Bella Italia (12 page)

“Okay, let me see for a minute,” Cora said while she looked for the right name on a present. “We just had a present for Koen and Maaike … That means we have another one for Niels.”

“Unbelievable,” Aad grumbled, shaking his head. “It’s like Santa only thought about him.”

“Santa doesn’t exist, Grandpa,” Niels said, being a smart aleck.

Aad looked around the room worriedly. “I wouldn’t say that too loud, son. I hope he didn’t hear you.”

Everyone chuckled again.

Niels tore the paper off the large rectangular gift.

“Wow,” Hans said when he could see what the gift was. “It’s one player from each of the twelve best soccer teams in the world, all in their original jerseys!”

Niels held the box with all the action figures in his hands awkwardly. Even though he was a big fan of the Dutch team, he showed no emotion in his face whatsoever.

Hans grabbed one of the figures from the box and held it up. “Spain, the world champion. What a great team, and this is an amazing player, right here.”

“Traitor,” Aad growled. “We should have never lost that game!”

Because Niels didn’t respond very enthusiastically, Hans quickly put the figure back and grabbed a more obvious choice. “Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the top-scoring Dutch player.”

It seemed as if it all passed by unnoticed by Niels. He stared motionless at the box.

Hans didn’t understand his son’s instant mood change at all. Quickly he looked at Petra and her mother, both of whom were looking with a great deal of worry at their son and grandson. “Is something wrong, Niels? Check it out—isn’t this great? Here you go … the living legends, the godly yellow canaries. Brazil, undoubtedly the best team in the world!”

“Put that away!” he snapped at his father, who held the doll in front of him. Niels’s reaction came as a complete surprise to everyone. Before Hans had a chance to respond, Niels raised his voice and hit the doll from his father’s hand. “I said put it away!”

Aad stood up and tried to get his grandson’s attention. “Hey, they’re not that bad, those Brazilians? In my day …”

“Stop it! I don’t want to see that shirt ever again!”

“Now, now, son …” Aad protested.

“Dad!” Holding back her rage, Petra made an attempt to stop her father.

“Can’t you see that the poor boy is in distress?!” Cora hissed.

“But …”

“No
but
s. Sit back down and leave him alone.”

Aad mumbled that he had only meant to be nice, but quickly did what his wife had asked him to do. Hans tried to calm Niels down by placing the whole box behind the chair. Koen crept over to look at the play figures, and Maaike slouched across her mother’s leg. “Is Niels mad, Mommy?”

“No, sweetie, he just doesn’t like soccer very much. Look, did you notice that your pony can change color when you wash it?” Laura picked up her daughter and walked into the kitchen with the present. On her way, she nodded to her husband, Bert, to follow her and to bring their son, Koen, along. “Come on, Koen; let’s go get something to drink.”

Once things had settled down in the room and Niels had calmed down a little, Hans tried to talk to him. “There,” he tried to say in a very jovial way, “the box is gone.”

Niels slowly shook his head. “Only the shirt has to go, the rest can stay.”

“Why does the shirt have to go?”

“Because! I don’t ever want to see it again. It is bad.”

Hans wanted to ask more, but realized that he may cause even more unrest. This was clearly one of those moments that Wim had talked about, but now he had experienced it for himself for the first time. He grabbed the action figure from the floor and hid it behind the couch.

Then he pulled out the box from behind the chair. “There you go, sir. All of the great players are back, and we gave the bad guy a time-out.”

Niels smiled faintly.

After the incident with the action figure, Cora picked up where she left off with passing out the gifts. There were still a few gifts left to go, and Bert and Laura came in from the kitchen with a tray of drinks. Everyone tried to remain as cheerful as possible, but the mood wasn’t nearly as relaxed as it had been earlier. After the last gift was handed out Cora returned to the kitchen to clean up a little and to get the last round of drinks for everyone and Petra followed her. The moment they were out of everyone’s view, Petra fell into her mother’s arms. She began sobbing, and all of her pent-up tension came out.

“All right, my child,” Cora whispered. “Let it out; it’s good for you.”

