The Italian Teacher(9)
“You’re far too kind. I couldn’t possibly.”
“Couldn’t you?” Natalie mutters under her breath. “Why you came here, no? Broke.”
Cecil looks over, pained.
“What’s that, sweetie?” Bear asks his wife, calling to the waiter for a bottle of red now. He returns to Cecil. “I’m warning you. You don’t let me help, and there will be dire consequences. For a start, I tell Romolo to cancel your pizza—and Romolo listens to me.” Affectionately, Bear pokes his son’s gut. “Cecil, I’m determined on this point. You are going places, and I want to say I helped.”
“If I were going places, I’d be there already, I daresay.” Cecil looks into his lap, as if a map rested there. “You know, I did want to sculpt once, and would’ve cut off my left arm merely to be adequate. But my drive just went.” He looks up. “To tell the truth, I’ve felt better ever since.”
“Hear that, Natty? Take a page out of this man’s book.”
“A page?” she responds, smoking hard. “You’re saying I ought to give up on making art?”
“What in hell you talking about, sweetie?”
“I never gave up,” Cecil clarifies. “Merely that I stopped trying to impress people I didn’t even care for.”
“Why impress anyone, if not the people you don’t care for?” she responds.
“Point is,” Bear intercedes, clasping her forearm, “can’t let the bastards get you down is all Cecil’s saying. But sure, the business ain’t for everyone. It’s a foul mess, art is. Am I right?”
Cecil nods wistfully. “Can be, yes.”
“You are a talent, my Natty. If you want to be. All it takes is a bit more oomph. But who says you’ve got to?” He takes a drag off her cigarette, then stubs it.
“I was still smoking that.”
“You hearing what I’m saying, sweetheart?” He takes her hand, his other on Cecil’s chest, gripping the man’s tweed jacket, as if unifying two comrades. “It’s not just me saying so. Your teacher agrees. Ain’t that so?”
Cecil’s eyebrows rise in confirmation.
“You’re humiliating me,” she tells Bear.
“I’m saying you’re swell,” he corrects her. “Who cares what others think! Oh, for crying out loud.” He drops her hand, releasing Cecil too, and fills his own glass too high with wine.
“On what basis might I be decent?” Natalie asks, hope in her voice.
Pinch realizes that, oddly, it’s Bear’s disapproval that stirs his mother.
“Crazy girl.” Bear pulls her chair closer, grabs the back of her neck. “I love the hell out of you, Natty. That is what matters.” He pulls an abandoned pizza crust from her plate, stuffs it into his mouth, and pokes her ribs till she’s in hysterics. Only Pinch sees that his mother’s laughter isn’t pleasant—she’s nearly in tears, pushing her husband back.
Finally, Bear returns Natalie’s body to her control.
Wiping sweat from her upper lip, she holds her own throat, glancing around the trattoria, as if everyone noticed, though the only person watching is Pinch, who pretends to busy himself by gobbling the leftover fiori di zucca. Bear and Cecil resume their sloshy conversation about art versus craft, and Pinch turns his attention there, as if spectating a sporting contest from the stands, most of the action in Dad’s favor.
Bear runs his hand repeatedly through thinning shiny hair, holding the floor as he recounts tales of his failures of long ago, each of which renders his current glory all the richer. When the bill comes, he insists on snapping it up. “No wrestling me for it, Cecil. You’d probably win, and how would I live that down?
The four promenade home down Via del Pellegrino, which is dark and deserted, punctuated by conversation from apartments above. Bear—to emphasize points—keeps stopping, taking Cecil’s forearm, declaiming to his new pal (rather too loudly for this hour). The modest potter chortles, and Natalie steps away, idling outside locked storefronts, Pinch beside her—until a mouse runs over his shoe, causing him to kick the air in fright. The center of Rome is unnerving at night; Pinch has heard of knifings. When a teenager barrels toward them, Pinch tenses, tracking him, watching the kid stop at a decaying pastel-red facade, then holler to a high floor, whose closed shutters crank upward, revealing a little sister, who darts from sight, the glow of light within, the tick of forks.
Bear takes Cecil’s shoulder, leading him forth, and their convoy sets off again, right down the roadway. A distance back, Pinch feeds his arm under Natalie’s, both mimicking Dad and trying to speed her pace, lest they be stranded here.
“Not once,” Natalie mumbles, lost in an argument only she can hear. “All night.”
Pinch looks at his mother, contemplates her, almost asking what she meant—then he slips free, sprinting ahead to join the men. As they turn the corner onto Via dei Banchi Vecchi, Pinch glances back: his mother on distant cobblestones, allowing herself to drop farther and farther behind. On they walk until Natalie is lost from view.
10
Cecil stayed only a week, but he lingers in Bear Bavinsky lore as the comical stoic: “You walked here in the hail with no umbrella? Why, Cecil would’ve loved that!” At any mention of their departed guest, Natalie finds reason to leave the room. Nightly, she works on an apology letter to Cecil and reads various versions to Pinch. Yet she cannot send one; she’s too angry still. Meanwhile, Bear—who was kept away for much of Cecil’s trip—extends that absence, at his studio constantly now. Nobody questions this until another guest appears.