When they knew that these portraits called me. Terence’s didn’t leave the house for two years. He didn’t do any showings or sold any pictures. In that house, there was masterpieces of priceless value, one on top of the other, without importance. His study was a battlefield. When I arrived, they were still cataloguing.
“What do you think?” Jack asked me, his agent, with shinning eyes with the idea of the money he would gain.
I couldn’t breathe, in front of a painting he was holding in his hands, I have never seen such beauty. The model was too, of course, but the paint was different, the colours shined as if they had their own life. It was something completely new. There was love.
Yes, Terence infused in that painting all the love that he had. And it was a lot. I remained shocked, then I asked: “Who is that?”
Jack grimaced. “I was hoping you could tell me. In the title he calls him Tartan, a nickname for sure.”
“I don’t follow that circle anymore”, I had to admit. After Terence, I had never posed for any other painter.
“His even better than you”, he answered back, without fear of hurting my feelings.
I was. I have never seen a young man so beautiful. Golden hair, blue eyes, a perfect musculature, an enchanting smile. He was the absolute perfection. In most of the paintings he was naked and didn’t show any defect.
“So, you can’t help us?”
There was a strong delusion in his voice. I didn’t say anything.
It wasn’t important who Tartan was. There were forty-seven portraits that depicted him. All painted in only two years. Terence painted sixty-eight of me, but he needed seven years. Wonderful paintings, marvellous, but missing love. I was only a body, the best body he had found.
There was nothing between us, this is what I was trying to hide. I preferred being considered an ambiguous, rather than a manikin. Terence didn’t want me. If only he showed a little bit of interest I would have gone to him, even if it’s not in my nature. Terence was the genie, the most famous painter in the world. The crazy and most bizarre. The loneliest one. I would have done anything to please him.
Tartan managed to. Love flowed in those paintings, it was impossible not the get addicted to it. It was incredible to think that someone could be loved this much. But it existed. A palpable desire, carnal, a total union of their spirits. The joy of not being alone anymore. I could see it and it made me suffer.
I searched him for weeks and finally I found him. I received old friendships, I returned to the world of fashion, I found the most asked models, but nobody knew about him. At the end it was a friend, that didn’t know anything about fashion, who recognized him.
“That one bangs”, he said.
I couldn’t believe it; Terence’s love couldn’t be an escort.
“I promise, I’ve seen him. Of course, I don’t go to those kinds of types, but his always there when I go and meet Lara. He doesn’t do much, just lies on the porch showing off.”
There was a bad area, like in every city, where prostitutes and drug addicts frequent. He fell for an escort, and every week he would go and see her. Trying to buy her off and take her to the altar.
I went too, to find him. As expected I found him showing off. On a porch, naked chest, sat on a seat. He couldn’t be older than twenty and he was the most beautiful man that I have ever saw. I was so fixated on him that he realised.
He got up in such an elegant manner, muscles dancing for him. “Isn’t it majestic?” he asked me. “Wait until you see what’s under the trousers.”
I was shocked, I couldn’t speak. It was all there, Terence’s secret, a good body to shag?
“Hundred euro for one hour. Five hundred for the entire night.”
I really couldn’t speak.
“You are scared that it will misfire? I assure you it’s all real, you can check it. I can go for hours without getting tired.”
Terence couldn’t have got this low, it was impossible. If this is all he needed why he didn’t ask me?
“Decide, I can’t wait.”
I did something crazy, I had to know why he was so special. It was for my own sanity. “One hour”, I whispered.
The boy started laughing. “You will enjoy it so much you would not want to stop.”
I followed him to the back of the house, with a knot on my throat. There were no beds in sight, he asked me to sit in the middle of the room. I was sure he was going to perform some sort of erotic show just for me, but he went to get what looked like some earphones.
I got agitated. “What’s that?”
“The Tartan”, he answered. Then he busted out laughing. “I call it that, the complete name is too difficult to remember. It’s not easy to find you know? They made it illegal. Cost me a lot of money.”
I was gobsmacked. I remembered something about that device, old news from a few years ago. They demonized it on television. Nearly the plan of an evil man. Being found in the possession of one would mean immediate jail time, and he was putting it on me.
He placed it in my ear hiding it with my hair. I felt a tingling sensation, while the cables were connecting to my cerebral cortex. A wink of the eye and I was there looking at my body sitting.
“Everything ok?” he asked me.
I was in his body. I became that beautiful man.
I looked at those strong hands, the smooth and young skin. “Rent your body!” exclaimed.
He looked suspicious. “What did you think?”
I was embarrassed. “I thought it was about sex.”
“Of course it’s about sex, what else? You can do what you want with my body, fuck anyone you want. Men or women, it doesn’t matter, the body doesn’t remember and I will never know. Try not to exaggerate, but, make sure you bring it back.”
I kept fixating on him and he took it easy. “Not with me, forget it! There’s some filth that I don’t do. Look around you, there’s plenty of fresh meat.”
