One Step to You (The Rome Novels #1)(83)
He wondered where Babi was at that moment. He wondered why. He felt a stab of pain to his heart, knowing all the answers already.
*
During the holidays, people feel either sadder or happier than usual. And people don’t know what to do with certain thoughts.
“Dani, do you want this? If not, I’m getting rid of it.”
Daniela looked at her sister. Babi was standing in the door to her room with a dark blue jacket in her hand.
“No, leave it here. I’ll wear it.”
“But it’s coming all unstitched.”
“I’ll have it mended.”
“If you want it.” Babi left it on the bed, and Daniela watched as she left the room. Given all the times that she and Babi had fought over that jacket, it never would have occurred to her that Babi might just toss it out one day. Her sister certainly had changed. Then she dismissed that thought and started packing the last few gifts.
Babi was almost done clearing out her closet when her mother came in.
“Good girl. You’ve gotten rid of a lot of stuff.”
“Yes, here, take this. It’s all the stuff I’m throwing out. Even Dani doesn’t want it.”
Raffaella took a few outfits that were lying on the table. “I’ll make a package for the poor. The charity should be coming around later today for a pickup. Shall we go out together later on?”
“I don’t know, Mamma.” Babi blushed slightly.
“Whatever you prefer. Don’t worry about me.” Raffaella smiled and left the room.
Babi opened a few more drawers. She was happy. She’d really been getting along well with her mother recently. How strange, she thought to herself. Just six months ago they couldn’t look at each other without fighting.
She remembered the end of the trial, when she had left the courthouse and her mother had come running after her, catching up with her outside. “Have you lost your mind? Why didn’t you tell them what really happened? Why didn’t you tell them that that juvenile delinquent beat up Accado without any justification?”
“As far as I’m concerned, things went exactly the way I said they did. Step is innocent. He had nothing to do with any of it. How do you know what he’s been through? What he felt at that moment? You don’t know how to justify, you don’t know how to forgive. The only thing you’re capable of doing is judging others.
“For you, life is like playing a game of gin. Everything you don’t know is just an inconvenient card that you wish you’d never drawn. You don’t know what to do with it; it’s burning a hole in your hands. But you don’t stop to ask why someone is violent, why someone does drugs. What do you care?” Babi asked. “Instead, this time it does mean something to you, Mamma. This time your daughter is dating a guy who has some real problems, who isn’t only interested in driving a sixteen-valve VW Golf GTI, wearing a Rolex Daytona, or vacationing in Sardinia. He’s violent, that’s true, but maybe it’s just because he can’t figure out so many things in this life, because he’s been told so many lies, because that’s the only way he has of reacting.”
“What are you saying? This is all nonsense…Plus, can you just imagine? What are people going to think? You’re a liar. You lied in front of everyone,” Raffaella said.
“I don’t give a damn about your friends, about what they might think or how they judge me. You always say that they’re all self-made men, people who have achieved something. What have they achieved? What have they done with their lives? Made money and spent it. They don’t talk to their children. They really don’t give a damn about what they do or how much they’re suffering. You don’t give a fuck about us.”
That’s when Raffaella hauled off and slapped her right in the face. Babi put one hand to her face and then smiled.
“I said it intentionally, you know? Now that you’ve given me a slap in the face, your conscience is at rest. Now you can go back and chat with your girlfriends and sit playing cards with them. Your daughter has been brought up right. She knows right from wrong. She understands that you shouldn’t say bad words and you should always try to use good manners. Don’t you see how ridiculous you are, how laughable?”
Babi turned and left. Then she climbed onto Step’s motorcycle and rode away with him.
How long ago had that been? How many things had changed? Babi sighed and opened another drawer.
Poor Mamma, the things I put her through. In the end, she was right. Maybe I only realize that now. But there are more important things in life. But she couldn’t actually think of a single one of those things, so much more important, maybe because she preferred not to think about it, because it was just easier this way. Perhaps it was because there really aren’t that many things that matter.
“You look so sexy this evening.” One after another, the memories came back to Babi, implacable, melancholy, sad, and distant now. The weekends they’d spent together, fleeing on the wings of this lie or that. Always the four of them, with Pollo and Pallina, at the beach or in the mountains, at little restaurants, out on delightful moonlight strolls, standing somewhere chatting at night, or sitting on a low wall, lying on a beach, lost in the shadows on some uncomfortable cot.
Her eighteenth birthday party in Ansedonia. Ten at night, a sudden roar of motorcycles. All the guests rushing over to the edge of the terrace. Finally something to talk about. Step, Pollo, and all his friends had arrived. They dismounted from the motorcycles and strode into the party, laughing, brash, bold, and confident, looking around, his friends on the hunt for some pretty girl or other, and he on the hunt for her.