It had been twenty-seven seconds.

Twenty-seven goddamn seconds.

That’s how long your heart had stopped.

They told Damiano that later, in the hospital hallway, while he was still shaking, while his shirt was still soaked in your blood — or maybe it was just the sweat from holding you, screaming your name, praying to anything that would listen.

Now, days later, you were lying in a sterile white room, pale against the sheets, eyes flickering open with a sluggishness that made his chest clench.

You were alive. But nothing about this felt real.

“You scared the fvcking life out of me.” His voice cracked when he said it, sitting beside you, knuckles ghosting over the IV taped to your arm.

You blinked, dazed, disoriented. “Where...?”

“You're in Rome. Hospital. You—” he swallowed hard “You flatlined.”

The word tasted like poison.

You turned your head slightly, weakly, as if every muscle in your body was learning how to exist again. “I remember... light. And... something warm.”

He didn’t ask what you saw. He didn’t want to know. All he wanted was you here.

Alive.

You reached for him, barely lifting your hand, and he caught it instantly, pressing it to his lips, his brow, his chest.

“I don’t know what I’m supposed to do now,” you whispered, the words slurred with exhaustion.

Damiano leaned in closer, foreheads nearly touching. “You do nothing. You breathe. You stay. And I’ll do the rest. I swear, I’ll do the rest.”