Out of Season Read online

  Epigraph

  I tawt I taw a puddy tat.

  —Tweety Bird

  Contents

  Cover

  Title Page

  Epigraph

  Monday

  Tuesday

  Wednesday

  Thursday

  Friday

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Antonio Manzini

  Copyright

  About the Publisher

  Monday

  The lightning split the night and froze the white cargo van in a photo flash as it raced at high speed from Saint-Vincent in the direction of Aosta.

  “It’s starting to rain,” said the Italian at the wheel.

  “Then why don’t you slow down?” replied the guy with the foreign accent.

  First the thunder, then the rain, which came down like a bucketful of water tossed onto the windshield. The Italian switched on the windshield wipers without slowing down in the slightest. The only other gesture he made was to switch on the brights.

  “When asphalt is wet, becomes slick like soap,” said the foreigner, pulling the cell phone out of his jacket pocket.

  But the Italian refused to slow down.

  The foreigner unfolded a scrap of paper and started punching a number into his phone.

  “Why don’t you put phone numbers into your directory? Like everybody else does?”

  “No directory in phone. All full. And why you not mind your fucking business?” the foreigner replied, punching in the last of the number. The cargo van hit a pothole and they both jerked and bounced.

  “Now I vomit!” said the man with the foreign accent, putting the phone up to his ear.

  “Who are you calling?”

  The other man didn’t reply. He heard a sleepy “Hello . . . who is this?” from the receiver. He grimaced and ended the call. “Got wrong,” he muttered, angrily punching the keys of the old paint-spattered cell phone. Once he was done with it, he put the phone back into his pocket and looked out the window. The road was full of curves and the black-and-white sign announcing twisting curves ahead only loomed up at the last second. The engine’s blown-out head gasket and the rusty muffler emitted a cacophony of noises, like a basket of scrap metal tumbling down a flight of stairs. In the back, the tool box kept sliding from one side of the cargo deck to the other as the van pitched and yawed.

  “This is the universal deluge, my friend!”

  “I’m not your friend,” the foreigner retorted.

  Even with the headlights on bright, the Saint-Vincent to Aosta road was completely invisible. And the Italian kept shifting and downshifting, grinding the gears and jamming down on the gas pedal.

  “Why you not slow down?”

  “Because the sun’s going to be up soon. And by the time the sun’s up, I want to be home! Smoke yourself a cigarette and stop busting my balls, Slawomir.”

  The foreigner scratched his whiskers. “My name isn’t Slawomir, stupid asshole. Slawomir is Polack name, I’m not Polack.”

  “Polack, Serbian, Bulgarian . . . you’re all the same to me.”

  “You’re a dickhead.”

  “Why, isn’t it true? You’re all a bunch of fucking slimeballs. Thieves and gypsies.” Then he added: “Are you afraid of some curves?” and he laughed through clenched teeth. “Huh, gypsy? Are you afraid of them?”

  “No, I’m afraid of what a bad driver you are. And I’m not a gypsy.”

  “What, does that make you mad? What’s wrong with being a gypsy, anyway? You shouldn’t be asha—”

  A sudden flat thump interrupted him. The cargo van swerved to one side.

  “Fuck!” He tried to swing the steering wheel around in the opposite direction.

  The foreigner screamed, the Italian screamed, and the three surviving wheels all screamed in unison. At least until a second tire blew, and then the van lurched forward. It shot through a wooden rail, knocked down the pole with the speed limit sign, and came to a halt against a couple of larch trees on the side of the road. The windshield exploded, the wipers twisted and bent, the engine fell silent.

  The foreigner and the Italian sat motionless, glassy eyes fixed on some distant point while blood oozed from their mouths and eye sockets. Their necks broken, shapeless as a pair of marionettes with their strings cut. Another flash of lightning and the glare caught a still of two dull faces, eyes with pupils made of ice.

