Piero and the Wolf - A Tale of Guilt and Grace

 

Piero hadn't even had time to wake up.
With the dampness of the just-passed night evaporating from his clothes, he pointed the barrel of his rifle toward the bush and fired.
Morning had begun with timid light bouncing off the blanket of mist at the mountain's feet, the muffled chime of the village bell tower, and a warmth that smelled of home, breakfast, and sugar meant to sink generously into the black surface of coffee.
The bullet had pierced the foliage, scattering acrid swirls of bluish smoke, and ended its course lodged in a fallen trunk. The wolf had escaped unharmed yet again. It simply left. It had turned its back on Piero, who fumbled clumsily around his belt for another round for his rifle. The wolf had peeked out between two trees, like a curious onlooker leaning out a window onto the square. Then it vanished, kicking up a little cloud of dead leaves and dirt.
The previous day had passed like that, in anticipation of another chance.
Piero had christened a stump as his seat, waiting for the wolf to reappear, and, staring at clusters of red berries and lance-shaped leaves stirred gently by a timid breeze, he had fallen asleep.
The next day, as dawn chased away the last stars and the same ever-present fog rolled thickly across the valley floor, Piero had taken position in a trench. He had dug it with his bare hands, taming roots and negotiating with a pair of stubborn stones that refused to budge. When the wolf’s scent wafted into the air and the familiar rustling among the leaves betrayed its presence, the rifle barrel erupted with a bang, and the wild berries exploded, giving the illusion of blood. Even that day, the animal slipped away without bothering to run, and once again, Piero’s scorched fingers tangled as he tried to reload the rifle, desperate for a second shot.
He had cried.
It happened when the wolf, safe behind the trunk of an ancient chestnut tree, looked at him with its small green eyes. With its fur slightly ruffled along its back and a bit of dry earth around its nose, it looked as though it, too, had amused itself by digging a hole.
The night following his latest failure, with yet another dose of frustration weighing down his already heavy soul, Piero had neither slept nor eaten nor dreamed. For him, it was natural to feed on expectations, letting his sagging bundle remain closed next to a flask of wine that was turning into vinegar. The only thing that mattered to him was that the wolf would return, that his hand would be steady, and that the rifle would be willing to repeat yesterday’s scene.
At the next dawn, the gray coat crossed his sightline, always blending into the omnipresent foliage, always camouflaged by the black streaks that melded with the dense underbrush. Piero fired, and a mushroom in the distance disintegrated in a burst of fragrance. Desperate, head in his hands and eyes fixed on a carpet of burrs, he realized the wolf had escaped once more. He didn’t even react when that damp nose lingered on his neck, accompanied by the tickle of stiff whiskers and a breath that wormed its way beneath his jacket.
Shortly after, the animal moved away, turning its back on him.
Before retreating to safety, before slipping out of range, it melted into the twilight until it vanished, and the night’s chill began dictating its terms again.
Rain had tended to every single leaf, cleaned the wood, dusted the fruits, and put the ants on alert. On the forest floor, pine needles floated like tiny ships, and a network of miniature mountains, valleys, and waterways redrew the terrain’s geography. The day climbed in with a slight delay, shaking off the clouds and leaving a sea of cream over the roofs of the still-sleeping village.
From a high branch, the forest was invaded by shafts of light. Some pierced all the way to the base of the trunk, as if intent on igniting the piles of dead leaves at its feet. Others extinguished themselves in the dense vegetation, while still others cast luminous islands on the distant peaks of larch trees. Below, the familiar fog blanketed the valley, and a stream murmured in the distance. The water, emboldened by a curve, plunged into a small waterfall that resolved into a flurry of foam and vapor. A little farther down, a weathered wooden bridge had digested the nails holding it together, its exposed side coated with moss.
"And instead, we had it all wrong. We, because we thought we were big and strong by shooting at animals; you, Piero, because you thought the world was just a simple process of actions and consequences. But the wolf wasn’t in the bush, and I died in its place. Look at him; he lived his life knowing that a man had been struck down instead of him. In some way, he’s grateful to you…"
He was there, at their feet, his mouth curved into something that resembled a smile, ears upright as if he understood every single word. Suddenly, he licked Piero’s palm, and Piero grabbed his muzzle as though he were a house dog seeking affection by the fireplace. At that moment, a light whimper could barely be heard.
"And him, will he have forgiven me?"
The friend had laughed. With his corduroy pants that seemed fresh from the cleaners and that shirt smelling of laundry, he looked like he had just come from Sunday morning Mass, standing on the church square with the freshly folded newspaper tucked under his arm. His hair still shone with pomade.
"I hope so; otherwise, dear Piero, we wouldn’t know which road to take to get back home. Because they’re waiting for you at home, you know?"
"Re…really?"
"Of course! Everyone’s impatient. Your wife, especially… Though time up there is felt very differently from how it is in the world of the living, yes, sometimes we get a little bored too..."
He had trembled.
"Ah, your son is doing well. He’s down there..." His finger pointed toward the village. "Everyone speaks highly of him, and trust me, he still has a lot to do before they call him. So, what do you say, shall we go?"
Piero had hesitated. His purgatory—that immense and repetitive forest that he thought he had learned to know but that had always reserved surprises for him—was about to be left to its slow and inexorable cycle. He had to leave it, and he had to do so immediately.
The wolf had already started walking and was looking at him impatiently a few steps ahead.
"I killed you..."
"And I forgave you. Everyone has forgiven you..."
"Really? Are you sure?"
That smile was worth more than a thousand words.
A rustle of leaves marked the beginning of the journey.
The wolf led the way, sniffing the exposed roots, the stones of the path, and every other corner of the trail. Fern fronds jutted out from the sides, and sometimes they had to push them aside. Wild rabbits, crouched in shelter behind tufts of grass, watched their passage, unconcerned about the wolf just a step away from their noses.
They climbed with a slow but steady pace toward the upper part of the forest, the one Piero had never had the courage to explore.
In no time, they disappeared, embraced by a sea of green. Piero, his friend, and the wolf.
The forest breathed like a child absorbed in dreams.
Before leaving together, they had buried the rifle under a meter of damp earth.

