"You're older than I remember from the wedding."
"Gianna!" Antonella's voice is sharp.
"What? He is!" Gianna shrugs. "I thought he'd be, like, thirty. He's got gray in his hair."
I feel my jaw tighten.
Antonella steps forward, positioning herself between us. "Bruno, this is my sister Gianna. Gianna, please try not to insult my husband within the first thirty seconds of meeting him."
"I wasn't insulting him." Gianna's eyes stay on mine. "Gray hair is distinguished. That's what Oliver says, anyway."
A laugh escapes me.
"Distinguished." I repeat the word, testing it. "That's one way to put it."
Gianna recovers quickly. "See? He's not offended."
"That doesn't mean you should?—"
"It's fine." I wave a hand, cutting Antonella off. "She's not wrong. I am old."
The memory surfaces unbidden. Vittoria at eighteen, sitting across from me at Sunday dinner, her nose wrinkled in disgust as she complained about one of her professors.
"He's ancient, Bruno. Like, forty-something. Practically ready for a coffin."
I'd laughed then too. Told her she'd understand when she got older. She'd rolled her eyes and insisted she would never be that decrepit.
Now she's married to a Russian who's as old as I am.
Strange, how that works.
Every child in the world races toward adulthood. They count the days until their next birthday, desperate to add another year. They lie about their age, rounding up instead of down. They dream of being grown, of being taken seriously, of escaping the prison of childhood.
And then they arrive.
They reach the age they once thought ancient. They look in the mirror and see gray hair, lines around their eyes, a body that doesn't move the way it used to. They realize that forty isn't the end of life—it's barely the middle.
But by then, it's too late.
The years they wished away are gone. The childhood they couldn't wait to escape becomes a memory they'd give anything to reclaim.
I spent my youth preparing to lead if needed. Training. Learning. I never had time to be young. Never had the luxury of wishing my years away because every moment was already claimed.
And now I'm forty.
Sitting in a wheelchair.
Watching my wife's sister call me old.
"Bruno?"
Antonella's voice pulls me back.
She's watching me with those green eyes. Concern flickers in their depths. She noticed me drifting.
"I need to go out." I straighten in my chair. "A few hours. Business."
"Okay." She nods once. "Be careful."