Mad Diary of Malcolm Malarkey, page 14
“Of course,” Malarkey answers with a puff.
“How old are you?”
“We’re probably the same age.” He puffs. “Mid-fifties.”
Signore Liliano raises his eyebrows.
“Fifty-fifteen. Why do you ask?”
“You’re obviously aware of the age difference between the two of you.”
“Is there an age difference? Hadn’t noticed. Some people don’t see color. I don’t see age differences.”
“Can we talk seriously?”
Malarkey shifts gears, and the tenor of his voice changes with his expression.
“As long as it’s a serious question. Don’t want to waste time answering non-serious questions.”
“What do you want from her?”
“Want from her? Whatever she’s willing to give me.”
“Meaning?”
Malarkey leans in.
“Meaning, at my age, I no longer expect anything. She entered my life as a knock on my door. Maybe she’ll leave that way as well.”
“I noticed the engagement ring.”
“It belonged to my mother.”
“Then you’re serious about this?”
Malarkey puffs and looks Signore Liliano straight in the eyes.
“It belonged to my mother,” he answers, emphasizing the word “it” about as seriously as one can answer a question and pausing in between each word. Malarkey raises his eyebrows. Signore Liliano gets it.
“May I ask you another personal question?”
“As long as it’s personal. Nothing worse than answering impersonal questions.”
“How’s your health?”
“Why do you ask?”
“Because we’re old.”
“And?”
“And my guess is we may suffer from the same malady.”
“Would that be ED or old age?” Malarkey asks, puffing.
“It would be cancer.”
The Reader can only imagine where the conversation goes after that. It isn’t as if they are going to exchange prostate prognoses to see which one has a better chance of outliving the other or what degree of cancer each one has or what they fear most: having the prostate surgically removed or getting a semi-annual rectal exam. What the conversation does do is bring two men, who share a common and often lethal disease, together. Nothing unifies the seemingly un-unifiable than two of the Four Horsemen of Apocalypse, disease and death, being discussed by two men who are quite aware of two of the Four Horsemen of Apocalypse if not three of four. One can intellectualize that we are all made from the same carbon atoms of the cosmos, but until science discovers the answer to aging, we are all ineluctably tumbling headlong into the maw of mortality. With that thought in mind you might want to pour yourself your own Calvados as we return to the mother and daughter reunion taking place in the study.
“Did you set a date?” Signora Liliano asks.
“Not yet.”
“And did you move in?”
“No, we’ve kept our homes for the time being.”
There’s an extended and uncomfortable silence, but the elephant in the room is getting anxious and no one wants an anxious elephant in one’s room especially since elephant turds are enormous and quite difficult to clean up.
“What about children?”
Having spent as much time with Malarkey as she has, Liliana wants to answer, “As a concept or a recipe?” but she stifles herself.
“What about them?”
“Your clock . . ”
“Is ticking. I know, mother.”
“It is not a theory, Liliana. You have already had a miscarriage.”
“I’m well aware of that.”
“But …”
“But what?”
“He is old.”
Liliana is used to hearing such things, from friends, from other students, and she’s used to the looks they get when she and Malarkey are out in public with people staring at them and coming to the obvious conclusion that she’s “fucking him for the money.” However, Malarkey has no money so there’s obviously something else at work that even Malarkey doesn’t fully understand. Liliana used to get angry about it, indignant that others might be passing judgement on her, but then she decided to “fuck it” as Malarkey suggested. Regardless, at this point she doesn’t really want to hear it.
“So are you,” she answers with a bit of that disdainful residue and returns a scowl that can only be called “genetic.”
“But I am neither a widow nor childless.”
“What’s that got to do with it?”
“I have raised my family and so has he. You have not. Do you think this will last?”
“I’m not a fortune teller, mother. I never thought Massimo would die in an auto accident and neither did you. I never thought I would have a miscarriage and neither did you. I never thought I would meet Malcolm and, I’m certain, neither did you.”
“All the more reason to be concerned.”
“I think I know what I’m doing.”
