Free Finding the Thing Within by Coris/ciro Sceusa Page A

thirties, tall with long, brown hair and he had a shapely, well-proportioned figure. He was wearing a dark-blue suit and a blue spotted tie over a light blue checked shirt. Rosario was catching glances of him as he was talking to Lorenzo, and the stranger noticed. The only one not to notice was Lorenzo, or so it seemed as he went on talking just the same.
    As Rosario was listening to Lorenzo, he saw the man get up and walk towards the bathroom. As he arrived at the end of the corridor he turned and looked straight at Rosario. After doubting himself for a minute he interrupted Lorenzo to say:
    “I’ll be right back; I’m going to the bathroom, if the waiter comes, order me something with fish.”
    ***
    The toilets were not very big, just enough space for a sink, two urinals and a separate little room with the toilet. As Rosario walked in, he saw the young man washing his hands at the sink. He waited and then asked:
    “Salesman?”
“Yeah, why? You too?”
“So we’re colleagues then, what do you sell?” “Lingerie and you?”
“Electronics.”
“Oh, interesting!”
“Well, used to be we sold a lot more. Now it’s all in
    these hypermarkets and malls, either you’re inside or you don’t sell.”
    “Tell me about it, everyone things that selling clothes is great money, but we’ve been hit hard too by these big places. Everybody buys now directly from the stock-house and there’s no more job for the salesman. We are surviving mostly by selling to tiny village shops.”
    “I know exactly what you mean. We’re in the same boat, you and I,” and he shot him a provocative look.
“You too. If you want, we can meet up again some other time. I’m from Palermo, and you?”
“Me too!” and they swapped numbers.
“Oh, my name’s Rosario. Do you mind if I go out first?”
“Fine. My name’s Maurizio.”
Rosario was no longer impressed by how easy it was to pick someone up. The right kind of look at the right time told you enough to understand if someone was interested. He had become a master at this technique. Lorenzo had ordered the fish risotto for both of
them and Rosario was happy with the choice.
“All that time to wash your hands?”
“There was a queue!”
Lorenzo said nothing more and carried on eating
happily. Rosario thought he was either a genius at acting
or he hadn’t understood a thing. He watched him closely to
try and see which it was. The rest of the afternoon also
went by quickly but then on the return journey in the car,
Lorenzo, with his head resting on Rosario’s shoulder,
asked about what had gone on in the bathroom at lunchtime. Rosario blushed lightly and hesitated just for a
second before recovering and saying in a confidant voice: “Yeah he was a colleague; we just shot the breeze
a little.”
“So why didn’t you tell me? You think I didn’t see
you looking at him all the time?”
“Come on, I was looking at him like I look at everyone.”
“And you think I believe that?”
“What? Are you jealous? Didn’t we establish that
we’re not anything official? We’re just seeing each other
without ties, aren’t we?”
“Yeah, whatever..!”
“Listen Lorenzo, don’t get ideas. I told you a while
ago now that I’m a free spirit and that I won’t be tied down.
It’s already hard enough that I’m really beginning to care
for you. Hard because it already puts limits on my freedom.”
“I’m not stopping you doing anything.”
They continued on in silence. When they got back
to the city they said goodbye and agreed to meet up the
following day.

Part 8
    He was thinking continuously of Lorenzo and about how he had said that he did not want to rush things. It seemed that Rosario’s concept of time was different to that of Lorenzo’s. He took Tullio’s business card from his pocket, and seeing an email address on it, decided to send an email to the architect friend:
    “Dear Sir,
    I read about the study of the sound environment that you created in the search for