Inspiration

 ...so I sit down at my computer, adjust my chair's backrest, sniff out the air currents, assess the background noise: the TV from the next room, the fridge that's kicking in more often than usual, the cat crunching kibble, and my neighbor, who insists on mowing a lawn the size of Tennessee with nothing but a weed whacker.

I can see him sweating, wearing his tank top inside out, with bushy shoulder hair and a half-moon of redness spreading across his back. I pay him no mind.

I readjust the backrest.

To clear my conscience, I check my work email. A disgruntled client's unanswered message could ruin my inspiration, or worse, take their business elsewhere.

Nothing.

Well, not exactly nothing: a couple of petitions, an energy company rep with the world's best rates who just arrived in town, Russian woman seeking Italian husband, some alleged bank that isn't yours advising you to change your password.

The neighbor with his weed whacker must have stopped at the edge of a cotton field somewhere near Kingston Springs and is refilling the gas tank. The cicadas almost resume their song, but the 25cc engine roars back to life on the second pull of the cord.

Facebook notification on my author page.

I minimize the blank page, check it out, and discover I've been added to a group without my knowledge. Meanwhile, the Sardinian girl is showing off her new glasses and an unconventional neckline. I scrutinize the photo looking for a flaw. Disappointed, I postpone the task for another time.

Chapter 1

To avoid reformatting from scratch, I save my last successful novel under a new name, tacking on a string of Xs followed by a (1). I keep the first word and delete the other seventy-two thousand. While doing this, doubt creeps in. I pause to verify I've saved a copy on my computer, one on the external hard drive, one on the triple USB stick, one on the double CD-ROM, and one in the cloud.

I adjust the backrest, satisfied: all copies are accounted for, and I can return to deleting those seventy-two thousand words minus the first one with peace of mind.

Pristine page.

I insert the quotation marks, the accented capital E, and worry about that Scandinavian character I know I'll need sooner or later, the one with the Danish-Norwegian slashed O. Out of laziness, I consider taking some flavor out of the character by calling him Mario, and while I ponder this, the cat jumps on my keyboard and licks my chin with the taste of North Sea herring.

The first word of the novel is his.

I save it, wondering if the word might come in handy someday as the name of a fictional town, perched on a picturesque fjord with a large abandoned hotel on the snowy slopes of the mountain behind the settlement.

Second work break for the neighbor in his lawn, and tenth like for the Sardinian girl with her new glasses.

An email arrives from a colleague with a massive attachment. Thirty years ago, it would have crashed NASA's computers all by itself.

I stretch, rest my eyes by gazing at the blue-hazy horizon and contemplate starting with a dream-like opening, something that might go down in history:

"All happy families are alike; each unhappy family is unhappy in its own way"

"Call me Ishmael"...

I need to think about this. Like songs that are too perfect, relegating their entire album to being their eternal container (don't believe me? Try naming the other eight tracks from Hotel California...), overly successful opening lines might become self-contained aphorisms. Not everyone is Tolstoy.

