The Other Language(39)

“Mina, you are a genius.”

Mina cocked her head, beaming. Since the day Lara had become such an enthusiastic client, the issue of the forno seemed to have been forgotten, or at least put temporarily behind them.



For two years now Lara had seen her own body progressively lose its contours and definition. It wasn’t age, it was the divorce that had caused the implosion and slackened her from within. Her whole being had lost muscle and core, as though what she’d assumed was her legendary physical strength, her lean muscular body trained by years of running, and then practicing and teaching yoga, had turned out to be only a secondary effect of the safety of her marriage, a reflection of her domestic stability. The minute her husband was gone, so too fled her body. Since then, clothes had had the purpose only of covering up what she feared about herself.



At first there had been boredom. It had seeped into their marriage like a fume. Suddenly there was nothing to talk about, it was as simple as that. Nothing in the news worth discussing, nothing worth watching together on TV, no Caravaggio exhibit worth standing in line for, nothing they could share and use as a conversation piece. Just “Would you like another coffee? Are you coming back for lunch? Did you pick up my jacket from the cleaners? I am so tired I think I’ll just go to bed.” Their life had shrunk to a sequence of polite questions and answers that only served to make sure the mechanics of their cohabitation kept on working.

Then came the rage. It hit them like a tornado, it blew away the fume of boredom and shook their household from the foundations. In fifteen operatic minutes on one Sunday night everything came down and shattered. Rage made them feel alive and strong, gave color to their cheeks, lit their eyes. They were, for a fleeting moment, beautiful and sexy again. Of course it was a younger woman—a French one—whom they’d met at a dinner party three months earlier—a fact that gave Lara the chance to replay and revise all the instances when her husband had told her he wasn’t coming home for dinner/was going to see his brother in Genoa/meet in Paris an investor for his green technology firm, etc., etc. Lara stood up from the kitchen table, where they were eating a spinach and beluga lentil salad, and hurled the plate across the room. She saw the crumbled feta scatter in slow motion, then land on his shirt like snowflakes. She detected a flash of terror in his eyes and knew that at last she’d gained some power over him. She immediately furthered the opportunity and slapped him in the face. The gesture felt artful and precise as if, along with the shock, a supernatural force had just lodged inside her and was going to stay for good.

Sadly, rage turned out to be a bad drug; it never tasted as good as the first time and when it dissolved it left her limp on the floor like a used dishrag. She had tried to recapture its magnificence by summoning him again the next day for a further explanation (by then he’d checked into a hotel) but the force was gone, her fury was only a repetition of a stale act that led her nowhere. Now that he had abandoned the house, her husband seemed to have become invulnerable as if, after nine long years of marriage, he had, overnight, learned the trick of how to become a stranger. He was no longer scared of her reactions, but accommodating like a doctor with a difficult patient, ready to file for divorce, willing to take care of the bills and let her have the apartment. He was simply in a hurry to leave her behind.

“Is it because of the sex? I just need to know,” she finally asked, wincing at the predictability of the words she was saying. It was the last time they saw each other alone, before the lawyers became their permanent bodyguards.

“No,” he said.

“Then what is it? Does she make you feel younger?”

“No,” he said, drawing out the syllable into two and moving his gaze toward her with a hint of mercy. “Actually, she makes me laugh.”

Months later, once she had adjusted to the situation, the thing she regretted the most was having asked this last question. She could easily have lived with the version everyone had heard a million times, which required no translation, being the same in Chinese and Icelandic: man leaves wife for a younger, sexy girl who adores him without discernment. But no. He had left her for someone he simply had more fun with. She had visions of her husband and the girl driving through Provence in a convertible, laughing their heads off, as their hair blew in the wind.

Had she lost her sense of humor along the way, or—and this was what she feared the most—had she never had one to begin with?



Her brother texted her three days before arriving:

How many bars?

Just one in the main square.

They don’t serve fancy cocktails, I warn you.

I mean bars as in reception for iPhone.

Ooops. 2. Sometimes 4 if u go up on the roof.





Ben Jackson had gained at least twenty pounds in the last few years. He was on the verge of fat, but because of his height he looked Orson Wellesian. He emerged from the rental car sweaty and pale in wrinkled linen pants, a faded T-shirt and flip-flops. He stretched his arm out to Lara with a standard paparazzi-friendly grin, then changed his mind and gave her a brief hug.

“Hey Lara, thanks so much for having me.”

Leo was getting their bags out of the trunk. He and Ben were wearing the same expensive-looking sunglasses. Their bags were identical too.

“What are you, twins?” Lara said to her brother in Italian. She was eager to show off her funny side.