Episode 1 - Conversation, Crate, Cello

Summer 2005, Via Giovanni Maria Platina

His phone rang. Or rather it didn't ring, it played Handel's Water Music to him. Bored a few weeks back, he'd copied a CD of his own violin playing onto her laptop, edited a few of the tunes into small mp3s and bluetoothed them to his phone. So now he smugly had as many unique realtones as he wanted. For the last week it had been the Hornpipe. Problem was, it was such a jolly tune, he'd rather sit and listen to it than answer the call. He'd once decided to let it run through to the end and the caller had hung up. Baka.

A month ago he'd had Jupiter by Holst on there and had hardly answered any of his calls. Anta baka.

He wiped his oily hands on a cloth and picked up the phone. It was her. He'd guessed it was, she often called a couple of times a day just to chat about anything and nothing. Nothing was the best, he loved to chat with her about absolutely completely totally nothing whatsoever, that way he could turn off his higher brain functions such as paying attention to the words and just wallow in the sound of the air traveling from her lungs, up that gorgeous windpipe, over her vocal chords and out between those lips and tongue. Mmm, what he'd give to be a breath of that air.

She was talking. He'd answered the call and said hello and she'd begun a conversation and he'd been dreaming and missed a whole minute of it.

"…can hardly get through the door. Need to come and move it. Nearly killed the delivery man getting it up the stairs…"
"Sorry? What? The Signore just came in and said something. What did you say?"
"Are you listening?"
"Now I am, yes."

She sounded a little exasperated, cross even.

"I said, it's blocking the doorway, I can hardly get in and out the door. I need some space here. Can you come home and do something with it?"
"With what?"
"Seiji! Are you deaf or stupid? The planet Venus of course! It's just crash landed on the balcony and rolled in here and is blocking the front door!"
"For heaven's sake, what on earth are you on about, girl?"

There was a sigh. Not a sigh that spoke of weariness, more a sigh that spoke of if-this-goes-on-much-longer-Seiji-is-gonna-get-a-slap.

"You weren't listening were you?"
"I was trying to but got distracted," he lied
"We just had a huge crate delivered. It's massive. I can't shift it. The courier guy somehow managed to get it up three flights of stairs before he died but it's blocking the door. Come home now, it needs… I don't know, it needs things doing with it."

that was techie girl-speak for "I need a man".

She ended on a note of Shizuku-pissed-off-ness. Four out of five stars of pissed-off-ness.

a crate? Of what? Where from? He racked his brains. Nothing useful fell out.

"Well, what is it?"
"Baka! It's big, it's made of wood, and it's damn heavy. And it's got your name on it!"
"No, you silly woman! What's in it?"
"How the hell should I know? It's nailed together!"
"Open it, then."
"What with?"

your forked tongue, woman

"Get a screwdriver, prise the lid off."
"Amasawa?"

uh? Since when does she call me by my family name any more?

"Signore Amasawa!"

oh shit

He turned round. The Signore stood in the doorway. The man had x-ray hearing or something. He'd be upstairs in his study two floors up and he would just know when Seiji was on the phone, when the workshop sounds ceased for more than a few minutes. Spy cameras, the guy had to have spy cameras in here somewhere. Or a Ouija board.

these violins won't make themselves…

"Amasawa, these violins won't make themselves."

bingo! Guessed your line! I get the all expenses holiday in Rome! Thank you ladies and gentlemen and goodnight.

The man was a slave driver. A brilliant artist he may be, but he was the crappiest people-manager Seiji had ever met.

"Sorry, Signore, there's a problem at home. My wife is having trouble in the kitchen."

damn that was the lamest excuse he'd ever heard. Sorry, my dog ate my homework.

why am I like this only when the Signore reminds me I'm paid to learn violin making and not to exchange verbal sumo moves with my wife? I'm never this meek with anyone else.

"Amasawa, you know I disagree with you making long private calls in work time. Please keep it short. Fabrizio is about to make tea. Do you want a cup?"
"Yes, please."
"After he's brought it in, I'll ask him if you were still on the phone. I do not want to hear him say yes. Do you understand?"
"Yes, Signore."

The elderly man left the workshop.

jabber, jabber, squeak, jabber

Seiji looked at the phone in his hand. Shizuku's tinny voice came out of it.

hm… it would seem we've reached five stars of pissed-off-ness, now.

He put the phone to his ear, gently, like it was filled with nitro-glycerine and any sudden moves would blow his head off.

"…the damn toolbox? Not in the entryway cupboard, not under the bed! Where on earth have you put it?"

He didn't know what she was on about but he couldn't afford to not know. If she realised she'd been talking to the air for the last three minutes, he'd be sleeping on the balcony tonight. Again.

"Under the sink. The kitchen sink. Where it always is."
"Why didn't you tell me a minute ago when I asked?"
"Sorry."

