Section Six

She put the papers away in the folder. Paper rustled against paper again. She stopped the music, caught the eyes of the Signora in her peripheral vision, then closed her eyes, pretending to sleep.

hand reach to hand
hand stretch to hand
eyes raise to eyes

eyes lower to eyes
mouth gapes up in amazement

mouth yawns down in horror
feet raise to tiptoe

feet heel-thrust up and away
head cranes forward - up and forward

head floats back and up as
neck cranes backwards and
body floats up and
arms stretch up to horizontal and
legs split to V and
body floats up and

She stretched as she woke up, her arms pushed out horizontally, her legs thrust out to form a giant V. She yelped in pain as her outstretched foot collided with her neighbour's.
"Ow! Bugger! Oh, I'm sorry. Are you all right?"
"Yes, I'm all right, but are you? You seem to be in a little pain."
"No, it's all right."
"Forgive me asking, but when you went to the toilet, you appeared to be limping a bit."
"Yes, but it's nothing. A slight accident a while ago."
A slight lurch. An almost imperceptible click to a lower level.
"Where are we now?"
"Oh, I believe we will soon be preparing to land."
"Really? Have I been asleep long?"
"Yes, quite a good while, I believe."
The "No Smoking" lights came on.
A sporadic fanfare of seat-belt buckles being clicked into position started up.
She could feel her stomach starting to twang inside her.
Announcements echoed hollowly around. The flunkies reappeared and moved up the aisle, peering and pointing at people's waists.
Then her head nodded forward as the the plane dropped down a level.
The engines changed key. They whined and grated and sang like a saw-mill. They seemed to be chewing up the air and spitting it out again.
The cabin began to vibrate.
Their two hands seemed to meet almost magnetically. They clasped hard. Stains of heat spread through her fingers and she felt her body numbing over.
Her seat seemed to be shaking. Her calf-muscle felt like someone was tweaking needles across every half-inch of skin. She closed her eyes. Tightly. The headphones dug into her neck.
A shudder and a groan and they were down. Applause? No, not much. Janey's stomach returned to the normal position, from up or down she knew not. Signora Scandone smiled wanly and released her hand.
-Not sure who was holding whose hand there. -Did she have a bad meal, perhaps?
Announcements about staying in seats. Mostly adhered to.
Janey stretched out her hands in front of her, fingers intertwined and straining. "Well, we're here."
The Signora breathed out slowly. "Yes, my dear, the first stage is accomplished. I hope the rest of your trip goes well. And I shall no doubt see you the other side."
-The other side? "The other side?"
"To show you where you buy the bus ticket from."
"Oh yes. Of course. Thank you." Janey heaved the rucksack to her knees.
"That looks quite heavy."
"Yes, it's got quite a few things in it." -Too right it has. -No baggage handler's getting his grubby little hands on these.
"I think we can move now."
-Yes, let's get out there and strut our stuff.
Plodding like a plodding-dog down the long march exitwards, nodding like a nodding-dog to the nodding-dog stewardesses, with their repeated-yet-sincere smiles.
A thick hot slough of air hitting her in the face as they skirted the engine and trudged silently to the bus.
A restrained bedlam on the bus.
A subdued slow-stream ooze to the terminal.
And into the waiting room.
She drifted round in a circle like an apathetic dervish, floundering in a patchwork of tourist shell-suits intermingled with overalls intermingled with designer business suits. Incomprehensible announcements echoed into her head, making it sound as if she were in a swimming pool. Acrid smells of urine jolted in and out as she rotated. She thought that it was all drifting around her until she looked down and saw that her feet were moving. Embarrassed, she joined the muttering scrum waiting for the baggage.
-Give me your huddled masses.
She fingered the strap of her rucksack as she waited. It felt sticky already. Her left buttock started to itch. She scratched it until she became aware that a man was looking at her. Her stared at her, two pinholes of eyes peering through the cigarette haze from the mouth underneath. She smelt the burning and inhaled deeply.
She scratched the side of her nose. Pimple on the way. She put her hands in her pockets and whistled. Her fingers felt dry. She rubbed them together, still in her pockets. She stared down at the mute giant caterpillar of the baggage track. She flicked her tongue over her teeth. She could still taste the airline meal. She glanced through the aperture to the outside world to where men were manhandling cases as if they had been cuckolded by them.
Then a creaking and a cranking and the caterpillar finally trundled into life. She waited, motionless as a heron, then struck. She pulled up her holdall.
-Gotcha! -Right, this is you, matey, this is all there is of you. -Let's get the hell out of here.
