Signora Lucia’s Laundry

Lucia opened it.

A man. About forty, maybe a little more. An emaciated face, dark circles under his eyes, unshaven for several days. Eyes – empty, looking through, somewhere far away where no one was. Hair light brown, long, unkempt, falling over his forehead. Dressed poorly, but not like a beggar – just tiredly, just indifferent to himself.

The coat. Old, worn, from someone else’s shoulder. On the lapel – a tiny hole, the trace of a badge or brooch long removed. The coat smelled – Lucia caught the scent immediately, as soon as he crossed the threshold. The smell of dampness, of train stations, of a long journey, and something else she couldn’t immediately identify.

«Signora,» the man said. His voice was hoarse, broken, as if he hadn’t spoken at all for a long time. «I need to get something washed.»

Lucia nodded towards the counter.

«Come in.»

He entered. Stopped in the middle of the laundry, looked around – but not like the old man from the previous chapter, not with interest, but just to understand where he was. Then he approached the counter, stood, let his shoulders drop.

«Can you wash a coat?» he asked.

Lucia looked at the coat. It was dirty, yes. But that wasn’t the main thing. The main thing was how he wore it. How it had become part of him, a second skin he hadn’t taken off for months.

«I can,» Lucia said. «Will you take it off?»

The man froze. Looked at his hands, as if only now realizing he had something on.

«I…» he began, and faltered.

Lucia waited.

«I can’t take it off,» he said finally. «You understand? I can’t. It’s like… it’s grown onto me.»

His voice wavered.

«Then why wash it?» Lucia asked.

He raised his eyes to her. There was so much pain in them that Lucia looked away first.

«Because it’s dirty,» he said. «Very dirty. And I can’t take it off. I try. Every night I try. And I can’t.»

Lucia was silent.

«I’ve slept in it for three months,» he said. «Three months without taking it off. I have nothing else on. Only this coat. And it’s dirty. It stinks. I stink. I went to church, it smells of incense and cleanness there, and I stink, and people turn away. I went to the station, wanted to get on a train, go somewhere, but they wouldn’t let me on because I’m dirty and frightening. I went to the sea, thought the water would wash it off, but the water doesn’t wash it off, it only gets the surface, but inside…»

He fell silent because his voice cracked into a rasp.

Lucia went to the stove. Poured coffee. Set it before him.

«Drink.»

He took the cup. His hands shook so violently that coffee splashed over the rim, but he drank, burning himself, not feeling it.

«When did you last eat?» Lucia asked.

He shook his head.

«Three days. Maybe four. I don’t remember.»

Lucia went into the small room behind the laundry where she had a stove and a refrigerator. Returned a minute later with a plate. Pasta, yesterday’s, but still good, with tomato sauce and basil. Set it before him.

«Eat.»

He looked at the plate as if it were a miracle.

«I have no money,» he said.

«I’m not asking for money. Eat.»

He ate. First cautiously, as if afraid the food would disappear, then greedily, hurriedly, choking, spilling sauce on the coat.

Lucia watched.

Outside the window, a Vespa passed. Somewhere a child cried. A woman called her husband to lunch. An ordinary day in Trastevere.

The man finished. Wiped the plate with a piece of bread, ate the bread too. Looked at Lucia.

«Thank you,» he said. «I’ll repay you. I definitely will.»

«No need,» Lucia said. «Tell me.»

He looked at her for a long moment.

«Tell you what?»

«Everything. Or nothing. As you wish. But if you want me to wash the coat, you’ll have to take it off. And to take it off, you have to understand why it’s stuck.»

The man was silent for a long time. Looked at the wall, the window, the cup of cold coffee. Then he began to speak.

«My name is Andrea. I’m from Udine, up north. Mountains there, cold, snow. I had a family. Wife, daughter. My daughter was five. She loved it when I put her on my shoulders and walked around the room. She laughed so hard the windows rattled.»

He paused. Caught his breath.

«A year ago, they went to my mother’s. To the mountains. By car. I didn’t go, I had work. I said: go, I’ll come later. They went. And at the pass… a truck. The driver fell asleep. Swerved into oncoming traffic.»

Lucia closed her eyes. She knew what was coming.

«They’re gone,» Andrea said. His voice was horribly flat. «Both of them. Immediately. The truck driver survived. Served six months in prison, got out. But mine are gone.»

He looked at his hands.

