Michele - 4. Chapter 4

The morning of the expedition dawned with a few scattered clouds in the sky. For once, Michele had slept like a log, catching up after the previous wakeful night.

Michele dressed for hot weather. If they really were going to hike to the old watchtower, he felt he should be prepared. He opted for his thinnest white t-shirt and a lightweight pair of pale khaki shorts.

Somehow, Michele didn’t think his mother would approve of him going to a remote and dangerous site with some of the meanest kids in town, so he told her nothing of his plans for the day ahead.

“Still no luck with Toto?” she asked before he left.

Michele shook his head. “I couldn’t find him yesterday.”

Chiara sighed. “I’m sorry to leave you on your own like this again, caro. It didn’t seem so bad to leave you at home each day when I knew you could spend the day with Toto.”

Michele shrugged. “It’s okay, Mamma.”

“It’s my day off tomorrow. I promise we’ll spend some time together,” she said, planting a kiss on his cheek.

Once she had set off on her daily commute down to Amalfi, Michele grabbed a light shoulder bag and loaded it up with a few provisions. He took two bottles of water, a chunk of bread and some spreadable cheese to serve as a snack.

Michele decided that part of him was looking forward to this trip. He and Toto had often looked down on the Torre dello Ziro from among the olive groves on the other side of the valley, and had wondered what it would be like to explore it. However, their parents had never encouraged them to go up there on their own.

Yes, he would enjoy the visit. But he wished he were going there with Toto.

* * *

At the appointed time, Michele arrived at the spot where he had met up with Enzo and his friends two days ago. The others weren’t long in arriving; they coasted into the street together on their scooters, rucksacks already loaded with supplies for whatever they had planned for the day. Enzo was wearing his leather jacket again, despite the rapidly rising temperature. At the sight of Enzo’s brutish face and the looks of dim-witted enthusiasm on the faces of his two friends, Michele’s heart sank a little.

Who was I kidding? This isn’t going to be fun at all.

“Ciao, Michele!” Enzo called. “We’re ready to go. Climb on board.”

“Ciao, Enzo,” Michele replied dutifully, walking over to where Enzo sat waiting, his engine idling. He climbed on board, smelling the strong scent of the older boy’s deodorant mixed with a sour undertone of sweat.

“Rumour has it that your fairy friend Toto went camping with the two queer boys last night,” Enzo said. “I wonder what they’ve been up to on that mountain.”

Filippo and Antonio chortled.

Once again, Michele marvelled at the mess he had got himself into. How he wished that he, too, could have been camping with Gianni, Angelo and Toto last night instead of sitting here now on the back of Enzo’s Vespa, in spite of what Enzo seemed to be suggesting.

I hope you had fun, Toto.

Something that Michele had hardly realised was bothering him suddenly came out as a question. “Who’s the girl?” he asked Enzo.

“Claudia?” Enzo said, an unexpected lightness entering his voice once again. “She’s Angelo Rossi’s sister.”

“Claudia and Toto seemed pretty friendly when I saw them a couple of days ago,” Michele said gloomily.

Enzo spat on the ground. “Yeah, well, if she wants to waste her time on a fairy boy like him, that’s her loss,” he said harshly. “Let’s go, boys!”

They turned and sped out of the street, turning onto the road that descended into the head of the valley. Passing the turning for Scala, they bombed down the road that led down towards the coast. Reaching a series of hairpin bends, they took them at speed, leaning sideways as they turned. Michele closed his eyes and gritted his teeth, holding onto Enzo for dear life.

“A bit less tight, please, Michele,” Enzo growled. “You’re crushing my kidneys.”

At about halfway down the valley, they turned off the main road and climbed a side road leading up into the village of Pontone, an eclectic heap of old houses that crowded over the head of the narrow rocky crag on which the Torre dello Ziro stood.

The one and only road through the village took them as far as they could get by bike, so they chained the scooters to some railings and set off on foot through the narrow pedestrian streets. For a while they passed along a shady little alleyway where a stream tumbled along a stone channel to one side like a miniature acqueduct. Michele dipped his fingers in the water as they went, and wetted his brow against the intense July heat.

They emerged from the buildings at the foot of a flight of stone steps climbing up a rockface. From a distance, this crag had always looked quite impassable to Michele, a tangle of vertical cliffs, straggly trees and narrow rocky ridges that didn’t look like they could possibly support a path. To begin with, however, it surpassed his expectations. They passed through a gate into a quiet clearing at the interior of the headland with dry grass at its centre. Small pine trees crowded in from all sides, hanging over low stone walls and dropping their fragrant needles and cones onto the ground. The clearing rang loudly to the scraping sound of the cicadas.

