The Purple Room

by Mauro Casiraghi

  “It’s stifling today,” she says. “There’s some cool wine in there if you want some.”

  “I’m fine, thanks.”

  “I still haven’t thanked you. It would have taken much longer without your help.”

  “It was useful for me, too. Now I know how to plant lavender in my garden.”

  “What’s it like where you live?”

  “I’ve got a house in the hills north of Rome. Instead of vineyards, there are sheep and horses. Mostly sheep. Not that I know much about animals.”

  “You’ve got a dog.”

  “Lucky? It’s Michela’s.”

  “So, what do you do when you’re not working?”

  “I lie on the sofa and brood. Don’t laugh, Gloria. It’s tougher than you might think.”

  We sit in silence for a little while. We glance at each other every now and then, as if we each have something to say, but don’t dare do it before the other. Then I see her smile again.

  “What are you thinking about?”

  “I was thinking about what you said yesterday evening. It’s funny, you know.”

  “What?”

  “You seemed so sure of yourself when you said my room was purple. I tried to think back. That’s something I haven’t done in a long time, actually––think about the past, I mean. In the end, I understood what you were talking about.”

  “Well, please let me in on it, because I was up all night wondering.”

  “Do you remember when I took you up to my room that afternoon?”

  “Of course I remember.”

  “You were so nervous. You went around touching everything. The pillows, the knick-knacks, the records. I told you to leave my sister’s stuff alone. She was the kind to make a terrible scene if she found the slightest thing out of place. But did you listen to me? Oh, no. You looked in her drawers on purpose and tried on her things. Then you found a pair of glasses. My father had brought them back from a trip to America. They were the kind Elvis used to wear. Do you remember them?”

  “No… I don’t think so.”

  “You put on the glasses and started dancing like Elvis. You were so funny with those huge things on your face.”

  “It’s strange. I don’t remember that at all.”

  “Do you remember when we got undressed?”

  “Yes. I haven’t forgotten that part.”

  “And do you remember you took everything off, except for the glasses? You lay down completely naked on my bed, wearing those huge glasses. Do you understand now?”

  “No.”

  “The lenses, Sergio. The lenses in the glasses were purple––as purple as purple can be. The room looked that color to you because you saw it through tinted glasses.”

  I stare at her, speechless. Then I burst out laughing like crazy. I laugh so hard that Lucky jumps up and starts barking.

  Gloria watches me, bewildered. “Are you all right?”

  “Yes! I’m great! You’ve just taken such a weight off my shoulders. This is going to sound silly to you, but because of that one little detail––the color of your room––I’d started doubting everything.”

  “Everything?”

  “If you only knew what this means to me. In the last three months so many strange things have happened to me. Some good, some not so much, but they’ve all made me think things over. I’ve been thinking about when we were together. I know, we were only sixteen, but a little piece of those days is still there, deep inside me. It’s survived all the changes, the mistakes, the disasters of the past few years. It’s this tiny core, but it’s tough and strong, and it doesn’t want to die. Don’t think it didn’t surprise me, too, to find it was still there. That’s the reason I came here. It’s wasn’t a coincidence, Gloria. I wanted to tell you that I haven’t forgotten you.”

  Gloria scrapes some flakes of paint from the table with her fingernails. She lifts one, as thin as paper, and holds it between her fingertips. Then she blows it into the air with a puff.

  “If I were to say that I’d thought about you even once in all this time, it would be a lie. Still, lots of memories have come back to me just hearing you talk. That trip to Florence, with the rain that never stopped. The kiss on the train, as we were pulling into the station. The first time I saw you in class. You were sitting in the front, talking to a blonde girl. I blushed every time our eyes met, because I already liked you.”

  “I didn’t know that.”

  “There’s another thing you don’t know. On that day in my room, I didn’t fall asleep. I was pretending. I kept my eyes closed because I was embarrassed. I liked the way you were touching me. I hoped you’d take the initiative and go through with it. I was dying to make love to you.”

  “Instead I just left you there and went home. Now I understand why you didn’t want to see me again.”

