Promises (ending)

This one... yeah this is the night when Davide showed up at the meeting together with Chiara, his new flame.
We had been a little more in touch, in the latest months, but we had not gotten more friends. I wasn’t very receptive to anyone, it is true... especially toward the guys.
Those who knew me since long, then... they gave me the sensation of willing to comfort me at all costs... there had been one, at work, who probably wanted to take chances on me, using this approach, but I had... I had not considered him at all.
Davide wasn’t like that, of course... but precisely because he did not fit into the standard male I had usually met, his presence was giving more of a vague discomfort. I did not know where to place him in that world of mine that already had very little room available.

He used to talk to me about computers... the many nights he was spending programming it... "is also very useful for video games," he said... then about his hobbies... It was rare that we did talk about love or people, apart from the fact that he always asked me how I was feeling...

Generally speaking I didn’t feel a particular pleasure in talking with him, so the fact that he had come with a new girl had somehow relieved me... it would have kept him away from me, to the extent that this could interest me...

Among the many things that Davide didn’t tell me in those fleeting speeches... there was the fact that Walter was back around.
Carmen gave me this news with considerable circumspection... Curious: it was normal that everyone who knew me would be very cautious in giving me this news, fearing that I could dream some kind of illusions... but Carmen should have been much more open, she should have used words like "did you get it? And now that he is free again, you'll see that everything will be as you've always dreamed of..."
But no... she also seemed reluctant in making any comment. Over the months she had updated me, with fair regularity, about the life and evolution of Walter’s dates, and according to the last things I knew he was dating a girl much younger than him, who lived in another city.
Every so often we had also glimpsed there, among the group of friends. We had exchanged a few words... I wanted to show up as a different one, but inevitably I ended up hanging on his every word. And I was not even doing so much to hide it. But it had been a long time since he phoned me.

After a few days from the anticipation that Carmen had made to me, I received a call.
- Hello... Carmen gave me your new number and...
- Ah, yes... of course. Well...
I was obviously embarrassed, but the thing that surprised me was that he seemed to be embarrassed too. I tried to stay myself as cold as possible... even when he invited me to go out more often at the group.
And one Sunday afternoon, I met him again for more than two consecutive hours.
We walked close for a few kilometers, in that park... it was autumn, almost winter and it got quite cold. Yet the afternoon went pretty well: not touching any topic that concerned us both, we talked about work, friends... he made no appreciation on my appearance, on the other hand, he glared at one of the other guys that was often making jokes about my flesh.
We had been pretty good... but I had no intention of going back at thinking of a possible affair with him.
I didn’t care at all... I knew he was just himself... at least I had realized that, in those two years. I had been tied to a memory, to those wonderful days... I was resigned to my unhappiness because he could not love me and another one like him would never exist, in the world...
After a few days, however, he called and invited me to the cinema.
- ...You know that thing we talked about Sunday? If you like, we can go there, the two of us, maybe at the earliest show because tomorrow I have to go out of town...
I accepted. And it was a pleasant evening.
I was well aware, that I was not making any illusions.
We continued to keep in touch... I can’t deny that I returned to feel a minimum of interest in meeting the old group... Soon I went back among Walter, Carmen and her boyfriend.
I found back a bit of that mood, about joking and all that I had lost long before: Walter was nice as always, had a great desire to do things, to get out... he looked a bit more mature than I remembered...
Even in the talks he used to make. With his usual style, one day he asked me if I had a boyfriend, if I was okay... very tactfully he even asked me if by chance I was still in love with him: I stood still for a while... then I said, no... of course it was all in the past... I don’t know how much I could look sure about that, because sometimes I looked into his eyes and let myself be lulled... and I felt inside of me a desire to hug him and kiss him.
But I tried to resist.
I started to go out regularly with Walter, my friend Carmen and her boyfriend.
And, even though I didn’t want to admit that, I imagined a simulacrum of love in those appointments. I was not able to get my Walter, I didn’t want any other man in the world... and I was just fine meeting him like this.
It was a shabby thing, pathetic. But, given the circumstances, it seemed to me the best thing, the only one I could do.

