Andrea Canobbio - The Natural Disorder of Things

“Yes, I know,” he says. “I ought to make myself clearer.” And he picks up a photo album lying on the little table next to his wheelchair, hands it over, gestures for me to open it, and begins to tell a story.

It’s the life of a man from adolescence to adulthood. The man is named Alfredo Renal. The shape of his life was more or less like Rossi’s: born in the fifties, coming of age in the sixties, an adult in the seventies and eighties. He lived for others, in two senses: helping them directly and planning for their future. He did volunteer work, and he pondered the sociopolitical situation. A good man, but firm. Tolerant, but practical. A dreamer, but also a realist. A man who gave of himself totally, who wore himself out in the service of his fellow man.

A dead man, I think, noticing the past tense.

A saint. One of those young upper-class saints, chaste and industrious, who died early. Some extreme perversity kept him from taking advantage of the wealth he was born with. I have some flicker of memory — I might have heard of him. A saint for a brother: that’s quite a burden for a sister who’s no saint at all.

But I’ve never been interested in designing a eulogy-garden, building a celebration-garden, or erecting a monument-garden. The only monument I’m interested in is the monument to my own obsessions; the only celebration that of my own fixations; the only eulogy, for my own visions. The only things that fascinate me are the ideas running through my head. (I say “running” but in fact some of them drag themselves along like soldiers with wounded legs, searching for shelter before the next barrage; and even that’s not a good example because it still gives a sense of anxiety and urgency and mortal peril, while in fact some of my ideas simply haul themselves through the long corridors of my head like chronic depressives, dim in the leaden light seeping through the tall arched windows.) The only thing that fascinates me is myself.

But I force myself to look at the photos, to register a few details I can report to Carlo. The pictures all focus on Alfredo Renal’s smile: he was always smiling, and his smile was tactful, affable, docile. He smiled at the camera with the look of someone relying on a friend while faced with a difficult choice; you couldn’t disappoint him, you couldn’t betray him: his smile said, “I’m an optimist,” “The good will triumph,” “Life is a gift” (I’m exaggerating, so I’m not registering anything; but those smiles irritate me). Renal’s hands are another focal point: they’re never out of place; I page back to check, and in picture after picture his hands are always resting lightly on his neighbor’s shoulder, or hanging at his sides, or laid on the arms of a chair, half open or turned slightly toward the photographer; no fists, no fingers laced together on his knee, no hands supporting his head — they’re resting, and they hide nothing. (But after a moment I realize that I’m looking again at that smile: it’s not just irritating, it’s disgusting, it’s a terrible smile, an unctuous sore.)

Rossi scrutinizes me, savoring the sight of someone being won over by the photos of Alfredo Renal — he’s won over by my interest. He is not in any of the photos. Elisabetta Renal isn’t in any of them either. In fact, only a few elect personages are pictured with the saint. Just men — and sometimes a child. And there’s no panorama around, no scenery, no stage. You can’t tell where these pictures were taken; there’s not even a faded little lemon tree or a boxwood hedge or a hornbeam to look at, so I keep going back to that smile, the ever-present smile on those dead lips.

It’s 9:30 when we go into the dining room, and Rossi hasn’t made any reference to his wife’s being late; the table is set for four, but there are only three chairs, and at Rossi’s place the edges of the tablecloth hang open, making a white archway around the darkness beneath the table, like the mouth of a tunnel or a maxilla waiting for its mandible to slip in below. I’m hungry enough to eat a chair, but I’m distracted by the arrival of Elisabetta Renal.

She appears just as I’m approaching the table and taking hold of the back of my seat and the gardener is slotting Rossi into his spot; she comes in greeting me and greeting her husband — it’s the first time I’ve seen them together — she calls him “dear” but doesn’t kiss him and doesn’t look at him. She gazes at me and immediately sees my shameful bulging button.

She’s wearing a light blue dress that makes her look younger — maybe even too young. Her round collar is a half-moon rising on the horizon of her neckline and sealing it shut from one clavicle to the other. My first thought is that she chose it because last time she noticed me peeking down her shirt. As she moves from the door to the table, her pleated skirt ripples and lifts and falls, covering and uncovering her knees until the skirt disappears under the tablecloth along with her naked legs (Elisabetta Renal also never gets cold). I throw her a few quick glances and then immediately check to see whether her husband has caught me out, if he’s understood how I look at her, what I see in her.

We sit down, and I caress the little dinner roll set near my silverware; I don’t know how long I can hold out. I can’t hold out anymore: I pick it up, break it in half, and eat it. First one half, and then the other. Rossi and Elisabetta watch me in silence. I look at their rolls. And at the empty spot to my left, to Rossi’s right, across from Elisabetta. At the roll set near the empty spot’s silverware. I think, absurdly, that the servant is going to sit there. I have a strong sense that my hosts fear I’m going to reach for the other roll. These glances last no more than ten seconds altogether, but the silence and the awkwardness of the moment would be enough to mute the most enthusiastic conversationalists.

Rossi asks Elisabetta if we can begin. She looks stunned. “Of course,” she says. “Are we expecting someone else?”

Rossi doesn’t answer, he just raises one hand. The servant comes in carrying a steaming bowl and sets it down in front of Elisabetta Renal.

“Tortellini in brodo!” she exclaims, and I don’t know whether she’s being ironic or truly enthusiastic.

Another trip from the kitchen, another bowl. It’s for me. It’s quick work counting the tortellini: I get just ten of them. I try to suppress a sarcastic thought as I consider this other upper-class custom, which goes along with the hand washing in the basement. Instead of a tureen brought to the table, bowls are filled and then served with the items already apportioned. That’s all you get, unless you’re permitted to grab the daisies and poppies from the centerpiece and add them to the broth. I still have two or three hours ahead of me before I can leave here and stop in a pub and eat three burgers, and the realization stuns me; I put a tortellino in my mouth, and a flood of gastric juices doubles me over.

“Careful, it’s hot,” says Rossi.

After a bit, Elisabetta Renal asked whether we had already talked about the garden.

“Mr. Fratta presented some ideas to me,” Rossi lied without looking at me. I was on my third tortellino, and he hadn’t even shot me a conspiratorial look.

“Just random ideas,” I said, to make it seem less concrete.

“Please tell them to me too — otherwise I’ll feel left out.”

I talked about some ideas I’d sketched for the bank’s data center; they were structures and designs that couldn’t easily be adapted for the site at the Villa Renal, but my two tablemates wouldn’t have been able to figure that out. I spoke of steel and Plexiglas, fountains and topiaries, mosaics and mirrors and lights. They nodded without asking questions, and as I talked I went on eating; there was no risk of chewing with my mouth open because, as soon as a tortellino reached my tongue, it melted away into its broth — they were not only scant but overcooked, so I just drank them down instead of chewing. I tried to make them last, but there were only ten … such a perfect number: it must have been intentional.