  “No, you’re wrong. I wanted to be your girlfriend. I dreamed about you all the time, but the day after you came over, I didn’t feel well. I used to faint sometimes. My mother thought I was skipping meals and tried to solve the problem by forcing me to eat. That time, though, was worse than the others. I had to go to the hospital, and from the tests it turned out I had diabetes. My father got really worried and decided that my mother wasn’t capable of looking after me. He took me with him to Lugano. I stayed with him for a year. He taught me how to give myself injections and keep to a strict diet. When I went back to Milan, my mother and sister had moved again, so I was enrolled in a different high school. I could have called you to explain everything. I don’t know why I didn’t. Maybe I felt like I had to start over, with a clean slate. The same way I did four years ago.”

  Gloria looks over at the hills in front of us. Her eyes take on a stony look. “Do you have any idea how hard it is to isolate yourself from the rest of the world? You can go to the middle of nowhere, far away from everybody, cut off all your ties, and still keep on feeling like you’re in the middle of a crowd. Sometimes all it takes is memories to keep you tied down. Chained. What’s in your head is enough to trap you. I sought out my solitude. It was hard, but I did it. Now I’m free. I don’t need anyone. I don’t want to need anyone.”

  We sit there in silence, looking at each other. I would like to ask her what she came here to forget, but I know it’s no use asking questions. Gloria studies me to see how I’m taking it. I lower my head, hoping she won’t see the chaos that’s exploding in my brain. I stroke Lucky, glad to feel the dog’s little heart beating beneath its fur, and I wait. I wait for this moment to dissolve, to pass and become the next moment, the afterwards––but the afterwards doesn’t seem to want to arrive. I try desperately to send my other self on ahead of me, the one who is in complete control of himself and his actions, who calls up women and invites them out for a drink, who goes to meetings at work and says sensible things, who carries on a normal conversation over dinner. That one goes out into the trenches while I huddle up under the covers, like a coward. Only I can’t find him. That other self has gone.

  Now I’m the one in the trenches. I know what I should say. “You’ve been honest and I appreciate that. You’ve helped me understand a lot of things, and now I can go home feeling more at peace and get on with my life, look for what I really need. I still hope that we’ll be able to be friends, because you’re a very special person, Gloria.”

  What comes out of my mouth instead is, “Can I kiss you?”

  The words just come out, like the most natural thing in the world. Then, again, why shouldn’t I ask her? Shouldn’t I be honest to the bitter end? What have I got to lose? Gloria’s already answered yes to this question once. She’s my girl, the one who always says yes.

  I lean across the table, clasp her around the nape of her neck and pull her face towards mine. I close my eyes and press my lips to hers. When our mouths touch, the thirty years that have separated us vanish in an instant. They don’t exist anymore. Gloria and I aren’t two forty-year-olds kissing under a trellis in Tuscany anymore. Neither are we two sixteen-year-olds
making out in the library. Our past experiences don’t matter anymore. We are two innocents, free of the constraints of time and memory, linked by a kiss that cancels out everything else.

  Still, there’s something that isn’t right. A sharp pain, then a pulsing one, pulls me back. I can taste blood in my mouth. My blood.

  Gloria is sinking her teeth into my lip. Why?

  “Let me go, you asshole!” she screams into my face.

  I open my eyes and realize I’m holding her by the hair. I let her go instantly, then stare around, confused. What happened?

  We’re back under the portico. Gloria is glaring at me with hatred.

  “What did you do that for? Are you deaf? I said no!”

  My lip keeps bleeding. I have to spit the blood out.

  “Shit! Look at you. Look what I’ve done!”

  “It’s nothing,” I say in a faint voice. The blood runs down my chin on to my shirt. I wipe at it with my fingers, but only end up making it worse. It’s all over both my hands.

  “Keep still. Don’t touch it.”

  Gloria runs into the kitchen, opens the freezer and comes back with a tray of ice-cubes and some paper napkins.

  “Use these.”