There was a pause while sounds of Shizuku sweetly cursing inside kitchen cupboards wafted tinnily back to him. Fabrizio came in. Seiji lay his phone on the workbench and picked up a cloth and a piece of scrap maple wood. He pretended to polish the wood. It never occurred to him how stupid polishing a piece of scrap maple might look.

"Ah, Fabrizio, grazie."
"Prego."

The ancient caretaker placed the tea on the workbench beside Seiji's phone. He glanced at it. Shizuku chose that very moment to swear exquisitely in Anglo-Saxon. The word was probably lost on the old man but the context wasn't.

"Uh, Fabrizio. I'm right out of borax polish. Can you tell the Signore that I have to go to the warehouse and pick up a new tin? I'll be back in fifteen minutes."
"Si, si non c'è problema."

Seiji grabbed his phone and made for the door, as he went out he noticed the two new five litre tins of borax right by the door.

baka!

-o-oOo-o-

He was in a doorway, fifty yards up the alley. He checked back towards the violin school. No Fabrizio hanging out an upper window with binoculars, no secret agents lurking in the shadows, no stealth bombers. Of course there was always Signore Guarnieri's spy satellite network silently orbiting thousands of miles out in space, filming his every move, but if he hid in this doorway he was probably safe.

"Did you find it?"
"Yes, I did, but I banged my head on the cold water main pipe. Twice."
"Sorry. I'll kiss it better when I get home."
"It won't need kissing better, it'll need a weekend at a health spa. An expensive health spa."
"Fine, no problem. Can you open the crate?"
"Can't you come home early?"
"I could but you'd need to make my funeral arrangements."
"Is he in one of those moods again?"
"Uh-huh. Some days I think he's a cross dressing woman with really bad PMT, she's just not even reasonable sometimes."
"OK, well, I'll just put up with this thing in the way 'til you get in."
"How big is it?"
"It comes up to above my shoulder and it's about a metre square. It won't come through the door, Seiji, it's outside on the public hallway and people are looking at it in a very unhappy tone of voice."

He thought again. What on earth could it be?

"Does it say where it's from?"
"Where are you from?" Shizuku asked the crate, "Sorry, it's not telling."

Seiji smiled, she had some good humour left then. He might not be on the balcony tonight after all.

mental note – buy flowers and wine on way home

"It's got a label on down here. Wait a moment…"
"What does it say?"
"Nothing. It's the strong silent label type."

good, she was fine, just a bottle of wine then, scrub the flowers

"Can you tell where it's from?"
"Japan. Are you sure you're not expecting this?"

He thought hard. He'd cleared quite a lot of his possessions into the empty office behind dad's garage last time he'd gone back to Tama. He'd contacted a shipping company and instructed them to send everything over to Italy, and stuff had been arriving in shipments for two or three months. It just worked out cheaper doing it that way than hiring a whole container. His violins had arrived first. There was his bike but the crate sounded like the wrong shape. He drew a blank.

"It must be something from my workshop at home, but I can't think what. Are you able to open it?"
"Hm, I think so. Wait, I'm going to put you down a minute."

He listened while sundry clunks and bangs and squeaks of nails pulling through wood came down the phone line. A couple of minutes later she was back. She sounded breathless. If he'd had the luxury of this being the right mood, he could have happily just listened to her heavy breathing.

reminder to self – ask her to phone one day and just do a pervert heavy breathing call. Preferably a day I can sneak off to the toilet and listen properly for five minutes…

"Guess what it is."
"I really can't. I've been thinking for ages."
"What's nearly as tall as me, valuable, over two feet wide and needs a lot of heavy thick soft packing material to get safely from Tama to Cremona?"

mom? In a crate?

No, he couldn't think of a single thing.

"I give up."
"You play a smaller version of it."
"Is this a game now?"
"Yes. And you are going to love this. Guess right and I'll be nice to you in bed tonight."

now that was effective people-management... mental comparison between Guarnieri and Shizuku as possible bosses: one would mouth him off when he did wrong, the other would off him with her mouth when he did right. There was just no comparison was there? And Guarnieri didn't look anywhere near as good in stockings.

He smiled. Mostly because he'd suddenly worked out what was in the crate. Tall, wide, heavy packing and lots of it.

"Grandpa's cello!"
"Bingo! Well done!"

OK, reinstate those flowers, no balcony tonight

"Is it alright?"
"I think so. I got the crate lid off, wait while I take a side off too."

More knocking and splintering noises. The crate he hoped. Not the contents.

Then faintly;

"Oh, no. No. Baka! Oh shit! Shit, shit, shit! No!"
"What is it?"

More cursing. Then she was back.

"Damn beans – polystyrene beans! The crate was full of them. They're bloody everywhere. Oh, no the breeze is blowing them around the stairwell! Shit!"

There would definitely be some mouthing off tonight, but he thought the chances of him having the benefit of it were getting slimmer by the minute.

ah, well, two bottles of wine then – and some really expensive flowers. She deserved them…

-o-oOo-o-

19 Feb 07

as usual, inane ramblings can be found on my forum - click on my pen name