We spoke for a bit about this Franchino. Little by little I started to recall that he was one of the many people who would come to our house three or four decades ago, people who were, for the most part, involved with education. My mother asked, studying me with her eyes, if the reason I was asking about Franco Gilara had something to do with work. I was uncertain what to reveal for a moment, but in the end, I decided to tell her about the day dedicated to education, without going into details, however, but merely as something on the horizon. She turned morose, and when her mood darkens, she hunches, like a flower with its corolla bent down.
—If it’s still up in the air, don’t say anything to your father.
—I’m not planning on talking to him about it.
—You know how he is, good news excites him right away, but then, if nothing happens, he gets upset.
—But how’s his relationship with Franchino?
—There is no relationship.
—Why?
She furrowed her brow and shook her head slightly, sighing.
—Your father is a magnet. You end up attached to him and you don’t even know how it happened. From then on, you need him, one hundred percent, but he keeps you hanging on along with a thousand other people. If you don’t want to get hurt, you have to detach yourself, purposefully.
—What do you mean?
—Franchino, at a certain point, told him it was best if they didn’t see each other anymore.
—So they have a terrible relationship?
—Of course not. Dad doesn’t have a terrible relationship with anyone, even with the people he can’t stand.
—And Franchino?
—I don’t think Franchino is mad at him: when someone grows fond of him, that doesn’t go away.
As she spoke, another one of our conversations came to mind, from many years ago. I was twenty-six years old, married, and didn’t have kids at the time. I’d gone to France for work, to a party, in a castle decked out in a way I’d never seen. I’d had a fair amount to drink, and I latched onto someone who worked for an important newspaper, unlike me in those days, when I slaved away at a meager publication. The guy was my age, I’d known him for a long time. He made me laugh all night, I drank and laughed, and for the first time, I cheated on my husband. And it was amazing, really amazing, but not the sex, I care next to nothing about sex. I remember, instead, the swelling of proportions that followed. I walked down tree-lined avenues at seven in the morning, the air was lovely, and I felt I’d grown as tall as a giant. But then that sense of swelling proportions dissolved, and I started to feel terrible. Not about my husband, honestly, I didn’t feel the least bit guilty. In any case, I believed I had the right to enjoy life. Rather, I was afraid of going to my parents’ house, and I was certain that my father would have said, right away: Emma, what’s happened, without a question mark. He has those blue eyes that see things without questioning, calmly, so much more than others see, and you end up telling him every detail, because all you have to do is talk to him and you feel better, he emanates a fluid energy that’s reassuring. So, no big deal, I knew that he would have understood anyway, the way he always understands, and that he would have given me a hug. The problem, rather, was that I felt ashamed, not of what I’d done, but of having to tell him about it. And so I avoided every potential get-together with him and my mother, until the remnants of that night of the party had completely faded from my mind. And even then, I avoided my father, I mainly talked to my mother. That was when I asked her, point-blank: did you ever cheat on Dad? She stared at me for a long time, as if the question were gravely offensive, and she replied with a few words that made no sense: your father is so absolutely indispensable to me that, in order to be able to stay with him, I had to betray him many times, within all the possible and acceptable definitions of “betrayal.” The words were uttered without irony, even that phrase, which made no sense—acceptable definitions of betrayal—and with a pain that I never imagined she was capable of feeling. She’s always been an energetic woman, with an inner light that keeps darkness at a distance, even when it’s pitch-black. I said nothing more, and I beat a hasty retreat, as if I’d seen a snake.
But now that reply from over twenty years ago revisited me, and I asked:
—So, in your opinion, if I ask Franchino to support Dad’s candidacy, will he do it?
She seemed concerned at the idea that I was going to get in touch with Franchino. She said:
—It’s useless for you to talk to Franchino. He’ll always support him, in any case. But in my opinion, it’s better to let things be, your father’s fine as he is. He studies and writes for hours every day, now and then people come by to visit him, he and I have long conversations on a variety of topics. Just think, he’s started studying math for the umpteenth time, without understanding a thing about it. And then you’ve seen him with the girls, they adore him. What does he need this recognition for?
I didn’t reply. I heard my father and my daughters in the hallway. All five of them appeared in the kitchen, surprised to find me there, and we had a lovely evening. While he entertained us, all of us females, making sure to neglect nobody, from the youngest to the eldest, I thought—I believe for the first time in my life—even if my mother did something behind his back, he most surely hasn’t been faithful to her. He must have betrayed her discreetly, maybe even chastely, but constantly. And on the whole, I thought it was wonderful that these two old people whom I loved, in order to live together all their lives, had to come up with an innocent way of cheating on one another that enabled them to never say: let’s break up.
I had never been capable of adjusting the reality of facts to my advantage, and maybe that’s why I was so exhausted. As I returned to my place, I thought, maybe that small prize for my father meant more to me than to him. Given that nothing in my life added up, I was insisting on a recognition for a person I loved, one who managed to make everything add up.