  I take some napkins and dab at the cut. Then I put some ice in my mouth and hold it there. As it melts, it mixes with the blood. I feel like vomiting, but I swallow it anyway. Gloria is furious. She’s saying things I don’t really understand. I pick up a handful of ice cubes and rub them over my neck and forehead. I close my eyes, hoping everything will stop spinning. When I open them again, I see Lucky running to meet Ettore. He’s walking towards us in his linen suit and white hat with a black band. I’d like to have a hat like that.

  “Hello, everyone,” he says cheerfully.

  “Hi, Ettore,” Gloria says, without smiling.

  “ello” I mumble around the ice in my mouth.

  Ettore looks at my face, my stained shirt and the bloody napkins. He looks at Gloria, then back at me. He’s about to say something, but she shakes her head. He says nothing.

  “Would you like a drink?” Gloria asks him. “I need one.”

  She goes into the kitchen and comes back with the white wine. She pours for all three of us. She and Ettore drink. I don’t.

  “I was looking for you this morning,” Ettore says to me, “to take you to the caves.”

  “Ah ‘eah,” I say, my tongue numb. “Mi’ee wen’ ‘agh ‘ome. ‘oyfend. Oou noh ow i’ iz.”

  Ettore and Gloria exchange looks. Then Ettore says, “If you like, the two of us can go. With my car. It’s not far.”

  “That’s a good idea,” says Gloria. “Sergio, go with Ettore. I have to get lunch ready for my mother.”

  “Oh, sure,” I say, spitting the ice out onto the ground. “I’d really like to see those caves. Come on, Lucky. Let’s go.”

  The three of us walk out into the sun and towards the road.

  When we get to the jeep, Ettore opens the back. “All aboard,” he says to the dog. Lucky hops in. Ettore gets in the driver’s seat, starts the car and begins maneuvering the vehicle into the right direction.

  Gloria and I stand there, face to face, without looking at each other. It’s time to say goodbye.

  “Forgive me, Gloria. I don’t know what to say.”

  “There’s nothing else to say. I just have a favor to ask.”

  “Anything you want.”

  “When you come back to pick up your car, don’t come in to say goodbye. All right?”

  “Gloria, I––”

  “I don’t want to see you or hear from you ever again, Sergio. I know you’re a good person and you’ll do as I ask. You will do as I ask, won’t you?”

  “Yes,” I say, “I will.”

  I look at her for the last time, trying to fix the image of her face in my mind. Then I say, “Bye, Gloria. Take care of yourself.”

  I climb into the jeep next to Ettore. We pull out.

  In the side mirror, I watch Gloria walk away without looking back. She becomes smaller and smaller, until she disappears in a cloud of dust.

  22

  “Not many people have seen this place. I never bring tourists here.”

  “Why not?”

  “Too dangerous.”

  Ettore stops the jeep in front of a gate closed with a padlock. He gets out with a bunch of keys and unlocks it. Then he gets back in and parks in a clearing between the trees. He takes a flashlight out of the trunk.

  “From here we go on foot.”

  We start off along a path through the underbrush. Lucky runs ahead. Every now and then the dog makes a sortie into the woods, then comes back to the path and resumes trotting along at our side.

  We come out into a narrow valley sandwiched between two hills.

  “It’s down there.”

  Ettore leads me towards a rock wall covered in creepers. As we approach, I can feel a current of damp air.

  “That’s it.”

  Amongst the creepers there’s an opening carved into the tufa stone. It’s a passageway as wide as the doorway of a house, but slightly lower.

  “I forgot to ask. You’re not claustrophobic, are you?”

  “No.”

  “The first stretch is very narrow. Then it widens out and becomes a real cave. All the unexplored tunnels lead off from there.”

  “Aren’t you curious to know where they lead?”

  “They probably don’t lead anywhere. They’re just traps for people who are too greedy or too curious.” He switches on the flashlight. “Shall we?”

  I’m about to follow Ettore into the tunnel, but the dog stops at the entrance and refuses to budge.

  “What’s the matter, Lucky?”

  It whines and sniffs at the air from the cave. It’s frightened.