«I didn’t go to the funeral. I couldn’t. Sat in the apartment for three days staring at the wall. Then I went out. Walked wherever my eyes took me. Walked and walked and walked. Ended up in Milan. Then Genoa. Then here, in Rome. I don’t remember how I walked. I just walked.»

He stroked the sleeve of the coat.

«This coat, I found it at the station in Milan. Someone forgot it, or threw it away, or died – I don’t know. It was big, warm. I put it on and haven’t taken it off since. You understand? I can’t take it off because if I do, I’ll have to take off everything. Everything inside. And what’s inside… it’s…»

He fell silent.

The laundry was quiet. Only the machines hummed and the coffee maker hissed.

«What was your daughter’s name?» Lucia asked.

Andrea flinched.

«What?»

«Your daughter. What was her name?»

He was silent for a long time. Then said:

«Elena. Her name was Elena.»

«A beautiful name,» Lucia said. «Elena. That was my mother’s name.»

Andrea looked at her.

«Do you think it will help? If I take off the coat, you wash it, and then what? Will she come back?»

«No,» Lucia said. «No one will come back.»

«Then why?»

Lucia stood up. Went close to him. Looked into his eyes.

«So that you can live. You can’t go on living until you take it off. You can’t breathe. You can’t eat. You can’t love anyone. You’ll walk the earth in someone else’s coat, smelling of death, until you die yourself. And she wouldn’t want that. Your Elena. She wouldn’t want you to die.»

Andrea looked at her. His eyes filled with tears – for the first time in many months.

«How do you know?» he whispered. «How do you know what she would want?»

«Because I’m a woman,» Lucia said. «Because I’m a mother. Because I know: those we love don’t want our death. They want us to live. Even if it hurts them to look down on us.»

Andrea covered his face with his hands. His shoulders shook.

Lucia didn’t touch him. Didn’t hug him. Didn’t stroke his head. She just stood beside him and waited.

The crying was long, heavy, with wheezes and sobs. The kind of crying of people who haven’t wept for years. Who have accumulated so much inside that water no longer helps, you need to wail, howl, scream.

But he didn’t scream. He cried quietly, face in his hands, in a stranger’s laundry, before a strange woman, in a coat that smelled of stations and death.

After about ten minutes, he quieted. Wiped his face with the coat sleeve. Looked at Lucia.

«I’ll try,» he said. «To take it off.»

He stood up. Unbuttoned the buttons. Pulled the coat off one shoulder, then the other.

And froze.

Under the coat was a shirt. Once white, now gray, dirty, torn. But that wasn’t important.

What was important was that he stood without the coat for the first time in three months. Stood and trembled. Not from cold – from emptiness.

«Cold,» he said. «Without it, it’s cold.»

«It will pass,» Lucia said. «Give yourself time to get used to it.»

She took the coat. It was heavy, wet with sweat, dirty black at the collar and cuffs. She brought it to her face, sniffed it.

«What does it smell of?» Andrea asked.

«You,» Lucia said. «Only you. And a little bit of the road.»

She went to the sink. Ran hot water. Poured detergent, added stain remover, then something else, then something more.

«Will you put it in the machine?» Andrea asked.

«In the machine,» Lucia said. «You can’t wash something like this by hand. Months of dirt here.»

She loaded the coat into the big machine, closed the door, turned it on.

The machine hummed, water rushed.

«An hour and a half,» Lucia said. «Will you sit?»

Andrea nodded. Sat on the chair. Sat, looking at his hands. Without the coat, he seemed small, thin, defenseless.

«And you?» he asked suddenly. «Who did you lose?»

Lucia froze at the stove where she was pouring herself coffee.

«What makes you think I’ve lost anyone?»

«Your eyes,» Andrea said. «You have eyes like mine. Only older.»

Lucia was silent for a long time. Then she sat down opposite him. Poured coffee for him and for herself.

«My husband,» she said. «Twenty years ago. He died. Cancer. He was sick for six months, I cared for him, washed his shirts, sheets, towels. Every night I changed the bedclothes because he sweated, couldn’t breathe, couldn’t sleep.»

She sipped her coffee.

«After he died, I couldn’t go into the bedroom for a month. It smelled of him. Of medicine, of sickness, of death. But also of him. Of the man he was before. I would go in, breathe in that smell, and couldn’t breathe. And couldn’t leave.»

Andrea listened.

«And then I came here. To the laundry. I took his last shirt – the one he died in – and I washed it. By hand. For a long time. Until the water ran clear. Until the shirt was white. And then I understood.»

