“Sorry to hear that.” Step picked up a piece of cheese from the salad bowl with his fingers and popped it in his mouth.
“Yes, thanks for that. But try not to finish off the whole bowl of salad, okay? Listen, why don’t you go in the other room and set the table? The tablecloth is down there.”
Step stood up, opened the drawer, and pulled out a random tablecloth.
“No, use the red one. It’s cleaner, and after all, it’s Christmas. By the way, Papà and Mamma called…They wanted to wish you Merry Christmas. Why don’t you call them back?”
“I tried. The line was busy.” Step went into the living room.
“Why don’t you try again now?”
Step decided not to answer that question.
“Do as you think best…I told you to call.” Paolo burned a finger trying to see if the pasta was done. He decided not to insist.
Later, they were sitting across from each other. A small Christmas tree was blinking on a piece of furniture nearby. The television was turned on, but with the sound off, and Christmas presenters were talking over the cheerful music on the stereo.
“Jesus, Paolo, this pasta is incredible. For real.”
“It needs a little more salt.”
“No, if you ask me, it’s perfect like this.” In an instant, Step turned into a prisoner of his thoughts and memories again. Babi always put a little extra salt on everything. He’d make fun of her because she always did it, indiscriminately, with every dish, no matter what, even before tasting it.
“Why don’t you try it first?” he would ask her. “Maybe it’s already super salty.”
“No, you don’t understand,” Babi said. “The part I like is actually salting the food, putting it on…” Sweet and stubborn. No, he didn’t understand. He couldn’t understand. How had the breakup happened? How could their relationship have simply ceased to exist? How could she be with another guy? He imagined them together in an embrace.
Step was a masochist for love, eager and willing to suffer. He could never love her the way I loved her. He won’t be able to adore her the same way. He won’t know how to appreciate all her tiny movements, those fleeting signals on her face. It was as if he, and only he, had been given the right to see, to understand the true flavor of her kisses, the real color of her eyes, that sweet awakening as they opened with fluttering eyelids. No other man will ever be able to see what I saw. He least of all.
He imagined him like that, incapable of loving her, of truly seeing her, understanding her, respecting her. He wouldn’t be amused by her sweet caprices. He wouldn’t love her little hand, the gnawed fingernails, her slightly pudgy feet, that tiny hidden flaw, though not all that well concealed. Perhaps he’d seen her tattoo, a terrible thought, but he’d never be capable of loving it. Not as much as Step had when he’d first kissed it and now just at the memory of it. Sadness filled his eyes.
Paolo looked at him, worried now. “The pasta’s disgusting, isn’t it? If you don’t want any more, just leave it. There’s a fabulous main course.”
Step looked up at his brother and shook his head, trying to smile.
“No, Pa, it was great, seriously.”
“Do you want to talk about it?” Paolo asked.
“No, it really is a sad story.”
“Sadder than mine?”
Step nodded. They smiled at each other. A brotherly gaze in the true meaning of the word, perhaps for the first time, only now.
Then, suddenly, the doorbell rang, a long, determined sound that split the air, bringing with it joy and hope. Step ran to the door and pulled it open.
“Ciao, Step.”
“Oh, ciao, Pallina.” He tried to hide his disappointment. “Hey, come on in why don’t you?”
“No thanks. I just came by to wish you Merry Christmas. I brought you this.” She gave him a small package.
“Should I open it now?”
Pallina nodded.
Step turned it over in his hands until he found the top side and then quickly unwrapped it. It was a wooden picture frame and, in it, the best gift he could ever have hoped for. It was a picture of him and Pollo on his motorcycle, arms around each other, short hair, legs up, laughter in the wind. Something hurt inside him.
“Pallina, it’s beautiful. Thanks.”
“God, Step, I miss him.”
“So do I.” Only then did he notice how Pallina was dressed. How many times had he seen that jean jacket behind him on his motorcycle, how many times he’d slapped it, with friendship, with force, with glee. They smiled at each other.
“Step, can I ask you to do something for me?”
“Name it.”
“Give me a hug,” Pallina said.
Step moved closer to her awkwardly, opening his arms and enveloping her in a bear hug, thinking about his old friend and how in love with him she’d been.
“Hug me tight, harder. The way he used to do. You know, he always used to say…‘This way you won’t be able to get away from me. You’ll stay with me forever.’” Pallina put her head on his shoulder. “But instead, he ran away from me.”
She started crying. “You remind me of him so much, Step. He adored you. He always said that you were the only one who got him, that the two of you were identical.”
Step looked into the middle distance. The door was slightly out of focus. He hugged her tight and then even tighter. “It’s not true, Pallina. He was much better than me.”
“Yes, that’s true.” She smiled as she sniffed loudly. Pallina pulled away from Step. “Well, I’m going home now.”
“Do you want me to drive you?”
“No, thanks. Dema’s downstairs waiting for me.”
“Give him my regards.”
“Merry Christmas, Step.”
“Merry Christmas.”
He watched Pallina enter the elevator. She smiled at him one last time, shut the doors, and pushed the G button for the ground floor. As she was riding down, she reached into her jacket and pulled out her pack of Camel Lights. She lit her last cigarette, the one that was upside down. But she smoked it sadly, hopelessly. She knew that her one true desire, her only wish, could never come true.
Step went into his bedroom and put the photo on his nightstand and then went back to the table. Next to his place was a giftwrapped package. “Hey, what’s this?”
“Your Christmas present.” Paolo smiled at him. “Haven’t you heard that people give each other presents at Christmas?”
Step started to unwrap the package while Paolo watched him in some amusement. “I saw that yesterday you burned all your panels, and I thought that now you wouldn’t have anything left to read.”
Step finished unwrapping the present. He practically had to laugh. Il mio nome è Tex. Tex Willer. The comic book series he hated most.
“If you don’t like it, you can always return it.”
“Are you kidding? Paolo, thanks. I seriously didn’t have this one. Hold on a second, I have something for you too.”
A short while later, Step came back from his bedroom with a small case. He’d bought it that afternoon while he was waiting downstairs from Babi’s house. Before he saw her. He preferred not to think about that too carefully.