  The rain drummed down with its demented rhythm on the sheet metal of the van’s roof. The wrecked cargo van with its headlights still blazing creaked as it shifted in precarious equilibrium, perched on the roots that stuck out of the dirt. The van gave one last lurch as it settled on the soil, making the lifeless bodies of the two men bounce in their seats.

  It had taken three seconds from the first blowout to when the cargo van smeared itself against the tree trunks.

  Three seconds. No time at all. Barely a sigh.

  Three seconds is how long it took Deputy Police Chief Rocco Schiavone to figure out where he was. An eternity.

  He’d opened his eyes without recognizing the walls, the doors, and the smell of his home.

  Where am I? he asked himself, while his sleep-dazed eyes circumnavigated the space around him. The dim light in the room didn’t help. He was in a bed, not his own, in a room, not his own, in an apartment, not his own. And most likely, the apartment building wasn’t his either. He hoped at least that he was in the same city as last night, the city where he’d been living for nine months now, expiating his transgressions: Aosta.

  Seeing the body of the woman lying right next to him helped him put the pieces back together. She was sleeping peacefully. Her hair spread out, loose and black, on the pillow. Her eyes were shut and they trembled ever so slightly beneath the eyelids. She was opening her lips a little, as if kissing someone in her sleep. One leg was uncovered and the foot dangled off the edge of the mattress.

  He’d fallen asleep in Anna’s apartment! What was happening to him? Wrong! A first false step, a palpable risk of slipping into a comfortable routine! The danger of an unasked-for integration into that city and its inhabitants scared him right down to the roots of his hair, making him sit bolt upright on the mattress. He rubbed his face vigorously.

  No, this can’t be, he thought. In the past nine months, he’d never once slept away from home. This was the start of the slippery slope, he was well aware . . . and then, before you knew it, you were a regular in a local café, you started striking up friendships with the fruit vendor, the tobacconist, even the guy at the newsstand, until one fine day your barista utters the fateful phrase: “The usual, Dottore?” and you were done for. You automatically became a citizen of Aosta.

  He set both feet down on the floor. Warm. Fuzzy. Wall-to-wall carpeting. He stood up and in the half-light of a leaden dawn, as pale as a fish’s belly, he ventured toward a chair that embraced a pile of clothing—his clothing. A sharp blow to his toes lit up his brain, then a lightning bolt of pain hit him.

  He silently threw himself back onto the bed, frantically grabbing at his left foot, which had kicked the sharp edge of a chair leg. Rocco knew perfectly well that it was one of those ferocious, savage pains that, because God is merciful, do at least have the advantage of being short-lived. All you had to do was clench your teeth for a couple of seconds and it would all be over. He cursed in silence, he didn’t want to wake the sleeping woman. Not because he was particularly solicitous of her sleep, but because if she did wake up, he’d have to engage in a serious discussion and he had neither the desire nor the time. She ground out a couple of mysterious words between her lips, then turned over and went on sleeping. The pain in his foot, sharp and merciless, was starting to fade, and soon it was nothing but a memory. Fully awake n
ow, he put both hands on his face and flashes of the evening flicked before him, as if his eyes had been transformed into a slide projector.

  A chance encounter with Anna, the best friend of Nora Tardioli, his now ex-girlfriend, at the Caffè Centrale. Her usual smile, her usual feline gaze, her eyes tip-tilted, the eyes of a murderous she-cat, the usual getup of a dark lady of the provinces. Glass of wine. Idle chitchat.

  “You do know, don’t you, Rocco, that Nora expects you to call her sooner or later?”

  “You do know that I’m not going to call Nora ever again, right?”

  “You know, you two haven’t spoken since her birthday.”

  “You know, that’s something I do intentionally.”

  “You know, Rocco, she really cares about you.”

  “You know, Nora is having an affair with the architect Pietro Bucci-Something-or-Other.”

  Laughter from Anna. Raucous, slashing, mocking laughter, which made Rocco horny as hell.

  “You know, you’re wrong there. Pietro Bucci Rivolta is mine.”

  Anna jerked her thumb toward her chest, making the silver necklace that dangled over her neckline jangle.

