Florence in Ecstasy. Jessie Chaffee
really. Can’t she see that he’s a boy?
There’s a gust of wind and I cross my arms tight, wishing I’d brought a jacket. I spent the afternoon with St. Catherine, reading in a park near the river. She was born to cloth-dyers and her parents had hopes of a good marriage, but she had a vision of God at age six—saw him quite clearly hovering above her, blessing her with the sign of the cross, as she walked one of Siena’s narrow streets—and from then on she thought of nothing else. When she turned twelve, her mother tried to take her out to be seen, to attract a husband. Instead, she shaved her head and wrapped it in a scarf. She refused visitors, slept on a board, and wore a thin cross-covered chain with small hooks around her waist, pulling it tight so that it drew blood when she moved. Take that is what those hooks said to her parents, to her would-be suitors, to the people who didn’t believe her visions. Believe this. That was as far as I got when it began to rain, the skies opening up and drenching me.
The whistle begins the game, and instantly I can see nothing as all the spectators have risen. A flare gun goes off somewhere in the stands, and the guard dogs shift uneasily as smoke descends over the stadium, obliterating the figures in purple and yellow. There is history here tonight, centuries of competition on the faces of the people shouting around me. These regional rivalries run deep. Tonight it is Parma, but it could be any team.
“Great, huh?” Francesca roars beside me.
Mariotti, the great hope of the Florentine team, has the ball. He flies down the field, his long hair trailing behind. He has a casual ruggedness that has secured him a spot on the cover of every gossip magazine. He misses a goal and the Parma fans begin to chant, “Vaffanculo! Vaffanculo!” Fuck you! Fuck you!
As if in response, Francesca weaves her arm through Peter’s.
“Are you coming out after?” she asks twenty minutes into the match. There is a postgame party at a dance club owned by one of the rowing club’s members. “Mariotti is supposed to be there. But who knows if he’ll show his face now, huh? Anyway, you must come. It’ll be fun.”
There’s another surge from the crowd before I can answer—the Fiorentina have scored—and a large man pushes between us, fist raised. I try to speak around his protruding middle, but as the big belly falls back, Francesca’s face—her eyes wide, her mouth open and laughing—turns away from me and into Peter, her thin fingers grasping his cheeks. Then they are lost to the crowd as people jump up on their seats and I feel pressure against the backs of my knees. My right side is pressed into the divider, and there is no room now to even step back onto my own seat. The shouts around me rise and meld until a song grows out of the chaos, the tune familiar. Francesca’s voice climbs in sharp staccato, breaking off only when I squeeze her arm: “I’ll see you at the party.”
I slide by her and then Peter, who continues belting out the song, his eyes luminous. When they reach the chorus I realize that it’s a version of “Yellow Submarine”—“Fuck your yellow submarine,” maybe. I push through bodies and fight my way up toward the exit. I’m almost there when I feel a vibration against my shoulder and turn to see a young boy—his hair slicked back and his yellow Parma jersey pressed against the wall—glaring at me and pounding on the glass. He begins shouting, “Vaffanculo! Vaffanculo!” And how could he know that his curse is wasted on an outsider? I continue to watch his busy lips until they are obliterated by a great wad of spit that makes me jump back even as it is caught, squashed, on the divider between us.
The dance club pulses in the middle of a dark park near the river. When I step up to the door hours later, the tattooed bouncer barely looks at me before waving me in. The first room is enormous, every inch filled, and the bass beat of music engulfs me. The crowd radiates out from a central circular bar that glows like a small city. The ceiling stretches up several stories, and high above, people lean over balcony rails, humming red. On the perimeter of the room is a series of dark doors that lead to other rooms, one of which the canottieri has rented out. I had two drinks with my meal at a café near the stadium, but I’m already anxious for another one.
I am underdressed—jeans, sandals, and a button-down seemed right for a game and then a bar, but I look juvenile compared with the women in this club, all wearing spiked heels and fabric that clings to their bodies. More than the clothes, it’s the gesture that I’m missing. All around me they are talking, laughing, placing hands on arms, heads pitched back, backs arched, hips swaying right or left, all of these small movements melding to form a single S. A fluid motion in and away, a curling S with a strong spine. Leaning in, leaning out, but still bound to that core. It invites whatever the night might bring; it attracts and intimidates. I don’t have this gesture, don’t have any gesture. I just am. I feel a tug at my hair and turn, but there are no eyes on me. I run my hand across my head and keep moving.
At the third doorway, partially obscured by a thick velvet curtain, is a handwritten sign: FLORENCE ROWING. I descend into a room where everything is lower—low ceiling, low lighting, low tables with candles lining the back wall where people are seated in low clusters. The center, a small dance floor, is empty. I scan the room for Francesca, for anyone—I thought I’d be late, but I’m early, and I recognize no one in those little circles: not the men and not the women, who in this room have mastered an easy movement as well. I order a vodka and soda from the young bartender. He must be used to American students because he doesn’t blink when I drink it fast and order a second.
I look up when the curtain moves, hoping for a familiar face, then glance at my reflection between the bottles on the back of the bar and try to appear natural. I roll up one sleeve of my shirt, push it back down. I lean to one side, then the other, resting my elbow lightly on the bar’s edge. Look at you. I put my hand to my face, feeling for more flesh, then drop it quickly and look away. When I order my third drink, I try on the gesture, moving toward the bartender a bit and smiling, but his face remains blank as he scoops ice into a new glass.
I am decided on leaving when there is an eruption by the door.
“Oh, Fiorentina…”
Stefano enters and pauses at the top step with his arms raised, a handful of men behind him. The air swells with sound as everyone around me begins singing.
“Oh, Fiorentina…”
Stefano takes the steps two at a time, leading the charge, and I spot Luca and Gianni among his companions. The song surges up and down and even the bartender joins in.
“Ricorda che del calcio è tua la storia. La la la la la…”
I try to catch Stefano’s eye, but he doesn’t see me as the group passes and then divides, the men splitting off to greet people. The song slowly dies but the room is buzzing now.
“Ne prende un altro?”
An older man with thinning hair. He’s shorter than me and his shirt hangs too far open.
“No, grazie.” I shake my nearly full glass at him.
He puts out his hand. “Sono Bernardo.”
“Hannah,” I say, taking just his fingers.
“Piacere, Anna.” He stretches out the vowels, the grin not leaving. “You are at the canottieri?”
“I am.”
“Why haven’t I seen you before?”
I’m trying to think of a response that will end the conversation, but his frozen smile seems immovable.
“Basta, Bernardo. Ciao, bella.” Stefano squeezes my hand and gives Bernardo a look—his smile drops and he shrugs, muttering something under his breath before turning away.
“Grazie,” I say.
Stefano nods and calls for drinks. “A great game, yes? Forza Fiorentina!”
“A great game,” I echo, though I’d missed most of it.
With three glasses balanced between his hands, Stefano points to the back where a few other