She is a diva, not a shapeless jumper.
* * *
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
There's a door policy. The bouncer looks them up and down for a second and then lets them in, even if they don't really fit in with the kids with extended fangs or the girl with white contact lenses in the queue alongside them.
Marconi stared at him with a face that meant trouble, and the bouncer recognised the look. A cop.
'Don't pull out your badge unless you need to. We're just here to have a look round. She was probably here last week and I don't think she would have gone unnoticed, so keep your eyes open and try to question the right people,' the inspector says to Tommasi, who is already eyeing up the arse of a girl in a miniskirt so short he can see her knickers.
Marconi looks round. It's early; the dance floor is as empty as a church on Saturday afternoon.
He tries to spot the locals, the regulars.
He decides to visit the washroom.
There's a large, fat guy with an earful of earrings. A silver-coloured chain links the last of them to a large ring inserted in his bottom lip. He's peeing, leaning against the urinal.
Marconi moves closer, undoes his fly and tries to pee.
'Hey, man, do you come here often?' Out of habit he looks at the man's hands, noticing a large tattoo that goes from his index finger right up to his elbow.
The man shakes off the last drops with two sharp movements, does up his fly and crosses his arms in front of his chest.
'Go and talk to someone else, you piece of shit. You're lucky you're peeing and I don't want to get my boots dirty. But get in my face again and you're fucked,' and he swipes his hand across the front of his throat in an unambiguous gesture.
Marconi, visibly uneasy, creeps out of the bathroom and goes to sit down on a sofa.
There's a girl sitting opposite him.
Ugly, really ugly.
Aquiline nose, thin lips. Too thin. Wearing a black outfit with bits of material hanging off it, looking like something that has come back from the dead.
He smiles at her. She lowers her eyes.
No one pays any attention to her. This is my chance, he thinks, still with a healthy dose of optimism.
'What's your name?' And he smiles at her.
'Shadow.' She holds out her hand. She has enclosed her fingers in gloves made out of fishnet stockings. They stretch above her elbows.
'Shadow?' he repeats.
She opens her eyes wide.
She's definitely asking herself what planet I'm from.
'Are you enjoying yourself?'
'I never enjoy myself.' 'Oh.'
An embarrassing silence.
'Nice outfit, with all those… bandages.'
'Are you taking the mickey?'
She gets up and goes.
Ugly and a yob. Marconi adjusts his black shirt - like the one he wore to his uncle Luigino's funeral. His mother had bought it specially for the occasion.
That was a memorable day, the first time he had seen a dead person.
Everyone said: 'How beautiful and serene he looks, like he's sleeping.' But he himself hadn't been able to look at uncle Luigino for more than ten seconds, it upset him so much.
He used to see him every Christmas, at lunch with his relatives. A stout man, always cheerful. Not that shrunken thing that looked like the mummy he had seen in a history book.
'Look at him, son,' Aunt Santina had said to him. 'We all end up like that.'
When he swallowed, his saliva felt like a piece of cement. It had made a noise going down.
People are ugly when they die, he had thought.
Marconi goes over to the bar. He decides to have a drink and try to loosen up a bit.
He looks around again. The dance floor is still half empty. No one attracts his attention: just people in their weird outfits, and the large man from the washroom who is pointing at him as he talks to his friends.
Fuck.
He hurriedly turns round.
He orders a Southern Comfort and leaves a tip for the barman, ring in his nose and a black satin shirt artfully left open to show off his nipple piercing.
'So, your job must be hard… always being polite, serving people all night. And then, younger people are always the worst, always more bad-mannered, don't you think?' Marconi knows how much survivors of the Eighties enjoy running down the younger generation.
'Tell me about it! But every now and then you meet nice people,' and the barman smiles at Marconi.
'What are people like here?'
'Always the same faces. The goths act a bit superior and don't try to make friends. You're new here, aren't you?'
'Yes, but then you must know everyone!'
'I've worked here for two years. As I said, it's always the same people.'
'A friend told me about this place - she's new too,' hazards Marconi. 'She came last Friday but I'm sure you won't have seen her; you can't expect to notice everyone,' and he takes a sip of his drink.
'Of course, I did - the blonde, the femme fatale.'
Marconi plants himself down on the bar stool.
'Very fashionable, pale skin, red lips - a stunning girl. She isn't your girlfriend, is she?'
'No, no. As if! She's just a friend,' and he immediately regrets having said 'As if'.
'I wasn't the only one who noticed her. As soon as someone new arrives, they're all like vultures.'
'And you?'
'Oh, definitely not me.'
'So, what makes you sit up and take notice?' Marconi is trying to be friendly, in order to get as much information as possible out of him.
'Eyes turn me on. Eyes like bottomless pools, that cut you in two if you're not ready for them. Like yours.' The barman gives him a mischievous look.
'Thanks. Yours aren't bad either:' He feels embarrassed, then adds, 'I imagine she was busy trying to seduce someone.'
'Who?'
'My friend, last week. I'll tease her about it when I get home.'
'Ah, but then it's true that she's your girlfriend,' and the bartender turns his back on him.
Marconi looks round to check that there's no one nearby. The tattooed man is right behind him.
