Vittorio Valente

Pizzeria

On the night the automated system was installed, Marco lit the lamp one final time — not because it was needed, but because some rituals deserve a proper ending.

She had mapped thirty-seven towns no one had asked for. The thirty-eighth would be different, she told herself — though she had said the same thing before.

Every morning, Piero walked the beach before the town woke up. He had been doing this for forty years. He had never told anyone what he was looking for.