Chapter 3

Dressed in blue

"Even today? It seems to me that you are exaggerating." 

Sitting on the step that flanked the bathtub, I looked over at mom who was combing her hair. Despite the many sofas distributed in the living room, the most interesting conversations and discussions in the family always took place in my mother's bathroom. It was there that she was getting ready to go out, it was there that she could be found as soon as she returned, intent on combing her hair or putting her bag and hat in the chiffonier. The light green walls were framed with pink stucco, there were lots of mirrors and lots of light.

"Am I exaggerating? And why?" 

"Either for breakfast or for a drink you see this Hemingway almost every day and besides, he's a married man." 

"But there is always his wife who comes and goes, and then he also invites my friends, he says they are nice." 

"And what do you talk about for so many hours?"

"It's not easy to say!" I burst out laughing. "Regardless of the fact that the American is different from the English I am used to, every now and then he lowers his voice, as if he were telling state secrets, and I have a hard time understanding it. He stops, looks at us with a crooked mouth and seems to be smiling, so out of politeness we smile too. Then he starts to giggle and we giggle too. Then he laughs and we laugh too and it's funny that we end up laughing really, not just to...