The power’s out.

Some flickering storm in the distance knocked out the electricity, and now the villa is glowing only by candlelight — a few stubby wicks on the dinner table, a lantern near the piano, the warm flicker of Elio’s lighter as he leans against the wall, barefoot and shirtless, humming some half-remembered Sufjan Stevens melody under his breath.

You’re stretched out on the couch with your legs tangled in a worn linen sheet, too full from dinner, too tired to do anything except exist in this sticky, romantic heat.

Elio tosses you a peach and curls up at your feet. The storm never fully came, but the threat of it still lingers in the sky. The air feels drunk on itself.

You sat beside him without a word. He didn’t move, just shifted enough to let your shoulder rest against his. The breeze through the shutters was warm. Somewhere in the house, a faucet dripped, patient and irregular.

For a long time, you both just listened.

Then, out of nowhere: “You’ll remember this, won’t you?”

You turned your head.

“This,” he said again, glancing around like he could trap it — the candlelight, the lemon trees outside, the worn piano keys still echoing from earlier. “When you’re somewhere colder. Or busier. Or older.”

Your throat went tight. “Of course I will.”

He nodded like he didn’t quite believe you. Or maybe like he didn’t believe himself.

“I don’t want to go back,” you say after a while, quieter than you mean to.

“I know,” he says, not looking at you. “But we never stay, do we?”

He says it like it’s a line from a book — something rehearsed and half-true and aching. You sit up and press your knee against his, just barely.

He reaches over and pulls your hand into his lap, holding it palm-up. His thumb traces nonsense shapes into your skin, absent and careful.

“This summer doesn’t have to be real,” he says after a while. “Not forever. It can just be ours.”

You think about that — how certain memories feel made-up even when they’re not. How sometimes the best things are the ones no one else will ever see.

Then, softer: “I’m gonna miss this.”

You don’t ask what he means. This summer. This feeling. This almost. You both feel it — that thing hanging in the space between now and whatever comes next.

Outside, the crickets are louder than they should be. Somewhere down the hall, a record player clicks on, struggling back to life. And in this moment — this nowhere hour — the world is just the two of you and the soft hum of something about to end.