Page 63 of Capuleto

I raised an eyebrow, wanting to know more. Nikita, who caught my gesture, simply said, "I'll tell you later," which made me doubt what might have happened. Knowing her, it could have been anything.

Adri was waving a transparent pendant in front of my eyes, filled with a red tint that looked like blood. Was it really blood, or just a well-made reproduction to give the boy something to hold onto?

I was dying of curiosity, but my head was foggy from the painkillers, and I couldn't think straight. I would delve deeper into what had happened when I got home.

I was surprised and delighted that Nikita had earned her nephew's trust and managed to get him to share the origin of his nightmares.

Adriano kept calling her "Aunt Nikita," with that emphasis and a growing admiration he couldn't hide. Seeing them so close alleviated the pain from Dante's loss and made me see that perhaps a happy home was possible.

I offered a smile to my wife that got caught in the green of her eyes. Hope, that was what my wife offered me, making the impossible seem attainable.

Once I recovered, I would give her the surprise I had planned to give in Santorini; she deserved what was taken from us, and I intended to see it through to the last consequences.

Aleksa showed up half an hour after Nikita and Adri. He was accompanied by Álvaro San Juan, the trusted man sent by Uncle Giuliano.

My man was serious and looked like he had rested little. We were all the same. He didn't even greet Andrey, who was stationed in a corner of the room. He simply told me that he had everything ready for Dante's farewell, that everyone was informed, and that when I gave the word, we would fulfill his last wish.

"Do you have the pendants?" I wanted to make sure.

"Of course. Everything is arranged just as we discussed, down to the smallest detail. Dante deserved no less." We agreed on that.

"Thank you, Aleksa." My man glanced at Andrey.

The Russian looked like a wax museum figure. He hadn't blinked since Aleksa entered. Maybe he had fallen asleep standing up and had the ability to do so with his eyes open. Soldiers learn to do amazing things in war.

Adriano got hungry, and Nikita offered to take him to the vending machine in the hallway to buy him a chocolate bar.

I turned back to my man, watching my son's hand brush against Nikita’s as they left the room.

I thanked Aleksa for handling everything while I had been confined to the hospital.

"My father told me this morning to go to his house with Álvaro; he wants to meet with both of us."

"We're going now, and I hope they discharge you tomorrow."

"Me too. I wish it wasn't just me getting discharged," was the last thing I said.

"Don't think about that; you know that in the state he was in, deep down, it was for the best. Dante wouldn't have endured living in such a cruel way, deformed, in pain, and with devastating aftereffects. Knowing him, he would have blown his brains out. If he were here, he'd surely exclaim, 'Last one to do it is a pansy.'" That made me smile sadly. Aleksa was right; that was so like him. "Rest," he murmured before leaving.

The room fell silent, and my mind drifted back to that night when the three of us shared how we wanted our funerals to be. We promised that when one of us was gone, the others would fulfill his last will.

It was one of those promises made when you're quite drunk and start talking about things with some significance, like the first time you shave your balls, or whether you prefer your omelet with or without onions.

We ended up talking about death and our own visions of our funerals.

Dante had mentioned that he didn't want to be boxed in; tight spaces were never his strong suit, especially since he was once held in a tiny cell for forty-eight hours to extort us.

His decision was to be cremated and return to the origins; we all wanted to become ashes, although we agreed that a small part would be preserved in steel pendants shaped like bullets that Aleksa had seen in a jewelry store. We would buy three, and there they would wait for the ashes of the first, anticipating those of the other two.

The rest of the ashes would meet different fates.

Dante's ashes would be ridden on a Harley on a route involving all the Angeli dall'inferno. He chose it at that very moment; it was his favorite on the Costa del Sol, starting from Marbella, passing through Puerto del Viento, and reaching Tajo de Ronda; a gorge that extends to the Guadalevín River, five hundred meters long and one hundred meters deep, which was a spectacle in itself.

Once there, we would watch the sunset and deposit them in a hole dug in the midst of nature, where we would plant a baobab, also known as the tree of life. It was his way of not dying, or not entirely. Dante would become nourishment for that tree and eventually become part of it.

His idea was that, in this way, if he was the first to go, the rest of us would have a place to come and chat with him. And if he was the last, it would be a beautiful contribution to nature.

After planting the tree, we would return to Marbella for a small celebration where alcohol and rock music would flow.

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