The Will

The will

psychological thriller

Roberto Rizzo

Copyright © 2021 - Roberto Rizzo

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Roberto Rizzo

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The will

License Notes

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Roberto Rizzo

I do not think being a homebody type of person. Perhaps this is because I took my first flight when I was before nine months.

From Africa to Europe, from Libya to Italy. At the yoke of the plane was my father, a Tripoli air force pilot who, at the beginning of the war, was moved to Novi Ligure airport where I am still living and where I have been writing since the age of fifteen. But my always hidden desire to travel burst forth at the age of eighteen when, without any money, I decided to wander across Europe. Other times, a different Europe, other borders. Real borders and in some cases almost impassable. However, I wandered for more than two years traveling throughout Europe with a friend of mine, hitchhiking and working in different places to scrape together the few money needed to survive.

It was in Copenhagen that we were in serious difficulty, because we lost our job and, with a few cents in our pocket, we were certain to be in a position of constraint.The humiliation of the travel warrant was in our hands but we had to think up a solution that could delay, at least temporarily, an inevitable surrender, when a sudden inspiration, gave me the solution. I could draw, we still had a few cents to buy a colored chalk box and being in perfect physical condition to overcome any hesitation, I had the winning idea: we would work as pavement artists! From that moment everything changed. No more empty stomach, fears and hardships, but beautiful women, smart restaurants and nightclubs at night. Qualified begging but, above all, well-paid, during the day. It was during that long period of dolce vita that I knew a Danish girl, I married her and took her to Italy, where I started a business. In the meantime I kept on writing and composing my first songs andI had the chance to share some musical experience with Fabrizio de Andrè. I attended many literary and poetry competitions where I got gratifying results, and began to cooperate with Panorama, a Yugoslav magazine written in Italian.

Some of my poems were published in the prestigious journal Fenarete and in other qualified periodicals, until it happened to me to know Eugenio Montale who, at that time, was not the Nobel Prize yet and who, luckily, expressed me sympathy and which I grew fond of him a lot to. In that period he was living in Milan at 11 Via Bigli and I was accustomed to visit him every Monday when I went to Milan because of my job. Even if at first I had gone there because of it, for a long time a kind of fear kept me from submitting to his judgment even one of my poems. But the day came when he asked me why I had not brought him one of my writings yet, so that he finished with a sentence I will never forget: I have not yet figured out if you're one of the most honest and fair man I have ever known or just a very smart guy. "

It was just this honesty to give me a confirmation of being faced to the wittiest man I had ever happened to meet. Not only that conviction kept unchanged but was strengthened in time.

The following Monday I took him almost everything I had written until then.

For two weeks he told me nothing. During our conversations I was pleased with his encyclopaedic knowledge and with his intelligence ranging from philosophy to politics, from art to science, from psychology to religion, and, of course, from literature to poetry. From our conversations I drew confirmation to have almost the same point of views with the one I considered my only teacher. The following week, for the second time, he was approaching the subject: Don’t you want to know what my opinion on your writings is?

I felt like I was going to sink: Sure! Of course! I said eagerly.

So why didn’t not you ask me?

Because I fear your judgment. Moreover just because you haven’t spoken to me before about it, convinced me that your opinion was negative.

I want to give you an advice. Enter the competitions no more.

I felt like I was going to die. My doubts were changed into certainties.What I wrote was worthless or at least was of very little value, and therefore, implicitly, his advice was to consider myself a writer no more.

Got it. - I said, mortified. - I'll stop writing."

You have understood nothing.

He replied and, smiling, he added a sentence that, satisfying me beyond all expectations, I will keep for ever in my heart, but my discretion always prevented me from reporting it to someone. However, encouraged by his exhortations, even after his death, I tried never to leave my passion for Literature, Poetry, Theory, Philosophy, Music and Related Texts.

In the mid-eighties, somebody thought of electing me as President of a cultural association in my town. I complied with enthusiasm because it was intended to promote new talents by publishing their literary works and offering them the chance to express opinions through the magazine of the association. It is a commitment I could carry on for few years only but whom I give credit to for having given me the opportunity to carve out a short time to write everyday.

I have always supported the idea that a life with no news is not worth living and maybe just because of it I have occasionally tried to breathe new life. The last chance I had was when, going to the Russian consulate to get some details, I asked about a young Russian tourist who, by chance, as I could verify very soon, was fond of literature. What could I do but marry her?

However, today, thanks to a chain of events, not least as a result my marriage, at last I was able to put into practice the exhortation of Montale by being able to write at full time and I am sure that it is consequential that often happens to me to feel the sensation that he himself could be pleased because I've heard him.

And now, traveling into my mind, I get high on space, formulating theories that recklessly try to stretch out their hands to embrace those who desire to think, to know, to understand. As I try to do so..

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The will

CHAPTER I

The moon shone high in the sky. The waves, reflecting a thousand sparkles, broke at the feet of the long line of cliffs that decorated the coast as far as the eye could see. The air was cool yet the drops that the spume threw over him refreshed him. He stood still and as he watched the fluctuations of the sea, he could feel himself drawn to and embraced by its immensity. He would have liked to have dived in, to have been swallowed up by its vastness and to have got drunk on its eternal peace. In the clear sky, a few white clouds chased each other seeming to reflect the games of the seafoam.

