A Short Story Of Economic Injustice, Sex and Death

At The Beach In Rome One Summer Afternoon 1999

 

The sea at the horizon, under the glare of the sun, sparkles with diamonds that are so near and yet can never be reached. Ahmed looks at it from time to time as he walks along the stretch of beach he has come to know so well since the start of the summer. He tries to walk along the damp sand, next to the sea, where it is less tiring. But it is not easy with all the people playing racket ball, running into the surf, strolling in groups, the children digging enormous holes and erecting flimsy castles, the odd dog barking menacingly. And all that flesh out to tan in long rows and columns; like the numbers he did at school. Thinking of maths he puts his hand in the pocket of the shorts he is wearing to check on the money that is there. Never enough, he thinks as he caresses the crumpled notes. Never enough.

"Musica! CD! Musica!", the litany does not change. It is endless. They are the only words that connect him to the world he is walking through. That link him to those that lie horizontal, bathing in the sun, like the lizards he used to hunt back at home as a child. Home, so far away it seems. So far away from everything, from all the dreams, the adventures he imagined when he was young enough to scatter his mind everywhere. Nowhere to be seen now. Only the sound of his litany under the sun. Endless it seems. And yet the old Nigerian man had told him last night that he should be lucky in the scheme of things. That he was selling the latest, trendiest objects to be found on Rome's beaches at the end of this, the second millennium of Christ, and he was streets ahead of all the necklace sellers, the hat hawkers, the Brazilian charm bracelet pushers that everybody had already bought, and wished upon, and worn out, without their wishes ever being realised.

So I am the king of my circle, ahead of the scheme, he thinks, I sell the latest technology… and I am fuck all, as I walk among these horizontal people, the only one erect.

Francesca looks out at the sea and down at the diamond that sits on her engagement ring and wonders. Why it all seems so bland, so without surprise. Even under this sun. Heating her body, without release.

"it took me less than an hour and half of Rolex time to get here from Abruzzo", he says standing at the bar drinking his iced coffee entertaining his small entourage - three timid young men - with stories of his fast cars, and motorways, and speeding past police cars because his dad is mayor of a town in Emilia Romagna where the best tortellini are made and the girls suck deepest and not a stain of sperm has ever dirtied the leather interior and the music has played and he even stopped for the black prostitutes that mushroomed across Italy to seek oral pleasures as he drove along at 220 km/h seeking satisfaction, coming as the speed traps flashed. His number plate on film; the fine to authenticate the experience. The taxes he does not pay. The boys that laugh. "The bitches have enormous arses", he shouts and the barman grins and the boys laugh

"Where is Fabio?", Enza asks Francesca. "At the bar, having a coffee with the lads. He just got here. He's been away on business for couple of days. Can't remember if I told you about it", she replies. Enza smiles and says nothing. Fabio is Francesca's fiancé, and Enza is Francesca's best friend. And Francesca and Fabio are getting married after the summer, sometime early autumn. So Enza keeps smiling and thinks: Of course I know, you stupid bitch. I was out with him for dinner the other night - the night he said he was leaving - and… she stops her train of thoughts with a mental X-rated sign, as if embarrassed by what she had done. Not for her friend, but for the act in itself. All that exchange of bodily fluids strikes her as something repulsive here under the glare of the sun. I wonder if he will still fuck me after he marries, she wonders, unconsciously squeezing her thighs together.

Ahmed thinks back to the times before he left Morocco: the afternoons, the whole days spent with his best friend Sidi discussing what they would have done once they reached Europe. They watched the tourists, the travellers stroll through their town, cameras snapping, videos rolling, and they marvelled at how rich they all were, at how naked many of the women were in their summer clothing, at how easy they must have been. They talked for hours of how much money they would make, the things they would buy, and all the sex they would have. Especially the sex. And then the return back home, maybe in a large car, wads of money thrown on to their mothers' tables. Each time they thought of it, their return became more grandiose, like in those American films when the soldiers come home and everywhere people fill the streets with shouting, dancing, and multicoloured streamers cascade down from skyscrapers, which would make them laugh as there were no skyscrapers in Chauen. "Forget the tall buildings, we've got all the mountains of the Atlas to celebrate our victory under!" Sidi would shout with ecstasy as he filled his lungs with the world standing above their town under the ruins of the old catholic mission. Until the muzzein called the faithful to prayer and the two young men would run down the mountainside - which, with its two peaks, encased Chauen - among the loose stones and the goat droppings, their djellabas flapping in the cold winter air.

Francesca looks at her Cartier watch to see if her half-an-hour is up, and turns over to catch the sun on her front. Her eyes closed, the drowsiness induced by the heat, she removes herself mentally from her surroundings. Wondering about her upcoming marriage, about Fabio and how all her friends envy her. Then she drifts deeper still, where thoughts acquire the blackness of the sea at deep depths and the fish are all blind monsters. Here she nearly sees her disgust laying hidden like a trap, and shoals of unuttered desires swimming around. She rubs more sun protection into her arms, her breasts, her brown stomach automatically, without thinking, as if the dream is outside.

Ahmed keeps on walking. Keeps on hawking. Past all the beach clubs, with their wooden cabins, their showers, their restaurants and volleyball nets. Swimming pools too in the more expensive ones. He is feeling thirsty, so he stops at a water-fountain further up the beach. A middle-aged woman holding a fat child by hand stands behind him muttering unpleasant remarks directed at him. He concentrates on the cool water running down his throat. Feels the sun on the back of his neck heat him inside. Blocking out the words he cannot fully understand, and turns to leave. His eyes cross with hers, and all he sees for a fraction of a second are her brown irises which remind him so much of his grandmother, who was always muttering too, and he laughs and feels sad. The woman pulls back, fear appearing in her gaze, making him feel powerful for an instant until a wave a loneliness drags him back to the sea's edge and to his work.

