Day 19 - Only Laugh - Chapter 19 (1413 words)

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ONLY LAUGH WHEN IT HURTS

By Wayne Webb

CHAPTER 19

It had taken him a while and he travelled across a few continents to escape his past, a past he could not remember let alone understand, and now he felt like he was truly away from it all. The legend had receded and other things occupied the minds of people these days. Occasional spots on the television would come up every now and then, the 'where are they now' specials or retrospectives that would follow the path of comedy, entertainment or that old stalwart, time. He did not worry too much about them, no one thought for a moment more about the man who ran the café in the sleepy Tuscan village who bore a passing resemblance to a man from what must have been years ago.  

Tony's life was Italian to the most he could pull off, he had an Italian name, spoke the local language exclusively, and he had his own coffee place, which became a bar after 9 pm, when he reopened and held court with his regulars and the occasional tourist well off the beaten path. He had named his bar Solo Ridere in Italian, or “Only Laugh” in the language he had grown up with. The locals assumed that it was a reflection of his mellow and laid back nature, a youngish aged man, looking much older than he really was, reflecting a much harder life up until the point of making his way here. He spoke broken English with customers when it was necessary, but he had immersed himself in the native tongue and was unwilling to accept that he had another life elsewhere.

He had many reasons for the name, it reflected the way he was when he was old Tony, it reflected what he could do when trying to grasp any of it, and it reflected what he wanted to do more than anything else now. He smiled wryly and said so very little but he could not truly laugh heartily at even the funniest of things. Perhaps it had been worn out of him the locals had guessed, they had their own legends and gossip built up around the young man who had calmly inserted himself into their lives in halting Italian at first, but soon fitting in the language, the style and the nature of the town. He was no longer even the newest person on the block.

He opened when people wanted him to serve a coffee, he closed when siesta time rolled around. The kitchen and bar opened together when people came out of their homes and the cleaned up after everyone else had gone to bed, before the sun rose. Like clockwork he was dependable and reliable and local.

Inside his own existence he corresponded when he needed to with the companies and efforts that went on in his name. He had divested himself of many of his responsibilities but kept those that kept others, helped others. He did not want anyone out of work, or out of pocket or on their own when he could be helping them, financially at least. It was not truly altruistic, but nothing really is any more. He felt something was missing, something was being made up for, or a hole was being filled in perhaps, something the old Tony had dug up. If it was that it was divorced enough from his conscious mind to not see it clearly, but close enough to the surface to feel it's need. So the money circled around, assisting and intervening without anything from him except approval. His people contacted him via email and occasionally via a re-routed internet phone call. He certainly wanted to make up for something wrong, but not such a deep seated desire to be involved face-to-face.

So he sat day after day behind the bar in Solo Ridere, serving coffee and listening to the innocent gossip and daily bitching of people living their lives in ordinary extravagance. He loved the smell of roasting beans and of tannin bursts when the cork came free of the bottle. He served cakes and savoury treats during the day and lighter meals and small dishes in the evening. There were other restaurants nearby and he was not interested in taking their trade, taking their customers, when there was enough to go round. He wanted them before they did other things, after they had finished and would be winding down.

Once a week the local choir group would pack out the pews of the church with people young and old, listening to Arias and Choruses from the great Italian works of art, on cold nights people huddled together and watched the steam rising from the assembled throats. On summer evenings when the light was fading to a murky covering, they would open the wooden doors, cast off the iron chains and clasps that held the halls closed, and let the music spill out into the village square. He never missed one, he loved the sound of it all, the highs, lows, tragedies and jokes of Opera. They were always spelled out subtly and obviously together in a way that only clumsily erected plots sung manically in Italian could do.

It made his life make some sense for an hour or so, at least.

Tonight it was Spring, the air was cool but the doors were still being flung wide in denial of the passage of Winter and encouragement for the onset of warmer, balmy nights. The younger generation of villagers not yet clamouring for the lights and action of Florence nearby, were still in the back of the church watching cynically but holding on to the traditions of their upbringing. Tony had seen a couple of these kids lining up to get their first drinks on their own, parents had brought them in before they reached 16, but as they crested that magically nonsensical number the power transferred to themselves and they wanted a taste of adulthood, which was technically exactly the same as when their parents purchased it, but was somehow in all ways sweeter when independently procured.

There were three teenagers, all turning 16 within days of each other than had been coming to Solo Ridere for a few years with family, with older friends and as the time neared they came along together alone and ready.

The three of them walked in behind Tony on the way back from the church as the singing ceased he had already left, to ready the bar for the people who would dribble in for conversation and red wine into the late hours. His chef had been there ahead of him preparing the Tapas-like food that people would snack on regularly. They had not changed the menu for a few months and Antonio the chef was chaffing under the need for change. Tony himself left the choice to Antonio, he had the skill and the impetus for a new menu, Tony was accepting of change and evolution whenever it presented itself.

As he took the cobbled lane from the Square back a few metres to where Solo Ridere was fronted, he could hear them shuffling behind him. He knew who they were, they had come out of the church the same time as him and walked a respectful dozen or more paces back. The clack, clack, clack of the girl's leather boots, and he double whiffles of air expelled by the boys American designed colour overloaded monstrosity curiously defined as sneakers.

As he reached the front door, he saw them mirrored in the glass of the window faces obscured by the sign painted there and legs framed out by the red-checkered curtains detailing the lower half, but clear torso identified none the less. He put his hands in his pockets and slowly turned on his heels.

“Happy Birthday, well soon anyway.” He said looking at his watch, mighnight still over 3 hours away and the eve of her being sixteen and the girl blushed yet smiled broadly. “You know I can only serve you after midnight and your friends... not at all unless their parents are coming?” He framed it as a question, but it was a clear warning he was not to be taken lightly.

“That's not why we are here. We have a proposition for you.”

For the first time in some time Tony was silent because he did not know what to say, and not because he did not want to say it.