Three Light-Years: A Novel

by Canobbio, Andrea

  He took up his post the first time, saw her return home after an afternoon shift, at half past eight. Nothing happened, there was nothing to see. After an hour he got fed up and went home.

  Another time he waited from six to nine and didn’t see anyone who even remotely resembled her husband or ex-husband appear.

  He followed her out of the hospital one afternoon then lost her in traffic, and instead of going straight home he continued driving down a very long road, almost leaving the city, and began wandering through the northeastern outskirts. Huge shopping malls had sprung up there, replacing abandoned factories, along with new buildings that architects tried to make less depressing by painting the roofs blue or the shutters pink; here and there, the empty shells of the old factories still stood, each carrying the weight of its entire history like the homeless man he’d met at the playground.

  One day, instead of lurking around to spy on her, he stopped under the trees where they’d kissed for the first time that late afternoon in June, and another evening he looked for the exact spot where he had parked when they made love in the car. He stayed there thinking for an hour; that, too, was a way of spying on her; that, too, was a pathetic way to spend his time. He thought of all the times he had masturbated thinking about making love with Cecilia in the car. Their relationship was still in transit, maybe it would never reach port, and he couldn’t allow himself to think beyond fantasies of car sex. At most, he imagined doing it in the comfort of the backseat.

  He stationed himself one last time and saw Cecilia take the child to someone, maybe his father. All the boy had with him was his schoolbag. Was it his father’s house or that of a classmate? He stood waiting for Cecilia to come back down, imagining her with her ex-husband. And there, in that place that told him nothing, in that neighborhood that wasn’t his, at that address which he’d never wanted to know, he thought that maybe he didn’t care about Cecilia anymore; maybe he wasn’t just fed up with that strange friendship-with-relapses, maybe he didn’t love her as he thought he did, maybe he no longer loved her or maybe he had never loved her, and it was just the fear that she might be his last chance playing a nasty trick on him.

  He started the Passat and drove away, instantly feeling a sense of relief. Enough is enough. He was letting go, he had let go. The moment when you can finally say it’s over comes just like that, out of the blue. Even with relationships that seem never to end (maybe because they never began).

  * * *

  Nevertheless, he continues to see her. For two years, lunch has been their time together and it’s difficult to end the habit overnight. It’s equally difficult to come up with credible excuses when Viberti decides not to show up one day and the next day Cecilia asks why he didn’t come. Then again he has to eat in any case and he might easily be spotted if he went to one of the other cafés across from the hospital, so all through the month of March Viberti sometimes uses the side door and goes to eat his boiled vegetables in the café that he’s renamed “the urologist’s.” But he’s not at ease as he eats, he feels like she’s going to surprise him at any moment.

  One day, coming around the column that conceals their table, for a moment he thinks Cecilia has brought her thirteen-year-old daughter to lunch. The young woman sitting with her looks familiar, even though Viberti is certain he’s never seen her before. He would remember the wide black headband in her hair and her intimidating look. Too late to retreat: Cecilia invites him to sit with them: “This is Silvia, my sister.”

  Viberti sits down and says hello. “You never told me you had a sister,” he murmurs, gets up again, starts to sit down a second time, and then decides to get up and go order the plate of boiled vegetables and a glass of mineral water. All he has to do is go around the column, lean over the counter, and order his plate from the barista, but what he’d like to do is leave, go out the door, and eat by himself at another café. He mistook her for Cecilia’s daughter because the idea of meeting the young girl frightens him.

  He returns to his seat. He’s petrified, like marble, and he thinks it shows, as if blue veins had appeared on his skin. He has no desire to make conversation; he hadn’t wanted to have lunch with Cecilia, let alone with Cecilia and her sister. This Silvia seems less interesting than Cecilia, not as tall, less attractive. He doesn’t know how it could have happened—in two years not a hint about the existence of a sister. He’d like to insist and say again “You never told me you had a sister,” to punish Cecilia, but it wouldn’t be polite. He feels rigid, like the column behind him. In fact, he is the column, he’s turned into a column so he can stay in that café forever, ignored by everyone, in mute adoration of the woman sitting at the table.

