THE FLEA and THE GNAT_____

The last to leave had been that big woman, Gabriella, whom he, Ringo Round, which was a keen observer cat, also equipped with antennae beating,  in terms of capability to perceive, even space probes, could not suffer. Ah, he found her too grimace, too petulant, not to say of her habit to use industrial quantities of deodorants and perfumes, which made the air not breathable ,   making  his nostrils pinch and his eyes water. However it was she, the big Gabriella, who turned off the lights and set the alarm when the library closed at eight in the evening.

He, Ringo Round, had been holed up between two shelves in the underground, because if that there, Gabriella, had seen him, she had kicked him out. When Ringo heard the gate close, ____which meant that Gabriella had gone____he was rubbing at the ribs of the books   , now of one shelf , now on the other between which he was hiding. And what books! The Iliad, the Odyssey, the Aeneid . Oh, yes, he  was able to read, even if nobody, except his great friend, Carol, knew this ability of his.   It had been she, Carol, a lanky thin middle aged librarian, wearing glasses whose lenses looked like the bottom of a bottle, who had taught him to read- She had done it even there, in the library, where Ringo had got into the habit of going every day, and also of spending many nights there, just for her, for Carol, who loved him . She had beginning to take care of him spoiling him, providing the cat with delicious foods that she prepared.

It had been incredibly funny , a blast, the way  Carol, who doted on him, had taught to him to read.  It had been a very enjoyable play, from which Ringo Round had had a lot of fun, much more fun than from reading. Because, even if he had learned to read, not that he had become a great reader. Oh, but how incredibly wonderful  it had been when Carol had taught him to read! She made him scratch with his nails  the words, a word at time, on the page of the book set before him, yeah, under his muzzle, while she was spelling  those same words, a word at time, oh, and then she blew the word she had just spelling and he was scratching, into his ear! It was …delicious….it was like feeling a pleasant breeze, a very soft and caressing wind in his ear, but in his head too!

Eh, unfortunately it had happened that her great friend had been also scolded severely , and taken at bad words, and even threatened with disciplinary measures, when she had been seen by other librarians THERE, in the library, oh, the most important cultural institution of their city , during her working hours, while she was wasting time playing with that very bad cat, which, damned him! They all were very tired, very bored of always having that lousy animal, with its hateful meowing, at their feet ( around them) And they had always to have him at their feet   because of her! It was she who had brought the lousy, terribly incessantly meowing bad and ugly beast in there, in their very clean, perfect excellent  library! When she, Carol had told to those kind and distinguished ladies what she was doing_____that she was trying to teach the cat to read____, and she hadn’t said it in a defiant or arrogant tone, but instead in a calm tone, as if convinced that they too might find it interesting or, at least, funny, oh, my God, what faces those ladies had made! And , with their crooked faces, with their wide open mouths they had begun to shout, to rant at Carol, so much vehemently, so madly angry, that they looked demon possessed. Ah, God, what they had to hear! Was she teaching that lousy, stinking , barking beast to read?  “Oh, but think about looking after disabled children instead! Teach them to read, instead of that bad, stinking cat!” They, the elegant ladies of the library had shouted at her, in evil, very poisonous voices, before they walked away in angry steps,  wagging, indeed shaking their big ass menacingly.

Now, for that evening ___it was already dark, since it was winter___the big Gabriella had gone, so he, Ringo Round, could get out of his hiding place between the shelves full of books , which he didn’t really want to start reading. Just when Ringo was walking up the stairs to reach the ground floor, he felt a sting, like the prick of a very sharp needle, between his back and his neck. Damnation, a goddamn flea had started to peck him ! He immediately, with a lightning fast move, turned his head, twisting his neck, ready to take out the damned flea with his teeth, while he also raised a paw, that he was ready to attack the terrible beast with his claw too. Oh, but the damned, terrible beast, that was a very small animal, managed to jump away before he ( the cat) was able to catch it. Eh, since that terrible beast, however very small, but rather minuscule, it was the Vespertina flea, the most fast flea of all those which roamed around there.

As Ringo felt himself all sizzling with race for having let the damned animal escape his teeth and his claws, the Vespertina flea, jumping  as if it were dancing of glee______oh, how incredibly light, indeed  weightless it felt for having succeeded  in escaping from the clutches of that very bad cat______(it) entered the reading room , where it continued to jump around before going on a table.  There was dust on the table. Oh, you see that today no one had sat at that table near the window where usually a girl with a long blonde braid sat , who filled pages and pages with numbers. Oh, yes,  no one would ever have imagined it, but the Vespertina flea was able to recognize numbers and also letters of algebraic expressions, even if it couldn’t read like Ringo Round. Eh, imagine if someone thought (was proposing) to teach a flea to read! However  the Vespertina was all satisfied also because that day it had managed to pinch the backside of Gabriella and other ladies with a backside even bigger  than that of Gabriella. That day hadn’t been too bad either, even if unfortunately Vespertina hadn’t been able to slip into the blonde braid of that girl , who hadn’t been sitting there, at the usual place, next to the window.

