Twitch
The song is the story
People always ask if that’s his real name but no one’s ever gotten a straight answer out of Twitch. By “people” I mean tourists and, yes, even a town as forgettable as San Sierlo gets tourists in this part of the country.
Danny and I moved here in 2004 after that war criminal was reelected in the U.S. I’d already begun working with an Italian attorney to establish dual citizenship and the morning after the election we booked one-way flights. It was a lot trickier to settle in another country than we’d expected and we thought we were coming into this with open eyes. Language was just the beginning (Thanks a pantload for refusing to teach us Italian, Mom).
Considering we’re a couple of city kids, I think we’ve done all right with our little grocery store/cafe here, though. Sure, Florence would have been ideal if we could have afforded that but now that I’m used to small-town life here it’s pretty sweet. Mostly.
Twitch introduced himself to us the day we put the open for business sign out front for the first time. And when I say “introduced himself” what I mean is that a tiny, slightly stooped person of indeterminate gender stuck their head in the open doorway and crooned something wordless and even kind of tuneless but lovely nevertheless. Danny stopped stocking the shelves and I came out from the tiny kitchen, wiping my…