Michele felt that this could be a magical place, if you could only come with the right person.

Filippo led the way for a while, tracing a path up and down steep, neglected-looking stairways. Of the three, he was the one who knew the area best. He told a trashy tale about how he had come here with some girl and had almost lost his virginity.

“Then she had some kind of, like, religious crisis,” he said, “and left me here all hot and bothered with nowhere to put it.”

“I bet you banged one out there and then,” Enzo snorted.

“It’s good in the open air,” Filippo shouted, and the three older boys guffawed.

Michele followed at a distance, wishing he were anywhere else but here. They were now following a broad footpath that hugged the side of one of the cliffs. An unfenced edge to the left led to a sheer drop into the valley. Almost directly below, a chaotic jumble of terracotta rooftops comprised the village of Atrani at the water’s edge. The cars travelling the coast road looked like ants. Staving off a wave of dizziness that threatened to overwhelm him, Michele cast his eyes upwards instead. High above them now, on the far side of the valley, he could see the high stone crag where Ravello’s Villa Cimbrone gardens stood. At the top of the cliff, the gardens’ scenic terrace was dotted with visitors admiring the panoramic views of the sea; Michele had stood up there with Toto many times, enjoying the scenery in total safety. From where he stood now, the marble busts that stood along the outer wall of the terrace were little more than white dots.

When they finally reached the end of the path, Michele was glad of the rest. His knees were aching from the steepness of the endlessly descending stairs.

The watchtower itself was a small round ruin that stood on one of the narrowest points of the crag. From here, it was possible to look down off one side of the cliff to Atrani, while the other side offered a wider view over the sprawling resort of Amalfi. Pleasure boats came and went from the large marina, while the grey sandy beach was lined with serried ranks of coloured parasols.

They took it in turns to climb to a viewing balcony within the remains of the tower. Michele felt a small moment of triumph as he stared almost vertically down at the coast. He thought to himself that, if he ever did manage to make up with Toto, he would have to bring him here. He was sure his friend would love it.

“Pretty cool, huh?” Michele heard Filippo ask the others.

“Yeah, we’re, like, kings of the world up here…” Antonio replied.

Enzo seemed less impressed. “Where can we go for a drink?” he said offhandedly.

Filippo said they could sit down at a belvedere that was even higher up, at the end of the cliff at the highest point of the crag, so they turned and retraced their steps along the unfenced path. Michele’s legs protested at the climb, and he drank some of his water, wishing he’d thought to bring his baseball cap against the sun.

After hiking up the hill for a while longer, they emerged at a concrete and cobblestone platform. It stood right at the end of the cliff as Filippo had promised, with just a low metal fence and a thin strip of straggly grass between them and the sheer drop. They settled down facing each other on a pair of concrete benches. Enzo produced a pack of cigarettes and offered them round; Michele shook his head.

“Kids,” Enzo snorted again, but he didn’t seem that bothered.

The three older boys returned to discussing their attempted romantic conquests. Michele suspected this was for his benefit. None of them seemed to have quite managed to see it through with a girl, although they all tried their best to make their exploits sound impressive. After a while, Filippo produced two bottles of beer that he had swiped from his father’s cupboard. He popped one open and they passed it round. When the foul-smelling drink came into to Michele’s hands, he pretended to take a swig and then passed it on, wiping traces of the drink off his lips with the back of his hand.

“Say, Michele,” Enzo said after a while. “These two stronsi have told us their stories, but we haven’t heard anything from you. What’s the furthest you’ve ever got with a girl?”

Michele looked back at him blankly. “I… I haven’t…”

Enzo howled with laughter. “Nowhere? Man, we need to find you a girlfriend.” His jovial manner faded. “You do want a girlfriend, don’t you?”

Michele felt himself flush. “Sure, yeah… of course I do.”

Antonio was looking at him with a sleazy grin on his face. Michele looked away and rummaged in his bag to cover his embarrassment.

Enzo stretched, stamped out his cigarette butt on the concrete floor and rose from his bench. “I’ve got to take a piss.”

Filippo followed suit. “Me too.”

The two older boys left the belvedere to look for some suitable trees to water. Michele was left alone with Antonio, who crossed over the platform to sit next to him.

“I know better,” Antonio said, grinning and licking his lips playfully. “I don’t think you do want a girlfriend. I think you liked it when Toto kissed you.”

Michele shifted away from him a little. “What? No! Shut up.”

“You don’t need to hide it from me,” Antonio leered, and sliding closer, he placed a sweaty hand on Michele’s bare thigh and rubbed it gently up and down.

For a couple of seconds, Michele froze in a sick kind of horror, but then he thought of the others and his paralysis broke.

“Get off me!” he cried in disgust. He sprang to his feet and backed away.