  “I don’t think your dog likes Etruscan tombs,” says Ettore.

  I attach the leash to the dog’s collar, then I tie it to the branch of a bush.

  “Good boy, wait here.”

  I give it a quick pat and leave it outside. As soon as I set foot in the passageway, Lucky starts barking.

  The space is very narrow. I have to walk with my head bent down and my arms pressed tight against my sides. Ettore lights our way.

  “Look how they tunneled into the tufa stone. You can still see the signs of their chisels. These holes in the wall, every two or three yards, are where they set their oil lamps. It makes sense. After all, no one could dig in the dark.”

  I don’t know how far we’ve come, but the light from the entrance has disappeared. Lucky’s barking has become a faraway sound. The further in we go, the narrower the tunnel seems to become. I realize that I’m short of breath.

  “Can you feel how heavy the air is in here?” Ettore says. “Not much oxygen gets in this far, but we can go as far as the main cave without a problem. I tried to bring Gloria once. She was all excited at first, playing at being an explorer. Then, when we got up to about here, she stopped and said, ‘I heard a noise down there.’

  “I told her it was probably moisture dripping in the cave.

  “‘No, no,’ she said. ‘It sounds like something scratching against the wall.

  “‘Oh, right,’ I said. ‘I forgot to tell you that there’s still an Etruscan in here tunneling. Nobody’s told him that he’s been dead for centuries!’

  “As soon as I said it, I wished I could take it back. Gloria wanted to go straight home and I’ve never managed to get her back here again.”

  In the silence that follows, I hear it––a scratching noise. It’s obvious that Ettore told his little story knowing that the sound would come to lend it credence. He expects me to say something. Instead, I don’t say a word, but just keep on walking along behind him. About ten steps later we come out into the cave.

  “What do you think of this?”

  He shines his flashlight up towards the ceiling. It must be at least twenty feet high. All around us there are the entrances to tunnels like the one we came from. Without the
flashlight, the darkness would be absolute.

  Ettore grasps my arm.

  “Be careful,” he says, pointing to the ground in front of me. In the center of the cave, there’s a hole covered by a rusty grate. It’s a pit. The beam of light is lost in the darkness. It’s impossible to say how deep it is.

  “Come on. I’ll show you something.”

  Ettore leads me to the entrance of one of the tunnels. You can’t see the end here, either. “Go in and tell me what you feel.”

  I lower my head and step into the tunnel. It seems exactly the same as the one we’ve just come from, but here something is different. It’s as if the air from the cave were being sucked into the tunnel. I can feel it on my skin and in my hair. It’s a cold damp draft that draws me in. The effort of staring into the darkness deep in the tunnel is making me feel dizzy. It’s like I’m falling forward, being pulled in. Instinctively, I take two steps back.

  “Strange, isn’t it?” Ettore says.

  “What is it?”

  Ettore pulls a glass marble out of the pocket of his jacket. “Shine the light here.”

  He hands me the flashlight and sets the marble on the ground. As soon as he lets it go, the marble starts to move, first slowly, then faster and faster. It rolls into the tunnel as if a mysterious force were sucking it in. I follow it with the beam of the flashlight as far as I can. Then it disappears without a sound, swallowed up by the darkness.

  “It’s an inclined plane,” I say.

  “Exactly. It doesn’t seem so to the naked eye, but there’s a steep slope. This could be the passage that leads to the main tomb.”

  “Shall we go down and take a look?” I say boldly.

  “I wouldn’t recommend it. In spite of the air you feel, there probably isn’t enough oxygen. Can you imagine if one of us lost consciousness down there? You could call for help until you were blue in the face. No one would hear you.”

  Ettore speaks those last words without his usual friendly smile. Is he trying to let me know that he’s the stronger one? That he could go and leave me here to rot? That if I don’t stay away from Gloria, I’ll have to deal with him? That’s fine with me. He can ditch me here, go back to Gloria and tell her she’ll never have to hear another word about me. I couldn’t care less about dying and being forgotten. I’m already dead. Dead and buried at the bottom of the sea.