I verify that all the location photos are in the folder. They're there, keeping company with the floor plans, maps, notes, the draft I sketched while waiting for that client who was an hour and a half late, and the list of three possible titles.

I stretch again.

The noisy neighbor, the intrusive cat, that other feline glaring resentfully because its bowl is empty in the center (believe it or not, cats judge the amount of food in their bowl by evaluating how many kibbles are grouped in the middle. The others, piled on the sides or scattered about like hand grenade aftermath, leave them completely indifferent).

A WhatsApp notification from three hours ago (I tried to save on the blinking LED and now I look like a jerk once a day) and the washing machine starting its spin cycle. I challenge anyone to remember the maximum spin speed beyond the third day after purchase.

I drink, do some sit-ups, lazily eye the pair of five-pound dumbbells and regret it. The bike has been sitting in the garage for too long to find an excuse that wouldn't make the entire planet laugh. I consider changing my t-shirt. I'm struck by the certainty that tomorrow's breakfast is limited to a couple of somewhat stale rusks, but I abandon the idea of running to the store. Impossible to park. Impossible to reach the checkout without being stuck behind the forward-thinking family with their apocalypse food supply, in quantities sufficient for regular time, overtime, and penalty shots.

I choose a vinyl to put on the turntable. Better said, I review about thirty before realizing I have no clear idea what I want. Italian prog, rock, hard rock, dark, fusion, and blues. I decide to ask YouTube for help.

Meanwhile, the computer has gone into standby mode, and the game is about to start.

Chapter 1, see you tomorrow.

Red on the Hill: A Winter's Tale

 

Maria spotted the red tent just hours before it started snowing. It was a late snowfall, arriving at the tail end of a dry and cold winter, so harsh that the countryside around her house had fallen ill with a jaundiced yellow. That day, like thousands before it, she had spent studying, nourishing her young mind with books.

Barely thirteen, with a body that was slow to bloom and boredom as her life companion, Maria had few reasons to venture out. Partly because she had to wait for the bus that passed only twice a day, partly because reaching the bus stop meant walking half a kilometer down a dirt road, where stones refused to compromise with shoe soles, and where she feared the neighbors' dog might come charging at her, foaming at the mouth, dragging its broken chain behind.

The village, distant and inhabited by people without imagination, was small enough to not merit a tourist's stop or careful visit. It was also so predictable and shabby that the school at its center, painted in pastel colors borrowed from sadness, was the only building in town that dared to exceed the canonical two floors, venturing into a third attic level dedicated to a dreary library deserted by almost everyone. Maria, on the contrary, borrowed many books, made herself comfortable in the armchair before the fireplace, and read until exhaustion.

During the fair season, the outdoor porch was perfect for the purpose, with its green-enameled swing that creaked like an old music box, the table with its flower-patterned oilcloth secured with windbreakers, and the wooden railing that shed flakes of dry paint at the slightest movement. Custer, her old mongrel with a tail broken in the middle and a white patch on the side of his muzzle, loved to curl up in the corner of the balcony. In that spot, the railing posts seemed sandpapered, and moreover, a dark halo on the wooden floor testified to how attached the animal was to that piece of world.

On one of those winter afternoons with the scent of snow in the air, the red tent appeared in the meadow atop the hill.

It was perfectly positioned in the center of a crown of trees, with its shorter side facing the wind and guy lines well-tensioned. The zipper at the entrance appeared half-open, with the lower flaps barely fluttering. One of the first snowflakes of the snowfall, which would last for two days from then on, settled on the slanted side. Like the millions that followed in its wake, it rolled to the ground with a barely perceptible rustle. Maria returned home somewhat worried, with Custer by her side. The dog nimbly jumped over the missing plank on the wooden bridge laid across the stream banks. She preferred to pass along the side, relying on a firm grip on the frozen handrail.

In the evening, with her mother in the kitchen, her father just arrived and his mood slightly worse than the time before, Maria alienated herself from reality and began to read, letting herself be lulled by the rocking chair in front of the fire. The news droned on with its usual rosary of bad news. Meanwhile, Moby Dick was making a fool of Captain Ahab.

A mound of snow. That's exactly how the tent appeared. After more than two days of uninterrupted snowfall and icy wind that had stiffened its contours, none of its sharp geometries could be seen anymore, and the surrounding plants had their branches bent. Maria, wearing snow boots, and Custer, with a touch of arthritis and snow tickling his belly, got close enough to imagine that the red tent could very well be someone's tomb. Maria turned back, running and watching out for the unstable bridge. She arrived home with burning feet and cheeks colored with fever-red. Lord of the Flies, brand new, was just waiting to climb onto the rocking chair with her to be initiated.

