Page 32 of Marcello

“Exactly!” Pasquale said. Then his face brightened like he had an idea. “Hey – you and Fede should come by for a tour! I can sneak you in for free.”

“Sure!”

“…maybe,” Federica said unenthusiastically.

Pasquale could tell she wasn’t into it. “I mean, I could just take Marcello, if you don’t want to come.”

“No, it’s fine,” she said, then added noncommittally, “We’ll have to go someday.”

“When can you do it?” I asked Pasquale.

“I work Monday morning at nine. You could come by any time after that.”

“Perfect!” I said. “I don’t work on Monday till 4.”

“Are you going to ask me?” Federica said, irritated.

“What? You said we should do it!” I snapped.

“I said ‘someday,’ not necessarily Monday.”

Pasquale became visibly uncomfortable.

“I, uh… see somebody I need to say hi to. Catch you guys later,” he said, then slipped off into the crowd.

“Why are you so pissed off?” I asked Fede.

“I’m not pissed off,” she said in an incredibly pissed-off voice. “I’d just prefer it if you would ask me before you start making plans for us.”

I wasn’t really listening to her anymore.

I was retracing my steps backwards through the conversation until I remembered –

“Are you mad because I made that joke about the Camorra?”

She made the fart face. “No.”

Yes.

“Jesus – it was just a joke!”

“I don’t want to talk about it.”

“Fine,” I snapped, “but I want to go on the tour, and I should be able to do things once in a while without us being attached at the hip.”

Federica looked like I’d slapped her –

And then she got really angry.

“Fine. Go on your little fucking tour, but I’m not coming along.”

“FINE,” I snarled, then stomped off.

When I found Pasquale, he asked, “Hey, man… is everything okay?”

“She’s pissed off I made a joke about the Camorra.”

“Oh. Yeah, some people are really bothered by it. I figure it’s like the weather – why complain when you can’t do anything about it? For instance, there’s some Camorra dipshit who hangs out in front of our work sometimes, and you just know he’s selling drugs. My boss gets all upset about it – but if you report them to the police, and a dirty cop tells them who reported ‘em, you’re dead meat. So nobody ever does shit.”