  “Claudio always eats boiled vegetables for lunch,” Cecilia says. If she’d wanted to put him at ease she could have come up with a different opening. He feels like refusing to speak for the entire lunch so that Cecilia will realize how offended he is. But it’s hard to say absolutely nothing. If you don’t talk, you’re saying you don’t want to talk. Instead you have to be able to talk without saying anything: his mother was a master at this.

  Cecilia persists: “Silvia, too, used to eat boiled vegetables for lunch and dinner … years ago. Remember, Silvia?”

  “Were you on a diet?” Viberti asks.

  Silvia is painstakingly chewing a bite of her sandwich and can’t answer, she taps her lips delicately with her fingertips, a gesture that Cecilia often makes, as if to say, “Wait, I’ll tell you.”

  But Viberti can’t wait, he’s embarrassed at having put her on the spot. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to intrude. You liked boiled vegetables, that’s reason enough for me.”

  Silvia finally swallows. “I’ve never been on a diet in my life.”

  It’s strange being a threesome for the first time, as if the last time for the two of them alone had already passed. And it’s strange that it’s never happened before; could it be that in two years not one coworker or friend had come into that café? And could it be that no one, seeing them, sat down at their table? The table is hidden away, that’s why Viberti had chosen it. And he certainly wouldn’t bring a friend or a coworker there on his own; he has no brothers or sisters, and he never wanted to share Cecilia with anyone. Nor has Cecilia ever done so before today. There must be a reason for it.

  “I like boiled vegetables,” Sylvia adds, “but back then I ate them because I had a plan.”

  Cecilia nods. “A plan … of course, it was a plan.”

  “I had to eat the same dish for a whole week. One dish a week for four weeks and then I would decide what made me feel best.”

  Viberti smiles. He was supposed to be irritated and offended throughout lunch and instead he finds the story amusing. He asks what the dishes were.

  “I remember the first one was boiled potatoes and boiled fish. Another was poached eggs, carrots, and zucchini. Then rice, peas, and chicken. I don’t remember the fourth. Midway through the rice, peas, and chicken I got fed up and dropped it all. Still, I should remember the fourth. Mozzarella, tomatoes, and figs? What do you think, Ceci? It seems to me there were figs and also asparagus. No, that’s impossible, they’re not in season at the same time. I remember artichokes, too, but I could be wrong about the artichokes, I’ve never been a fan of artichokes. Once I pricked myself with an artichoke. No—there was mozzarella in the fourth dish, there was tomato, but I don’t remember the third ingredient.”

  “And you didn’t eat anything else?”

  “Ah, I knew this story would intrigue you,” Cecilia says, her sarcasm plain. She’s edgy, he hadn’t noticed. He’d been so irritated about the fact that she’d kept the existence of her sister hidden from him that he hadn’t detected the dark look on her face. She’s upset or angry, or very tired. Something must have happened in the ER, or to the child.

  “In the morning I had yogurt and cereal for breakfast,” Sylvia says, “and in the evening I also ate fruit. Not just any kind of fruit. Bananas, for instance, are disgusting. Our mother always told
us not to say that a food was disgusting, but there’s no better way to describe bananas. Remember, Ceci? No bananas. And mind you, bananas are very good for you. The potassium. Take allergies, for example. I read somewhere that bananas are great for allergies. Pears, apples, plums. I ate them all. But not bananas. But then again, who knows if these things you read are true? You doctors, when you read these things, do you believe them? I always suspect it’s the banana growers who pay the journalists.”

  “So, in the end what foods made you feel best?”

  “Maybe the eggs with carrots and zucchini. After three days of rice, peas, and chicken I was desperate.”

  “But how did you come up with the idea?”