He would like to be able to disappear, but he has to know more.
'I told you she's not my girlfriend. She's just a friend. We share a flat with two other people. You know, it's hard to pay the rent when you're a student,' Marconi adds, talking slightly more quietly.
'What? I can't hear you if you whisper.'
'I don't have a girlfriend.'
The barman turns to him, smiling.
'Hey, faggot, we're thirsty here.'
I'll turn round suddenly, grab his head and slam it down on the bar. I'll show him my badge, shouting: 'Police, you bastard!'
Instead, Marconi stays where he is, being chatted up by the camp barman.
'Here's your Jack Daniels, but you don't have to be so rude.' The barman puts down a round glass strategically filled with a generous shot of golden liquid, enough to keep the lout away from them for a while.
'Where were we? Don't pay any attention to him. I've known him for years, and he's like that, but he's not dangerous.'
'Good. So, tell me, I'm curious, did my friend do anything she shouldn't, last Friday?'
'You really are nosy, aren't you? OK, I'll satisfy your curiosity. But only if you let me buy you a drink.'
'OK,' is all Marconi manages to say, swallowing the last mouthful of his Southern Comfort. 'Well? But tell me everything, OK?'
'OK, I'll tell you. She danced a bit and then…'
'And then?'
'What do I get if I tell you?'
'Tell me first and then we'll see.'
'You're a tough guy, eh?'
Fuck. Are you going to tell me or do I have to rip it out of you? Marconi thinks, but all he says is 'Go on.'
'She danced for a bit, but from about halfway through the evening she then stopped being competition for me.' He puts his hand over his m
outh to hold back a snigger.
'How do you mean?'
'Are you jealous?'
'I am not jealous,' Marconi says slowly. He's losing his patience.
'She picked up another girl and they put on a show on the sofa there at the back. Those poor disappointed little boys.'
'So she disappointed a lot of people.'
'Well, yes. But now let's talk about you. You must need a licence for a mouth that sexy…' He pours him another drink.
Marconi thinks about getting out of there, but just at that moment the barman points at a girl and says: 'There, that girl over there. She's the one she was with, the girl with long hair. Samantha, she's called. Spelled the English way, of course. She used to go out with the DJ, then he dumped her and now she gives it away to anyone who wants it… men, women and small animals.' He laughs.
Marconi picks up the whisky the barman has just put down on the counter and turns his back on him, leaving him looking puzzled.
'You're so rude! Where are you going?' the barman shouts at Marconi's back, then he turns away angrily.
Tommasi has disappeared.
It's her. I bet it's her. I can feel it.
The dark-haired girl that the barman has just pointed out is sheathed in a long dress made of some glossy fabric. She has started to dance in the middle of the dance floor, which is now filling up, her eyes half closed and her lips soft. She is amazingly sensual.
Marconi, who can't dance and feels ill at ease, moves towards her and improvises.
'I need to talk to you. It's important.'
She doesn't answer and carries on dancing.
'They told me that last week you were with my girlfriend. I need some sort of explanation,' he adds seriously.
'Who do you think you are?' she replies sullenly.
'Listen. I know it's nothing to do with you, but I hope you can understand.'
The girl turns her back on him, and a few people at the side of the dance floor start to stare at him rudely.
Marconi tries playing the melodrama card. They say it works, with women. 'I'm totally in love with her,' he says in his best soap-opera voice, looking down at his feet. 'Marta and me have been together three years, but she cheats on me every time she goes out. I know she does, but I can't leave her. And no one has the courage to tell me the whole truth about what she gets up to.' Then he pretends he's walking away.
'Wait,' he hears behind him. 'OK, sit down,' she says, suddenly sympathetic.
She leads him towards a mirrored corner where a large velvet armchair invites people to escape from the crowds of people.
'My boyfriend used to cheat on me too, and he didn't waste any time in dumping me, that shit. But what did you want to know?'
'I'd like to know how far she went. Did you just kiss?'
'We danced. We eyed each other up, as you do, then she moved towards me and started to brush against me. I took her by the hand and… but I didn't know she was spoken for.'
'Don't worry about it. You couldn't have known. But what else did she do?'
'We sat down - here, in fact. This is my favourite spot because it's so intimate - and we started kissing. She kisses really well, but you'd know that better than me. Things warmed up a bit… I'm not exactly an iceberg. And when she started to bite my neck, I whispered to her to follow me. We went into the bathroom… and it'd be better if I didn't tell you anything else.'
Marconi struggles to hide his own arousal. He realises that he's as hard as those other men before they died. That isn't a reassuring thought. He tries to cover the fact by taking off his scarf - because of the heat - and draping it across his lap.
'No, carry on.' He ought to press her to reveal details about what the suspect looks like, rather than about their sexual activity in the loos.
The girl, who doesn't seem to need any encouragement, takes his hand in a gesture of support and rests it on her thigh, which is left uncovered by the split in her skirt. Just at that moment the tattooed man walks past.
He is definitely a biker.
