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The call connects.
"Fugo." breathes the voice of Giorno Giovanna. "How are you?"
Fugo can’t speak. He can barely breathe.
The gentle timbre of Giorno's voice makes Fugo want to take refuge in the phone line. He hasn't realized how devoid of sleep he is until right now. And God – he's so, so tired.
For two weeks straight he's been toiling away in Firenze, putting what was left of Passione's residual drug presence to a definite end. It was rotten, painstaking work… but it was over. Finally.
His tongue feels like lead in his mouth. "Everything was a success. I got rid of–”
“I didn’t ask about the mission,” Giorno interjects but his tone indicates that he isn’t angry. “How are you? Any injuries?”
Giorno’s concern is touching, more salutary than he deserves. His throat is tight when he tries to formulate a reply. The best he finds that he can do is a nod. “I’m fine – I'm coming back," says Fugo, and he winces when his voice wobbles a bit. "Right now."
There is silence over the line. Fugo holds his breath, waiting.
"I'll hold you to that." says Giorno, and then softly, adds "But if you're late, it's okay too, Fugo. It won’t be the end of the world.”
"I'll make it." He says, refusing to even entertain the idea of not making it back in time. Giorno probably knows as well as he does – that every word coming out of his mouth is to reassure himself, not Giorno. "My train is coming. See you soon."
Fugo hangs up. He swallows hard and tries to compose himself as he turns away from the phone booth and towards the platform. A train's horn sounds off in the distance and relief floods his veins.
He checks his watch – it's 6 P.M. on the dot. He'll definitely make it home to Napoli before midnight. He has to.
The train arrives. Fugo steps on.
Something about his tense, brooding face causes people to move far, far away from him. Fugo finds himself very much alone in this sliver of the train compartment and he prefers it that way. His solitude gives him time for his mind to wander as far as it can.
He thinks about the harrowing success of this job, something only Giorno would trust him to oversee. In his tight circle, Giorno keeps Mista close like an organ he cannot live without but he treats Fugo like an extension of his arm, sending him out and summoning him back at will. Sheila E doesn’t leave his side – period – but that’s her prerogative as his bodyguard.
The three of them make up Giorno’s inner circle but Fugo still feels like an outsider when he thinks about their past and what he’s done – or rather, what he hadn’t done.
Fugo props his arm up on the narrow ledge of the window, eyes slowly adjusting to the quickly passing scenery shooting by. The colours of Firenze bleed away into the colours of Roma as the train makes its stops.
Belatedly, he hears the train loudspeaker announce its longer stop at the Roma Termini and he braces for the inevitability of a greater influx of passengers getting on, invading his peace. The doors open and a flood of travellers leave. Defying his expectations, only one person steps into this compartment.
A man wearing a nondescript brown suit approaches, taking the seat across Fugo despite the several unoccupied spaces around them. Strange. Very, very strange.
Fugo has long learned that coincidences often are not. In the deepest part of his mind, a memory resurfaces.
(He stands in front of Giorno’s desk, staring at the vivid red flowers elegantly arranged in a vase to avoid his piercing gaze.
“Stand users are drawn to other stand users.” Giorno had said plainly, a lilt of amusement in his voice. “It was inevitable that I’d search for you again.”
Did he know, then, what Fugo had been thinking?
That it was inevitable he would find his way back too?)
The man in front of Fugo shifts and smiles knowingly. Behind him, something red and gold stirs.
Fugo throws his arms up to shield himself as an explosion tears a hole through the other end of the compartment. For a moment the world is a collision of debris and heat.
He summons his stand, barely containing the fury bubbling and snarling inside of him. Fugo clenches his fists and lets himself rage.
Rogue stand user defeated (Yet another thing he will have to mention on his already lengthy report to Giorno), Fugo stands near the wreckage of the train compartment and hears the hastily exchanged words of the police officers called to the scene. He doesn’t care what easy-to-stomach explanation they twist the situation into, he just needs to keep moving.
Due to the severity of the explosion, the trains stop moving in and out of the termini. There’s no hope for Fugo to get onto the next one anytime soon what with the hole still in the train and the collateral damage done to the station.
Slipping away from the scene, Fugo hurries to the road and signals for a taxi. A white car pulls up quick enough and the driver flicks Fugo a friendly grin, “Where to?”
“Napoli.” He says and slides into the backseat, ignoring the high-pitched tin still ringing out in his ears. His clothes are singed and noticeable but the impressive glare on his face would keep anyone from being too nosy about it.
His face, however, isn’t enough to keep the taxi driver from talking his ear off. “Are you visiting someone in Napoli? Scary what just happened on the train, isn’t it?”
The Roma Termini gets further and further away and Fugo finds himself wanting to be let off so he can get a different taxi.
“Not visiting.” He says brusquely, “Going home.”
“Oh, you’re Neopolitan? I’m from Roma – Trastevere in fact. My shift’s almost over, you might be my last passenger, actually.” chuckles the man.
There’s a plastic-encased card hung on the back of the driver’s seat. Donato Manginelli is the name of his driver. Not that Fugo will be using it, but he likes to know the names of the people who dare to pry into his business.
He makes a non-committal noise and the taxi slips into silence as it merges onto a freeway.
