Seven Seasons in Siena by Robert Rodi

six inches to the left. I wave to her over the railing and call out, “Ciao, Silvia!” as though she were the person in the world I’m most eager to see—realizing too late that the reverse can scarcely be the case.
    In fact, she gives me a sort of fixed smile, then turns to her two companions and says something I don’t quite catch—but I can imagine it’s along the lines of, Please excuse me while I go and find some place for this American friend of Dario where he can do the least harm.
    Even so, she’s extremely courteous as she leads me to the kitchens. She’s making some amiable chatter and I’m too intimidated to admit I only understand about thirty percent of it. I just smile and repeat,
“Sì, sì, sì,”
like an idiot. For all I know she’s asking, “And do you have any experience in the slaughter of livestock?” and I’m telling her Yes, yes, yes.Please lead me to your doomed sheep and poultry. “And did you bring your own knives?” Yes, yes, yes. I carry them with me always. They are my children.
    Fortunately, once we enter the kitchen I can see that the evening’s carnivorous offering is already quite oven-friendly. There are chicken parts everywhere, being systematically dressed with olive oil and rosemary. I’m introduced to the chef, who’s called Biondo, which means “Blond”—despite which his hair is carrot red. (Later I’ll learn the nickname comes from a restaurant he used to own, Il Biondo in Via Montanini.) He’s a tall, broad-shouldered man in his forties who smiles and welcomes me with carefully pronounced consonants, perhaps having been forewarned of my stupidity. Then I meet another worker, Antonella, in whose lap Silvia more or less deposits me before beating a hasty (yet elegant) retreat. Antonella is a pleasant-faced woman with golden ringlets who asks me to wait a moment while she finishes ladling a large tray of lasagne with meat sauce, during which time there is a small silence that proves awkward only for me, as I’m the only one standing around doing nothing. I decide to fill it by asking Antonella if she is in fact a native-born Caterpillar, which must be akin to visiting a convent and asking one of the nuns if she is in fact a virgin.
    â€œSì, sì,”
she tells me with a proud toss of her head,
“sono bruca pura.”
I am a pure Caterpillar. I feel suddenly stung, as though she’s stressed her inviolate bloodline over the kind of compromised-at-best status I myself might achieve, if I’m lucky; but then I realize it’s just civic pride again, no different from a Manhattanite boasting about being a native New Yorker. (Even Luigina herself isn’t bruca pura.)
    It’s very warm in the kitchens, and I feel my skin prickleand flush, then bead up. I hope I won’t be asked to wear an apron, because lashing me into yet another layer of fabric is only going to aggravate the problem. When I think no one’s looking, I swipe my arm over my forehead, and it comes away glistening and slick. I slip my fazzoletto off my neck and stuff it into my back pocket; I don’t want to soil it with my sweat.
    Having finished the tray of lasagne, Antonella takes me to the very back of the kitchen—where the air is thickest—to a counter on which two dozen loaves of bread are piled high. There’s a cutting board with a serrated knife resting on it, and a basket containing a small quantity of bread slices. Half a loaf sits primly next to the knife. Clearly, someone has abandoned this post—probably to attend to something more urgent.
    Antonella asks me if I’m able to cut the bread—as though my awkwardness with the Tuscan dialect might be symptomatic of an overall ineptitude that extends to my motor skills. I assure her I can cut these loaves of bread very well indeed, that I have been complimented on my carving skills, and am just short