Poor Terence, was this his mystery? All that love for a rented body and for the spirit that possessed him. A spirited that he considered really good.
He was deluded, but at the same time appeased. It was obvious he couldn’t compere, Terence always and only loved himself.
Those pictures were nothing else put self-portraits.
March 2013
LIGHT OF MY EYES
Translation by Cinzia Albanese
There was only darkness. An everlasting darkness, eternal, broken by noises. Strange noises, unknown. She had no way of identifying them, she was not capable.
“Claudia, is that you?”
“Of course, Giulia, who did you think it could be? There’s only us in this house.”
“I don’t know, your steps seemed…different. I didn’t recognize them.”
She heard the door shut, with a squeak, and the steps approached.
“You need to get used to recognizing sounds. It’s already been four years.” A long sigh. “And on top of it you always stay in that bed! There’s still days that you refuse to get up!
“I know but, I…”
“Giulia, losing your eyesight doesn’t mean to stop living. There must be a thousand things you could do, start going out, meet new people.”
“But I was a painter!”
There was a point of commiseration in Claudia’s voice. “Giulia, you loved to paint, you were not a painted. Painters are the ones who sell the paintings, those who are able to keep up their art.”
Giulia bit her lip. “At some point I would have managed, I would have become famous.”
Another sigh, a bit longer. “What’s the point of talking about it now? It happened, it’s no one’s fault and some things can’t be changed.”
“Maybe one day, with a transplant…”
Claudia tapped her watched with her nail as she usually did when something made her nervous.
“We don’t have money for those kind of things, Giulia, you know it. Why do we have to always argue about this?”
“Money, Money,
Money! You don’t know how to talk about anything else! Every time we talk you throw the money subject!”
Claudia’s voice got louder. “Don’t get me upset, Giulia, don’t make me say things that you don’t want to hear.”
“I’ve been surrounded in this darkness for four years. You can see, you can live! Think how I’m feeling!”
“I live? Are you joking? I’m here being your nurse, for four years. I had to leave work and you don’t even try to get up from the bed! You are sick, everything was given to you. Sure, I had something on the side we managed to go forwards for a bit, but now we don’t have any money left. We have to find a solution.”
Giulia started crying. “You want to put me in a hospital. Is that, isn’t it? You want to get rid of me!”
Claudia was walking around the room. She wasn’t doing anything to contain her anger. “So, you don’t want to understand! There’s no money. They have all gone. Stop. Do you know how much it would be to get you recovered? We can’t even afford that!”
“So, what do you want to do with me, throw me in the bin? I certainly can’t start working. Take your place, I’m going to try and get ready.”
Claudia chugged. “My place! Even if they retake me, something I doubt very much, the pay will only be enough to pay for the rent, what would we eat?”
“Stop it, stop it, I’m not interested. Why do you want to scare me?”
Claudia sat down. She was in front of her now. Lowing her voice.
“It’s been two months since we last payed the rent. At any moment, the eviction will arrive.”
Giulia stopped sobbing. “We are already at that point?”
Silence. Maybe Claudia nodded, but Giulia couldn’t see her.
“Have you tried to search for a job?”
“Giulia, I would even go to the street and prostitute myself if it helped, but do you think anyone would pay?”
“Don’t say things like that, don’t even think about it!”
It transfixed bitterness. “It’s good that you can’t see me, Giulia. You wouldn’t like how I’ve become. I’ve never been beautiful, not like you, at least, but now…It’s a despair, I look like a whale. I can’t stop eating, I just can’t.”
“Claudia…” Giulia found herself with tears in her eyes.
“I’m not sorry for his death, there’s no reason to go forwards, no reason.”
“It’s my fault, I know, it’s my fault!”
“No, Giulia, why would you say that…”
There’s an ironic sound in Claudia’s words, couldn’t pretend not to notice.
“It’s my fault, I know. If I didn’t come to visit… If he didn’t come to pick me up from the airport, he wouldn’t be dead and I wouldn’t be blind.”
“No, if anything it’s my fault. I was the one that was supposed to pick you up. He didn’t want to, I made him.”
“If you had come…I don’t even want to think what could have happened, if I lost you. What would have happened to me?”
Claudia’s voice became firm. “If I came nothing would have happened, there wouldn’t have been an accident, I know.”
A long silence could be felt.
“Claudia, what can we do now? What would we do if we get evicted?”
“I don’t know Giulia, I really don’t know. I can live on the street, find something, but you…”
“You would leave me somewhere, in some institute”, insisted again Giulia.
“That’s why we need money.”
“But there’s my pension, isn’t there? I’m blind!”
I heard her pant. Giulia thought it was because if the pension.
The silence protruded and then Claudia interrupted with an impact for Giulia.
“I should sell a kidney.”
Giulia jumped, she wasn’t sure she understood. “What?”
“Yes, there’s a good market for these kinds of things. It’s not legal, but gives good money. With one kidney, we can be fine for two or three months at least.”
“That’s absurd!”