“It was awful, Mom,” Petra said, sobbing. “Did you see his reaction? He was scared. Afraid of a little doll. What in the world is going through that little mind of his? What can I do to help him? I feel so powerless. My child is in hell, and it’s my job to get him out of there … but I’m failing miserably. We’re failing, because Hans is suffering just as much as I am. We feel so helpless. We’re failing him as parents.”

Cora pulled her daughter closer to her. “You’ve had it, sweetheart. Let it all out. I totally understand that this must be incredibly difficult, but you and Hans must not blame yourselves. You’re doing the best you can. And you know Daddy and I are always here for you. Always remember that, sweetheart. We are here when you need help. Niels is our grandson, and we love him to pieces.”

She started to feel her own tears welling up, but she held them in. She had to be strong for her daughter in this moment.

Just then Hans came in. Without saying a word, he turned around and walked back into the living room. He would have preferred to hug Petra himself, and it hurt him to see her this way, but for now he would let her be with her mother. Apparently, she needed her mother more than him right now.

Back in the living room, he watched their son on the floor in his karate uniform with his back turned to the box of soccer action figures. He seemed to be fully engaged with the Lego structure that he was building with Koen. Thankfully, January was right around the corner. Then Niels could start his karate lessons, and hopefully things would become better for him. They had worried for a moment that he might refuse to go. To be confronted with new people, learn new things. But he seemed to be looking forward to it; in fact, he had been so excited about it that he’d put on his karate uniform the moment he unwrapped it. Surely, it would all work out and get better eventually, but Hans found it difficult to remain optimistic. He had taken his vacation days to spend some quality time with his family, but caught himself feeling a bit ambivalent about it. He was suddenly overcome with a need to hold Niels tightly and never let him go.

Detective Carlo Martuccia opened the front door to his apartment and stepped inside. He walked into the living room, where the TV was on. His wife, Ciara, got up from the couch and kissed him.

“Hi, honey,” Martuccia said. “How was your day?”

Ciara shrugged her shoulders. “Long and tiring. Those alternating shifts are exhausting.”

Martuccia acted surprised and said sarcastically, “Oh, really?” As a detective, he always had alternating shifts, so he knew exactly how she felt.

Ciara went along with his act. She made a disappointed face and playfully pushed him away from her. “Go away—you’re mean.”

Martuccia quickly stepped forward again and took her in his arms. “Oh, baby, I’ve longed for you all day.”

She let out a sigh and relaxed somewhat. “I’ve longed for you, too, my big, strong policeman.”

“Well, I don’t know about the strong part anymore. I’m wiped out, too.”

“I’m sure you are,” Ciara answered mockingly. “It’s hard sitting around all day in your office and ending the day with dinner with all of your colleagues, recapping the latest developments in all of your cases. All of this on the government’s tab, of course, with excellent food and wine. Yeah, I can imagine you must be completely exhausted by the time it’s eleven thirty.”

Martuccia grinned. “Unfortunately, your description is not exactly consistent with reality. The food and wine were indeed good, but that can’t really be said of the atmosphere. It is a miracle that we didn’t come to blows with each other.”

Ciara was suddenly serious. “Was it that bad?”

“Unfortunately, yes. But enough about work.” He held his hand just above his Adam’s apple. “The shit that happened tonight, I’ve really had it up to here.”

Ciara pinched him in his arm and winked. “But now you’re home. Go and have a look at the little one and freshen up. Meanwhile, I’ll open up a bottle of wine.”

“Good plan.” He kissed her quickly and turned around. “I’ll be right back.”

As quietly as possible, he walked into Gianni’s bedroom. He pushed the door handle down slowly, opened the door, and carefully walked inside. With extreme precision, he pulled up a chair with wheels to the crib and sat down quietly.

Every time he looked at his son it warmed his heart. Especially when he was sleeping so angelically like this. During the day it was usually a very different story, the little devil.

