I
He was awakened by the pattering of raindrops on the windowsill and blinds. He frowned without opening his eyes. A summer storm raged outside — there was the whistling of the wind and that drumming that was getting on his nerves more and more. Thud... thud-thud... Thud... Thud, thud, thud... thud... God, how he hated that sound! The rain reminded him of that day, and of the other one too... If he hadn’t followed Kalo and gone to the cliffs that day, everything would surely be different now.
He woke up fully.
He had a career, plans... He had friends, a future... He thought he had climbed to the top of the world. What does he have from all that today? Nothing! One big nothing!
He had already forgotten when he last wrote. In the state he was in, of course, it was impossible for him to continue working at the company. In the new situation, he might have adapted to the job, but he had no desire, no motivation. Everything, he once had, was gone. Once Sebastian Catano, a superior personality, writer and screenwriter, a desirable bachelor, a smiling man... and today, just his shadow.
He left Sicily and came to the family summer house in the south of Calabria. He used to come there to write because the environment and the house he was in somehow had a good effect on him. This time he came for a completely different reason. He came to face and reconcile with himself, with memories, with mistakes and... to think about how to move on. However, he was mistaken, coming to that house was another mistake in a series. He did not accomplish anything he came for. He did not find peace or accept his condition, nor did he get rid of the memory or the cause of all his troubles. And how could he, when every foot, every inch of the house reminded him of her. He found himself in a vicious circle; he no longer knew where the boundary between day and night was, the boundary between love and hate, the boundary between life and death.
He did not differentiate between day and night; they were the same for him. He placed an equal sign between loving and hating, and the life he was living could no longer be called life. It could not be called life that he slept, ate, and occasionally had sex with paid prostitutes. Admittedly, he only slept when he was thoroughly drunk, after one or two bottles of whiskey; the images from the past, which were constantly before his eyes, wouldn’t let him sleep. He ate when he felt extreme hunger, which he didn’t often feel due to the excessive intake of carbohydrates, i.e., whiskey. He had lost weight and muscle tone because he had stopped working out, running, and swimming. He didn't need those whores either, but it was the only way to get rid of the constant tension. It's true that those girls had to work very hard to get him an erection, but money makes everything possible.
He took a deep breath before shouting at the top of his lungs: – Antonio!
Soon there was a knock on the door. A middle-aged man entered the room. – Do you need something, sir?
– Bring me a bottle of whiskey – he said gruffly.
– You’ve just sobered up... – the old man muttered.
– Antonio, this is the last time I’m warning you about two things: if I hear you address me formally again, and if you try to meddle in my life one more time, both you and Maria will be out of here. Is that clear?
– Clear – Antonio replied calmly. – I have something to say to you too, for the last time... son. If you continue like this, we will leave on our own because we don’t want to witness your suicide.
– Oh, I’m really worried! – Sebastian laughed sarcastically. – You won’t be the only ones who’ve turned their backs on me.
– You’ve turned your back on yourself – the old man said, leaving the room.
***
Allegra Bellini stood up from her desk and walked to the window. Her gaze was fixed on the dark clouds that hung over Rome.
The first drops of heavy rain struck the window in front of her.
She wrapped her arms around her shoulders and took a deep breath, wishing to banish her memories. She hated the rain because it brought her back to the past, and with every drop, it erased her hopes of escaping from her memories. It rained both the day she saw him for the first time, but also on the day she saw him for the last time.
She winced at the sound of her mobile phone. She looked at the screen — Giovanni; and then at the name she had unconsciously written on the fogged window glass — Sebastian. Two mistakes that had marked her life. She had tried to correct the first mistake with the second, wanting to suppress the pain. How mistaken she had been! To this day, she had not succeeded in doing so; she had only learned to live with the pain.
– Hello – she answered the phone, wiping the name written on the glass with her palm.
– My love – his voice grated her eardrums – I’m coming to get you; it smells like a strong storm is brewing. Come downstairs in five minutes.
– Okay – she replied mechanically, still staring at the marks her palm had left on the window.
Suddenly, a conversation with her mother popped into her mind.
“God’s punishment will catch up with you! Adultery is a mortal sin!” her mother’s eyes flashed with anger.
“Mother, I have never done such a thing!” she snapped back, equally furious.
“Yes, you have! You cheated on Sebastian with Giovanni, and now you’re cheating on Giovanni with Sebastian!”
“Mother!” she raised her voice, wanting to end this painful conversation that once again reminded her why she felt worthless in her own eyes. “Even if it were true, as you say, you’re the last person fit to judge me! Do I need to remind you?!”
“You’ve already reminded me… Do you think it’s easy for me to live with that?” a tear sparkled in her mother’s eye. “I didn’t have a choice... but you, by your own choice, continue to destroy your life! Have you ever wondered what will happen when Giovanni puts all the pieces together?”
Allegra headed for the elevator with her mother's words in her mind. She knew then, as now, that her mother was right. Yes, she ruined her life by choosing a lie. The first time unconsciously, carried by feelings that destroyed her from the inside, feelings that made her unable to even breathe, let alone think soberly; second time consciously, again because of those same feelings, wanting them to disappear, to forget them. Lie after lie, one lie led to another, they multiplied progressively until her whole life became one huge lie and she still lives in it.
***
Where are you, Allegra?!, Giovanni bit his lower lip in frustration.