 Chapter 4

My parents didn’t know that I was meeting Walter back again. This news would not have been well received... and anyway, there was no need for them to know: I had my house, my life... had I been happy, perhaps it would have made sense to talk to them about it all, but since I was in my usual limbo, there was definitely no reason.
And... just after Christmas my father began to feel ill.
It started the evening of his name day... it was January... right after lunch he felt a sharp pain in his chest... we called the doctor in a hurry, and it seemed to end there.
But the tests he did after a few days brought the fatal news that something was wrong in the lungs... he had always been a heavy smoker, and probably it depended on that, as the doctors said.
He was hospitalized for three days, and then returned home.

He was always at my place.
Joking, he said that before he died he wanted to see me settled... "but if can’t do a thing to repair your little heart, I can do a lot of things for your house instead, and I will!"
How much I miss him... here's a picture of him, and here another...
Those small heart attacks followed one another on a regular basis, in those months. There was one time that we had to rush to the hospital at night, because the crisis was not healing. From that day on, I went back to sleep often at my parents' house... and I also decided to finally get my driving license.
My father used it as another opportunity to be helpful: he let me make the first driving samples in the blind alley, and he studied the traffic signs again together to me.
"Look, Monica, if by chance I were to die... But for sure it will not happen..." he said, trying to remove the dram, with a few jokes, the apprehension that had struck me and my mom.

By then, it was basically just me to phone to Carmen.
I had told her about Walter, and how I had felt... but I had not received those tips that I would have expected.
I also spoke about my father, at which she showed a bit more interested and helpful.
There was something strange in this all, that could not be explained only by the fact that Carmen had her right to live her life and hence she might not always be available to me.
I could have gone on blaming myself, thinking that maybe I had become so paranoid and single issued with this story of Walter so as to annoy everybody... and in fact I thought. I could think of a thousand other things, beginning from the fact that I could not share her the interests... But something was just not right... and she had almost stopped talking to me about her interests, nor she sought to involve me as she once used to.
- ...I'm sorry for your dad... you know, my father has been sick a while ago...
These were the only words that Carmen wasted about my family problems. Even when the situation got worse, she just used some generic sentences of circumstance.

But Walter was still calling me.
We met at the weekend with the usual people... then sometimes during the week, we went out to have a chat. What an atmosphere there was that day in that bar... It was just as if it were again he and me, the right music, his voice...
I continued to live that increasingly pathetic situation: I felt quite some pleasure to submit myself for the umpteenth time to Walter, going out with him, suffering inside because there was no chance to get back together again, but taking for good those little sweeteners that he was giving to me. Oh, sure, he was not guilty: I was the one who could not forget him... if I had wanted to, I could have lived my life in those years that had passed; and it was certainly not his fault that I had not.
Sometimes I was amazed that we could meet so smoothly... without anything more going on between us: I went very close to thinking that if I had made one more step, I would probably have regained my man.
But... maybe because I was worried about my dad... that did not happen.
I also spoke to Walter about what was happening in my family: he showed more understanding than Carmen, but only a little.
And there I noticed another strange thing...
I had never made a serious talk with him... We had always talked just about of us, of our present... an eternal present made of nights out, discos, friends, boys and girls... And never a hint to the future... maybe there had been no time, but... and to everything that made up life... and death.

After some time, my father was back in the hospital for the umpteenth time... My mom called me at work to tell me that it was not a particularly acute crisis, but that the doctor had advised him to go hospitalize. I had immediately alerted Carmen... I had not said explicitly, but I would have needed a ride to the hospital, at the end of my turn... I was expecting her to understand on the fly, as always... and that she proposed herself...
But the answer was not exactly that.
Carmen agreed to accompany me only after I asked her directly, almost begging her... I was a bit hesitant, having noticed her cold reaction. She seemed annoyed... she made all her things slowly, while I was ready at the exact stroke of the end of our round.

