I'm Not Scared by Niccolo Ammaniti

Author:Niccolo Ammaniti [Ammaniti, Niccolo]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General Fiction
Publisher: Canongate Books
Published: 2010-02-22T16:00:00+00:00

Six

When I woke up the old man had gone. He had left the bed unmade, a packet of Dunhills crumpled up on the window sill, his underpants on the floor and the bottle of water half-empty.

It was warm. The cicadas were singing.

I got up and looked into the kitchen. Mama was ironing and listening to the radio. My sister was playing on the floor. I shut the door.

The old man’s suitcase was under the bed. I opened it and looked inside.

Clothes. A bottle of perfume. A flask of Stock 84. A carton of cigarette packets. A folder with a little pack of photographs in it. The first was of a tall thin boy, dressed in blue mechanic’s overalls. He was smiling. He looked like the old man. Francesco, the boy who had jumped off the cliff with his pecker out.

There were some newspaper cuttings in the folder too. Articles about Francesco’s death. There was a picture of his wife too. She looked like a television dancer. I also found a lined school exercise book with a coloured plastic cover. I opened it. Written on the first page was: This exercise book belongs to Filippo Carducci. Fourth C.

The first few pages had been torn out. I leafed through it. There were some dictations, some summaries and an essay.

Describe what you did on Sunday.

On Sunday my papa came home. My papa lives in America a lot and he comes back every now and again. He’s got a villa with a swimming pool and a diving board and there are little wash-bears there. They live in the garden. I must go there. He lives in America because of his job and when he comes back he always brings me presents. This time he brought me some tennis racket things that you put under your feet so you can walk on the snow. Without them you sink in and you might even die. When I go to the mountains I will have to use them when I walk on the snow. Papa told me these rackets are used by the Eskimos. The Eskimos live on the ice at the North Pole and they have ice houses too. Inside they don’t have a fridge because it wouldn’t be any use. They eat a lot of seals and sometimes penguins. He said he will take me there one day. I asked him if Peppino can come too. Peppino is our gardener and he has to cut all the plants and when it is winter he has to take all the leaves off the lawn. Peppino is at least a hundred years old and as soon as he sees a plant he cuts it. He gets very tired and in the evening he has to put his feet in hot water. If he comes with us to the North Pole he won’t have to do anything there, there are no plants there, only snow and he can rest. Papa said he’ll have to think about whether Peppino can come with us.

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