Anyone who knows about the market for motorcycles also knows that the 75cc Primavera Vespa is a marvel of engineering and performance, considering the price. Helmet with visor, dark glasses, full tank, Astrud on the iPod, Josecho passes the southern outskirts of Madrid, the brick blocks of the Usera barrio, the tower blocks of Orcasitas. Once he gets beyond the M40 ring road, the Vespa devours roads lined with densely populated towns [the kind that if you flipped the photo over you would have no idea they were upside down], as a camera taped to his helmet films the passing horizon. The engine humming, he passes children playing soccer, washing lines largely bare of clothes, dogs chained to fences, small soccer fields fringed with vegetable patches, huts with satellite dishes on top, dismantled cars with children sitting inside, clandestine spots for dumping trash. Then, unexpectedly, a long way now from the city center, Josecho comes in sight of a billboard that bears his own face and the words HELPING THE SICK: NOW IN SHOPS, and stops, cuts the engine, and dismounts. Without removing helmet or glasses, he hops over a barbed-wire fence and walks across the short stretch of ground separating the ditch from the billboard, its steel frame set in a field of artichokes, or at least what look to him like artichokes. He glances around, detects no animal or human presence, looks up, and, from this perspective, sees that he looks quite ugly in the photo, but—and this is the first time—the advertising billboard also makes him feel impervious to solitude. “Bad Poets” was playing on his iPod and it shook him because, as he turned to leave, he noticed a rusty cast-iron plaque set into a flagstone on the ground, peeking out between the plants. It bore an inscription: Miguel Redondo Villacastín [1902–1937], Falangist, poet, and illustrious son of San Jerónimo, shot dead on this spot. Your friends will not forget you. September 1976. And Josecho saw that, indeed, of the 6 stanchions supporting the billboard, one was not metal but the trunk of an old oak riddled with bullet holes. The sun was setting. He had another look around before leaving. There was no one there. Back on the roof of the Windsor Tower, Pavofrío turkey sandwich and Mahou in hand, he pressed play on the video of the day and watched it over and over, focusing particularly on that final section: there still wasn’t anyone there. And then to bed.