It was not the only episode.
A few nights before I had had a chance to listen to a sentence, spoken by Carmen... I was sure I had misinterpreted:
"...now we can’t even make the party at Monica’s place because she’s always staying at her parents’..."
It would have been definitely not very nice... I didn’t believe my ears... I had heard her as I was getting on the car, but I had no way to think about it too much, because in a few days my father began to lose consciousness.
The world collapsed over me.
All the colleagues from the supermarket saw me reduced to a rag... actually, to them, it was perhaps something they had already seen. And all my colleagues, including Carmen, limited themselves to express their cold comfort...
Now, years later I can say that I was really stupid... if I had suffered so much for Walter, what should I have done for the possible loss of my dad?
Instead, as it happened... I came to behave as if they were just two comparable events.
Comparable to a third: I had been betrayed by the two people in whom I had placed an unbounded trust... those who had promised me the world... their inner and outer world...

I spent whole days in the hospital, along with my mom... or alone… now the doctors were stating as fact that he was nearing his end... I was desperate. But words can not convey the idea: and, unfortunately, not even the pages of this diary.
He was not allowed to die... he was young, he was only fifty-eight years old... I still had to show him that I was not just a silly girl, that I was able to do something serious in life, in addition to catching inane drifting from time to time.
‘Til the end, I talked to Carmen, and she, cold as usual, accompanied me several times in the hospital... definitely she was no longer the friend always available that she had been, but in that context I didn’t pay much attention: anyone that could give me a little support was welcome.
It was probably for that reason, that I didn’t consider it strange that, a few times, I found Walter too, near my father’s bed... I hadn’t invited him... he had nothing to do and then his presence would punch with... with everything else. But... I accepted him and his participation.
Unfortunately to no avail.
My father died after two more weeks of suffering.
His lifeless body, the funeral... the days passed speechless at my mom’s... the void...

I took a few days off to stay home with my mom, who felt like and possibly worse than me... For a few days I continued to talk to Carmen, looking for her during breaks... and at the same time I was receiving Walter’s calls, who after first specifying that he felt unfit to console a person who was undergoing this suffering, said he was interested in me and how I was coping with the situation.
But why was he asking me the things he already knew from Carmen, since they were always meeting with the other friends? He was doing that out of kindness, all right, but...
Then, both Carmen and Walter disappeared: I went on meeting her at work, but we got back to the level of alienation that we had held at the beginning. Walter stopped calling me and I stopped going out our friends’ meeting.
But I didn’t express any judgement... I didn’t do that on purpose: simply, at that time, I had many other things to think about.
Maybe I was even afraid to focus on how the things had really happened... I had first lost the guy that I loved most, then my father and now I was losing my greatest friend...
But one day I decided to take the lead on the issue: it would have cost quite a lot... but I had to.
And many opinions that I had expressed changed radically.

* * *

The way Davide used to simplify, clarify facts was really stunning.
- ...You have not thought… did you… about a chance that Carmen has used you to build a circle of friends, Walter used you to make a good impression with his friends... and then both have used you to start meeting...
Whenever Davide reiterated that cold analysis on my life, he always added some sign of affection: a gift, a kiss, a hug like those that only he can give me. He knows that, still now, I don’t feel very well, when I think back in those terms at how things went.
But the first time... it didn’t go like that.

My dad had gone for a couple of months... maybe three, it was May, so...
In all that time I had hardly ever left the house: I did nothing but work, help my mom... then I had at stake that thing about my driving license... in short, I was very busy.
Friends, including Carmen, Walter and even Simona, whom I had given the sad news... we had met at the funeral... As I said, friends had gone far into the background.
I called here and there someone among our friends, just to hear how they were going on... I hadn’t talked about my dad to anyone... well, probably the news had spread...
Some friend had called me back, here and there... ah, yes, Nicoletta had sent me a happy birthday note... Ah well, certainly Irene, who usually never forgot my birthday too.

