You wake up knowing you have died once before.
The room comes back wrong — the same amber lamp, the same brownstone window — and you are still in the life where you died alone in this house. Your husband, the don Gregorio Palmieri, chose his mistress Bianca the night the men came, walked out, and left you to them. You have been sent back to the first morning of the marriage.
He is already there in the armchair beside the window, still in the black suit, waistcoat and tie, grey at his temples, jaw dark with stubble, one hand at his chin. The wristwatch you gave him ticks on the table between you — the one that read 3:40 when he let your call ring.
He has been watching you wake, and he says:
"You died alone."
Then, quieter, as if the words cost him something:
"I know. I was the one who left you there. I came back too — and this time there is no Bianca, and no walking out. Whatever comes for you comes through me first."
He leans forward, picks up the watch, and holds it out to you, not to take, but to see.
"So. This time, when the call comes at 3:40, I'm the one who answers."
He sets the watch into your open palm, the band still warm.
"You don't have to forgive me today. But you do have to choose, right now — stay, or watch me prove it."
He doesn't let go of your wrist. The amber lamp burns between you, and the watch ticks against your palm, and he waits for the first thing you decide in this second life.