She looked around for Signora Scandone. Disappeared already. Waved away the man proffering baggage trolleys, at a price. Stepped past the perfectly-coiffured not-a-khaki-crease-out-of-place military-sun-glassed inscrutable exemplar of la bella figura at passport control and emerged into a murky extra-airport daylight.
-Palm trees! -Palm trees!
A deafening altercation confronted her. Coach-drivers, porters, taxi-drivers were all screaming at each other simultaneously, raising their fingers high to the heavens and rolling their eyeballs in unison. A minor parking squabble in downtown Naples.
A brace of taxi-drivers noticed her arrival. "Hey English? Taxi?"
She waved them away. Looked around. Nobody. -Well, you knew I was coming it seems, and you knew when as well, but you're not here, are you, you little shit? -Ah well, not to worry. -We're not going to crumple up and die, are we? -No, we're not. -And finding a bus-stop and a tobacconist's shouldn't be beyond our capabilities. -I think we'll go - thataway.
The holler continued. "Hey English, English! You don't want to ride with me?"
-No, matey, not even in your taxi. -Ah, there it is. A tobacconist's sign. -Do it. -Make haste make haste gangway you infidels here we come. -We can do this no problem. "Mi dà un biglietto per l'autobus per Napoli." And there it was. -No problems. -Piece of piss. -You want a ticket bought, I'm your woman. -Now where's the stop? -Moron, why didn't you ask why didn't you ask? -Ah well, not to worry, ask someone. -He'll do. -I think.
A wiry sharp-faced imp-like figure, swathed unseasonably in a blanket-like coat, with a big slouch bag slung over his shoulder, was tap-dancing on the spot next to her.
"Scusi, ma dov'è la fermata d'autobus?"
"Oh, hi! You English? Think I saw you on the plane. Pretty shitty, all that delay wasn't it? Still, good to be here, bit hot though feel like I'm overdressed ha ha yeah you want the bus-stop it's just there I'll join you think I've still got a ticket left yeah no problem just as well good idea to get the bus 'cos these scumbag taxi-drivers'll rip you off something rotten I do this trip quite a lot and I always avoid them like the plague LIKE THE PLAGUE biggest rogues out even in Naples take your last lira though that's worth fuck all nowadays. Well, shall we go? Want a hand with the bag?"
-I don't believe this. -I've come to a place where almost nobody is supposed to speak English and they're all falling over themselves to speak it, especially this foul-mouthed little tosser - he's got more verbal diarrhoea than a sodding medical thesaurus! "Er, no thanks. I'll manage. Thanks all the same."
The operatic side-show had subsided. A path had been made for the coach and it had disgorged a plethora of red-kneed Brits who had obviously just said farewell to Sorrento and who were haggling with another trolley-custodian and working out the minimum number they would need to borrow to get all their luggage to the check-in desks in comfortable time.
With perfect timing, the bus swept in to fill the gap vacated. Some fairly subdued citizens slouched off the front of the bus. In contrast, a whole heaving cacophony of people appeared suddenly from nowhere and flowed in at the rear, hardly any of them clipping tickets, and grabbing what seats there were.
She and the imp shrugged - he was silent for once - then they stepped aboard. She struggled with the ticket-machine, pushing the ticket in all four possible ways before the thing grudgingly bit a hole in it. She was acutely aware that people were probably giggling at her. They made their way to a space near the doorway, and held onto the poles. She dumped her holdall on the floor. The bus lurched braked spluttered and rattled out across the carpark. She and the imp slid up and down like roundabout horses, their hands rubbing across the silver poles polished clean by generations of hands doing the same up-and-down dance.
"So did you get a cheap flight I did last minute job course you have to be quick you have to be prepared to drop everything my uncle he knows someone in a travel agent's back in Manchester so I get these REALLY GOOD DEALS but like I said you have to be ready to seize the moment SEIZE THE MOMENT that's my motto but that's me really just one of life's gypsies I guess but anyway I got this REALLY AMAZING DEAL it was like only fifty quid right so I didn't hesitate right I hesitated about as long as a priest in a brothel sorry no offence meant anyway none taken I'm sure you seem like a really together sort of person so what are you doing here?"
"What?"
"I said, 'What are you doing here?' sorry did I startle you I have this knack of asking REALLY UNEXPECTED QUESTIONS just a sort of enquiring spirit I guess goes with the gypsy in my soul you can't pin me down don't know where I'm coming from next."
-I know where I'd like to pin you down, buster, but out of consideration for the train passengers who'd have to travel over you, I'll refrain!