  “But why are you so interested in me and Nora?”

  “Because you’re making her suffer.”

  “There’s nothing else I can do. Evidently, I’m not what she needs.”

  “Why, are you saying that you know what Nora needs? It isn’t much, Rocco. Nora isn’t asking for much. She’d be happy with the basics.”

  Anna ordering two more glasses of wine.

  Then another two.

  “Shall we go?”

  The street. Dim lights. The entrance to Anna’s building, not far from Rocco’s.

  “I live around here.”

  “Then it won’t take you long to get home.”

  Anna smiling, her eyes dark and glistening. Her eyes tip-tilted as usual. Still the eyes of a murderous she-cat.

  “You don’t like me one bit, do you, Anna?”

  “No. Not one bit. Oh, God, I guess you’re not a complete loss, physically speaking. Fine sharp nose, smoldering dark fake-Latin-lover eyes, you’re tall, you have nice shoulders, and plenty of hair on your head. But you know what? I wouldn’t even board a cable car with a guy like you, just to get up to the ski slopes. I’d wait for the next car.”

  “Well, don’t worry, it’s not a risk you’re about to run. I don’t ski. See you around.”

  “Maybe so . . . but I hope not.”

  He lunges at Anna. He kisses her. She lets him. And with the hand behind her back, she opens the front door.

  Going upstairs.

  And they fuck. Forty-five minutes, maybe fifty. And for Rocco, that’s one for the record books.

  Anna’s breasts. Her hair, loose and black. Her muscular legs.

  “I do Pilates.”

  Her arms, firm and shapely.

  “That’s the Pilates, too.”

  Exhausted and sweaty, both sprawled on the bed.

  “Girl, I’m too old for this, you know.”

  “So am I.”

  “What about the Pilates?”

  “It’s not enough.”

  “You’re very pretty.”

  “You’re not.”

  They both laugh.

  “Water?”

  “Water.”

  Anna getting out of bed. Firm ass cheeks. Rocco thinking: Pilates again. She goes into the kitchen. He knows it because he hears the sound of the refrigerator door. She comes back to bed.

  “Next time will you tie me up?”

  “I’ll handcuff you, actually. That’s more my line of work.”

  Rocco guzzling from the bottle of mineral water. Anna showing him her paintings, which hang on every wall in the apartment. Flowers and landscapes. Which she paints, to fill her endless afternoons of boredom. He falls asleep like a child as she shows him a Tuscan marina.

  He quickly got dressed. Underwear, trousers, shirt, Clarks desert boots, jacket—and with a catlike step he left the bedroom and Anna’s apartment.

  The air outside was cold, partly because of the rain that had fallen all night long, and the sun had not yet appeared. But a glow on the horizon announced that it was going to be a beautiful day. He looked up and saw a very few clouds grazing lazily in the midst of the sky.

  He pulled out his cell phone and glanced at the time. Six fifteen.

  Too early to go get breakfast but too late to go back to sleep. His house keys jangled in his pocket, as if suggesting a shower before heading over to the café on Piazza Chanoux.

  He walked along quickly, his shoulder brushing the walls like a cat out late, striding past the two cross streets that separated his apartment from Anna’s, and finally returned home.

  As was to be expected, the apartment was empty. For that matter, even Marina wasn’t there. She wasn’t in bed, she wasn’t in the living room watching some pre-dawn newscast, nor was she in the bathroom taking a shower or in the kitchen making breakfast. It was as if she’d heard him come in. As if Marina had seen the unslept-in bed and had understood that Rocco hadn’t come home that night. For the first time in all these months, he’d slept away from home, and maybe she hadn’t liked the new development. So now she was sulking and refusing to show herself.

  Without bothering to look around, he slipped into the bathroom and turned on the hot water. He took off his clothes and stepped into the shower, shampooing his hair and running the water over his body for several long minutes. He only stepped out of the shower once the steam had turned the bathroom into a Turkish hammam. He cleaned the mirror with the flat of his hand and his face appeared before him, in all its dingy squalor. Bags under his eyes, reddened eyelids, wrinkles over his cheekbones. He snarled and took a look at his teeth. He wished that Marina might pop out of that blanket of dense steam. But no such luck. He picked up the bar of shaving soap and began the process of shaving.

