Steal You Away

by Niccolò Ammaniti

  They’d been joined on that occasion by Flame, a sixteen-year-old airhead with the character and IQ of an inbred pitbull. A pathetic misfit who unloaded crates at the Co-op in Orbano and cackled like a lunatic when he fired his pistol at sheep or at any living organism that was unlucky enough to cross his path. One night he had entered the Moroni’s farm and shot the donkey in the forehead because the day before he’d seen Schindler’s List on TV and been much taken with the blond Nazi.

  To excuse themselves for coming to the party uninvited they’d brought along a gift.

  A dead cat. A big fat tabby they’d found squashed flat on the Aurelia.

  ‘Pity, if it didn’t smell so bad Caterina could make herself a fur coat out of it. It would suit her. Come to think of it, she can use it anyway – the smell of the cat will mingle with her smell to create a whole new stink,’ Rocca had remarked, examining the carcass closely.

  On entering, they had found an atmosphere that was to say the least dullsville. Dimmed lights. Chairs against the walls. Pansy music. And couples dancing and smooching.

  First Flame had changed the music and put on a cassette of Vasco Rossi. Then he had started dancing on his own in the middle of the living room, which might have been acceptable if he hadn’t started whirling the cat around like a mace, hitting anyone within range.

  Not content with that, he had gone and cuffed all the boys round the head while Bacci and Ronca wolfed down crisps, mini-pizzas and soft drinks.

  Pierini sat aloof in an armchair, smoking and watching with approval the entertainment his pals were laying on.

  ‘Congratulations, you’ve brought the whole gang of louts.’

  Pierini had turned. Sitting on the arm of the chair was Gloria. Dressed not in her usual jeans and T-shirt but in a short red dress which suited her incredibly well.

  ‘Can’t go anywhere on your own, can you?’

  Pierini had gaped like an idiot. ‘Of course I can …’

  ‘Bollocks.’ She looked at him with a tarty little smirk that set his guts churning. ‘You feel lost if you don’t have your goons tagging along.’

  Pierini didn’t know what to say.

  ‘Can you dance, at least?’

  ‘No. I don’t like dancing,’ he had said, taking a can of beer out of the pocket of his leather jacket. ‘Want some?’

  ‘Thanks,’ she had said.

  Pierini knew that Gloria was a tough one. She wasn’t like all the other little bimbos who fled like a herd of deer as soon as he approached. She knew how to drink a beer. Looked you straight in the eye. But she was also the shittiest rich kid in the whole area. And he hated rich kids. He’d passed her the beer.

  Gloria had made a face. ‘Ugh, it’s warm …’ and then asked him: ‘Do you want to dance?’

  That was why he liked her.

  She wasn’t shy. A girl asking you to dance was unheard of in Ischiano Scalo. ‘I told you I don’t like it …’ Actually he wouldn’t at all have minded doing a slow dance with that little girl and smooching a bit. But he hadn’t been lying, he was a lousy dancer and he didn’t want to look stupid.

  So it was out of the question. Period.

  ‘What’s the matter, are you scared?’ she had persisted, remorselessly. ‘Scared they’ll take the piss out of you because you’re dancing?’

  Pierini had glanced around.

  Flame was upstairs and Bacci and Ronca were in a corner laughing amongst themselves and it was dark and that beautiful song, Clear Dawn, was playing – just right for dancing cheek to cheek.

  He had put the cigarette in his mouth, stood up and, as if it were something he had always done, slipped one hand round her waist and the other in his jeans pocket and started dancing, swaying his hips. He had held her close and smelled her sweet scent. A scent of cleanliness, of bath foam.

  Shit, did he like dancing with Gloria.

  ‘You see you can do it?’ she had whispered in his ear, making the hairs on his neck bristle. He hadn’t replied. His heart was thumping.

  ‘Do you like this song?’

  ‘Yeah.’ He must go out with her, he had told himself. She was made for him.

  ‘It’s about a little girl who’s always alone …’

  ‘I know,’ Pierini had mumbled and all at once she had started rubbing her nose on his neck and he had almost fainted. A painful erection had risen in his jeans and with it an irresistible desire to kiss her.