“Come on, Michele,” Antonio coaxed.

“No!” Michele replied. He turned to leave, but came face to face with Enzo and Filippo, who were just returning, doing up their flies.

“What’s going on?” Enzo asked, looking suspiciously from Michele to Antonio. He had obviously spotted that something was wrong.

Antonio was on his feet at once, his manner completely changed. “This little queer boy touched me, Enzo,” he shrieked. “I swear it!”

“No…” Michele repeated. He turned towards the exit again, but Enzo and Filippo barred his way off the platform.

“You’re not going anywhere, Michele,” Enzo growled. “What kind of sick game are you playing?”

“Please… it’s not true…” Michele protested weakly, retreating down the belvedere towards the railings. Now all three of the older boys closed ranks and advanced on him, blocking his escape completely.

“We’ve got to pound him, Enzo,” Filippo urged. “We can’t let him do that to Toni.”

Enzo nodded, and they advanced a little further. Desperately, Michele looked around for another way out. He thought he saw a rough path of sorts just outside the belvedere walls… if he could just get to it, maybe he could outflank the others and make a run for it.

He edged towards the railings and put one leg over them onto the narrow strip of grass beyond.

“What are you doing, queer boy?” Enzo asked, puzzlement clouding his anger for a moment. “There’s no way out that way.”

Michele ignored him and took his other leg over the railings, facing the other boys over the metal bars. His escape was almost in sight. He took a sideways step towards the wider ground, planning to turn and run…

Something gave way suddenly under his feet, and all of a sudden he was falling. Instinct took hold and he flailed out with his arms, catching hold of a straggly shrub that was growing out of the cliff to his right. He cried out as his full weight pulled down on the one arm and he swung hard into the cliff face, grazing his right cheekbone painfully against the stone. Somehow, his left hand found a handhold among the rocks, but his feet were dangling uselessly in empty air.

He glanced down over his left shoulder, and the distant rooftops of Amalfi swam into view far below. Below him was nothing but empty space. He whimpered and looked up; three pale, horrified faces had appeared at the railings looking back down at him, but none of the older boys tried to reach him. He felt the shrub shift a little, as if its roots were beginning to loosen in the impoverished soil.

“HELP ME!” he screamed.

“Shit…” Filippo squeaked. “Let’s go! Come on!”

And he fled. The others lingered for another split second but then they, too, were gone. Michele was left alone, clinging to the uneven rocks and the creaking shrub, sure, then and there, that he was about to die.

Toto… Mamma… I’m sorry…

Their faces swam before his eyes and he scrabbled at the cliff with his feet, weeping with the effort, trying to find purchase. The rocks under his left hand started to crumble, a few small pieces tumbling away into the void below him. He searched the cliff even harder with his feet, trying to find something, anything, with some grip.

Please… he prayed. I don’t want to die today!

Somehow, his left foot found a small crevice, and he jammed the toe of his trainers into it as hard as he could, boosting the left side of his body with a desperate effort until he found a handhold among the rocks at the top of the cliff. Gripping the rocks with all his strength, he lifted himself up and – miraculously – his right hand found the railings.

Gasping, chest pounding, he pulled himself up the railings like a ladder, tumbled over the top and sprawled on the cobblestones, eyes closed against the blue glare of the sky.

He pulled in a single, ragged breath and howled, hot tears streaming down his grazed and dusty cheeks.

* * *

He wasn’t sure how long he lay there. It may have been a minute, it may have been several; for a while, he was just gone.

Eventually he came to his senses enough to know that he had to move. He couldn’t just lie here, baking in the afternoon sun.

He dragged himself to his feet on knees that felt like jelly. He staggered back up to the benches, holding on to the stone wall of the belvedere for support, until he found his discarded shoulder bag. Shakily, he took out one of the water bottles and downed half the contents. The rest, he sprinkled over his hair and his face against the relentless heat of the cloudless sky.

They left me!

Michele didn’t think he could manage the walk back up to Ravello on his own.

Mamma… a voice in his fractured mind thought.

He would go down instead.

Michele lifted the bag strap over his head and began his journey. First one foot, then the other… soon he had made it to the dappled shade of the small pine trees that lined the top of the crag.

He allowed his mind to drift away again and kept on walking, barely thinking, eyes fixed on the path before him. Gradually he travelled the length of the crag until he found himself back on the edge of the village. His innate sense of direction took over, and he turned left down a steep lane that could only lead down towards Amalfi.

Down and down he plodded, stone step after stone step, on legs that felt like lead weights. Passing between isolated houses and under overhanging rocks, he eventually came out among the scattered houses at the back of the valley in which Amalfi stood.