  By eight o’clock, he was at the café on the piazza, the second obligatory destination of the morning. Then he walked from there to police headquarters. All of this without even noticing that, high overhead, instead of clouds there was now a clear blue sky.

  He stealthily entered the office. He avoided the questions from Officer Casella, who was standing in the doorway, and hurried down the hallway to avoid meeting D’Intino or Deruta, the two officers he’d dubbed “the De Rege Brothers” in honor of the Piedmontese comics, a pair of dumb-and-dumber buffoons from nearly a century ago, repopularized by Walter Chiari and Carlo Campanini when Rocco was just a kid, hunched over in the living room—which also served as his grandmother’s bedroom—watching the old black-and-white television set.

  Before starting a day at work, Rocco needed to smoke a joint, and in order to do that, he necessarily had to sprawl comfortably in the chair at his desk with his office door closed, in silence. Absolute silence.

  He went in and sat down at his desk. He pulled out a joint. A little stale, but still acceptable. After just three tokes, things already started to go better. Yes, the temperature was going to change and, yes, all he had ahead of him was a quiet day in the office.

  Someone knocked at the door. Rocco rolled his eyes. He stubbed the joint out in the ashtray. “Who is it?”

  There was no answer.

  “I said: ‘Who is it?’”

  Still no answer. Rocco got up and threw open the window, to eliminate the stench of cannabis.

  “Who is it?” he shouted again as he strode toward the door.

  Still not a word. He opened the door.

  It was D’Intino, the Abruzzese officer, who was waiting silently like a watchdog.

  “D’Intino, is it too much trouble for you to say your own name?”

  “No, why?”

  “Because for the past hour I’ve been shouting, ‘Who is it?’”

  “Ah. Were you talking to me?”

  “Well, were you the one who knocked at the door?”

  “Of course.”

  “When someone knocks on a d
oor and, on the other side of the door, someone asks who is it, who do you think they’re talking to?”

  “I don’t know . . .”

  “Listen, D’Intino, I don’t want to ruin a day that actually seems to have gotten off on the right foot. So, I’m going to make an effort to be nice and try to figure out what’s wrong. Shall we just start over?”

  D’Intino nodded his head.

  “So now I’m going to close the door and you knock again.”

  He suited action to words. He shut the door. He waited ten seconds. Nothing happened.

  “D’Intino, you have to knock at the door!” he bellowed.

  Ten seconds later, D’Intino knocked at the door.

  “Good. Now, who is it?” Rocco shouted.

  No answer.

  “I said: Who is it?”

  “Me.”

  “Me who!?”

  “Me.”

  Rocco opened the door again. D’Intino, as expected, was still standing there.

  “All right, now, me who?”

  “But, sir, you knew it was me.”

  He smacked him flat-handed on the back, three times. D’Intino hunched his neck deep down into his shoulders, and took the smacks from his boss with faint objections. “Yes, but I said it was me because you’d already seen me, sir, right? And so I said to myself, why shouldn’t I . . .”

  “Stop!” shouted Rocco, reaching up and placing his hand over the policeman’s mouth. “Enough is enough, D’Intino. We’ve determined that it was you who was knocking. Now tell me, what is this about?”

  “A bad, bad crash on the state highway.”

  “So what?”

  “Two dead.”

  “Well?”

  “The highway patrol wants to know if we can come.”

  Rocco put his face in his hands. Then he shouted: “Pierron!” He couldn’t take anymore of D’Intino, he needed to talk to someone with an IQ higher than that of an orangutan.

  Ten seconds went by and the face of Italo Pierron, the best officer he had, peered in from a side door. “Yes sir, at your orders!”

  “What’s all this about a crash?”

  “On the state highway from Saint-Vincent . . . a cargo van. There are two fatalities.”