Paolo Giordano - The Solitude of Prime Numbers

Yes, it was Soledad. He recognized her Spanish accent, still quite noticeable.

"Who is looking for her?" asked the housekeeper.

"It's Mattia."

There was an extended silence. Sol tried to remember.

"I can give you her new address."

"That's okay. I've got it, thanks," he said.

"Good-bye, then," said Sol, after another, shorter silence.

Mattia walked off without turning to look up. He was sure that Sol would be standing at one of the windows watching him, recognizing him only now and wondering what had become of him in all those years and what it was he had come back in search of. The truth was that even he didn't know.

Alice hadn't expected him so soon. She had sent the card only five days before and it was possible that Mattia hadn't even read it yet. At any rate she was sure that he would call first, that they would arrange to meet, perhaps in a bar, where she would prepare him calmly for the news.

Her days were filled with waiting for some kind of signal. At work she was distracted but cheerful and Crozza hadn't dared to ask her why, but in his heart he felt he deserved some credit for it. The void left by Fabio's departure had made way for an almost adolescent frenzy. Alice assembled and dismantled the image of the moment when she and Mattia would meet; she studied the scene from different angles and adjusted every detail. She wore away at the thought until it seemed not so much a projection as a memory.

She had also been to the local library. She had had to get a card, because she had never set foot in it before that day. She had looked for the newspapers that reported on Michela's disappearance. They were upsetting to read, as if all that horror were happening again, not far from where she was. Her confidence had wavered at the sight of a photograph of Michela on the front page, in which she was looking lost and staring at a point above the lens, perhaps the forehead of whoever was taking the picture. That image had instantly undermined the memory of the girl at the hospital, superimposing itself over her too precisely to seem believable. For the first time Alice had wondered if it might not all be a mistake, a hallucination that had lasted too long. Then she had covered the photograph with one hand and gone on reading, resolutely dispelling that doubt.

Michela's body had never been found. Not so much as an item of clothing, not a trace. The child had simply vanished. For months the line of a kidnapping had been pursued, but to no avail. No suspects were ever named. The news had gradually moved to the margins of the inside pages before finally disappearing altogether.

When the bell rang, Alice was drying her hair. She opened the door distractedly, without even asking who's there, as she arranged the towel on her head. She was barefoot and the first thing Mattia saw of her was her bare feet, the second toe slightly longer than the big one, as if pushing its way forward, and the fourth bent underneath, hidden away. They were details he knew well, which had survived in his mind longer than words and situations.

"Hi," he said, looking up.

Alice took a step back and instinctively closed both sides of her bathrobe, as if her heart might burst out of her chest. Then she focused on Mattia, took in his presence. She hugged him, pressing her inadequate weight against him. He circled her waist with his right arm, but kept his fingers raised, as if out of prudence.

"I'll be right there. I'll just be a moment," she said, rushing her words. She went back inside and closed the door, leaving him standing outside. She needed a few minutes on her own to get dressed and put on her makeup and dry her eyes before he noticed.

Mattia sat down on the front step, his back to the door. He studied the little garden, the almost perfect symmetry of the low hedge that ran along both sides of the path and the undulating shape that broke off halfway through a sine curve. When he heard the click of the lock he turned around and for a moment everything seemed as it had been: he waiting outside for Alice and she coming out, well dressed and smiling, then walking down the street together without having decided where they were going.

Alice bent forward and kissed him on the cheek. To sit down next to him she had to hold on to his shoulder, because of her stiff leg. He moved over. They had nothing to rest their backs against, so they both sat leaning slightly forward.

"You were quick," said Alice.

"Your card arrived yesterday morning."

"So that place isn't so far away after all."

Mattia looked at the ground. Alice took his right hand and opened it palm side up. He didn't resist, because with her he had no need to be ashamed of the marks.

There were new ones, recognizable as darker lines in the middle of that tangle of white scars. None of them seemed all that recent, apart from one circular halo, like a burn. Alice followed its outline with the tip of her index finger and he was barely aware of her touch through all the layers of hardened skin. He calmly let her look, because his hand told much more than he could in words.

"It seemed important," said Mattia.

"It is."

He turned to look at her, to ask her to go on.

"Not yet," said Alice. "First let's get away from here."

Mattia got up first, then held out his hand to help her, just as they had always done. They walked toward the street. It was difficult to talk and think at the same time, as if the two actions canceled each other out.

"Here," said Alice.

She turned off the alarm of a dark green station wagon and Mattia thought it was too big for her alone.

"Do you want to drive?" Alice asked him with a smile.

"I don't know how."

"Are you joking?"

He shrugged. They looked at each other over the roof of the car. The sun sparkled on the bodywork between them.

"I don't need to drive there," he said by way of justification.

Alice tapped her chin with the key, thoughtfully.

"I know where we have to go, then," she said, with the same playfulness with which she announced her ideas as a girl.

They got into the car. There was nothing on the dashboard in front of Mattia, apart from two compact discs, one on top of the other with their spines facing him: Mussorgsky's Pictures at an Exhibition and a collection of Schubert sonatas.

"So you've become a fan of classical music?"

Alice darted a quick glance at the CDs. She wrinkled up her nose.

"No way. They're his. All they do is put me to sleep."

Mattia writhed against the seat belt. It scratched his shoulder because it was set for someone shorter, Alice probably, who sat there while her husband drove. They listened to classical music together. He tried to imagine it, then he allowed himself to be distracted by the words printed on the side-view mirror: Objects in mirror are closer than they appear.

"Fabio, right?" he asked. He already knew the answer, but he wanted to untie that knot, dissolve that awkward, silent presence that seemed to be studying them from the backseat. He knew that otherwise the conversation between them would stall right there, like a boat run aground on the rocks.

Alice nodded, as if making an effort. If she explained everything all at once, about the baby, the quarrel, and the rice that was still stuck in the corners of the kitchen, he would think that was the reason she had called him. He wouldn't believe the story about Michela, he would think of her as a woman having a crisis with her husband, trying to reestablish old relationships to keep from feeling so alone. For a moment she wondered whether that was actually the case.

"Do you have children?"

"No, none."

"But why-"

"Drop it," Alice cut in.

Mattia fell silent, but didn't apologize.