On the third day, under a sky that alternated white clouds with timid streaks of blue, the tent had sunk under the snow's weight like a cake taken out of the oven at the wrong moment. On that occasion, Custer had stayed in his bed, and the book told of a pig's head, impaled on a wooden stake and surrounded by a perpetual swarm of flies.

On the fourth day, it rained.

Maria didn't dare find another excuse to leave home, face the frozen slush up to the hill, and see what had become of the red tent. She imagined it pressed to the ground, with crumpled guy lines and the collapsed structure protruding from the canvas like a compound fracture.

The night that followed, she managed to sleep only a few minutes.

Nightmares, oppressive blankets, and too much darkness pressing against her eyelids. The clearing among the trees, with the tent at its center, appeared to her in dreams along with a rapid alternation of seasons, with a flock of crows taking turns at the feast and a procession of worms heading toward that memory of red.

Winter passed, then spring. Frodo Baggins managed to free himself of his burden, Beverly Marsh, along with the losers, completed her initiation rite, and Maria turned fourteen.

One summer morning, having passed her exams with flying colors and with mom and dad down in the village looking for a new car, she returned to the clearing. She brought Custer along, slightly limping from worsening arthritis and attached to an unprecedented leash interpreted as an irredeemable offense. The grass, tall and thick, hadn't managed to completely mask the tent's canvas that the sun had begun to fade. The curved frame tubes had proved irresistible to invasive weeds. In the middle, a newborn tree was reaching toward the sun and had dragged a flap of the tent along with it. The smell of decay in the air was quite distinct.

Lord Jim climbed his river, Guy Montag tried to set as many fires as he could, and Big Brother stared at her for a long time from the large poster on the walls.

In August, under the scorching sun and with the attic heated up, the library closed for its usual summer break, and Maria finished rocking herself under the shelter of the porch, when nothing new was happening on the western front anymore.

She ran toward the hill and arrived there panting. The tree, nourished by abundant spring rains, had grown at least a meter and a half and was dressed in red like a Christmas fir. The tubes, stakes, and now-rusted guy lines twisted in the air like a rather macabre piece of modern art. She ran back even faster and noticed that the bridge had surrendered its second rotten plank to the river. A wooden stump remained as a witness to better times gone by.

The following autumn, only a few unread books remained in the library, and middle school released her into a new world.

She forgot about the hill, the clearing, and the eager-to-grow tree that dragged along the remains of the red tent and who knows what else. She forgot to the point of no longer dreaming about anything related to that place. In her thoughts, there was some space for that curly-haired boy from class 1B and a new excitement for her breasts, which had finally decided to insistently point against her undershirt. In the morning, after breakfast, choosing matching clothes began to require a few extra minutes.

The institute's library, housed in a quiet basement, had so many books that Maria had to give herself a rule. She chose criteria that considered historical chronology and a not-too-rigorous alphabetical order. Before the holidays, she stocked up on the complete works of Flaubert, Guy de Maupassant, and Goethe.

She rocked on the porch with Madame Bovary and learned the rudiments of Sentimental Education. It happened at the end of the afternoon, with an imperious thunderstorm that had made the eastern sky disappear. She learned about the life of Jeanne Le Perthuis and the cynical ambition of George Duroy, an irresistible playboy from a Paris that only appeared in vintage prints anymore.

At the beginning of September, without Custer, who was confined by arthritis to his favorite corner of the world, she found herself again before the tree. It had grown to match its siblings surrounding the clearing. The tent's canvas had turned to piglet pink and fit perfectly among the already lush branches. The frame tubes held it taut, as if a skilled and patient hand had starched and ironed a shirt collar. Among the highest leaves and just beyond the shelter of the canvas, one could glimpse a black head of hair, rather disheveled but still thick. It rested on the main trunk as if someone had arranged their afternoon nap in the shelter from the sun.

Maria hadn't come empty-handed.

She circled the trees, stamped her feet on the ground to drive away vipers, and finally sat with her back against the trunk. Enterprising ants began to take measurements of her bare ankles, and she drove them back, burying them under a light layer of soil. The tent fabric barely fluttered, like that first time at the beginning of the snowfall. Sparrows were singing, and cicadas were certainly not holding back. She felt the hard grass pierce through her flimsy summer pants and a hint of itching in her legs.

She persisted.

She pushed with her back, and the young, still tender trunk began to rock. The black hair, producing a sound of broken bones barely confused with the rustling of leaves, settled on the branch beside her.

With an emotional voice, she began reading The Catcher in the Rye.