“Oh, it’s not the end of the world! With one kidney, I can live perfectly fine. I just need to be more careful and not to get too tired.”
“I don’t want to her you talk about this, it’s abominable!”
Claudia’s voice becomes bitter. “Why? Talking about going and fight so you can stay comfortable in bed is ok, but talking about that bothers you!”
“Stop it, stop it, I don’t want to hear it!” shouted Giulia, hysterical.
Again, another silence, Claudia returned to the fight. “They pay well for it, you know. There’s a market for the exchange pieces. In the underground, true.”
To Giulia it was impossible to understand how she continued to insist. “You can’t really think about it!”
“True I wouldn’t be able to be behind you like now, I wouldn’t be able to lift you up or even give you a bath…”
“I’m not paralytic!” She shook her head. “What are you making me say! Doesn’t make sense!”
“You might not be paralytic but you act as if you are one. You never get up from bed!”
“I don’t feel safe, I can’t see! Is it possible that you don’t want to understand?”
“After four years.”
“Stop it, I beg you. Let’s stop this argument.”
The hated silence returned, this time more oppressive. When resumed, Claudia seemed more relaxed. “You don’t need to” she said.
There was a bit of time before Giulia understood.
“Are you crazy? Have you gone completely insane? If you think that I…” She couldn’t continue, she was too shocked.
Claudia’s voice continued to be calm, soothing. “You don’t need two kidneys. To stay lying there on the bed not doing anything, one is more than enough.”
“Crazy! I don’t want to stay here listening to you!”
“Do you prefer being thrown in the middle of the street? What would you do if I can’t look after you anymore?”
“I don’t care, I don’t want to talk about it. You are crazy! I’m not listening to you!”
The silence returned, but the tension was still there. Giulia didn’t like that the discussion finished there, but she couldn’t understand what happened to her sister, she never treated her like that before.
Before starting again Claudia took a long breath, theatrical. “You owe me”, she said.
Giulia didn’t expect it. “I don’t owe you anything! What are you babbling about? Just because you are worried about me you can’t think…”
The sister interrupted her. “Oh right, you forgot about it. You are an expert in forgetting the unwanted things. You owe me anyway.”
“What do I owe you?”
“A piece of your body. Eye for an eye, tooth for a tooth. It says it in the Bible.”
“You are scaring me, stop it.”
“Of course, the piece that you owe me you can’t return so we have to be able to be satisfied.”
“I don’t want to listen to you anymore! I’m not talking to you anymore.”
You could hear the chair falling to the ground, Claudia stood up quickly.
“You took something from me and I want it back!”, she shouted. “I will not allow you to go so smoothly!”
The fear increased, stronger than ever. It was never felt so intense. If Claudia was going against her, what hope would she have?
“I don’t understand what you are talking about.”
“You took away from me what I loved the most, so you have to pay!”
Her voice trembled. “Are you talking about Roberto? Your husband? You always said that you didn’t make me responsible! Did you lie?”
Claudia raised. “I said it? Yes, it’s probable. I said a ton of things. But you are responsible. Even more!”
She always had that doubt, she didn’t dare fight back. “I don’t remember. I don’t remember anything about the accident and you know that. I’m not lying. You can’t think that…”
&nbs
p; “I don’t think of it, I know!”
“Enough! It’s not fair, not now! Not after all this time! You are not thinking, you are upset. You can say what you want, I don’t remember anything anymore.”
“Oh, but I believe you, I know very well. You weren’t yourself. You were done, completely done! You remained in a comatose state, but not because of the accident. But because of all the drug you had in your body!”
He was successful, he had to hurt him. She wasn’t stupid, deep down, she knew that sooner or later it would have happened.
“I came out of it. What’s the point of talking about it? You want me to say that I wasn’t myself? Yes, in that time I wasn’t myself. I was sick. You helped me to come out, I was in a terrible state. I don’t want to think about those times.”
But she was thinking about it, and a thought came in mind. “Did I cause the accident?”
She didn’t answer. “Yes, detoxicate yourself. Even this costed me a fortune.”
“Stop it already! Always about money, you can’t think about anything else. What does that matter now?”
“It matters, money always matters.” The voice becomes angrier. “I want what you took away from me, and I want it now!”
Where they together in the accounts? What are they refusing to face? Whatever it was, Giulia didn’t want to know about it. She wanted her life to go back to the way it was. She wanted to ask it, but how without getting out of hand. “What?”
Claudia seemed nearly alert. “You really don’t remember anything? You don’t remember being pulled out of the car, after the accident? You took from me something from my husband. A piece of Roberto. They found it in your mouth.”
Giulia couldn’t talk.
“I want it back”, concluded the sister.
Swallowed, but with the feeling of being sick. “Are you saying…”
“Yes, you swallowed my husband’s penis. You cut it off in one bite. Not that he needs it now that his dead. This is what you owe me.”
Giulia was horrified, started to tremble. “That’s impossible. I can’t…”
The Prison Page 68
