my mother used to say, “ask a woman who loves you to do it.” She was talking about herself, of course—but was she also making a prediction? Is that why I’ve never gotten anything done in my life, mother? Because I’ve never found a woman who loved me? “Don’t kill yourself with self-pity,” I can hear her saying. And she’s right. But sometimes I can’t help it—lately, it’s been pricking me like a big thorn in the seat of my pants. Even poor Flaminio, I think, even poor Flaminio wound up one step ahead of me. Armanda Ragusa’s no bargain, I’ll admit—but the devotion of that pitiful thing is better than anything I’ve ever gotten. Now, as I watch her bustling among the actors, doing Flaminio’s bidding as radiantly as if it were Jesus Christ Himself who’d visited her in that dream, I choke with envy. If I want my memorial prayers chanted, I’ll have to sing them myself. Perhaps I should never have expected more. I should have known better. I was no longer a boy when I joined the troupe.