He had called her on time, but he had already been waiting for ten minutes. A strong storm had reached that part of Rome, where her law office was located. Her voice didn’t sound right over the phone. Lately, she had been more tired and in a worse mood than usual, and she was having those migraines more often, the ones that sometimes forced her to spend the entire day in bed. He decided to look for her despite the rain, which was falling harder and harder.
He ran across those few meters to the entrance of the high-rise building and took the elevator to the ninth floor. Allegra’s office was unlocked and empty.
Unbelievable! She didn’t lock up!, he shook his head, searching for his mobile phone in his pocket to call her. He stayed on the seat of car! I’ll call her from a landline!
As he dialed the numbers on the dial of the phone on her desk, his eyes wandered quite by accident to the window pane across the desk. The letter S written by a finger was clearly visible on the fogged glass. Next to the letter, there was a smudge where something had been wiped away. Giovanni froze. He felt some kind of icy hand clutching his throat, and an even icier hand squeezing his heart. Sebastian, Sebastian, and Sebastian again!, he almost shouted out loud.
He hated him even though he had never met him in person. From the moment he found out about him, he was the inexhaustible source of his every bad mood. He tried to expel those negative feelings from himself because he shouldn’t hate a man who had done nothing directly to him — Allegra was the one who hurt him — but it didn’t work because he loved Allegra unconditionally, so all the hatred fell solely on Sebastian.
Giovanni fell in love with Allegra at first sight when he saw her in the amphitheater of Sapienza University, during their second year of studies. They were both taking a family law class. At first, he was attracted to her big green eyes, and then everything else. He courted her, but she rejected him. Just when he came to terms with the fact that he could only be her friend, she unexpectedly threw herself into his arms. It was only many months later that he learned why she had done that.
How happy he was that day when she showed up at his door and said she agreed to be his girlfriend. Knowing nothing about her except that he loved her, he didn’t notice the small warning signs sent by her lost gazes, her occasional complete disengagement, her lukewarm kisses, and her refusal to share intimacy with him. When he confessed that he couldn’t imagine life without her, she cried; when he proposed to her, she cried; she cried even after their first wedding night. She told him that's how she reacts to happiness. He believed her... until the moment he accidentally found the marriage certificate and the divorce agreement. Both documents bore two names: Allegra Valentini and Sebastian Catano.
His Allegra had a marriage behind her, and it was with a well-known writer. Although he was deeply affected by the knowledge that she had kept something like that from him, he remained silent. He didn’t want to dig into her past, but the unspoken questions that lingered on his lips created an increasing pressure with each passing day. In the end, he couldn’t hold back anymore; he asked her and she admitted it, saying that she got into that marriage very young. They had parted when they both realized it was just a case of ordinary infatuation. Although her story seemed convincing at first glance, the seeds of doubt had been sown in Giovanni forever. He began to revisit the past and reevaluate every behavior of Allegra’s, her every action. It didn’t take him long to connect the dots and realize the devastating truth: his wife still loved her ex-husband.
She had never said it aloud, and she didn't have to — her behavior gave her away. For more than six months, Giovanni has been living with that knowledge, swallowing every day some bitter pill served up by life, because his love for Allegra was stronger than reason. From time to time he would fall into difficult emotional states from which he had to get out on his own, since he did not want to say anything to her, fearing that he would lose her — the little he had of her. Between these episodes, he consoled himself, thinking that perhaps he was imagining things. He convinced himself that she really had a lot of work, and that’s why she stayed in the office until late; he convinced himself that she was really tired when she fell asleep on the couch in the living room; he convinced himself that she was one of those women who had a hard time showing her feelings. He hoped that time would set everything right, that Allegra would eventually see how big his heart was, and he hoped that their marriage could survive.
Now, for the first time, he had proof of how things truly stood — that letter on the window, written with a finger, was Giovanni’s truth. There, on the window glass, was the first letter of the name of the one she still thought of, the one who was still in her heart. With a vast emptiness in his soul, Giovanni Bellini hung up the phone, finally admitting the truth to himself — Allegra had never been his, and no matter how much it hurt, he had to end the lie they were living.
He himself did not know how he felt at that moment; yet, above all, there was sadness that he would lose her. He took the stairs down, instead of the elevator, hoping to calm his turbulent thoughts before seeing her. He asked the doorman to lock Allegra’s office.
***
She stood next to Giovanni's car, wet to the skin. She let the summer shower was hitting her face and body, wanting to punish herself for not being able to resist the feeling in her chest. She could never do that, because he stood on the pedestal of her love and was the master of all she had — her heart, soul, body, thoughts, dreams... The same, like all other masters, sometimes good, sometimes cruel, but those who are subordinate and dependent must remain silent and suffer, must endure. She suffered and was constantly at odds with her own desires, even when words came out of her mouth that were completely at odds with the truth.
My desires and my reality have always been the shores of an unbridgeable river, she began to laugh hysterically.
Warm arms wrapped around her waist. She turned slightly and looked into the eyes of the man who was comforting her for the last time.
Man is a strange being — sometimes, he doesn’t see what is obvious and tangible, and sometimes, he sees the invisible. They say it has to do with the truth and a person’s ability to accept it. In that moment, as they stood in the rain on one of Rome’s parking lots, they both looked with the eyes of the truth, both aware of what they had been pushing under the carpet for months. There was no longer any reason to hold back; raindrops began to mix with tears. They both wept for their lost love, and both for the one who left irreparable wounds on their hearts. She raised her hand and placed it on his cheek.
– Will you ever forgive me? – she whispered.