  “I don’t know, at the time I was obsessed with food. I had gone to a lecture, a Swiss guy—he wasn’t a doctor or a dietitian—had come to give a talk at the university. I remember going to it by chance, a friend had dragged me along.” She turned to Cecilia, “Enrico Fermi,” then turned back to Viberti: “An old friend of mine, his name was Enrico but I called him Enrico Fermi because in a debate once he had defended nuclear power and we’d almost lynched him, plus he had red hair…”

  Cecilia was getting up. “Enrico Fermi had very red hair, yes.”

  “Are you going already…” Viberti says.

  “Will you call me?” Silvia asks.

  Viberti rises, Cecilia has quickly slipped on her jacket and says, “Ciao, see you,” smiling and touching his arm.

  Silvia repeats: “Will you call me later?”

  Cecilia nods, and the next moment she’s gone.

  Viberti sits back down. He’s at a café with a stranger, somehow, for some reason. He can’t afford to be late either, he has appointments. He could have remained standing and said goodbye, then left immediately. But he can’t help it, he has to cover up the awkwardness. Because Cecilia’s headlong flight has made both of them feel uncomfortable, it doesn’t take much to see that. And Silvia does nothing to ease the situation. She keeps staring in the direction in which her sister disappeared.

  “You were telling me about this Swiss lecturer … who was he?”

  Silvia lowers her eyes. “Yes. Well, he was from Switzerland. I don’t remember his name, something like Fletcher or Frecher. I’m not sure—I had gone by chance with this friend, I mean, I had absolutely no interest in the man’s philosophy.”

  “Philosophy?”

  “I don’t remember it all that well. It was all based on ritual, he aid that nutrition must observe a ritual, that you should only eat raw foods or boiled stuff, otherwise the foods are injured, you know, by being fried or grilled. I don’t understand why boiling things would be any better, he was a bit of a charlatan—oh, and then he had this idea about a soup bowl…” Silvia takes a sip of tea.

  “A soup bowl?”

  “According to him you should always eat out of a soup bowl, because the food must be held, it must be embraced, like this—” Her hands form the shape of a shell.

  Viberti smiles. Silvia smiles, too.

  “Yet later he convinced you.”

  “He convinced me?”

  “The philosopher.”

  “Yes, he was quite fascinating, the way he spoke, the way he described it all. And I got the urge to try it, because among other things he advocated the principle of the one single dish.”

  “And did he also tell you to drink tea at meals?”

  “No, that’s a habit that I fell into afterward.”

  And she starts talking about her passion for green tea, about how difficult it is to find good Japanese tea in Italy (stuff about the product’s perishability and temperature changes during transport), she says that green tea is much more delicate than black tea. She talks about properties that are good for the heart and circulation, others that prevent virtually all types of cancers. “I’ll have to send you the link to a great site, you’ll see, you’ll be converted, too.”

  Viberti listens to her. It’s funny how this woman is similar to yet unlike her sister. Then he remembers that he has to get back. But he makes no move to get up. He looks at the sandwich that Cecilia left untouched on the table. Was that all she had for lunch?

  “The way you’re looking at that sandwich…” Silvia says.

  “How am I looking at it?”

  “Like it did something wrong.”

  It’s a mortadella sandwich. The pink-and-white slices peek out from the edges of the bread like small naughty tongues. “No,” Viberti says, “I would never eat it, but I don’t resent it. I respect it. It lives in its world and I in mine.”

  Silvia laughs. “There’s a fantastic novel you should read, it was one of my father’s favorites, it’s called The Cook. I’ll lend it to you, if you’d like. I’ll give it to Cecilia. It’s about a chef who seduces, or influences, or deceives—in short, who manipulates people with his recipes.”

  Viberti stares at her, bewildered, why on earth would that book interest him?

  Suddenly Silvia is standing up and putting on her jacket. “Now I really have to go. Write down your e-mail.” She puts a blue clothbound notebook under his nose, hands him a pen.

  Instead of writing, Viberti reads a note that jumps out in the center of the blank page, I want her to like me, and is left dazed, staring at the underlined words. Then he looks up.

  “Your e-mail,” Silvia repeats, “write it down there. You do have an e-mail address, don’t you?”

  Viberti nods, writes down the address, hands back the notebook.