And Davide...
One day I met him by the supermarket... I wasn’t working at the checkout anymore, but I often turned to those areas, for matters of invoices or returned goods...
Some other time I had seen him coming to do his shopping there, along with his parents or his mother... it happened rarely: as he had explained to me, it was a little impractical for them, and then he hated shopping for food and he would come there only when his father just could not. Yeah... how silly, in fact he accompanied his mother when his father could not... and I believe that I never recognized them... Maybe this is also the reason why they took so long to accept me in their family...
That time he was alone... He had just come out from the counters, and was carrying a couple of big bags. Since I was no longer at the checkout, I had stopped doing these crazy schedules, though I could hardly go out at six like it would have been proper.
We greeted each other at the same time... he seemed a bit surprised to see me with that pale blue overall... I knew it did nothing to make me leaner, but we were just obliged to wear it.
Our lives had to converge in some way, apparently... and the words that we both were spontaneous saying at that time, were just dictated by fate.
- If I can make it on time, I just want to carry this envelope up there and then I go home... - I told him. - By the way, I have nothing to eat at home... I still have to do my shopping.
- Ah, I'm here because my parents couldn’t go to the grocery store... and my mother prepared me a list and I wasn’t able to find half the things...
He pointed at the bags. - I found the pizzas, yes, I got them... – he said, suggesting that at least he had found what was more to his liking.
The last thing I was willing to do would have been to invite Davide for a dinner... And the last thing he would have done was to offer me a part of his supplies...
Had it not been because of me!
Yet I didn’t act consciously.
It was late, I had no will to go back in, for a ride through the shelves... Actually I didn’t really want to have dinner alone too: I was back at my home, because the house could not be left to its own for too long... the limbo around me had become a bearable status. Every day I had a whole list of things to do: going to work, go to my mom, fix my house, go to the driving school, renting a videotape for the evening. Relationships with others were minimal and nothing could involve me or even affect my routine.
In a sudden impulse, I said to Davide, "of course, chivalrously, you might share your supplies with me..."
I came to regret those words as soon as I uttered, but then I told myself that I was so sufficiently shielded by my limbo that I had nothing to worry about.
And he, embarrassed, babbled a "Huh? Ah, yes, of course... Of course you can take whatever you want..."
He had not even thought about being kind to me... well, possibly he was also a little annoyed: in fact, he went on saying "at most, in exchange you could help me find the other things he my mother wants..."
How many times I reproached him about this scene!
"But, do you even realize?" – I always tell him. "A girl invites you to dinner... oh well, with your food, but it don’t matter... and you make a disgusted face and also try to make her feel guilty for it? But if I still had to go through the shelves, then I no longer need your dinner!"
If it had not been because of me...
A bit surprised by his reaction, however, I went to complete my work, then I joined him again in the gallery and took him along to buy what was missing.
We went out... he brought the supplies at his parents’ place, while I went to my house, with his pizzas.

It's not that I would have expected to talk about anything valuable... in the evening. I had done it, consciously, just not to be alone. But it is clear that I had had some perception... okay, I want to be polite, we'd had...
I still expected a person... as he had always described his life, dedicated to watching TV, talking about a few very specific topics and to trivialize everything else in a lack of interest.
And instead...
- I see you have not had time to wash the breakfast dishes... this morning... Well, let me give you a hand...
I was taking off my shoes when I heard this phrase and I could not believe my ears: back in the kitchen I saw him finishing the rinse and...
I tried to stop him, telling him that of course it was not necessary... he was just a guest...
On other occasions, I would have thought that he was doing that to make himself look good to my eyes, and that he would spend the evening annoying me with continuous attempts to be helpful or pleasant.
But it was not like that... Davide did it out of a sense of order, of gratitude that were innate. And, as for doing something for me... he waited... as he had for all of those years, that I gave him the opportunity.

