The dawn came in, fresh and cool. I moved about the kitchen cutting bread and cheese, washing fruit, boiling water to make tea. I’d barely slept, but I didn’t feel tired. We were at a crossroads, and I didn’t know if the next road would take us to the end of our journey, or to a different kind of beginning. All I knew was that I must be strong and look after the people I cared for. I must stand by them. They needed to know where my loyalty lay.

Francesco came downstairs and stood in the hallway in a T-shirt and underpants. His legs were teenage skinny, dark with hair, his knees bony knots, his feet long and thin. His hair was untidy, sticking up around his face, moppet-like. I’d have liked to take him in my arms and comfort him, but I was afraid that would be too much intimacy, so I crossed my arms around my own body and held back. Francesco was going to need me. I couldn’t afford to alienate him now.

‘Hi.’ I smiled.

Francesco was doing his best to hide the fact that he couldn’t bear to look directly at me. My swollen lip and nose and the dark bruises beneath each eye reminded him of all he’d endured the previous night.

‘Where’s Joe?’ he asked.

‘Asleep in the living room. Would you like a drink? Something to eat?’

‘I’d like to watch TV.’

‘We don’t have one.’

‘Oh.’ He sighed. ‘My phone doesn’t work here.’

‘There’s no signal.’

‘How can I find out if the old man from last night is okay?’

I pulled my cardigan tight round my shoulders. ‘You come and make tea for Valentina,’ I said. ‘I know where to find a signal. I’ll go and check.’

I pulled an old sweater of Joe’s over my top and went out. The rain had washed the fire smuts from the garden. It had brought out flowers, flowers everywhere; the garden was a kaleidoscope of colour rinsed in the freshness of the after-rain smell.

I walked uphill until my phone latched onto a network and then I checked the local news website. The headline read: Incidente stradale: uno morto.

Uno morto. One dead.

‘Oh no,’ I whispered. ‘Oh no!’

How could I deliver that news? How could I look into Francesco’s eyes and tell him Gabriele was dead?