The flea heard a very faint sizzling sizzle , nevertheless perceptible in the absolute silence that reigned in the deserted library, where the silence was interrupted only time from time by the rumbling noise of a car running at high speed on the nearest street, which , however, was at a considerable distance from the library walls. After a little while having heard the sizzling sizzle , the flea Vespertina felt its body touched, very softly, by something looked like a velvet veil. Then, even without being able to see it clearly, since the room was almost completely dark_____as soon as a tad of light entered from a closed window______the flea understood that it had to be a gnat . Ah, gnats abounded there  in the library, because of the large consumption of drinks, including alcoholic ones as well as sugary ones by the library goers , drinks as orange, coke, tea, and beer above all.  

The flea had nothing to worry about the presence of the gnat, there was certainly no risk the gnat could come in its eye, as it often happened to humans , and even to other animals. Animals, yes, that very bad cat , which seemed the master, but indeed the prince of the library, he, as a cat could see very well in the dark….ah, Vespertina hoped he (  the cat) would not start , in absence of more great and more palatable animals, to catch her. The flea   hoped that there were some mice, at least one little mouse in the library, so that the terrible cat would certainly have chosen to hunt the mouse, even if very small, he would not have been taken by the whim so, just to overcome the boredom, to start chasing a flea. Not to mention   that from that ferocious cat she would always be able   to defend herself pecking (pinching) him repeatedly, even if in this way the flea risked  a terrible paw from the cat. And she, Vespertina, certainly didn’t want to die , since she absolutely wanted to be there  tomorrow , when the girl with the long blonde braid would be sitting again . at the same place , at that table. And then Vespertina would have sneaked  into her hair….the girl, absorbed in her equations, perhaps would have given herself a careless scratch to the head , but without crushing the flea. Since it had been enough for her, Vespertina, to move to another part of the girl’s head, or she could slip in the girl’s long braid.

The next  day, but indeed the next morning the girl with the long blonde braid would be back for sure to sit in her usual place at that table.

The flea Vespertina did not know, nor she imagined that even the gnat which, after having fluttered around her, has settled on the wall near the window, it too , was wondering why the girl with the long blonde braid hadn’t come to the library that day. Oh, the gnat too liked so much not only that girl’s hair, but also her face. It couldn’t resist landing on the tip of the girl’s nose. What a good smell, the girl’s skin had…..

Two beacons of light, or rather two circles of shining and intermittently flashing gold  suddenly appeared at the door of the room, and they remained there, incandescent and motionless, for a few minutes. They were the eyes of Ringo Round , which, before entering, wanted to have an overview of the room, wanted to become aware of its nocturnal inhabitants. For this, of course, in addition to his eyes in the night version, he could also count on his sense of smell , which had nothing to envy to that of dogs, and, of course, on his antennae. In fact it was with these that he immediately perceived the presence of the flea and the gnat, before stopping them out of the darkness with his eyes of light.

As soon as they saw the headlights of his eyes peeking into the room, the flea and the gnat knew it was the terrible cat . While the gnat didn’t care of his presence_____it knew that the cat would have ignored it, unless it went to flutter on the cat ‘s muzzle____and it remained attached to the wall, waving its wings just a little, she, the flea Vespertina, at first, when the cat appeared, recoiled ( went backwards), trying to flatten her body on the table. She would have wanted to jump to hide in some hole, but her very nimble paws had started trembling.

Ringo Round entered the room with his quiet, padded step. No, he had no intention starting to hunt the two insects, they were too small and not even appetizing.

It was certainly not the two tiny animals that Ringo was thinking of. His caution ( circumspection) before entering the wide room , but even now that he had entered, and he was moving at a leisurely pace, concerned rather another animal, but indeed a very beast, yeah, a black beast. He had seen that black beast , which hung like a dark bundle at the back of a chair, down there in the underground. And he knew from experience, as he was an aging cat, that the little  crumpled looking bundle was a bat.  Even if the bat , which was a small animal, could look like a harmless little bag when he was asleep, however when he rose in flight, with his wings fluttering, seemed much bigger than he really was. When the bat flew, unfolding that kind of cloak that were his wings, which rose , as swollen by the wind, and he, the strange animal, flew up and down with sudden jerks, he seemed like a threat looming over you.

Once Ringo Round had chased a bat , which had bit him on the neck, making  a terribly screeching sound. Not only had he not chased a bat since then, but he had even become afraid of bats.

And precisely even now, that he was moving quietly, with a calm, relaxed step, looking around and sniffing the air, he feared that the bat, which he had seen in the underground, could be in that room, hidden in some corner, ready to leap out to attack him.  Oh, but maybe he could rest assured, his antennae did not perceive the presence of that very black beast there in the room.  And then, yes, if he had been there, the bat would have already fed on the two tiny animals, which instead were quiet, the flea on the long table and the gnat   on the wall next the window.

“How strange” the cat happened to think, ”it seems that these two tiny animals are waiting for something, but indeed for…someone”

The cat, he too, had noticed the girl with the long blonde braid , who came to the library every day, and who hadn’t come that day. Ringo Round, unlike the flea and the gnat, knew why the girl hadn’t come . When he, early in the morning, had gone out of the library to take just a few steps outside,  he had seen that girl while she was run over and knocked to the ground by a big car. Then, from the sidewalk, where he was walking, he had seen her lying in the middle of the street that she seemed dead.