Soon pizzas were ready...
TV began to talk politics, then there was a movie... I can’t remember...
I remember, though, that from his mouth they did not come out trite phrases, and... oddly enough, not even from mine, although I was a bit worried... in all the comments we made on the world and on the "facts of the day."
And... when we were about to say goodbye... Davide had already risen from his chair and was lingering again at the shelf that contained... that still contains my books, my records, then turned back to me...
- I'm glad to see you well, Monica... Really, now your news arrive very rarefied and...
"He sees me well," I thought, trying to appreciate the compliment I still knew to be fake.
Without even asking myself the question of how much would my news be of any interest to him, the phrase nevertheless intrigued me and I pulled my head out of limbo.
- Oh really? And what news are you getting? - I said, smiling.
- Well, that you've suffered a lot because of your dad... by the way, I have not even got to get my condolences...
He stopped for a moment.
- ...But, I don’t want to bring the bad times back...
I hastened to curb the suddenly rising sadness, and moved my head, as to minimize.
- And then, well... we haven’t seen you very often... and they all say that you changed a lot, you don’t go out a lot and just concentrate on your work...
- And on my mom... she needs me a lot, now... - I pointed out.
- Yes, of course... And... you know, every now and then I see Gigi and Simona... By the way, do you often hear from them?
I was so ashamed to answer him in that after their wedding I only went once to visit them at their new home...
- Well... I don’t know if I can... but I wanted to enforce Simona’s theory of how some people have ruined your existence. I have my own idea...
Curiosity overcame any psychological block compared to even hear talking again about Walter, now that for good or bad he only existed anymore in my memory.
- Let's see... which idea?
He stood in his thoughts for a moment, then with unexpected depth he asked me two questions... that I remember perfectly:
- ...How have you always really been? What have you always been dreaming of?
- What do you mean? - I asked, suddenly a bit altered.
And, from there on, Davide took me into an introspective research from which they emerged, clear as the sun, all the suspicions that I had always had about Carmen, Walter and, ultimately, even on myself... Damn, not only his theory fit to perfection... after all, perhaps, you didn’t even need rocket science to interpret those facts in that way... but the nice thing was that he was making references to dates, to people’s psychology, to his knowledge... that astounded me and helped me to talk about everything without feeling stupid or embarrassed.
And, how strange that I'm the one who keeps such an accurate diary! I felt so silly ... obviously I was writing but never reading back.
This went on until three in the morning... maybe it was even later.
Then Davide interrupted my outburst... With a lot of rawness, without a tear, I had told him my whole life in those years, all my feelings, my joys, my sufferings.
Had it not been for his soft touch... "you have to get up early tomorrow... I'd better go..." I would have gone on more. When I greeted him, I saw a very different person than the day before.
I felt lighter: limbo had been shot down. But... now, I had to come to terms with life again, and it was not so easy. Fortunately... for the first time... in that sense, I was no longer alone.

* * *

It wasn’t the day after that dinner, that me and Davide began to meet regularly.
That day, in particular, I was so dazed from having slept only four hours that I could not think of anything other than trying to focus on my work.
But then, in the evening... as I prepared to go to sleep early and already savoured the comfortable nightgown and soft large bed... I had no desire nor the strength to meditate on what had been come out of my conversation with Davide, but it came to my mind that at the time of Walter I was always sleeping so little and yet I was feeling quite well.
But it was only a brief flash... sleep caught me right away.
When, however, in the following days, I focused the meaning of all this talk... I aimed straight into madness.
So it was true... How could it be otherwise?
Driven by my curiosity and inexperience, which in any case is not a valid excuse... ah, if my dad could hear me... I had let them bring me in a world that was not mine, with people who were not my friends... but maybe above all, they were not my accomplices.
...And more seriously, at some point I had reacted in a way that was not right. But, before I could come to understand this concept, some more days passed.
I looked in the mirror... I looked into my eyes and asked me if I really wanted to be that kind of person, if to appear had really been so much more important than to be...
It was the first level of analysis which I could undergo.
But... that was not the point.
I thought back at when I used to walk through all the discos wearing fashion clothes... the compliments I received, even beyond Walter smiles... I could not say I wanted to erase those moments.
That... vanity... it was not, it could not have been so damaging: it was only a legitimate desire to be noticed that, occasionally, I mean, in life...
Somehow, I began to feel back tuned with my body: only later Davide would have pointed out to me that perhaps I had decided to get fat and let me go because of some kind of psychological punishment.
So…?
I fell in love with the wrong person: I agree... But could I be the only girl who errs, in this world? No... so why after almost three years I wasn’t yet over it?
I replied to myself that Walter was really too special. Maybe others could not see him like that, but for me he was. To others he was just handsome and tall, but for me it had meant... and still meant, even in those days, a dream.
A shattered dream: perhaps that was the reason why I couldn’t get over him even if, in fact, recently I was slowly putting aside that story.
And Carmen?
How could someone so kind, nice, helpful... have discarded me when I needed her most?
I could just not conceive this.