  And he would have done so if the lights hadn’t come on.

  The police!

  Flame had set about Caterina’s father with the dead cat, so they’d had to run for it. He’d left her there and fled, without even saying goodbye, see you, nothing.

  Afterwards, in the bar, he had fumed with rage. He could have killed that lunkhead Flame for ruining everything. He had gone home and shut himself in his room to turn the memory of that dance over and over in his mind like a precious stone.

  Next day, outside school, he had walked decisively up to Gloria and asked her: ‘Do you want to go out with me?’

  And she had first looked at him as if she’d never seen him before, then burst out laughing. ‘Are you crazy? I’d rather go out with Alatri (he was the priest who taught religion). Stick to your cronies.’

  He had grabbed her roughly by the arm (why did you want to dance with me then?), but she had wriggled free. ‘Don’t you dare touch me, okay?’

  And Pierini had stood there, unable even to slap her face.

  That’s why he couldn’t stand Moroni, the bosom pal of little miss I’m-the-only-girl-who’s-got-one.

  What the hell did a girl who was so

  so what?

  … beautiful (how beautiful she was! He dreamed of her at night. He imagined taking off that little red dress, then her knickers, and at last being able to see her naked. And he would touch her all over as if she were a doll. He’d never tire of looking at her, of inspecting her all over because, he was certain, she was perfect. In every part of her body. Those small tits and those nipples that you can glimpse behind her T-shirt and her navel and those few blond hairs underneath her armpits and her long legs and her sparsely haired pussy with untidy curls as fair and soft as rabbit’s fur … Stop!) see in a little nerd like that?

  He couldn’t stop thinking about her, and couldn’t think about her without getting cramp in his stomach, without wanting to punch her in the face for the way she’d treated him: like shit.

  And that little tart liked a boy who didn’t say anything when you punched him, didn’t complain, didn’t ask for mercy and didn’t cry, like all the others, but stood there motionless, and looked at you with those eyes … those poor-little-puppydog, Jesus-of-Nazareth eyes, odious eyes that reproached you.

  One of those people who believe that crap the priests put around: if anybody hits you, turn the other cheek.

  Try hitting me and I’ll ram your nose back through your face.

  The blood rose to his head when he saw him sitting good as gold at his desk drawing shitty little pictures while everyone else in the class was yelling and bombarding each other with the blackboard-rubber.

  How he wished he could turn into a bloodhound so that he could pursue him across valleys, rivers and mountains and flush him out like a hare and watch him grovelling and floundering in the mud. Oh yeah, then he would kick him and break his ribs and see if he didn’t ask for mercy and forgiveness and finally become like any other kid, not some kind of fucking extraterrestrial.

  Once, in the summer, little Pierini had found a large tortoise in the vegetable patch. It was eating the lettuce and carrots quite calmly, as if it were in its own home. He’d picked it up and taken it into the garage, where his father’s working table was. He’d clamped it in the vice. He’d waited patiently till the animal put out its legs and head and started waving them about and then, with the hammer, the big one that was used for breaking bricks, he had hit it right in the middle of its shell.

  Stok.

  It had been like breaking an Easter egg, but muc
h, much harder. A long crack had opened between the plates of the carapace. And a damp reddish pulp had oozed out. But the tortoise didn’t seem to have noticed, it kept wiggling its legs and head and hanging there mute between the jaws of the vice.

  Pierini had moved closer and searched for something in its eyes. But he had found nothing. Nothing. Neither pain, nor astonishment, nor hatred.

  Nothing whatsoever.

  Two stupid little black balls.

  He had struck it again and again until his arm was too sore to continue. The tortoise lay with its carapace turned into a jigsaw puzzle of bones dripping blood, but its eyes were the same. Staring. Stupid. With no secrets. He had removed it from the vice and put it on the ground, in the garage, and it had started walking off, leaving a trail of blood behind it, and he had started screaming.

  Yes, that was it, Dickhead was just like that tortoise.

