Sleep sickness
The first part of this story can be read here in Neapolitan, English, Italian, French, and Spanish.
The Neapolitan and Italian version of this post can be found here.
Francischiello’s mother was really distressed about the state of things: at times her heart started racing or hurting, or in other instances the food stuck in the gullet.
“You gotta eat your salad,” she said once.
“That’s not related, mom. We’re not talking about this.”
“I know, I just didn’t say what I was thinking,” she replied straight back.
“Ok, let’s talk it over breakfast.”
And so when the time came, the two of them started to eat.
“Why don’t you cook some little fennels tomorrow?”
“But you hate them, don’t you?”
“No, mom, now I might like ‘em. I changed my mind, you see? Things evolve!”
“I’m baffled.”
“Yeah, you’re right. But, you see, those who publicly despise them keep ranting behind closed doors about how tasty they are.”
Time wore on and Francischiello’s head kept hurting. On top of that, he felt weary and drained all day long. But when it was time to hit the sack a weird energy kicked in out of nowhere, and he wasn’t sleepy anymore. Not to mention the numerous times he had to drag himself out of bed for his physiological needs.
On the whole though, he was in his right mind in a lucid mood. One morning however his thoughts appeared to be jumbled and deranged and he lost his marbles.
Three hours later he had regained his former self. But something had to change.
