The Confessions Of A Concubine. Roberta Mezzabarba

of what my

      pupils would see.

      Pietro, with a woman, by the hand: his wife.

      Me alone.

      The smile faded from my face, as I looked at the scene that as it passed my eyes slowly reached my brain.

      Jesus, I wished I could disappear swallowed up by the floor.

      He had a dark blue suit, a white shirt stretched over the chest I knew and a thin tie, the same color as the suit.

      She, light eyes, blond hair, smooth cut into a bob that just touched her shoulders: she was wearing a long black dress that left her back bare, and had a shell-shaped evening bag in her hand.

      On the left ring finger together with the wedding ring a cascade of diamonds glittering so much that it attracted everyone's attention.

      While Pietro was talking with the managers of other stores, the director’s wife turned to Pietro's

      wife:

      "My dear, you really are a splendor, and what a beautiful ring! Is it a present from Pietro?"

      "Oh, yes, he gave it to me a few days ago, and just think, it wasn’t an anniversary!"

      "My dear, watch out, men are real devils, they always know how to make us forgive them even for something that we will never know about!"

      I felt as if I was living in a nightmare: my cheeks were on fire, my hands were like ice and I had a huge desire to cry.

      As soon as I was sure that my legs would support me, I headed for the bathroom, with an uncertain step.

      I opened the glass door that led into the dressing room and then everything disappeared.

      ***

      In the distance I heard a voice calling me,

      lovingly.

      "Mysia dear, what’s wrong, come on open your eyes. You gave us take a nice scare darling."

      The director’s wife caressed my neck gently and stared at me with genuinely worried eyes.

      Now I remembered... Pietro with his wife, the bathroom, then total darkness.

      With a quizzical gaze, perhaps reading all the questions that were crowding my mind, Mrs. Olga explained what had happened.

      "Dear, I saw you coming to the bathroom with such an uncertain step that I thought I would follow you to make sure you were alright, and instead I found you slumped on the ground, unconscious. Maybe you suffer from low blood pressure? And tell me dear where your husband is, maybe it would be better if you went home..."

      "Thank you, but I feel better already. It's nothing, really. Thank you."

      I had only seen that woman a few times, in the

      store, and now she was on her knees with my head resting on her legs. The touch of her hands on the nape of my neck suddenly made me think of my grandmother, but it was just a flash.

      I tried to get up, but my legs still couldn't support me. Mrs. Olga helped me to a sitting position, and then stand up.

      So it was that I made my entrance into the meeting room where the buffet was set up, supported by the director's wife, attracting everyone’s gaze, including Pietro’s.

      I wanted to cry.

      I spent the next two hours with colleagues who kindly took turns keeping me company.

      At a certain point there was a momentary pause in the close surveillance, to which I was being subjected, just enough for Pietro to come closer and whisper calmly in my ear:

      "You look beautiful. I would have liked to be the one who found you in the bathroom, unconscious,

      completely in my power, so you could not have denied me!"

      I hated him for his one-way jibes, but his proximity melted my joints and ligaments, and I felt my knees go weak again and the blood melt in my veins, yet I had to maintain the impassive mask of the afflicted colleague, because his wife was watching us.

      Whether it was hatred or the fire that burned inside me that was predominant, I had no idea.

      A few words when I returned from that devastating evening.

       Between today and tomorrow

       I dress in air

       and in the irreversibility of time,

       I wait,

       to breathe.

      Sitting at the kitchen table, alone with the scarlet notebook in front of me, I did not want to sleep, just write.

      I wanted Pietro but I could not have him, it was clear, but I didn’t want to listen to the voice of logic that told me to stop, to interrupt that relationship while I was still in time, in time to save myself, in time to save my dignity, in time not to continue on the path of vivisection in pieces, of the choice, I like this and I don’t like that.

      But stubbornly I looked only at what I wanted to see, I gave light to what made my heart beat faster, without evaluating the fact that Pietro seemed more interested in sex than in a future together, that after seeing him with his wife I should no longer have any doubt that he would never leave her for me.

      But blindness is a choice.

      And I had chosen.