  And at that point he, too, can finally stand up, say goodbye, and quickly leave the café.

  * * *

  He was waiting for Giulia and Marta outside the main entrance and was surprised by the smiling crowd that seemed to drift aimlessly around the hospital, not a forlorn crowd—people with real or imaginary ailments, patients’ families, doctors, vendors peddling useless first aid kits—but the kind of festive weekend crowd you’d find at an amusement park. Giulia had made another geriatric appointment for Marta.

  The hospital had been built in the thirties and the prosthetic wings added after the war stuck out from the decrepit body of the original core. The past always in plain sight yet invisible to everyone, like certain traits fathers pass down to their children, similarities you don’t want to see, the past that doesn’t pass away. What did I really teach you? Did I teach you anything useful? Anything concrete? Did I teach you how to tie your shoelaces or how to knot your tie? See, these are the things you get from a parent that stay with you later. No, I’m not kidding. Every time I pack a suitcase I remember the day my mother taught me how to fold a jacket. You spread it out on the bed. You fold one sleeve over and then the other. Then you fold the lower half of the jacket over the upper half. I’ll never forget her graceful gestures.

  When Giulia and Marta appeared at the end of the driveway, Viberti saw that his ex-wife was talking while his mother prudently stayed silent. Giulia wasn’t being cruel, and she didn’t need further confirmation of her mother-in-law’s memory loss; Giulia spoke out of compassion because, unlike Viberti, she wasn’t used to being silent. For years she had talked with Marta, for more than ten years they had told each other everything, and it was inconceivable that silence should now descend on them—she had to revive the dialogue, recite the lines for the both of them. Every so often he imagined himself hospitalized in Giulia’s ward, stuck in bed, helpless, forced to listen to her talk.

  The parked cars and all the commotion disturbed Marta, who stopped and turned around every few steps, though once they’d passed through the gate Giulia had taken her by the arm, dragging her along. Viberti walked down the entry steps, uncertain whether to go and meet them. He didn’t want to complicate things further. What was his mother afraid of? The ambulances, taxis, motorbikes she heard coming up behind her. Maybe she didn’t remember where to go.

  “Here we are!” Giulia chirped with the satisfaction of a mother at her child’s first steps.

  “You look very elegant, Mama,” Viberti said, and i
t was true. Marta’s tastes were simple but refined: that day she wore a charcoal-gray knit suit and a cream-colored blouse; she certainly didn’t look eighty-three years old.

  “But it’s not a doctor visit, right?” she asked.

  Giulia shook her head. “We just talked about this.”

  “Even if it were, Mama, you’re perfect, with you we won’t make a bad impression,” Viberti said, taking her arm and squeezing it, then immediately letting go, worried that he might break a bone.

  “We were taught from an early age that for a doctor’s visit…” Marta began telling them.

  “But it isn’t,” Giulia interrupted her.

  “It isn’t, you won’t have to undress, you won’t have to let everyone see your undies,” Viberti teased her.

  “Silly, that wasn’t the reason, I’m spotless, what do you think … Where’s the entrance? Has it always been here?”

  Giulia said goodbye when they reached the first corridor and was swallowed up by the crowd of patients in gowns and slippers and visitors shouting into their cell phones. Viberti led Marta, who was increasingly confused, to a side staircase past a vending machine that dispensed coffee and hot chocolate. A small elevator reserved for staff waited behind a frosted-glass door. From his coat pocket he pulled out a key that he’d had a nurse give him (he’d lost his) and inserted it into a lock that stood in place of a button.

  Marta observed him: “You look very elegant, too, in that white coat.”

  “Thank you, Mama.”

  You look very elegant, too: she hadn’t forgotten the compliment he’d paid her earlier and wanted to return it.

  Giulia had arranged everything so that they wouldn’t spend even a minute in the waiting room. As soon as they reached Geriatrics a nurse recognized Viberti and introduced herself warmly to Marta before leading her into the examining room. “Take care,” Viberti said. Marta disappeared behind the door without answering.