The Arch of Titus (a short story)

The Arch of Titus
((A short sketch)(82 AD))






He was on his way slowly, over to the Arch of Titus; push around by the early late crowd of the city of Rome, as cars raced by and a million window lights and street lights went on, as if it was the Christmas season three months early. Faces churned about him, around him of the young to middle age girls, ugly and fat older women, too fat to be begging for money, too lean to be a whore, yet flaunting down side streets, by fountains, past the Spanish Steps, passing him by, reeking with garlic, and booze, and sweat, out into this pre-twilight evening. Here, on this path way to the Arch of Titus, all the vulgarity of the city walked, all dimly and slyly unexplained.
He took in all the smells of the people, the rough gagging cigarette and cigar smells, and the suffocating perfume smells, and then caught a glimpse of the Arch from a distance over a mass of heads and shoulders—had he taken a taxi he could have avoided all these humdrum, everyday stirs. And there he stood twenty-feet from the Arch; a violin player was nearby, his hat between his legs, playing for spare change. He caught a glance of a German woman, short dark hair, glistening green eyes, slender, perhaps thirty-three, he was a youthful fifty-one years old. They stared at one another half drifting in aloofness, had seen one another early on at the Spanish Steps, what a coincidence they both thought—simultaneously. They both smiled at one another.
The German woman came over to him, talking in a soft voice, craning her eyebrow, the gentleman looking here and there, not sure if she was coming to meet him or not, trying to be unobvious. They were both dressed for the October weather, nothing exaggerated, and nothing over tight, as the youth of the day prescribed to: somewhat fashionable though, for 1997.
A fat old woman was fixing a pullout chair to sit on, to beg for coins, she had a typical wooden bowl out ready to place on her lap once she got herself arranged, and had a big hoagie sandwich ready to eat, and a large thermos full of something.
Said the German woman (very much a lady), as if trying to be fairly interested in the gentleman without overdoing it, “I seem to see you here and there, I’m in Rome alone, it seems like you are also, do you mind if we see Rome together, so many men try to pick me up, I have no time in seeing the sights, and I only have two days here, you look safe, and you’re American, are you not?”
“Correct,” the man said, taken back a bit, “and sure, I’m alone also, and can use some company.”
“Look, see the Arch, isn’t it beautiful?” she commented.
“Yes, and the Spanish Steps, also, where we were earlier today, where I first saw you…” said the American as if wanting to say something more but didn’t, as they walked around the Arch a few times getting to know one another, as if they were lovers, or brother and sister—to bystanders.

(Hours later)

“Good gracious!...” said the woman to the American, “You do realize not many men can do what you are doing, without wanting to go to bed with the woman?” And then she added to that, “Incidentally, my name is Chris!” (And the elder man thought back thirty-years, he had met a Chris in Germany, Augsburg, and they looked very much alike except would have been three years older than him, not seventeen years younger, and he shook his head, the resemblance was remarkable, but she had died of leukemia. They had dated for a year, and then he went off to the war in Vietnam, and received a Dear John letter from her, knowing she only had a few years of life left, he understood.)
“Yes, I’ve been told that before, that I don’t look like a person you have to worry about, and grow thin in fret. Most men feel any kind of contact with women is a proposition. I don’t’ see why men can’t simply be friends with women.” (And there they stood, shoulder to shoulder, and all except for the voice, and the expression he now remembered from 1970, that his girlfriend had back then, they were nearly identical—like to like, Chris to Chris—although the age was the deciding factor here. ‘What a coincidence,’ he said to himself.)
“It makes it more of a meaningless world, doesn’t it?” she responded (The gentleman walking the lady back to her hotel.)
“Yeah, I suppose so,” commented the man, “the very challenge to give the evening more purpose than what it was meant to be, is purposeless, or as you say meaningless.”
In the entrance of the hotel they waited together for the night watchman to open the door, “Good evening folks!” he said.
“Tomorrow then, we’ll meet at the Spanish Steps and see the rest of the city together, if you don’t mind, and then I’ll have to catch a train back to Germany?” questioned the German woman, named Chris, kissing the gentleman on the cheek. And he heard her say as she walked away, “A well-kept man.” And he mumbled under his breathe, “Perhaps, the old saying is true, someplace in the world, we all have a double.”


No: 616 (6-3-2010)