Page 64 of Marcello

So I ran.

I leapt down the stone steps four at a time –

Hit the street –

And sprinted as fast as I could.

Back at university, I’d been an intramural soccer player.

I hadn’t exercised much since I’d come to Naples, but I was still in pretty good shape –

And panic gave me wings.

I wasn’t in a make-believe movie anymore, that was for sure.

I was running for my fucking life.

The road beside the monument was a one-way just wide enough for one car.

To my left was a set of brick steps.

I raced up them and came out on a street crammed full of residential buildings.

I darted for the nearest alleyway as fast as I could.

People saw the gun in my hand and screamed –

So I shoved it in my hoodie pocket and kept running.

Minutes flew by as I sprinted through back alleys.

The streets kept ascending, going up and up –

Until I came out at the top of a hill.

A big government building labeled Archivio – ‘Archives’ – loomed to my right.

The view was incredible. I was hundreds of feet above sea level. The Bay of Naples spread out before me, with tons of high-rises lining the shore. In the far distance, Vesuvius looked like two mountains right next to each other.

But I didn’t give a shit about the view.

All I knew was that if I was on top of a hill, there had to be a way down.

There was. Steps led to a narrow switchback street that descended hundreds of feet, back and forth, until it reached the buildings lining the bay.

I raced down the switchback, past tiny rooms in the concrete walls of the hill. Very poor people lived in them, their laundry drying outside on metal racks. They watched in alarm as I sprinted past.

Halfway down the ramp, I paused and looked back.

If the cop was still chasing me, I couldn’t hear him.

Now was the time to ditch the gun, and this was as good a place as any.

My current position was hidden from the tiny apartments in the side of the cliff, and there weren’t any cars coming up the switchback. I was alone.

The walls of the switchback were made up of crumbling concrete blocks. I found a gap between two of them, wiped off the gun with my sweatshirt, and dropped it in the hole.

I took a mental snapshot of the location, then started running again.