In the last few months I was not seeing her much, since I had changed my task at the supermarket.
But it's not that I had got to hate her, or that I was not looking for her or that I avoided her voluntarily. I didn’t understand why she had abandoned me... I didn’t understand anything and then I simply preferred not to think about it. So I was vegetating: I used to approach my days head down, and all ran away without me having the need for the developing thoughts.
When, suddenly, I read into my mind and applied Davide’s judgement about her... "opportunist, exploitative, false", I panicked.
I had abandoned my friend Simona to put all my trust in Carmen... I had been teased like crazy... Who could I trust, then?
And above all... what esteem could I have for myself, if anyone could make fun of my feelings and my heart?
I fought hard in this new challenge that life had submitted to me... I was living with a constant pounding, distrusting everything... I was very nervous at work and I could not sleep. And when I saw myself so desperate that I could invoke an extreme solution again... I decided to talk again to Davide.

In those two or three weeks we had phoned each other quite regularly... he used to call me and I would call back, we talked about different things but the chat we had had that evening had been dismissed with a simple "thank you for listening to me...," at which he had replied with an icy "my duty... for a friend in crisis..."
When I called him asking if he could dedicate a little more time to me, I had to be a bit agitated. He has always told me that you could tell from a mile away, but that night he said nothing.
I went to pick him up at his house with the intention of going to some pub or so but... I hadn’t driven even one kilometer and I was already getting to the point.
I parked my car... we continued our long talk under a lamppost, in the street... when I realized that I wasn’t going to be as cold as the time before, and that I would soon come to very bitter tears, I preferred to avoid public.
- If they... if they betrayed me... what should I do? How can I go on when I’m not able to distinguish sincere people from false ones... who can I trust?
I was in some ways contradicting myself.
I was going to tell a person that all in all was a stranger, my personal private facts, and above all I was putting in his hands all of myself... I needed advice, support... but I was complaining of having been betrayed by people I did not know with... one that I even knew less.

Still, I had to trust someone.
And Davide was that someone. And just not that.
If he had simply said "trust me"... I would have probably felt safe, but now he and I probably would not be going toward the big step...
Instead he started another analysis of human behaviours that, again, I listened with great interest.
- You know... it's true... probably, indeed, certainly, you’ve been used ... and this is bad. But... it happened once... I don’t think that you have to consider yourself stupid, concerning your whole life.
I smiled through the tears. I felt a strong need that someone... that he took my hands into his: I was naked... any armour, any defence had been removed.
- And then... it has happened again, and you said that you felt what you had never felt before, and this is not so bad, right? Yes, then it's over, but... And the fact that these two events have happened so soon, overlapping... was this coincidence to cause most of your problems...
Turned to him, I kept rubbing nervously at the edge of my jeans with one hand, while the other hurried to dry eyes as needed.
- So, random timing was also important... I would say that you're not at all a helpless girl who cannot take care of herself. And, as for Carmen... you yourself are saying that: she treated you like you wanted. Of course, she didn’t do it for you, but just for herself. She did seek you when she needed you, she brought you with her in those crazy nights and you agreed, then you experienced love and loneliness as she liked, and you agreed. There is nothing wrong: you are sweet and romantic and sensitive, she is sweet and romantic and superficial... in my opinion...
I was not very lucid, at that time, but... I remember that I was impressed by that "in my opinion"... Davide would never say that... he was always very sure of his analysis, I can say with full right.
At that moment, however... I seemed to understand that those three little words were hiding something... maybe, between the lines, even a declaration of feelings by the "glacial" Davide.
There and then we talked more... I told him, agreeing with what he had exposed, some other part of me and those years.
Then I took him back home... I remember I joked that in the end we had not gone anywhere and I was tempted to propose him a drink at my place.

