Twenty minutes later the doctor came down, walked past the concierge and leaned his back against the inside surface of the street door. The leather bag swung from his index finger. Pietro hadn’t moved from the azulejo fountain, now went to Luca and lifted the bag from his hands. On the first floor, the two windows had gone dark. The concierge accompanied the doctor into the street, back through the Piazza del Duomo, the polychrome Madonnina statue atop the cathedral defying the blackened sky. They returned up the Corso one behind the other, not stopping until the hospital. When they arrived, the accident and emergency department sign was lit.
‘I want to say goodbye to Lorenzo. Starting tomorrow he’ll be cared for at home.’ The doctor took back his bag and lifted up his face, all sharp angles. Stepped towards Pietro but did not face or look at him. ‘The woman on the balcony is the wife. He was my teacher in secondary school. He has intestinal cancer. He’s tired.’ Luca straightened his raincoat. ‘His wife asked me who you were.’
Pietro buttoned his jacket. ‘Who am I?’
‘You’re the priest who’ll be confessing him tomorrow.’
‘I’m not a priest any more.’
‘You will be tomorrow.’ The doctor stared blankly at the emergency department sign. ‘Because tomorrow I’ll be helping him to die.’ He looked now at the concierge and truly saw him for the first time. Pietro was a tiny man whom the evening was nevertheless incapable of covering. Luca sought him with fearful eyes, then closed them. Together they walked through the hospital’s front gate. They arrived at the entrance to the ward.
‘Are you coming in?’ the doctor asked, heading off without waiting for an answer. Pietro didn’t move. He looked for something to support him, struggled to catch his breath, leaned against one of the fir trees. Then he raised his head. The windows glowed. He sought out a window on the first floor, confident he would see him, and he did. Lorenzo was there. Pietro drew a breath and waved with his hand hanging from his nose. The child pressed himself up against the window, hesitated. Then he returned the gesture, creating his own trunk.
Pietro headed back out to the street without entering the ward. He paused when he reached the pavement. An ambulance went past, its flashing lights staining him turquoise. When the lights were turned off, on the emergency department ramp, he started home. The concierge walked without haste, before his breathlessness forced him to stop altogether. He needs me. The effort choked him, choked him still after he arrived at the lodge and sat down in his kitchen. He felt for the drawer below the table and opened it without lowering his head. Felt some more, found a sack containing a scrap of bread. It was dry. He set it down on the table. Cut a slice thin enough to see through. Held it in the palm of his hand as he poured half a glass of wine from the bottle he had brought from the sea. With the bread and the wine he went into the bathroom. Standing before the mirror he saw what his tears looked like. Two rivulets trailed into his shirt collar. He lifted up the bread, broke it in two, lifted the glass and drank. The pasty mix swelled his cheeks. He needs me. He swallowed it down.