name, Maria Rita.” Marta took the document as if seeing it for the first time and exclaimed emphatically: “I always hated that name!” Then she immediately marveled at how young she was in the photograph, and shook her head, laughing; no one knew why she found it so funny.

They sat in the kitchen and drank iced tea, Marta still chuckling to herself, looking at the photograph. Viberti wondered if Cecilia had yet read the letter, which he’d slipped through a crack in her locker. He was almost sure the envelope had been firmly inserted in the locker’s frame and that when she opened the door, Cecilia wouldn’t be able to miss it, but he continued to imagine possible mishaps, scenarios in which the letter might have fallen to the bottom of the locker and gotten buried among old sandals and schedules from past shifts in the ER.

“I remember perfectly when I had this photo taken,” Marta said. “I remember perfectly” had become one of her favorite expressions and Giulia never failed to point it out to him. “The photographer’s studio was downtown and I’d never been there before; he was a shady-looking little hunchback who infuriated me by making me stay in that pose for an hour, taking me by the chin to turn my face from side to side and putting his hands on me to arrange the folds of my dress. When I told Stefano about it he got really angry and wanted to go there and make a scene.” The eccentric uncles everyone used to have, and the friends who were a little crazy or disabled or hunchbacked, but unique and unforgettable, don’t exist anymore. Among my mother’s girlfriends there wasn’t one who was normal. And my father had a whole tribe of protégés and dependents, who continued to seek protection and charity even after his death. My friends and I, on the other hand, are apparently normal people, forgettable and interchangeable, our disabilities concealed, our humps internal.

Viberti smiled at the idea of his father causing a scene, ignoring the fact that his mother had called him Stefano. But Marta added: “He had just finished playing tennis and said he’d smash the racket over his head.” She laughed happily, quite content, and Viberti made an effort to laugh with her. Instead of stopping to think twice and deciding to let it go, he said: “I didn’t know Papa was so jealous.”

“Oh, no, no, I really did mean Stefano Mercuri. Your father wasn’t at all jealous. Stefano, on the other hand, made such scenes…” She laughed again, maybe only because she was happy to have shown her son that she could still remember something. She didn’t seem at all concerned or aware of what her words implied. And Viberti knew he shouldn’t attach any importance to that strange, unintentional confession. How many times had he thought to himself that there was something between Mercuri and his mother? How many times, as a boy, had he hoped that Mercuri and his mother would get married? Hoped or feared.

To escape the awkward situation, he stood up and went out on the balcony, glancing around the courtyards, noting that from that side of the building the part-time hermit’s cave truly was well protected and hidden. It was entirely possible that Marta had been raving deliriously. But wait a minute, he thought, they’d been talking about a time when his father was still alive and well, a period, in fact, when his parents had been married only a few years and he was little. Maybe Marta wasn’t raving, and Mercuri had been her lover before and after she married. But Viberti didn’t look anything like him. Then again he didn’t look like his father either. He looked a lot like Marta.

As soon as he left his mother he went to look for Giulia on the third floor. She had just returned from the hospital, she didn’t know anything about the mix-up with the ID card. They talked a bit about Marta’s new anxiety attacks, which worried them both, and discussed the best dosage for her sleeping pills and tranquilizers. Then Viberti, smiling with feigned nonchalance, told Giulia about Marta’s mistake, how she had attributed to Mercuri the jealousy of a husband.

Giulia shrugged. “You’ve always thought that, too, haven’t you?”

Viberti’s smile immediately faded. “Well, but we’re talking about the sixties here.”

“I see,” said Giulia.

Viberti kept his irritation in check.

“I have to go,” he said, and left before Giulia could add anything else.

* * *

He did not try to call Silvia Re that night or the next day. Silvia left him messages but he didn’t call her back. It was Friday, and on Saturday morning he would take Marta and the two caregivers to the house in the mountains, where his mother would spend the rest of the summer away from the sweltering city. He wouldn’t be able to see Silvia over the weekend, so he might as well put off calling her until Monday. Maybe he should call to tell her, but he kept putting that off, too. All he could think about was how Cecilia would react to his letter. He hadn’t heard from her, hadn’t seen her at the hospital or at the café. Maybe the letter really had fallen to the bottom of the locker and disappeared forever. Maybe Cecilia had read it, had liked it or hadn’t liked it, but since it didn’t change anything, since it didn’t solve the issues that kept them apart, she thought she’d talk to him about it later.

By five in the afternoon Viberti was tempted to go back to his wicker chair and watch the courtyards from up there, but something held him back, as if it were no longer possible. Still, the temptation was strong. Watching the courtyards he’d be able to think about the affair between his mother and Mercuri, about how bitter and sad it made him feel.

Soon after, Cecilia called him. She sounded excited, happy. She’d read the letter, she’d found it very moving, she wanted to get another one just like it that very instant. Then she said she wanted to have dinner with him that evening, she recalled that one day, months ago, Viberti had told her about making a pasta with a special sauce.

“Yes,” he said, “I can make it again anytime,” and she laughed.