Fabio pays the bill and starts walking down toward where Francesca and the others are. As he passes the wooden cabins, used as changing rooms and rented on a daily or seasonal basis, Enza jumps out from between the narrow gap dividing each cabin, where children are often found playing. I was waiting for you to call me, why didn't you? Look. This is not the place ok! Come on Fabio, be nice to me, don't be a prick. Oh yes I will, if I want to. Stop it. Speak to me. Ok, come with me. Fabio drags Enza into her family cabin, locks the door, pushes her down on her knees. Now, you be nice to me. Enza looks up, not moving, trying to find his eyes, his smile. But after the glare outside, inside the cabin she cannot see. No more words. A hand runs through her hair and pushes her closer. Enza pulls Fabio's D&G swimming trunks down.

Ahmed sells a double CD of Vasco Rossi and pockets the 20,000 lire. The couple continue to rummage through his musical selection, pausing over a reggae compilation. They are both brown and lean and beautiful. And the woman sits so close to the man her hair - long and black like the night and the eyes of women in Morocco - is draped across his shoulder. It must feel good to feel each other's heat, he thinks as the couple look up and their eyes meet: all three breaking into a smile. How's it going? They ask.

Silent for a moment, pretending to look for something in his bag of CDs, then replies: Not bad, Hamdoul'lah. But his mind goes to Sidi and the straight of Gibraltar; how it felt crossing those black, uncaring waters that winter night. The currents are strong here, the pilot had said as they sped towards the lights of Tarifa, a battered smirk on his face. Ahmed played deaf and sat petrified as the gommone cut across the choppy sea, lifting itself out from time to time for brief moments of eternity, before landing on its belly. Through the surf that sprayed his face and eyes stung of salt he kept his focus on the bright Spanish coast, lit up like those TV shows from Spain they picked up back at home. He felt seasick. Felt he would never make it. Knew a wave was about to tear him from the rope his hands clung to so violently, releasing him from the pain in his knuckles and dragging him under to drown, without ever learning how to swim. His vision a clear and bitter premonition that made him laugh a laugh that was not his, and yet remained with him ever since.

He had made it, of course. His judgement kidnapped by fear. It had been nothing else. But Sidi had not and had perished as if in a sequel to Ahmed's vision.

All her friends off to lunch, Francesca leafs through a magazine and feels restless, wonders how funny humans are at dissimulating, at how she can lay without moving and yet explode inside in slow motion. Then watches, as she does each day, as the young north African approaches, looking so handsome under the glare of the sun, so sweaty too that she has imagined the taste of his skin, his balls. Built intricate fantasies of sex and secretions.

Ahmed looks, as he does each day as he approaches, at the young Italian woman reclined on her sun-bed, looking so beautiful under the glare of the sun, and ripe too that he has imagined the flavours hidden in her crevices. Built intricate fantasies of secretions and sex.

It all happens so rapidly: their eyes meet for too long this time. The sun, the glare, the heavy hand of heat all disconnect time, sound and surroundings from the senses. Ties to time and society severed by two hands, ten fingers that make contact across dreamscapes in tangible reality. A caress is exchanged behind the borders of his CD bag and her magazine. Crazy how some never know they are gamblers until all the chips are on the table. And she is looking round. And he is too. And the place, despite the radios playing, looking frozen in time. Around them nobody she knows. Most people out of the sun, having lunch or playing cards. She takes his hand in hers and takes him to her cabin, the closest to the sea. Inside it is dark and hot. He starts to say something when a finger comes to rest on his lips. All words evaporate. A kiss pushing to be born. A hand closes over her breasts. Another between her legs. She pulls away, kneels down, pulling his shorts to his knees. He feels his cock hard against her lips, and his balls tighten. She stands up, turns around, and takes his cock in her hand, pushing it between her buttocks and up her asshole. Her anus pulsating, they come together. Waves of pleasure wash over them, endless like the sea.

Like a tropical storm, it is all over too soon, as if nothing had happened. Only a rivulet of semen and juice along the inside of her thigh. Yet all had happened. They smile at each other; a kiss sealing a secret that is only theirs. Behind the cabin two 12-year-old boys keep punching and kicking each other to look through a hole in the cabin's wood. When the young man leaves, they run down to the sea.

Ahmed stumbles to the shoreline and stops, embracing the sea with his gaze. You were right Sidi, dreams can come true, he whispers to himself.

Francesca feels brave and excited. She is light-hearted, like the protagonist of a novel by Colette read for French classes; a hand slaps her from out of nowhere and whore rings out as she falls to the ground. Her left ear ringing like a fire drill, the kicks start. Through her fingers she sees the faces around her looking at her with…a foot hits her temple and she blacks out. Stop it you're killing her, she thinks she hears someone say, it's the bastard we should be after. And suddenly they are gone. Her blood already darkening on the sand.

Ahmed is running through the car park, a posse of 12 or so men behind him, blinded by the sun and by hatred. As he runs he looks around for help, but there is nobody, only the car park attendant looking gleeful and a family of four looking away. Then, across the road, behind the multitude of cars parked everywhere, he sees a police car. For a second he thinks of his illegal status, then of his life. His hand goes up for their attention, his foot stumbles and he falls. The pack cheers; the police will hear all this racket he thinks, and send me home.

The small crowd pull back as Fabio walks away from the Ahmed's dead body: a pair of bloody balls hanging from a scuba-knife. The police turn their siren on. The sea at the horizon, under the glare of the sun, sparkles with diamonds that are so near and yet can never be reached.