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“Where did Chiara run off to?” Lexy asks, nudging me as we finally make our way inside.

“With Matteo.”

“Who's Matteo?”

“No idea.”

She stares at me.

I shrug.

“Apparently family.”

That seems to be the answer to everything here.

Nonna Carmela's house is narrow from the outside, squeezed between two others like they were all built holding hands, but the moment we step inside, it seems to keep going.

The floors are covered in old patterned tiles that feel cool beneath my sandals, and every available surface holds something. Framed photographs. Little ceramic bowls. Lace doilies. A wooden crucifix hangs above one doorway and a faded picture of the Madonna above another. There are family photos everywhere, some so old the people in them are almost impossible to make out.

And then I see him.

Damiano.

Maybe six or seven, grinning at the camera with two missing teeth and scraped knees.

I stop.

There are more.

Damiano at the beach.

Damiano in a school uniform.

Damiano standing beside a much younger Nonna Carmela, already almost as tall as her.

Pieces of him I've never seen before.

I reach out and run one finger over the edge of a frame.

There's an entire childhood here that happened before I knew him. Birthdays, summers, ordinary afternoons. A little boy who had no idea that one day he'd grow up and become my entire world.

My throat tightens.

Later.

I'll ask about them later.

Right now, half of Sicily seems to be following us through the house.

Voices overlap from every direction while someone asks if we want coffee, someone else asks if we're hungry, and another woman I'm pretty sure I was introduced to three minutes ago is already telling Dex he's too skinny.

He looks at me.

“Don't fight it.”

“I wasn't planning to.”

Smart man.