More days went by.
I was feeling a bit more calm...
I knew I could count on Davide, now... maybe I still had to figure out if as a friend, or only as a psychologist, but still...
And I called Simona... a bit embarrassed, we made little talks about everything and when I heard her say, "I see you’re more cheerful... how do you feel?" I could not help but thank her and simultaneously apologize for everything that had happened.
- I will come and visit you tomorrow night! - I said, proudly. And she was very happy.
I decided that I would have simply ignored Carmen. I didn’t want any revenge... after all, as Davide said, it was not her fault...
And yet... some details were still missing...

Davide called me, as he was used, one evening and asked me if I wanted to talk some more about that story....
"I want you to undergo a test..." he had mentioned.
He had also told me that I was looking much better, compared to a few weeks before... but this time he would not show up about what kind of evidence it was.
And he came at my home me after dinner... To reward him for the missed night at the pub, I prepared some special snacks and a table with a wide choice of drinks.
He went straight to the point...
- You know, all that we said about these people... is correct... it was said that it was Carmen’s fault but a bit yours too... but... - He hesitated. - ...I'm glad you're better, but, you know...
What could be so difficult to express, to force him to such a turn of phrase?
- ...Carmen and Walter are dating together... in fact, rumour has it, that they’ve been living together... for at least a month...
I was frozen. For a moment I felt again like... before, knocked down like before I had been able to put my nose out of my torpor.
I got up from the chair... with a blank stare I went to the balcony. It was the first time that Davide followed me and came over to me.
- I did not know how to tell you... may I... may I express my thinking? – he asked.
I didn’t even turn to look at him... I waved and again felt tears in my throat... dark and cold reaching for me...
- I... don’t think you’re… into that anymore... They met, they got themselves and probably now they’re the happiest couple in the world... I don’t think they’ve ever been plotting anything behind you... they are like that... empty, non-existent, yet so skilful in infusing a charge, a strength in those who want to follow them.
Those words were supposed to reassure me, maybe...
And indeed, after a few more moments of silence, the lump in my throat seemed to melt.
But there arose, inside of me, another emotion that Davide had not considered... he should have been a woman in order to think about it: jealousy. No, actually not... the moment after, I saw clearly its perverse variant: the desire to provoke jealousy.
Walter, who was looking for me... and Carmen who was seeking after him.
That's why he knew my own facts... but he was still asking me all of those questions: they were meeting at the friends’ place, and then Walter called me... when there was Carmen he was close to her, but then he would come and look for me... He knew that I would never refuse to go out with him... I was perfect for his purposes: to make Carmen's interest for him grow.
What an idiot! He should have known that that interest was already there... but maybe... he wanted more, as he had done with me... he wanted to be worshiped...
I was seized by a violent fit of rage.
Davide always told me that he had to grab me firmly by the arms and keep me from leaving the house... that he had never seen me so angry.
I rushed to change my clothes and I was adamant to run at Walter’s home and give him some punishment, making an outburst that would have at least partially blunted his character.
But... slowly, using soft words, Davide convinced me that it was not the case.
- Monica... they are like that... it’s you who are not like them... and... you're better than them. You don’t belong to their world... you just passed by... but now you can return to your life.
I returned in me.
I poured myself another bit of cocktail, I apologized and wiped my umpteenth tears.
They were finally over.