  13

  Graziano Biglia woke up at about seven o’clock in the evening, still feeling bloated after the enormous lunch. He took a couple of Alka-Seltzers and decided to spend the rest of the evening at home. Just lazing around.

  His mother brought him tea and pastries in the sitting room.

  Graziano picked up the remote control, but then told himself he could do something better, something he was going to have to start doing regularly, since country life had a lot of long pauses that had to be filled and he didn’t want to become a couch potato. He could read a book.

  The library of the Biglia household did not offer a wide choice.

  The Animal Encyclopaedia. A biography of Mussolini by Mack Smith. A collection of essays by Enzo Biagi. Three cookery books. And Luciano De Crescenzo’s History of Greek Philosophy.

  He opted for De Crescenzo.

  He sat down on the sofa and read a couple of pages, then it occurred to him that Erica hadn’t called yet.

  He consulted his watch.

  Strange.

  When he’d left Rome that morning, Erica, still half asleep, had said she would call him as soon as the audition was over.

  And the audition had been at ten o’clock in the morning.

  It should have finished a long time ago.

  He tried her mobile.

  The number was not available at present.

  How come? She always keeps it on.

  He tried ringing her at home, but there was no reply there either.

  Where can she have got to?

  He tried to concentrate on Greek philosophy.

  14

  They were fifty metres from the school.

  Their bikes dumped in a ditch, the four of them were crouching behind a laurel hedge.

  It was cold. The wind had got up and was shaking the black trees. Pietro huddled into his denim jacket and blew on his hands to warm them.

  ‘Well, how shall we do it? Who’s going to put the chain on?’ asked Ronca in a low voice.

  ‘We could draw lots,’ suggested Bacci.

  ‘No lots.’ Pierini lit a cigarette and turned to Pietro. ‘What did we bring Dickhead for?’

  Dickhead …

  ‘Right. It’s Dickhead who’s got to put the chain on. A shitty, puky little Dickhead who’s got no guts and has to go home to his darling mama,’ commented Ronca contentedly.

  There it is.

  There’s the truth.

  The reason they’d made him come.

  All that song and dance because they were too scared to chain up the gate themselves.

  In films the villains are usually exceptional people. They fight the hero, challenge him to duels and do incredible things like blowing up bridges, kidnapping the families of decent folk, robbing banks. Sylvester Stallone had never come up against villains who pussyfooted around like these three cowards.

  This made Pietro feel better.

  He’d show them. ‘Give me the chain.’

  ‘Watch out for Italo. He’s crazy. He’ll shoot you. He’ll fill your bum so full of holes you’ll have six arseholes all spurting out squit,’ Ronca guffawed.

  Pietro took no notice. He pushed his way through the hedge and made for the school.

  They’re scared of Italo. Always acting so tough and they don’t even dare put a padlock on a gate. Well, I’m not scared.

  He concentrated on what he had to do.

  The sombre black silhouette of the school seemed to be floating in the mist. Via Righi was deserted at night, because there were no houses there. Only a neglected public garden, with some rusty swings and a fountain full of mud and reeds, the Segafredo Bar with graffiti on its shutters and a streetlamp that crackled, making an irritating buzz. No cars passed.

  The only danger was that lunatic Italo. The cottage he lived in was right next to the gate.

  Pietro stopped, with his back against the wall. He opened the padlock. Now he only had to crawl as far as the gate, shut it and go back again. It was easy, he knew, but his heart didn’t agree, he felt as if he had a steam engine inside his chest.

  A noise behind him.

  He turned. The three bastards had moved closer and were watching from behind the hedge. Ronca was waving his arms, urging him to get on with it.

  He dropped flat and crawled along on his hands and knees. He held the key between his teeth and the chain in his hand. The ground was covered with mud, rotting leaves and soggy paper. He was getting his jacket and trousers filthy.

  From that position it wasn’t easy to tell whether Italo was at the window. But he noticed that no light was visible through the cracks in the blinds, not even the bluish glare of the television. He held his breath.