He was really blessed. With his wife, with his family. Both his own mother as well as Ciara’s mother were always ready to help. The two grandmothers also often came up with great tips and ideas that were very helpful in helping to raise little Gianni. Those tips could be about a variety of things: tricks to help him eat, to help him fall asleep, or to do something simple that would keep him entertained for hours. When it came to raising children, these experienced women had an answer for everything. While he watched his little son now, he could feel himself become more relaxed. What a beautiful little boy he was.

During moments like this, he felt he didn’t see enough of him, but he also knew that he had found his calling in doing his type of work and that he had to do it, no matter what. His mother and mother-in-law had set up a type of work schedule amongst themselves, so that they could take care of their grandchild when both Ciara and he had to work at the same time. They did the same thing for a few of their other grandchildren whose parents both worked. It was a mystery to him how they managed to spend all that time with all their grandchildren. But they did it out of love and didn’t want to hear a thing about spending their free time any other way. This is what they loved doing the most with their free time! It was also a tradition held in very high regard with both families.

Everything revolved around the children
, he thought. He grew up in a safe haven in Italy. Maybe that is why he became a police officer—to keep the streets safe for children? For his own child? It sounded like such a cliché, but during tonight’s dinner, which was actually more of an office meeting, it seemed to him that this view was shared by many of his colleagues. Many of them had children and because of that they all had a big problem with the decision made by the corps leadership today. As of now, the Monster of Garda murder case was officially closed. In the eyes of the general public, that is something that had already happened months ago, but internally, within the department, his team had managed to stretch out the investigation with very limited resources. But from now on, the murder of the German boy Mats would go into record as solved, even though almost all of his colleagues saw it as a typical cold case. Even if everyone in upper management was convinced that the homeless man Ottavio Galli was the killer, they knew better. In their eyes, management was making a big mistake. Maybe even a very crucial mistake, one that could come back to haunt them one day.

Even though he shared his colleague’s opinion, he could still sympathize with the decisions made by his superiors. The number of robberies was on the rise, drug use had increased (which, in turn, made the drug trade flourish), and the problems with immigrants were spiraling out of control. He had heard loaded phrases like “limited budget” and “shifting priorities” used once too often. Nobody had a say in anything anymore. It wasn’t said in so many words, but if you had any insurmountable objections to anything at all, you could just pack your bags and leave. This decision was final and irrevocable. He had to keep his job. For his wife and child.

Carlo stood up slowly. He leaned over and gave his son a kiss on the forehead as gently as possible. Gianni moved for a moment and Carlo froze, but his son continued his sleep soundly. Carlo sent him an air kiss and carefully walked to the door. He was looking forward to sharing a nice glass of wine with his wife. Once they started talking, the job stress usually disappeared into the background, and he could finally begin to fully enjoy his evening.

A wonderful prospect.

Petra opened a beer for Hans. She decided on a bottle of water for herself, which seemed wiser for now. It was ten thirty; Niels was asleep and Hans was watching TV. This was the ideal moment to have the talk she’d been dreading.

After her parents and sister had gone home on Christmas Eve and Niels had gone to bed, she had stayed up and talked with Hans. He had asked her how she was doing and said that he could see her suffering in all of this, but she had responded defensively, despite her good intentions to talk to him about it. She had wondered what could have happened that had made Niels react so intensely to the Brazilian soccer shirt. It had to be connected to their Italian vacation somehow. Had he seen something that he associated with that shirt? They would have to tell Irene about it as soon as possible, to see if she could get to the bottom of it. Hans had one arm around Petra and said that maybe she should go and see Irene as well. Petra had nodded in agreement, but suddenly felt empty and tired. She promised to talk about it again later, but wanted nothing more than to go to bed.

As relaxed as Petra had always been, she now seemed to become irritated rather quickly. Every once in a while she felt like just forcing Niels and pulling the information out of him, and she was shocked by her own thoughts. Then she would console herself with the thought that they literally had tried everything to encourage his development. The karate lessons were a good example of this. At first, Niels had reacted surprised at their suggestion to participate in a fighter sport, but when they gave him the option to choose he became excited and chose karate. He had only had a few classes so far, but it was a start. They had taken another step. Hopefully, it was the right one, but that would remain to be seen.