Elena Ferrante - The Story of the Lost Child

“I’m leaving tomorrow for the United States, I’m going to study there.”

I tried not to shout:

“Now is not the moment for that conversation, as soon as possible we’ll talk about it with Papa.”

“One thing has to be clear, Mamma: Elsa will return to this house only when I am gone.”

“For now the most urgent thing is to find out where she is.”

She cried to me in dialect:

“That bitch telephoned a little while ago, she’s at Grandma’s.”

The grandma was, of course, Adele; I called my in-laws. Guido answered coldly and put his wife on. Adele was cordial, she told me that Elsa was there and added, Not only her.

“The boy’s there, too?”

“Yes.”

“Would you mind if I came to you?”

“We’re expecting you.”

I had Enzo leave me at the station in Florence. The journey was complicated, with delays, waits, annoyances of every type. I thought about how Elsa, with her sly capriciousness, had ended up involving Adele. If Dede was incapable of deception, Elsa was at her best when it came to inventing strategies that could protect her and perhaps let her win. She had planned, it was clear, to impose Rino on me in the presence of her grandmother, a person who — she and her sister knew well — had been very unwilling to accept me as a daughter-in-law. For the entire journey I felt relieved because I knew she was safe and hated her for the situation she was putting me in.

I arrived in Genoa ready for a hard battle. But I found Adele very welcoming and Guido polite. As for Elsa — dressed for a party, heavily made up, on her wrist my mother’s bracelet, and on full display the ring that years earlier her father had given me — she was affectionate and relaxed, as if she found it inconceivable that I could be mad at her. The only silent one, eyes perpetually downcast, was Rino, so that I felt sorry for him and ended up more hostile toward my daughter than toward him. Maybe Enzo was right, the boy had had scant importance in that story. Of his mother’s hardness, her insolence, he had no trace, it was Elsa who had dragged him along, beguiling him, and only to hurt Dede. The rare times he had the courage to look at me his glances were those of a faithful dog.

I quickly understood that Adele had received Elsa and Rino as a couple: they had their own room, their own towels, they slept together. Elsa had no trouble flaunting that intimacy authorized by her grandmother, maybe she even accentuated it for me. When the two withdrew after dinner, holding hands, my mother-in-law tried to push me to confess my aversion for Rino. She’s a child, she said at a certain point, I really don’t know what she sees in that young man, she has to be helped to get out of it. I tried, I said: He’s a good kid, but even if he weren’t, she’s in love and there’s little to be done. I thanked her for welcoming them with affection and broad-mindedness, and went to bed.

But I spent the whole night thinking about the situation. If I said the wrong thing, even just a wrong word, I would probably ruin both my daughters. I couldn’t make a clean break between Elsa and Rino. I couldn’t oblige the two sisters to live together at that impossible moment: what had happened was serious and for a while the two girls couldn’t be under the same roof. To think of moving to another city would only complicate things, Elsa would make it her duty to stay with Rino. I quickly realized that if I wanted to take Elsa home and get her to graduate from high school I would have to lose Dede — actually send her to live with her father. So the next day, instructed by Adele about the best time to call (she and her son — I discovered — talked to each other constantly), I talked to Pietro. His mother had informed him in detail about what had happened and from his bad mood I deduced that Adele’s true feelings were certainly not what she showed me. Pietro said gravely:

“We have to try to understand what sort of parents we’ve been and how we’ve failed our daughters.”

“Are you saying that I haven’t been and am not a good mother?”

“I’m saying that there’s a need for continuity of affection and that neither you nor I have been able to insure that Dede and Elsa have that.”

I interrupted him, announcing that he would have a chance to be a full-time father to at least one of the girls: Dede wanted to go and live with him immediately, she would leave as soon as possible.

He didn’t take the news well, he was silent, he prevaricated, he said he was still adapting and needed time. I answered: You know Dede, you’re identical, even if you tell her no you’ll find her there.

The same day, as soon as I had a chance to talk to Elsa alone, I confronted her, ignoring her blandishments. I had her give back the money, the jewelry, my mother’s bracelet, which I immediately put on, stating: You must never touch my things again.

She was conciliatory, I wasn’t, I hissed that I wouldn’t hesitate for a moment to report first of all Rino, and then her. As soon as she tried to answer I pushed her against a wall, I raised my hand to hit her. I must have had a terrible expression, she burst into terrified tears.

“I hate you,” she sobbed. “I don’t ever want to see you again, I will never go back to that shitty place where you made us live.”

“All right, I’ll leave you here for the summer, if your grandparents don’t kick you out first.”

“And then?”

“Then in September you’ll come home, you’ll go to school, you’ll study, you’ll live with Rino in our apartment until you’ve had enough of him.”

She stared at me, stunned; there was a long instant of incredulity. I had uttered those words as if they contained the most terrible punishment, she took them as a surprising gesture of generosity.

“Really?”

“Yes.”

“I’ll never have enough of him.”

“We’ll see.”

“And Aunt Lina?”

“Aunt Lina will agree.”

“I didn’t want to hurt Dede, Mamma, I love Rino, it happened.”

“It will happen countless more times.”

“It’s not true.”

“Worse for you. It means you’ll love Rino your whole life.”

“You’re making fun of me.”

I said no, I felt only all the absurdity of that verb in the mouth of a child.

I returned to the neighborhood, I told Lila what I had proposed to the children. It was a cold exchange, almost a negotiation.

“You’ll have them in your house?”

“Yes.”

“If it’s all right with you, it’s all right with me, too.”

“We’ll split the expenses.”

“I can pay it all.”

“For now I have money.”

“For now I do, too.”

“We’re agreed, then.”

“How did Dede take it?”

“Fine. She’s leaving in a couple of weeks, she’s going to visit her father.”

“Tell her to come and say goodbye.”

“I don’t think she will.”

“Then tell her to say hello to Pietro for me.”

“I’ll do that.”

Suddenly I felt a great sorrow, I said:

“In just a few days I’ve lost two daughters.”

“Don’t use that expression: you haven’t lost anything, rather you’ve gained a son.”

“It’s you who pushed him in that direction.”

She wrinkled her forehead, she seemed confused.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

“You always have to incite, shove, poke.”

“Now you want to get mad at me, too, for what your children get up to?”

I muttered, I’m tired, and left.

For days, for weeks, in fact, I couldn’t stop thinking that Lila couldn’t bear the equilibrium in my life and so aimed at disrupting it. It had always been so, but after Tina’s disappearance it had worsened: she made a move, observed the consequences, made another move. The objective? Maybe not even she knew. Of course the relationship of the two sisters was ruined, Elsa was in terrible trouble, Dede was leaving, I would remain in the neighborhood for an indeterminate amount of time.