Chapter 4

Chapter 4 - The Grimaldi’s

The Grimaldi’s were a strange family. Bruno’s parents, Virgilio and Theresa Grimaldi could not have been more different. He, unlike his father, the Conte, was tall and handsome. He had short black hair and dark eyes mounted on a strong proud head with a massive frame to hold it up. His wife was miniature. She had thin, scraggly hair and a mousy face. She never developed the traditional Italian woman’s middle aged pouch. She would always be as skinny as a rake and her breasts were almost non-existent, much to her husbands displeasure. But, she came from a good family and Bruno had married her to please his parents. Well, his father really.

Theresa had one exceedingly endearing feature. She was the only child of a wealthy nearby landowner and on his death the Grimaldi family estate would become significantly larger. Plus, his rich farmland would be a welcome diversification.

Virgilio and Theresa had two boys. Giacomo, the elder, resembled his mother and Bruno who resembled his father. The Grimaldi estate had forever been handed down from father to first son. So, the mousy, bespectacled, twitchy Giacomo would get it all. And both Bruno and his father hated it. Almost as much as Bruno’s father grew to hate his wife. Since they conceived Bruno, his father had refused to touch her. Just going through the motions to produce two boys practically made him ill. His only solace came in the arms of his long time lover, who lived in a nearby village. She was a widower whose husband had died under mysterious circumstances.

Virgilio pretty much ran the estate once the boys hit teenage Dom. Il Conte, nonno Grimaldi, was ill with what later became known as Parkinson’s Disease. It made him more angry and lewd than ever. He turned into an old twisted ferret.

And so these strange, dysfunctional, three generations of family all lived together in the ageing Palazzo. Antiquity was everywhere, both inside and outside, reflected in the architecture and every furnishing as well as in the poor soles that resided there. It was as if the life had been sucked out of this place a long time ago and now it stood for good, for the sake of survival and continuity.

Virgilio controlled everything, particularly his wife and two sons. She was not allowed to air opinions. His tool was his drunken rages and pitiful beatings. Her solace was the local church and her eldest son. He was so thin and frail and yet somehow different from the other Grimaldi men. Much different. He was profoundly intelligent and sensitive. He cared for the place in a different way and he had great ideas for how to modernize the estate. Giacomo was soft and generous and was interested in everyone that he came into contact with. He had a terrible twitch that almost connected his left eye with the corner of his mouth when he was most nervous, or around his brutal father or brother. He was nearly blind in one eye. He wore the thickest spectacles over both.

Were he not a Grimaldi, Giacomo would have had a terrible time at school. Instead he was bullied at home, often trying to protect his mother. And his shoulder would forever ache from the time his father dislocated it while teaching him to shoot correctly. Bruno and he then tried to force the shoulder back in, being only partially successful.

Bruno hated Giacomo more than life itself. Bruno was entirely the opposite of Giacomo. He was tall and handsome with his father’s black hair and temper. He was also a son of a bitch like il Conte and always had an eye for the women. Bruno was that kind of dumb person that always think their smart. He could never understand why Giacomo was born before him. He was so obviously the best person to run the estate. Over time he presumed his family may overturn tradition and put him in charge. How wrong he was. And how hard he worked to prove his superiority.

“Where’s Giacomo?” Was one of his many opportunities to outdo his brother.

“He’s in the fields with Marco. You know, Marco from school.” Bruno’s mother responded.

“Oh, no, not that idiot.”

“Don’t be silly Bruno. No, Bruno, leave them alone.”

It was too late. He was off after them. Marco was easy prey. He was two years above Bruno at school, but already Bruno’s pack of friends tormented his every moment. And Bruno was only thirteen.

Bruno found them in the fields by the edge of the vineyards, where the hay bails were stacked. The boys were prancing amongst the bails like two young, awkward stags. Bruno watched them from behind a nearby olive tree. He hated them both so much. He despised their weakness and girlish playfulness. He mumbled to himself something about how he was not surprised that their only friends were girls. Bruno squinted in the afternoon sun as he watched their every move.

The two, spindly young men had no cares that afternoon. This was rare for the worrisome, nervous and abused natures that propelled them. They knew they were safe here, so they played and they danced from hay bail to hay bail. Pushing and pulling and laughing. The sun’s rays were everywhere. They climbed up to one of the higher bails and fell off it, embracing each other as they fell. And they landed on the soft grass together, rolling and giggling. When the rolling stopped they lay, in each other’s embrace, just long enough. Just long enough to share a look, to discover something new, to catch each other’s breath. And Bruno saw it too. He had his weapon. Finally, he had his weapon for life.

copyright ©Philip L Letts 2007