Marconi tries to hide by lowering his head between his hands:
'Samantha, just forget about him. He's got different tastes.' The man then bursts out laughing. 'He likes dogs, not cats.' And he laughs again. 'He doesn't play football, he prefers a bat.' He sounds like he could go on forever.
Marconi's erection has gone. And he breathes a sigh of relief as he hears the laughter from that heavily built, leather-clad jerk moving away. One problem solved.
She starts talking again, her eyes fixed on his. She articulates every word clearly, omitting not a single detail. She explains how she pushed the other girl gently against the pink wall of the bathroom, how she lifted her dress and slipped off her black panties. And she talks; she talks on without ever breaking eye contact with Marconi. Every pause leaves him hanging on those full, seductive lips, and the story they are relating.
He feels aroused a second time, burning with desire. He is aware that he is gripping her hand, and he forces himself to speak in an attempt to shatter the spell of her story.
'Thanks. You don't know what you've done for me,' he says, slightly hesitant, rearranging his scarf. 'You know, I gave her that dress for her birthday,' he then adds, like an accomplished actor.
'You've got great taste. I love oriental-style dresses, and black and red are my favourite colours. If I were her, I wouldn't let a man like you get away. I'll tell you a secret: the touch of satin drives me wild,' she says, as if trying to recreate the magic of a moment before.
'How naive I was to fall in love with someone like her. It was her eyes that struck me the first time I met her in Piazza Maggiore. I was sitting in Neptune's shadow, when she walked by and glanced over.'
'Yes, I know that look. Two crystal-blue eyes that seem to see right inside you.'
'And you? You'll think I'm a masochist, but I'd like to know what it was about her that attracted you.'
The girl briefly closes her eyes as if to conjure up an image.
'Her blonde hair against that pale skin, the full mouth… I liked everything about her, including that fantastic hairpin of hers. Imagine, she wouldn't even let me touch it. It must be very important to her.'
'I don't think I've ever seen it.'
'Come on, you must remember it, it's so beautiful. It's like a ceremonial dagger, inlaid with two red stones at the end.'
Marconi's eyes light up.
'A dagger?'
'I couldn't think of a better word. It was a type of metal hairpin. Don't tell me you can't remember it. I once saw something similar at Montagnola, but it couldn't even compare with hers.'
'Who knows who gave it to her. But, you know what I say? After this evening, it's not my business any more.'
With that hairpin she probably skewered a human eyeball.
'Let's have some fun. What did she tell you her name was?' he then asks her, holding his breath.
'She didn't tell me anything about herself. You know, we didn't talk very much… But I want to give you a piece of advice: why don't you get your own back? You'll feel much better.' She watches him languidly.
He reckons that it has been too long since he last had sex. A good fuck, not like the one with Sabrina that evening. But then he controls himself and declares that he'll have to finish with his girlfriend first. He can't wait. He gets up and leaves her sitting there, slightly stunned, on the red velvet sofa.
* * *
CHAPTER FORTY
Make-up smeared on her eyes - a mess, like the bed she is stretched out on. A dishevelled doll: naked, fucked and abandoned. He has gone out again this evening. He didn't say much. 'You're beautiful, but what have you done? You don't even look like "you".'
Why not? What is 'me'?
Why can't this girl be me, and the girl in a tracksuit and no make-up only a version of me that I put on like a disguise every so often? Why not?
Who decided what I am? How have I ended up like this? Imprisoned in a character I don't particularly like.
/> Yes, I hate myself.
Because of my insecurity, because of my fear. Yet I can't change. This is how I am.
The slip is now just a heap of fabric lying by the end of the bed. It has stopped being an instrument of seduction. She hugs her teddy bear and seeks out the flesh under her fingernails.
When I taste the sweetness of my blood, I'll stop. I don't want to dream tonight. I just want to see darkness.
Darkness that swallows her up.
She lies still and breathes deeply. She thinks about how he made love to her.
He put himself inside me by just pulling my knickers to one side. He didn't even take them off. He felt heavy on top of me, burning me inside.
He stung, like his coarse stubble. He smelled like he always smells before he has a shower. It was over quickly, too quickly for the pain to turn to pleasure. But do women ever enjoy sex?
In the magazines they say they can, but I don't believe it.
It's a lie. One of the many lies they write. Like 'surprise him and he'll be yours forever' or 'conquer him in the kitchen' or 'pretend you don't care and he won't be able to resist you'.
If he comes home and I pretend I don't care, he'll go out again in five minutes. It's complete rubbish. And I'm an idiot to fall for it.
She has smeared on her face the moisturiser they said would give her perfect skin. She spent twenty-five Euros on it and her skin is still red. On the cold floor, there's a lace slip that isn't a lace slip any more: it's just a shapeless piece of material.
As soon as he finished he went to wash my smell from his body. And he shaved.
I still smell of him, yet I'm here alone.
* * *
CHAPTER FORTY-ONE
'I need to see Mariangela,' Eva says, sounding serious.
'She's busy. You can speak to me.'
'Roberto, I need to speak to Mariangela. If I'd needed to speak to you, I would have said so.'
'At this precise moment, you should be busy at the scanner, getting those images ready which I asked you for,' he replies, annoyed.
The Girl with the Crystal Eyes Page 10