“I just want you to be happy. Are you happy?”
“Yes. Are you?”
“I am. I just wish I could be happier for you,” says Signora Liliano as she sips a glass of water.
After the discussions end and after the goodnights have been gratuitously spoken, Malarkey and Liliana go to bed.
“So, was your evening as unforgettable as mine?” Malarkey asks.
“She’s not easy to deal with.”
“No, really. I would never have thought that. Then I had the better evening.”
“Why?”
“Because your father and I have a lot in common.”
“Really. Like what?”
“The three ‘c’s. Cohibas, Calvados and … cancer.”
Liliana ponders that comment.
“He shared that with you?”
“Yes.”
“Then you should feel privileged.”
“Because?”
“Because he’d share that with very few people. Maybe it was the Calvados.”
“And not me?”
“You go without saying.”
He turns to her and they kiss. Liliana is too tired to make love and, for that matter, so is Malarkey. It’s a tiring journey and the dinner is not a respite from that. So, as is their normal bedtime position, Liliana turns on her left side and Malarkey spoons her with his right hand cupped around her breast. It isn’t sexual for Malarkey nor is it sexual for Liliana. Perhaps, for Malarkey, a cupped breast brings him closer to the world of maternity. After all, Malarkey is an orphan. For Liliana, a cupped breast gives her a kind of solace and warmth in a villa that for all its regal opulence is somehow bereft of both.
CHAPTER THIRTY-EIGHT
THE BENTLEY; OR SEX WITHOUT BORDERS
Early the next morning, the Reader finds Liliana and Malarkey drinking Lavazza and eating croissants at a kitchen table as the kitchen staff scurries around the scullery preparing food for later. Malarkey isn’t going to describe the kitchen. The Reader should imagine what Mario Batali’s kitchen might look like. If the Reader cannot imagine what Mario Batali’s kitchen might look like then the Reader should Google Mario Batali’s kitchen. Mario enters and immediately walks up to Malarkey.
“Signore Malcolm, I have talked with Signore Liliano and he agreed to let you drive the car whenever you wish.”
Malarkey can hardly restrain himself.
“Grazie mille, Mario.”
Mario leaves.
“Did you hear that?”
“What I heard was impossible,” Liliana answers in between sips of Lavazza.
“What do you mean?”
“No one drives that car but Mario. It must have been the Calvados.”
“Or my charm.”
“As I said, the Calvados.”
Malarkey rushes through whatever breakfast there is to rush through, grabs Liliana before she’s had time to chew a croissant let alone swallow it, and after he gets some driving tips from Mario climbs into the driver’s seat. It’s a crisp, sunny, late-December morning in Arona. The sky is clear. From there, one can see Monte Rosa in the distance in all its magic mountain majesty. From Malarkey’s point of view, the snow-capped peak appears to be smiling. For Malarkey, it’s the conjunction of space and time and a moment that does not come that often. Malarkey gazes at Liliana and raises his eyebrows. Driving a Bentley: something he had not imagined on a “bucket list.” And not just any Bentley, but a Flying Spur. Who could ask for more?
After a final driving tip from Mario, Malarkey adjusts the seat, the mirror, whatever other accoutrements need to be adjusted before he starts the car. The engine merely hums. Then he turns on the radio. As they slowly drive off the estate, one hears the finale of Rossini’s “William Tell Overture.” [Once again, to get the true flavor of this chapter, reading it to Rossini would be mandatory. Malarkey suggests the Reader listen to (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c7O91GDWGPU)].
At this point, the Reader should imagine aerial shots of Malarkey driving off the estate before engaging the winding eleven miles or eighteen kilometers (depending on whether you’re an American or not) from Arona to Stresa along the shore of Lago Maggiore. Malarkey isn’t going to describe the journey from Arona to Stresa along the shore of Lago Maggiore since there are no words that can accommodate the beauty of the lake and the sky and the Alps, but as Malarkey drives, he broadly smiles at Liliana. She’s not quite sure about Malarkey’s driving skills since he looks more at her than at the road, which, at some moments, becomes a bit disconcerting. Each turn he makes parallels Rossini’s music not unlike his driving exuberance in the car he drove in Carmel. The Reader follows his turning and winding, dipping and rising from Arona to Stresa along the shore of Lago Maggiore until Malarkey enters Stresa proper where he gingerly avoids hitting oblivious pedestrians and irresponsible Vespa drivers while navigating through phone-flashing tourists until they arrive curbside at the Regina Palace Hotel.
