Читать книгу A Rebel In Love - Cristiano Parafioriti - Страница 4

In Galati Mamertino, Sicily, Calogero Emanuele, known as “Bau”, gets up early and is conscious of having to start another day of work in the town hall. Like many Sicilian fathers, his children are scattered across Italy for work and, of course, this distance cannot help but make him get out of bed a little sadder.

Every damn morning.

Spring has just begun and here in the Nebrodi mountains, there is a timid sun. At dawn it rises from the mountain of Rafa and a few warm rays strike the wrinkled tiles of the main square of this remote village, but they do not warm the chilly air and the numb bodies of those getting started.

Calogero Bau drinks his coffee at the Bar Ciccio, smokes his second cigarette and stares absently at the few passers-by and the imposing Mother Church. At that very moment, his heart turns dark. He thinks of don Peppe Emanuele, known as Malupilo, the evil hair, his father, who had died only a few years before, and who was a pillar of that church, always involved in organising the events, preparing the procession and the Masses, and unconditionally serving the Lord and the clergy. He might have seemed a little gruff at times, but he was just old-fashioned, in the good sense of the word, a man of few words and a lot of work. When he passed away, it was as if an aisle in that church had collapsed, and it was even worse for his son Calogero, who had relied on this man for his whole life.

Calogero Bau has a wife, three young sons, an elderly mother and a “thornback” sister who still lives in Galati. He is employed by the town hall – a luxury nowad

ays – and making a living as best he can. A cup of coffee, a couple of cigarettes and then he's off in his blue Fiat Punto to work at the Records Office, just outside the village on the road to Tortorici.

Every damn morning.