Davide instead plays volleyball as a defensive specialist on the Vasto Magica Team. He’s from Vasto, in the province of Chieti, and came to L’Aquila to study Engineering Management. He’s in his first year but has already taken three exams. He did well on all of them and he’s very pleased. Right after Easter he must take the most difficult exam of all: Calculus 2. He has to take it, to keep up, because otherwise he’s in danger of losing the scholarship that enables him to live at the Casa dello Studente, in room 411/B. Davide always has a smile on his face, even if he does not have an easy life: he recently lost his father to an illness and has become the one the entire family relies on.

On the night between 5 and 6 April 2009 there are not many students at the Casa dello Studente, only about thirty. Over the weekend many students returned home: with just a few more days till Easter, some decided to start their vacation a few days early and return immediately afterwards. Others are still not back at the Casa because they are unnerved by the continuous tremors that have been making the city tremble for more than four months. They are frightened because they do not feel safe in that building. They heard it creaking after each tremor and cracks had appeared in the walls, growing bigger and bigger. Many students, fearing an earthquake, decided to brave the cold and sleep outdoors: they even organized a kind of notte bianca, an all-nighter, for the tenants of the Casa dello Studente. Michelone is also invited, but he doesn’t go because the exam is coming up in a few days. And besides, being Arab-Israeli, he’s used to devastations and makes light of his friends’ fear of an earthquake: ‘Guys, after putting up with the kamikazes in Gaza, do you think I came here to die in the middle of this bucolic paradise?’ His family had helped him move from a troubled land so he could have a better future.

And so the only ones left in the Casa dello Studente are those who still have classes to attend or exams to prepare for. Marco, the psychology student, arrives at ten o’clock at night after a weekend spent with his family in Sora. Before going to bed he calls his mother to tell her that everything is okay and that he will keep his mobile phone turned on during the night, so they can be in touch in case of any tremors. They are all students from out of town, many of them aren’t used to earthquakes. Angela, the girl from Puglia, is scared, so she asks Francesco, her boyfriend from L’Aquila, to spend the night with her. Francesco isn’t on duty as a security guard that night; he sleeps there just to reassure her.