«What?»

«That the smell isn’t in the shirt. The smell is in me. I carry it with me. And I can go on carrying it. But the shirt – it’s just fabric. It can be washed.»

They sat in silence. The machine hummed, spun, rinsed. Time passed.

«Do you believe there’s something… after?» Andrea asked. «Afterwards?»

Lucia looked out the window. The sun was setting, shadows grew longer, the golden glow returned.

«I don’t know,» she said. «For forty years I’ve washed the things of the dead. Shirts, sheets, dresses they died in. And you know what?»

«What?»

«They never smell of the end. They smell of life. Of what was before. I think that means something.»

Andrea was silent.

«Maybe there’s just a washing machine there,» he said. «A huge one. And they’ll wash us all until we’re clean.»

«Maybe,» Lucia smiled. «Then I’ll have work there.»

He smiled too. For the first time.

The machine beeped.

Lucia opened the door, took out the coat. It was wet, clean, without a single stain. Dark gray, like a cloud before rain, but clean. It smelled of detergent and freshness.

She put it in the spin dryer, turned it on. Ten minutes later she took it out, almost dry.

«Come,» she said, and pushed open the door to the courtyard.

They went out.

The courtyard in the evening was special. The sun no longer burned, but caressed. It lay on the walls in golden patches, kissed the flowers in the well, played in the ivy leaves. The lines with laundry cast long shadows, and these shadows moved, lived, breathed.

Lucia hung the coat on the longest line. It hung heavily, but beautifully – dark against the gold.

«Look,» she said.

Andrea looked.

The wind played with the coat. It moved, as if alive. The sleeves rose and fell, as if the coat were embracing someone. The tails flapped, as if it wanted to fly away.

«Clean,» Andrea said. «Really clean.»

«Clean,» Lucia confirmed. «Now it’s your turn.»

«My turn?»

«You. Clean on the outside. Inside – not yet. But inside is harder. Inside, you have to do it yourself.»

Andrea stood, looking at the coat. Then he shifted his gaze to the sky.

«Elena,» he said quietly. «Forgive me. I didn’t come. I couldn’t. I didn’t say goodbye.»

His voice wavered.

«I love you. I’ll always love you. And I’ll try. I’ll try to live. For you. For her. For myself.»

Lucia stood beside him and was silent. This wasn’t her conversation.

When he fell silent, she said:

«Come tomorrow morning. The coat will be dry. And you’ll take it.»

Andrea nodded.

«How much do I owe you?»

«Nothing,» Lucia said. «But if you want – come by. Tell me how things are going.»

He looked at her for a long moment.

«I will,» he said. «I definitely will.»

And he went towards the exit. Without the coat. In a single dirty shirt. But he walked differently now. Straighter. Lighter.

Lucia watched him go.

Then she went to the coat, adjusted it on the line. Stroked the sleeve.

«Protect him,» she said to the wind. «And her too. Protect them all.»

She returned to the laundry. Sat on the chair. Poured coffee.

Outside, it was getting dark. Lights were coming on. Somewhere music played – a neighbor had turned on the radio. It smelled of evening, of food, of flowers, of life.

Beyond the glass, a shadow flickered.

Lucia sighed, straightened her apron, and prepared to listen again.

The day in Trastevere is never quiet.

Lucia knew this for certain. Even during siesta, when the city freezes and seems deserted, somewhere someone will definitely shout, laugh, drop a pot, turn the radio up full blast, and then a tenor will float through the alley, belting out an aria from Tosca, mixed with the smell of fried onions and the exhaust of a passing Vespa.

After Andrea left, Lucia went out into the courtyard to check the laundry. Valentina’s sheets were already dry and lay in a neat pile on the bench by the well – Lucia had taken them down an hour ago, when the wind grew too strong and started whipping the fabric. The old man’s shirt hung on the hanger, almost dry, only the collar still slightly damp – Lucia touched it, decided it could be taken down and ironed in an hour.

Andrea’s coat dried on the far line. Dark, heavy, it swayed in the wind, and Lucia caught herself thinking of it as a living creature, just washed, fed, and now resting.

«Lucia! Lucia, are you there?»

Signora Maria’s voice burst into the courtyard, as always, without knocking, without warning. Signora Maria – the neighbor from the third floor, sixty-eight years old, three chins, five cats, and a tongue that never stopped – was already coming down the steps to the laundry, though Lucia hadn’t even opened the door.