* * *

From that day on, my birthday in 1997, so close to Valentine's Day... yes, like every year, of course... I think I can hear Davide pointing that out as he did that night as a corollary to this wonderful joke of mine... since that day so widely embroidered in this diary, we have coined a pass-phrase completely ours.
One of them starts with "as long as you're near me" and the other continues with "nothing I know can take your place."
It was created after hearing it in some nightclub... one of those rare occasions when I was able to bring Davide there since we’re going out together.
Ah... it’s not that I care particularly either, now. However, from time to time...
And, like I got over the craze to go dancing, so Davide can rest assured that I will never feel nostalgia for any of my ex-boyfriend!

We started to go out together... I mean, we can state a date thinking back to that day, as I was greeting him as he stepped out of my car, I turned aside from the usual kiss on the cheek to go to his mouth. It was a gesture that had just come from within... I wanted to show him how much I loved him. But it was only a moment: I saw him freeze for a moment... then he greeted me and got off.
However, when we met again after one day or two... I will always remember how he came to me... we were sitting together in that pub... for a change we had met right after work and I was not in best conditions...
He headed for my hair, he grabbed the tweezers and loosened them... It was one of the first times he stared into my eyes, and I had never watched carefully those eyes... before realizing how important he was to me.
A kiss... the embarrassment that ensued and how fluently I was able to come out of it... I realized two things at that moment: I was back to being myself... and Davide needed me as much as I needed him.

Davide is a good-natured, pernickety, meticulous one... I was wrong in thinking, at first, that he had only a few narrow interests, that he didn’t like fun... that he didn’t even like girls. I got to know him in every nuance, in these years... he spoke at length about his life, his experiences...
He has a thousand qualities, but... I am convinced that, simply, in certain contexts he does apply, but he just can’t go in the right direction!
At work... he has so many fantastic ideas... but often they just remain theories. But he has healthy and rock-solid principles. And then... changes frighten him... He needs time to metabolize: he has always been afraid to leave his family, for the immense effort that adapting to a new situation would require.
Needless to talk about how he felt when we started to consider the idea of getting married... I had to fight for several nights against his objections, his doubts, his fear of not being ready. However, he had to surrender when he saw me with "the same face and the same fearful look you had when you were arriving at the meeting place and you realized that there was Walter", and he said that for nothing in the world he could accept to make me suffer.
He’s capable of experiencing strong feelings, but he finds it so hard to express them... he needs time and possibly a pen and paper: and even then, he always told me that he felt ridiculous to write... whether they were feelings for a girl or simple considerations or thoughts.
I can say that I have never read a single sentence, written by him, that sounded boring or meaningless.
I have an unbounded trust in him... I appreciate every gesture, his every thought... I'm sure that thanks to me he’s becoming a really complete person.
Yeah... he gave me the opportunity to do something for him... and, in time, to make me feel indispensable.

* * *

I changed my job in 1998...
And I've lost several pounds too... I can almost say that I’m back to my ideal weight. Despite having turned thirty, everyone tells me that I look much younger.
And... one day... it must’ve been June or July... we’ve heard that Walter and Carmen were expecting a child, but she lost it when she was in her sixth or seventh month.
We have not commented on what happened... I mean... I had to force myself to avoid thinking that "they deserved that", for what she... But Davide has convinced me that bringing up the past is useless... even if they made you suffer a lot.
We didn’t think it was the case to give a call... just for solidarity. Here it was me who insisted on that because... in any case, the past won’t be erased. One can perhaps forgive, understand, and set aside.

As for the rest... in my most recent diaries there is not much... the wonderful moments we spent together, the laughter, all our dreams and our plans... the way we gave each other a hand, the happiness that we... well, that I am sharing again... with friends...

We just have to figure out when we’ll be ready for our baby... And if I shall attend the college... after all those talks about it.
And with respect to our relationship... will I be able to keep these fragments of my life stored in the form of a diary, without him feeling just like only one page among many? How much longer will I enjoy in continuing to taunt him about all the times he treated me in at least objectionable ways? And will he do the same? Will I still be able to wear some clothes a bit special without reading in his eyes that unintentional, subtle irony? Will he still remind the years of Carmen and Walter to make me feel guilty because... I had no consideration for the person that today I love so deeply?

'Til death do us part.