Now Malarkey could attempt to describe the Regina Palace Hotel in the manner of Thomas Mann, but as he’s said he’s not Thomas Mann and even if he were Thomas Mann a Thomas Mann description would take up a lot of pages and since the Reader is probably more interested in what happens at and after the Regina Palace Hotel, Malarkey believes an image would suffice. So, here’s a shot of the Regina Palace Hotel:
After Malarkey pulls up to the front of the hotel, Rossini ends. It’s incumbent upon the Reader to time the ending of the Rossini piece to coincide with the exact arrival time of Malarkey and Liliana at the Regina Palace Hotel. If not, please start over. But at the precise moment Malarkey parks, he holds up his hands from the steering wheel as if it were on fire and looks at Liliana.
“Fuck!!!!!”
Liliana merely raises her eyebrows, but doesn’t react. After all, it’s only a Bentley. Malarkey and Liliana decide to have drinks at the Regina Palace bar that overlooks the lake and from there they can see Isola Bella only four hundred meters away. If the Reader isn’t familiar with Isola Bella, then, oh never mind. Malarkey nurses a Guinness Bitters; Liliana, a dirty martini made with Belvedere vodka and blue-cheese olives. It’s a wee bit early for alcoholic beverages, but one needs to seize the moment in Stresa since those Stresa moments may not ever come again.
“Mario was right?”
“About what?”
“Driving the car.”
“What about it?”
“It is better than sex.”
“Excuse me?”
“He said driving it was better than sex.”
“Maybe for you,” Liliana says as she sips her martini.
Now this might appear to be a rather benign comment, but, for Malarkey, the wordsmith, no comment is really benign unless it’s a comment without words and only punctuation marks, in which case that’s already been done by a Brazilian writer. The Reader may detect a not so subtle irony on Liliana’s part. One might assume that it’s a dig at Malarkey’s sexual performance or lack of one. If one assumes that’s the case, then one is probably correct.
“Uh, what’s that mean?”
“Not sure you want to get into it, do you?”
“Is there a problem?”
“There’s often been kind of a problem.”
“With what?”
“Malcolm, it’s a glorious day in Stresa with the shimmering blue lake and the snow-capped Alps and peacock flocks on Isola Bella. Let’s keep it that way.”
Of course, Malarkey can’t keep it that way even with it being a glorious day in Stresa with the shimmering blue lake and the snow-capped Alps and peacock flocks on Isola Bella and so he needs to taint the glorious day in Stresa with the shimmering blue lake and the snow-capped Alps and peacock flocks on Isola Bella by stating,
“Wait a second. You said it’s often been a problem?” Malarkey asks, slightly agitated.
“Yes. On and off.”
“Then why haven’t you said something before?”
“Because before it wasn’t the most important issue.”
“And now it is?”
“To some degree.”
“What degree?”
“You know.”
“No, enlighten me.”
“You don’t have the … endurance.”
“Are you talking about having sex or running a marathon?” he quizzically asks.
“I knew this would happen.”
“What would happen?”
“You’d just get defensive talking about it.”
“Who’s getting defensive?” Malarkey defensively asks.
She rolls her eyes.
“It is a bit personal, isn’t it? I mean I’ve tried almost every med known to the sildenafil world.”
“Then maybe you should try a different med or …”
“Or what?”
“Or try something else.”
Malarkey’s eyes get wide.
“Like what? A dick injection?”