«I’m here, I’m here,» Lucia called back, coming out of the courtyard.

Signora Maria burst into the laundry like a hurricane. A red flowery dress stretched over her ample figure, curlers covered by a kerchief on her head, in her hands a huge bag from which something striped protruded.

«You won’t believe it! You simply won’t believe what happened!» she rattled off, without even saying hello. «That idiot, that cretin, that… that…»

«Who?» Lucia asked calmly, accustomed to Signora Maria always starting at the end.

«Mine! My precious husband!» Signora Maria threw the bag onto the counter. «Look! Look at this!»

She shook out the contents of the bag. Sheets tumbled out. White, with lace, clearly expensive. And on them – stains.

Many stains.

Red wine, that was obvious. And something greasy. And something else brown, like chocolate. And another one, completely incomprehensible.

«What’s this?» Lucia asked, examining the stains.

«This is him, the parasite, having a romantic dinner!» Signora Maria shrieked. «Yesterday, when I went to my sister’s! Can you imagine? I was gone for one evening, just one evening, and he… he…»

«With whom?» Lucia asked.

«How should I know with whom?» Signora Maria yelled. «If I knew with whom, I’d be there already! I’d tear all her hair out! I’d… I’d…»

She fell silent, because she didn’t know what she’d do to him, but clearly something terrible.

«And what does he say?»

«He says he ate alone!» Signora Maria threw up her hands. «Alone! Can you imagine? One person, one dinner, and stains like these? He poured wine on himself? Smeared himself with chocolate? Spread grease all over the sheet?»

Lucia struggled to suppress a smile.

«And why was he eating on the sheet?»

«He was eating on the bed!» Signora Maria was almost shouting now. «On our marital bed! With someone! Or alone, in which case he’s simply crazy! Either way, it’s bad!»

At that moment, Signor Enzo entered the laundry.

Signor Enzo lived one floor down, was nearly seventy, wore old suspenders and an invariable cap which he never removed even indoors, and for about ten years had been trying to court Signora Maria, despite her having a husband and him having a sick wife who hadn’t left her bed for the last five years.

«What’s all the noise?» he asked, entering. «I heard Signora Maria shouting, thought there was a fire or a murder.»

«There will be a murder!» Signora Maria snapped. «I’m about to kill my husband!»

«And what did he do?» Signor Enzo came closer, looked with interest at the sheets. «Whoa. That was quite a dinner.»

«You think he wasn’t alone?» Signora Maria asked hopefully.

«I think,» Signor Enzo scratched the back of his head under his cap, «that if he was alone, he has coordination problems. Or he was celebrating something very important.»

«What could he be celebrating?» Signora Maria wailed. «He has nothing important! He’s retired! He sits at home all day watching TV!»

«Maybe he won the lottery?» Signor Enzo suggested. «Or an old friend called? Or he just felt like a celebration?»

Signora Maria froze. Looked at the stains. Then at Lucia.

«You think…» she began.

«I think,» Lucia said, «that before committing murder, you should ask. Did you ask?»

«I did. He said: „I dined alone.“»

«And that’s all?»

«That’s all. And he smiled… like that… so… disgustingly!»

«Disgustingly?» Signor Enzo repeated. «How?»

«As if he knows something I don’t!» Signora Maria began to get wound up again. «As if he has a secret! And I hate secrets! I’m his wife! He shouldn’t have secrets from me!»

Lucia took the sheets, spread them on the counter. The stains were old, already dried, but clearly fresh – from yesterday.

«The wine will come out,» she said. «Grease – harder. Chocolate – medium. But this one…»

She pointed to the brown stain, the most incomprehensible.

«What is it?» Signora Maria asked.

«I don’t know. Need to smell it.»

Lucia brought the stain to her nose. Smelled it. Then again.

«Strange,» she said.

«What?» Signora Maria leaned forward.

«It smells…» Lucia hesitated. «It smells of medicine.»

«What kind of medicine?»

«I don’t know. Something bitter. Something old people take.»

Signora Maria froze. Looked at Signor Enzo. He shrugged.

«He doesn’t take any medicine!» Signora Maria said. «He’s healthy as an ox! He’s seventy-two and still… well, you know… forgive me, Lord!»

Signor Enzo coughed and turned to the window.

«Then I don’t know,» Lucia said. «But that’s exactly what it smells like. Medicinal bitterness.»

Signora Maria sat down on the chair. For the first time since her arrival, she fell silent.