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“Nico, would you stop it?”

“If you ask me to stop one more time I’ll throw my keys off the bridge.”

“But I only told you once.”

“I’m throwing the keys off the bridge.”

“Berengo, what the fuck, you’re forty!”

“I’ll throw them.”

“The doormen have spare keys.”

“I’ll throw myself i…

“I wish,” I start again, “I wish that at some point you could try to do a week of office work. The whole thing: one-hour commute in the morning, one-hour commute in the evening. And then after you got home you’d have to indulge your love of books not by walking to McNally and hearing some imperiali…

A middle-aged woman: “I’m looking for a book that’s like The Name of the Rose? Could you suggest something similar? It’s my favorite book!”

“Ma’am, if there were other books as good as The Name of the Rose, you’d know about them already, and their authors would be super famous and super popular.”

“So what is Fofi actually doing to you, specifically?”

“I don’t know if it’s anything specific. It’s little things. The way he asks questions. He’s really demeaning. He always tells me not to let the espresso percolate too much and checks if I’m rinsing stuff before putting it in the washing mac…

Today is a slow day. He needs to check his bank account to see if he can afford presents for Gustavo’s children: the €6,000 from his father’s last bank transfer, for the fourth quarter of 2010, has gone quickly, and the first payment of the year usually arrives a little late; his father needs time …