Michele made his way down through the maze of alleys and steps until he came out on the main street. He turned towards the sea and drifted down the road, passing cheerful tourists and serried ranks of parked Vespa scooters; a lonely, defeated figure in stained and dusty summer clothing.

The bar where his mother worked was just a short into town. Wordlessly, he stepped into the cool and dark interior. His mother, who had been heading towards the outside tables with a tray full of drinks, stopped in her tracks.

“Michele?” she whispered, her eyes flicking up and down in horror at the sight of her grazed and battered son.

Unshouldering his bag, he placed it slowly on the floor, and then collapsed at her feet in a dead faint.

* * *

Michele came to a short while later. He seemed to have been rushed into the bar’s small office room. He was lying on a small sofa with his head on a cushion, and his mother was anxiously bathing his forehead with a damp tea towel.

“Mamma…” he breathed.

“What happened to you, Michele?” his mother asked. “Please tell me.”

Slowly, falteringly, Michele told his story. This time, he left nothing out. By the time he had finished, his mother was in tears.

“Oh, my poor, sweet boy,” she said. “Why didn’t you tell me sooner?”

Michele turned his head away in shame. “I thought I could handle it.”

The owner of the bar, a man called Maurizio, sent for a taxi so that Michele could be taken home. Chiara apologised profusely to him for the lost work time and promised to make the hours up another day. Maurizio waved this offer away and told her not to worry about it. Some things, he said, were more important.

Michele, who had talked himself out completely in recounting his tale, was silent throughout the journey home. His mother sat with him in the back of the car, holding his hand.

Michele also said little when they got home. Staggering into the shower, he stayed under the jets of warm water for a long time, allowing the dust and the dirt to run from his body. His cheekbone stung where he had grazed it, and he was nursing bumps and bruises on his arms and his chest.

Once he was clean, he felt a little better. He dressed carelessly in a tatty old pair of sports trousers and a baggy red hoodie, then picked up some old comic books and adjourned to the living area. His mother stayed nearby as he read, but she didn’t press him to talk.

* * *

Later that evening, once Michele had eaten an early dinner and reading had lost its appeal, he asked his mother if he could go for a walk on his own.

“Are you sure, tesoro?” she asked. “You’ve had such a terrible day. You must be exhausted.”

He nodded. “I won’t go far,” he promised. “I just need to clear my head.”

“All right,” she said doubtfully, “but don’t be too long.”

Michele went out via the sun terrace and stepped down onto the road below their house. The sun had lost its earlier ferocity and bathed him in low, golden rays as he walked. He turned up the hill, thinking of Toto, heading instinctively for the little piazza at San Cosma.

Michele halted on the threshold of the piazza as he realised that someone was already there.

It was Toto, smartly turned out in a blue shirt and khaki shorts, staring contemplatively into the little shrine where they had met up so many times before. Michele’s old friend seemed different. It was something in the way he was standing; Toto seemed more mature, somehow, as if he had grown up a lot during the last four days.

Michele didn’t feel mature at all, and he didn’t feel ready for this moment, but he had lingered for too long: Toto glanced up, and saw him.

For a moment, they both froze. Toto’s brown eyes registered surprise, and then, as he took in Michele’s sorry appearance, something else… something that looked like compassion.

Michele took a few tentative steps towards his old friend and stood a few feet away, hands in his pockets.

“Ciao, Toto,” he said quietly.

“Ciao,” Toto replied, looking Michele up and down uncertainly. “How are you?”

Michele shrugged and looked at the ground, kicking at the tarmac with a battered trainer.

“Ok, I guess,” Michele mumbled.

Michele could tell Toto had a hundred questions on his mind, but the thought of retelling his tale so soon made him want to cry all over again. For a moment, his chest hitched, but then he brought himself under control.

“I really missed you,” Michele managed at length.

And if you never wanted to see me again, he thought, I wouldn’t blame you.

But Toto said no such thing. Instead, he took a step towards Michele, an unfamiliar depth of feeling in his eyes.

“I missed you, too,” he replied. “So much…”

Michele looked anxiously up at him. Please don’t… not again…

But, instead, Toto just opened his arms in a gesture of submission. “I know you don’t… you know… like I do,” he began.

Michele shook his head, pain welling up inside him. Toto, I don’t KNOW what I want!

“But… if you like,” Toto added hopefully, “we could still be friends.”

Michele could restrain his tears no longer. Finally giving into them, he stepped forward and flung his arms around the other boy, burying his face in Toto’s shoulder. His chest shook as he wept.

Michele felt Toto’s arms close gently around him. He felt the briefest of touches as Toto kissed his forehead, and then they were silent.

This was where he needed to be. And, for now, it was enough.

-End-