Last Summer in the City by Gianfranco Calligarich

Author:Gianfranco Calligarich
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Farrar, Straus and Giroux

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But I was at the end of my tether, truth be told, and when I found myself on the street, heading for Ponte Sisto, I started to kick the garbage cans, overturning them on the cobblestones. The river was black and in the distance the beacon on the Gianicolo pierced the sky at regular intervals. On Campo de’ Fiori they were already setting up the market stalls for the next day and I took two apples from a pile of crates and ate them as I walked toward Piazza Navona. The fountain glistened motionlessly on its blue base in the middle of the deserted square. The square was magnificent at that hour, as if aware of its own splendor and its own pointless survival. I settled down under the arches and sat there looking at it, waiting to feel the desire to go home. But the desire didn’t come and so it occurred to me to go to the sea. The deserted streets urged me to start up my old Alfa Romeo. I got there in less than half an hour.

It was vast, immense, dark. I went and sat down at the end of a jetty. The sea was all about me, the waves beating on the shore, and, in the distance, in the darkness, the lamps of the fishing boats winked. What did old Cavafy say? The city will follow you, he said. For elsewhere, he said, do not hope, there is no ship for you, there is no road, just as you’ve wasted your life here, in this little corner, you’ve ruined it in the entire world. He knew a thing or two, that old Cavafy. I smoked a couple of cigarettes and thought about the packed suitcase I’d left at home. Well, I’d arrived where I meant to arrive. Now all I could do was turn back.

From some very distant place, the sky was starting to lighten by the time I got home. Outside the gate, a little English car was parked. I knew it well by now. And the girl who was inside it, fast asleep in her seat. “Arianna,” I said, “what are you doing here?”

It took her a while to figure out where she was. Then she tried to smile. “Oh, Leo!” she said. “I was afraid you wouldn’t come back.”

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