Liliana raises her eyebrows, smiles, sips her martini, but says nothing. Malarkey does not see that coming. For Malarkey, the rest of the day is somewhat tainted and Malarkey and Liliana don’t talk too much. Even the luncheon at the Ristorante Pizzeria Mamma Mia doesn’t lift the mood. It’s not a secret to Malarkey that things aren’t as good as they could be and the slow decline in his performance hasn’t gone unnoticed. The inability to perform sexually goes beyond the physiological. Intercourse is, after all, a psychological function as well. The two work hand in hand, so to speak.
As dusk falls on Stresa, they return to the Villa. Malarkey drives the winding eleven miles or eighteen kilometers from Stresa to Arona, but unlike the earlier trip, when he turns on the radio the Reader hears an instrumental version of the “Song of the Volga Boatman.” [To get the full flavor of what Malarkey was feeling on the way back, Google (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YZ6QJWpkvzs)]. Obviously, the “wind is out of the sails” on the return trip and as the Reader might imagine that parallels the music. What a twist. After kilometers of silence, Liliana finally says:
“I’ve arranged for Mario to drive us to Milan tomorrow,” Liliana says.
“Fine.”
“Something wrong?”
“No, nothing. Never felt better.”
“I thought you wanted to spend New Year’s Eve in Milan.”
“I did.”
“And?”
“And now I’m not sure.”
“Why not?”
“Performance anxiety.”
“Are you serious?”
“Nevermore.”
Liliana says nothing more for the rest of the drive, but the remainder of the page is left blank in case the Reader would like to write what Liliana might be thinking.
CHAPTER THIRTY-NINE
AT THE GRAND HOTEL ET DE MILAN AND AFTER
This is the famous Boldini painting of Verdi that regally rests in the foyer of the Grand Hotel et de Milan. One cannot visit Milan without being affected by Verdi and it is no different in Malarkey’s case, as the Reader will discover anon. The hotel attendants take their luggage up to Verdi’s Suite where, later that evening, Malarkey dresses up to look like Verdi with the same scarf and top hat, which he purchased in the Verdi Gift Shop downstairs.
“Lil, do I look like Verdi?”
Liliana finishes dressing and looks at Malarkey who’s posing as if he were Verdi.
“Yes, but without the talent.”
The comment stings Malarkey.
“Right. Grazie.”
Liliana catches the faux pas.
“You know what I mean. Musical talent.”
“Right. Musical talent. Of course. What else could it be?”
Though Malarkey has a penchant for Mahler, when it comes to opera, no one surpasses Verdi and Malarkey has read some of the best books on Verdi: Phillips-Matz biography; Osborne’s Complete Operas; Willis’s Verdi’s Shakespeare and on and on and on. In some ways, Malarkey admires Verdi more than any other composer for a myriad of reasons some of which will become clear in a subsequent chapter. However, before they leave for dinner, Malarkey returns to wearing his usual garb since he doesn’t want anyone to confuse him with Verdi.
It’s a relatively chilly New Year’s Eve in Milan. Clear skies. 4 degrees Celsius or 39 degrees Fahrenheit depending on whether you’re American or not. Arm in arm, Malarkey and Liliana walk the few blocks to the Ristorante Rigolo for dinner a very unpretentious restaurant as the photo would indicate:
It’s not exactly a hole in the wall, but one might mistake it for one; however the food is magnificent. For appetizers they share Oyster Britain, tuna tartarina with chives and raw shrimp; for first dishes, Liliana orders Risotto alla Milanese expressed with marrow and saffron while Malarkey orders Gragnano spaghetti with seafood and zucchini; followed by Redfish for two with potatoes and olives all accompanied by Brunello di Montalcino 2007 Tenute Silvio Nardi; and topped off with pineapple carpaccio with berry cream for Malarkey and a lemon sorbet with vodka for Liliana. Malarkey is hungry just thinking about what Malarkey ate. After dinner, they nurse a couple of Verduzzo Toblar of Venice Giulia 2008, but even though the dinner was superb, there seems to be a palpable tension in the air. Malarkey could say one could cut the tension with a knife, but that would be redundant so he won’t.