The bus rocked to a halt. Doors opened. People drifted past. He let go of the pole and scrubbed a hand through his tousled hair. Gazed down at his scuffed boots. He was still wearing the coat.
She stared across at him. "You said you made this trip quite a lot. What do you do?"
"Me well I'm a sort of semi-expat me stay here a fair bit about a quarter of time I guess know quite a few people Brits mostly you know always a floor to stay on but anyway like what I said before right what about you?"
-Go for it! She reached into her pocket; removed her wallet. -Must get that money-belt sorted out. Opened it with a rip of velcro that resounded throughout the whole bus and showed him a photograph. "I'm looking for a friend. You don't recognise him, do you?"
He screwed his face up. "Nah doesn't look familiar at all I mean you probably would remember an ugly mug like that wouldn't you doesn't have a lot of hair does he but no sweetheart sorry can't help is he English?"
"Welsh."
"Welsh schmelsh he's not local and there's not many Brits I don't know no sorry my love if I could help you I would you know me well you don't really do you?"
-Well, I'm getting to pretty rapidly.
"But me I'm let's say the sort of guy who's got his finger in every pie whoops almost said dyke which is the one about the Dutch lesbian but no matter you don't want to hear that but what I mean is I get around a bit and if this guy's been around Naples a while I'm pretty fucking amazed that I haven't bumped into him sorry scuse language again but you know right I kinda feel that language should be a liberating force you know what I mean we're too hung up about things like that in this country well not this country but you know what I mean and I kinds react against that anyway enough about me"
-Really?
"Tell me about you what's this guy to you why are you following him to the ends of the earth how long you here for that kind of thing?"
She drew breath to speak. She opened her mouth. The bus ground to a stop. There was an almighty hooting and bellowing and hollering like a vehicular hootenanny. Everybody craned their necks forward. The bus was filled with guttural voices, each venturing an opinion.
He shouldered his way round to take a look. "Looks like we've got ourselves a classic four-way ingorgo gridlock par fucking excellence every road jammed often happens at this junction not a way through total frustration lots of heat expended and then suddenly miraculously everybody worms their way through you're about to see Italian driving at its best and at its worst honey."
She looked out the window. Slowly, and not at all surely, the bus edged forward. It was as if some deity on high were slowly manipulating his model cars, lorries and buses one by one and inch by inch until everyone finally made it through. Paintwork almost scraped paintwork no more than a lick of paint away. The noise was deafening but eventually they squeezed through and resumed their journey.
He gazed sourly through the window. "Hey they really messed this place up didn't they these Camorra-built tenements really knew how to jerry-build a heap of shit for everybody."
A few heads swivelled.
"Camorra. That's Neapolitan Mafia, isn't it?"
"That's the ones sweetheart ever with us ever will be."
"So, do you think you should be talking about them in so loud a voice?"
"Well sod it you learn to live dangerously around here look at these places right I mean a lot of Italian cities are like this you know the centres are all very picturesque and all that sort of stuff not that you can say that about Naples nothing like it but very ancient and interesting all the same I suppose but you know out here these suburbs and all the outskirts of all these places right are all just pure rubble shite flimsy as a ghost's condom I mean just look at some of this."
"Looks like it's had a dereliction order passed upon it."
"Neat. I like it. Neat. Nice phrase." His eyes lit up for a second and then he fell uncharacteristically silent.
The bus jerked. They both slid on their respective poles, she up and down, he down and up as they lurched towards the front of the bus and then recovered.
"Whoops," she said, almost head-cracking him.
He was unperturbed. "Ah, not to worry. Happens all the time. Nearly there now, anyhow. Just getting into the centre."
The bus stopped. People streamed in, hardly any of them clipping tickets. She kept a ready eye on her bags, by her feet.
"Don't worry. I'll make sure nobody steals them."
"Oh, er - yeah. You read my mind. Do you think it's likely that they'd have a go at it?"
"Something as bulky as that? Probably not. But small things - cameras - jewellery - you'd better watch your step."
"Thanks. I will."
The bus sloughed to a halt.
"Well here we are: Piazza Garibaldi. Enjoy your stay." And he slid off the bus. And was gone. He turned back to wave at her, just as she was alighting.

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