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I look at him. “Is it crazy if I think he somehow is?” I ask, my voice small.

“I believe he's seeing it all.”

“Yeah?”

He nods, his eyes staying on mine. “No way in hell he'd ever let you out of his sight.”

I smile and look back at the sea. “He knew about this place, obviously. I told him everything. Showed him pictures. Mamma and Papà invited us so many times, but there was always something.” I shake my head. “Work. Money. Then we were saving. Then we thought we'd come the next summer and...”

Cancer.

I breathe out. “He would've complained about the heat constantly.”

Jude's mouth twitches.

“And Nonna would've fed him until he couldn't walk. He would've pretended to hate it and then gone back for thirds.”

“Sounds like him.”

“He would've tried to speak Italian.”

“That bad?”

“Terrible.” I laugh. “He spoke Sicilian with his family, but his Italian? God. His accent was horrible.”

Jude laughs quietly, and I look at the sea again as grief slips in, uninvited and quiet.

It always does.

But it doesn't swallow me whole this time. I can talk about him and smile. I can miss him and still stand here beneath these stars, remembering how ridiculous he would've sounded trying to speak Italian to my nonna.

Maybe that's progress too.

I breathe in. “I'm glad you're here.”

Jude turns toward me, but I don't look at him because suddenly saying it feels more vulnerable than it should.

“I just... this was supposed to be something Damiano and I did together one day. Coming back here. Going to Sicily. All of it. And I thought doing it without him would feel...” I search for the word. “Wrong.”

“Does it?”

I think about it. Really think about it.

“No.”

And I'm surprised by how true that is.

“It hurts.”

He nods.

“But it doesn't feel wrong.”

Another nod.

I smile faintly. “Maybe that's progress.”

“Maybe.”