The Year of the Mantis

found him dead in his car. Someone killed him last night, and I don’t know what to do.” His voice trembled as he started to sob, unable to control his emotions anymore. It was as if uttering the words dead and kill opened a faucet from where his tears could finally flow from the bottom of his soul.
There was a moment of silence when Luciano thought his mother dropped the conversation, assuming she didn’t give a damn.
“Luciano, where are you, dear? Have you called the Police?” Her tone rushed as she was running to get to the car to drive to his place.
“I’m out here, in the garage. I hoped someone would have come and helped me, but nobody’s going anywhere today,” he kept sobbing.
“Now, listen to me very carefully,” she said as she started the engine of the car. “I’m coming to you. Then, when I’m there, we’ll call the Police. They will take care of everything but try not to touch anything. Do you understand?”
Considering that would have been the best solution, he glanced around, and leaving the door of the car the way he found it, he faltered toward the exit to wait for Giulia.
“Ok, I’ll be waiting for you outside, but, please, hurry. I don’t want to be alone,” he begged, turning to view the shiny black Lamborghini. Claudio was very proud of that car and for Luciano, having it even for one day meant being able to wake up before him and borrow it.
Looking at it, it was nothing but a coffin, and as his father’s soul left the pain of this mortal life, too many questions started to swirl in his mind; most of those seemed to be complete nonsense. One question started to repeat insistently; was this the day he had to die? – he thought. Things could have gone differently if he had never known that goddamned strip club he used to frequent.
“I’ll be there immediately,” Giulia replied, ending the conversation. Her mind blurred with the fear of Luciano’s state of mind. She knew he loved Claudio, and regardless of his mistakes, Luciano still felt the attachment rightfully belonging to a son for his father.
Having spent the night on a train from Reggio Calabria, where she had a meeting the previous day, slowed her reactions at the steering wheel of the car. She kept praying to have at least the necessary interval of sharpness to reach Luciano and call the Police. After that, she could have collapsed, but not now.
She approached the building where her ex-husband had his apartment and noticed Luciano on the street. Parking the car at the side of the road, she got outside and ran to hold him.
He was in a strange trance and oddly held her back, despite the desperate need to feel the familiar warmth of a mother’s hug.
“Let’s go inside the apartment, dear,” she glanced at him, caressing his face and combing his hair with her fingers. Locking her eyes on him, she held Luciano tightly to herself, unable to find the right words to be said in such a moment.
Claudio’s death didn’t come as a surprise, she knew that frequenting a corrupted environment such as a strip club could result in some nasty consequences. She neither cared about it. Cheating on her with a cheap prostitute wasn’t something she would have forgiven— ever. Nevertheless, the consequences that incident brought to her son changed everything, and the most important thing was to have the Police make light to the mystery.
Ensuring that Luciano was comfortably seated on the couch, she grabbed her mobile phone and dialed the 113, the emergency number at the Police Department.
Keeping a steady voice, she could explain what had happened, or at least what she got from the phone call with Luciano.
Although the Members of the Police Department didn’t know Claudio personally, he was quite famous. He belonged to the elite group of skilled entrepreneurs who inherited the family firm, transforming it from a profitable business to unimaginable success.
Immediately, Forensic Police rushed to enclose the crime scene and collect all sorts of evidence, meantime Detective Maurizio Scala, who was designated to follow the case, reached the apartment to collect testimony from those closely related to the victim.
He remained standing up, not to contaminate any areas with his own traces. Giulia and Luciano sat down in the living room, on the couch where Claudio’s jacket was still lying.
“Who is living in this apartment?” Detective Scala asked, taking out a notebook from his pocket and began to scribble something.
“I live here with my father,” the shaky voice of Luciano came out as a feeble response to the question. His hand tightly held in his mother’s.
“What about you, Ma’am?”
Averting her gaze from her son, she turned to the Detective. “I don’t live here anymore. I divorced Claudio three years ago, but my apartment is not far. I divorced my husband, not my son.”
With a nod, Detective Scala kept writing his notes. “And you were the one who found Mr. Calvani’s body? Do you know anything that could help us?”
Luciano hesitated for a moment, trying to recollect his thoughts. “Yesterday, after dinner, Dad left. I know he used to go to a particular nightclub, but I don’t know if yesterday evening he went there or if he met his new girlfriend. He left home at about nine in the evening. I hadn’t heard any noise, as generally, I sleep with my earplugs. My father snored quite loudly.”
A disappointed grunt escaped Giulia; the words new girlfriend still burned, for she was the reason why the marriage, she thought was destined to last forever, smashed in a thousand pieces. There wasn’t a time when she wondered what her husband could have found in a prostitute that was better than all the years they’d spent together.
Just giving her a fast glimpse, Luciano continued