He was still lost in his thoughts when the voice of a small boy not far away distracted him.

Daddy, look! See how beautiful the sea is! exclaimed the child who was leaning against the backrest of a bench and was speaking to his father who was close by. The shrill voice brought him back to reality making him aware that he was still alive. He looked at the little boy. His little face was lit up with his great joy. It was a simple, spontaneous happiness such as only a childish emotion could express and so it was inevitably destined to be soon lost.

He moved away from the bench. The air was getting colder and hardly anyone was about on the streets. He looked at his watch, it was almost nine o’clock in the evening. He thought that it would be better if he started back to his car, but there was no rush. His idea of finding Ariadne’s thread which Olga had encouraged him to do on the phone had been a miserable failure. If anything, maybe seeing the places that were so dear to him had had the opposite effect to the one he had sought. He wished to find a little peace and quiet, to retrace all those happy moments of his memories, the countless instants of harmony and carefreeness yet his recollections had made him plummet into that sad atmosphere that leaves us with that which is no more, to the point of insinuating a doubt that it had never even happened. No, perhaps it was only the projection of the memory that had changed. When one is a child imagination colours reality in shades of pink and pale blue even though everything is only grey, and what was happening to him right then was this change in perspective.

He stopped in front of the car, thinking that the explanation for everything had to be sought for somewhere else when, without realising what was happening, he lost consciousness. When he came to, he was unable to quantify how long he had been senseless; his brain was befuddled and slow and although he could not understand how it had happened, he was sure of one fact – his loss of consciousness had been damnably real. He did not know if he had been hit or if it depended on an indisposition because his swoon had come without any warning and had been so swift, he had been unable to identify the cause. Furthermore, not only did he have no idea of how long he had been out for the count but he was also clueless about where he happened to be; the only thing that was certain was that, in that moment, although he had his eyes, he could not see anything at all. Straining his eyes in the darkness he had the impression that he was suspended in an immense black sky constellated with a myriad of tiny luminescent dots that blinked with intermittent light.

Then, slowly, ever so slowly, the dots grew bigger until he was able to perceive a few details yet he still could not see the outlines properly. Suddenly, he began to hear voices and, in that moment, he realised that up to then he had lost his hearing. Gradually the presence of the sounds and noises gained consistency until he was finally able to hear something comprehensible.

Mummy, Mummy, come here! He’s moving! Maybe he’s waking up!

It was the voice of a little girl, a voice that his semi-consciousness had amplified until it had seemed shrill and annoying but in the end it had been understandable. In the meantime, he was beginning to be able to distinguish the details of his surroundings more clearly. He got the feeling that he was in someone’s home, but he was not certain even of this. The only thing that was certain was that he was lying down in a bed or at least on something that was quite soft.

How are you feeling? Do feel better? Would you like anything?

Don’t shout, can’t you see that he’s still in a state of shock?

These and other words whirled through his mind. He used all his strength to try to understand what was happening, but, most of all, he tried to put a minimum of order into his thoughts.

The details were steadily becoming clearer. A woman and a small girl were standing next to him and it seemed to him that they were arguing, or at least having an animated discussion. He would have liked to have told them to be quiet, but he found that he could not make a sound, not even a whisper. With superhuman effort he managed to lift himself up slightly and, leaning on his elbow, he tried to speak, but instead of the question that he intended to ask, all that came out was a sort of guttural sound. Then his head began to whirl and, overcome with giddiness, he fell back unable to see or hear anything.

He woke up early in the morning. His watch showed him that it was seven o’clock and warm rays of sunshine filtered through the slats of the shutters. He felt refreshed and, strangely enough, he also felt perfectly well. His clothes had been carefully folded and were laid at the foot of the bed. He glanced around the room and it seemed to him that he was in a familiar place but one that was different to the place where he had been before losing consciousness. He got up and started to get dressed trying not to make a noise. He had almost finished when a little girl entered the room. She stopped when she got close to him and continued to stare at him in silence. What at first had seemed to be a simple pout became a delicate expression of benevolence. Her long, blond hair framed her pretty face which was enlivened by her wonderful periwinkle blue eyes. Luca drew closer and smiled back at her and asked her if she knew what had happened to him and why he was there.

You have been unwell, Daddy, she began as she sat down next to him on the bed. We have taken care of you and now you are better.

I’m sorry. I think I didn’t understand you. It seemed to me that you called me Daddy.

Of course, Daddy.

Luca decided not to insist and went back to asking about how he came to be in that place.

But you went away and left home and now you live here!

Thank you, dear one. But I’d like to know why, he remarked feeling more and more perplexed as he tried to find out more details.

We don’t know anything. All I know is that I missed you so much. Maybe you should tell us why you did it, she said sweetly as she got up and went towards the door.

Why, why? He needed to find answers to an infinity of whys, but at that moment the most important one seemed to be why this girl-child whom he