  There was total silence.

  He steeled himself, stood up and with an agile leap caught hold of the gate and scaled it to the top. He looked past the house, to where Italo kept his car, the 131 Mirafiori, and …

  It’s not there. The 131’s not there.

  Italo’s not there! He’s not there!

  He must be in Orbano, or more likely he’d gone to the farm, which was not far from Pietro’s house.

  He jumped down from the gate, coolly wound the chain round the lock and closed the padlock.

  Done it!

  He sauntered back more casually and coolly than Fonzie and feeling an almost irresistible desire to whistle. But instead he pushed his way through the branches and entered the garden to look for the chickenshits.

  15

  The panda has a fairly simple diet: bamboo leaves for breakfast, bamboo leaves for lunch, bamboo leaves for dinner. But if it doesn’t get those leaves it’s in the shit, in a month it’ll die of hunger. Since bamboo is hard to come by, only the richest zoos can afford to keep the great black-and-white bear among their prison populations.

  It’s a classic example of a specialist species, a kind of animal that has been driven by evolution into a tiny ecological niche where its existence is precariously poised on a delicate relationship with the environment. You only have to remove one element (bamboo leaves for the panda, eucalyptus leaves for the koala, algae for the Galapagos marine iguana, and so on) and for these creatures extinction is certain.

  The panda doesn’t adapt, it dies.

  Italo Miele, the father of Bruno Miele, Graziano’s policeman friend, was, in a sense, a specialist species. The caretaker of the Michelangelo Buonarroti school was the classic kind of guy who, if you didn’t give him a dish of bucatini with plenty of sauce and didn’t let him go with prostitutes, would gutter out like a candle.

  That evening, too, he was endeavouring to satisfy his vital needs.

  He was sitting, napkin tucked into his collar, at a table in the Old Wagon and guzzling down the speciality of the house, sea-and-mountain pappardelle. A concoction of boar-gravy, peas, cream and mussels.

  As happy as a pearl in its oyster. Or rather, as a meatball in its tomato sauce.

  Miele, Italo. Weight: one hundred and twenty kilos.

  Height: one metre sixty centimetres.

  It must be said, however, in the interests of accuracy, that his fat was not flabby
, it was as firm as a hard-boiled egg. He had chubby hands with short fingers. And that bald head, as large and round as a watermelon, drooped between his rounded shoulders and made him look like a monstrous Russian doll.

  He was a diabetic, but refused to accept the fact. The doctor had told him he must follow a balanced diet, but he took no notice. He was also lame. His right calf was as round and hard as a bread roll and under the skin his veins twisted, swollen, one over the other, forming a tangle of blue worms.

  There were days, and this was one of them, when the pain was so acute that his foot lost all feeling, a numbness rose up to his groin and Italo’s only wish was to have that damned leg amputated.

  But the Old Wagon’s pappardelle put him at peace with the world again.

  The Old Wagon was an enormous place, built in rustic Mexican style, fenced round with prickly pear and cattle-bones and situated on the Aurelia, a few kilometres beyond Antiano. It was also a motel, a disco, pub and sandwich bar, a billiard room, a service station, an electrical repair workshop and a supermarket. Whatever you were looking for, you would find it there, or something very like it.

  Its main clientele was truck drivers and passing travellers. That was one of the reasons why it was Italo’s favourite restaurant.

  No one to bother you, no one you have to say hallo to. The food’s good and the prices are reasonable.

  Another reason was that it was a stone’s throw from the Meat Market.

  The Meat Market, as the locals called it, was a stretch of asphalted road about five hundred metres long which branched off the Aurelia and petered out in the middle of the fields. In the intentions of some megalomaniac engineer it was going to be the new sliproad for Orvieto. But for the moment it was just the Meat Market.

  Open twenty-four hours a day, three hundred and sixty-five days a year, no holidays, no rest days. The prices were moderate and fixed. Credit cards and cheques not accepted.

  The hookers, all Nigerian, waited at the roadside sitting on stools, and when it rained or the sun was too hot, they would get out their umbrellas.