Read Online On Earth as It Is in Heaven by Davide Enia - Free Book Online Page A

friend!”
    â€œGerruso, you say that again I’ll club you to death. We ain’t friends.”
    â€œStill, you came back!”
    â€œBlame that on my uncle.”
    â€œYour uncle is nice to me.”
    â€œSure, he’s so worried about you, no doubt.”
    â€œWhy are you shutting the door?”
    â€œI don’t want anyone to see me talking to you, stump-finger. Anyway, I’m not going to talk to you at all.”
    â€œI heard that you decked Pullara.”
    â€œWho told you that?”
    â€œMy cousin Nina.”
    The swing started to sway back and forth again. The hollow feeling in the pit of my stomach. My head was spinning. My throat was dry.
    To regain control, I forced myself to start talking.
    â€œDid you know that they took me to the gym?”
    â€œTo do what?”
    â€œTo box, worthless piece of crap. I come from a family of boxers: my father, my uncle. But my mother pitched a fit.”
    â€œWhy?”
    â€œI don’t know, she said that I gotta study, that she won’t hear of it, that I can’t become a boxer, that sort of thing, women’s talk.”
    â€œAnd so?”
    â€œAnd so, first things first, if she got mad at me that’s your fault, if you hadn’ta cut off your finger, I wouldn’t have had to beat up Pullara, and none of this mess woulda happened.”
    â€œThat’s true.”
    â€œI know it.”
    â€œSorry.”
    â€œWell, the damage is done.”
    â€œI’m really sorry.”
    â€œNot as sorry as me. I made a deal with my mother. Really, Umbertino made the deal. I can if I make good grades at school.”
    â€œJesus, that’s tough.”
    â€œGerruso, I’m not an idiot like you. I’ve got all my fingers.”
    â€œWhat does that have to do with it?”
    â€œIt matters, it matters. You’ve lost a part of you, you were already an idiot, now you’re more of one.”
    â€œBut, wait, if I’ve lost a part of me, I oughtta be less of an idiot, right?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œWhat did your grandfather do for a living?”
    â€œTraffic cop, same as my dad.”
    â€œThere, it’s obvious that you’re completely hopeless. If you’d had a grandfather who was a cook, like mine, you’d understand the intelligence of fingers.”
    â€œWould you explain it to me?”
    â€œNo.”
    â€œWhy not?”
    â€œYou’re an idiot, you wouldn’t understand.”
    â€œRight.”
    â€œHey, stump-finger, you wanna hear something great?”
    â€œYes.”
    â€œI learned to make fried rice balls: arancine !”
    â€œBravo-o-o.”
    There wasn’t a trace of envy in Gerruso’s voice. That was too bad: What’s the point of telling someone something if it doesn’t make them even a little bit envious?
    All the same, I explained my grandpa’s lesson to him: before beginning to boil the rice, he had me touch every grain with my fingertips.
    â€œIt’s the fingers that recognize the quality of the ingredients,” he had said.
    His hands moved with agility, a caress for every ingredient. Then the boiling, the addition of saffron, meat sauce, and peas, the ball rolled in the breading, then the frying, and finally sheer admiration for the way that out of the incandescent oil there emerged an arancina a carne —a little meat orange—beautiful, spherical, appetizing, delicious.
    â€œIf you were a friend a mine, I’d have brought you one, Gerruso.”
    â€œThanks, that’s nice of you.”
    Without warning, the door to the room swung open. Umbertino appeared in the doorway. He had the look of someone who expects to enjoy what’s about to happen.
    â€œDavidù, see if you can guess who’s come to the hospital.”
    â€œPullara.”
    A quick spark gleamed in the center of his pupils. In the silence that followed, I understood that I’d given the