Gloria regrets not having kept her feet on the ground, especially after how often she found herself being thrown to the floor by the man who once took her to impossible heights.

Here she is now, seated at the restaurant named after her favorite poem, written by Max Ehrmann as if he was staring into her soul as he put pen to paper. Desiderata is about what you need in life, what you desire, and when the door opens and in walks Rolando, Gloria breathes as if he’s the oxygen she’s been craving.

It doesn’t even matter that he’s not carrying sunflowers.

“Uncle Rolando!” Pazito slides out of the booth and rushes to Rolando, almost crashing into a waiter.

“Hey, Paz-Man!” Rolando hugs Pazito with a love and tenderness that Frankie doesn’t.

Gloria thinks—no, she believes with her whole heart that Rolando will be an amazing father one day. She’s mostly sad that she didn’t realize this, oh, twenty years ago when he confessed his love for her, but it’s okay. Gloria’s greatest creation is Pazito, and she wouldn’t change a single hair on his head or bone in his body, and that means accepting some of those hairs and bones come from Frankie too.

She gets out of the booth with a smile and a hug.

“Great to see you,” Rolando says, as if it’s been years since the Fourth of July when they last saw each other for a barbecue in Althea Park, the same day he applied for the Death-Cast job.

“You too,” Gloria says. Even though she wants to hold on to Rolando for dear life, she lets go and sits opposite of him and Pazito. “So . . . tough day?”

Rolando’s tired brown eyes seem to say so. “I should’ve known what I was getting into with that job.”

“Did you cry a lot?” Pazito asks. “I think I would cry a lot.”

“That’s because you have a big heart,” Rolando tells him. “I’m going to be honest, I haven’t cried.”

“So you don’t have a big heart,” Pazito says.

Rolando chuckles. “I like to think I do, Paz-Man.”

Gloria is a breath away from agreeing before her son fires off his next question.

“Have you found out how your bosses know who’s going to die yet?”

“No, I haven’t. I actually won’t—”

“I think everyone has a prophecy,” Pazito interrupts. “And Death-Cast somehow knows everyone’s destinies. Prophecies are a big part of the Scorpius Hawthorne books.”

“You might be right, but I won’t be able to find out the big secret. I quit this morning.”

Gloria leans forward. “You did? Why?”