Maybe it will continue to be quiet all the way to Napoli. Maybe.
Fugo’s eyes flicker to the rearview mirror by pure chance and the accidental eye contact spurs his driver into pursuing another topic of conversation. “Are you in university, Signore? Or…?”
Once upon a time, Fugo had been a prodigy. Now he loathes the word more than anything in his life and would rather die than admit he had gone there. “No.” He says flatly, casting his eyes down to his hands.
The time ticking away on his watch tells him one thing alone – that he is a dead man if traffic doesn’t clear up soon. There are several hours remaining until midnight and the sun has only just started to set, striking orange and pink as it drops below the horizon.
Conversation fizzles out with that. For a moment. As traffic ahead of his taxi congests, Fugo fights to dispel of the sinking pit in his stomach. “It’s so crowded today, I guess everyone’s trying to get home, eh?”
Fugo wants to get home too. His anger has long given way to desperation and it feels like the world around him is falling. He should have been back days ago. He should have worked harder to clean up Firenze quicker. He should have hired a Passione chauffeur. He should have—
“After this, I’m goin’ back home to my wife. She’s eight months pregnant, ready to pop any day. I keep telling her that I can take a few days off but she insists I go to work.” Manginelli chuckles.
Fugo unfurls the fingers he hadn’t realized were still balled into fists and stares emptily at the half-moon indents left in his skin.
They leave Roma, slowly but surely, and things are looking better. Fugo is certain that his driver is not out for his blood so he allows himself to relax a minuscule amount and close his burning eyes.
“When you’ve got someone waiting for you, feels like you can do just about anything,” says the taxi driver. He launches into another winding story about his wife. Fugo tunes most of it out, but he hears the question directed at him at its end. “You have anyone like that, Signore?”
Fugo’s eyes flutter open and he stares at the rolling scenery on his left side window.
A wife? Inconceivable. Even if he was twenty, thirty, forty years older, Fugo would never have a wife.
But when he thinks of someone expecting his return, he sees a startling green-eyed boy who exudes grace and charm with every step he takes. He sees late nights in an office, scalding cups of lattes atop a chestnut brown desk. He sees deft fingers working golden blond hair into a sophisticated braid.
Fugo takes a deep breath, his words shaky when he says them, “I do.”
And he needs to get back to him — now.
A phone rings in the front seat and the driver shoots him an apologetic look as he nimbly opens it. “Elena, is everything o–” He freezes. “Now?! Right now?! I’m on the road!!”
Fugo has a bad feeling about the conversation conspiring over the phone right now.
The taxi driver hangs up the clunky cellphone and curses quietly under his breath. “My wife is going into labour.” He says weakly, looking at the sign on their right. They are barely nearing Cassino, an hour of the journey beneath their belt.
Fugo thinks. It isn’t a hard decision for him to make and realistically, it shouldn’t be one that he has to endure at all. “Drop me off in Cassino.” He says firmly.
“But, Signore, you—!”
“Everyone wants to get home, right?” echoes Fugo, fishing into his pocket for a handful of bills to pay his fare. “Go.” He adds a couple of extra lire and pushes it into the man’s hands when the taxi rolls to a stop.
“Thank you, Signore,” says Manginelli, exhaling. “You’re a good man. I hope you can find a way home soon.”
Me too, Fugo thinks wryly as he clambers out of the taxi.
It speeds away and out of the distance as much as the traffic will allow. As Fugo turns to the street ahead of him, he sees a bus with a number he recognizes that can get him closer to Napoli.
For what feels like the millionth time that day, Fugo’s heart starts to race. Every minute, he’s getting one step closer. He can do this, he can do this, he—
—can’t do this.
The baby in Fugo’s arms is wailing and her only reprieve is to stick her grubby fingers in the holes in Fugo’s shirt.
How did this even happen? One minute the baby's mother was shouting across the bus to the driver who yelled something at her, the next she's forcing the baby into Fugo's arms to stomp up to the front of the bus and argue there instead.
He can rapidly feel the life in his body start to give out.
Fugo doesn’t hate babies like some sort of evil villain from a book who also kicks puppies but he doesn’t like them either. This one is only content when she drools all over her fists and prods at Fugo’s shirt-holes. It gives her some sort of sick baby joy.
Contrarily, it makes Fugo want to hurl himself out of the bus, moving or otherwise. So there he stands with a fussy and slippery baby in his arms. If Giorno could see this now, he’d get a real kick out of it.
The child’s mother stalks back to them, her expression a great deal more tired than when she’d animatedly been arguing with the driver. “Sorry about that.” She says, though makes no move to take her child back.
Fugo thinks that she might have a little too much trust in strangers. Especially since the one she happened to pass her child off to is in the Mafia. He has a gun in his pocket for God’s sakes.
She sighs loudly and her shoulders slump. “Driver didn’t think my bus pass was a real one. I bought it with every dollar I had left. Need it to get around.”
Fugo nods but doesn’t know what he can possibly say to that. The baby squeals and sticks her hands into another of his shirt holes. He winces as something slimy touches his shoulder.
“She’s a twin.” The woman says, smiling fondly at her daughter as she continues to exploit the holes in Fugo’s shirt. “Her brother’s in the hospital so we go to see him as much as we can while they keep him for observation.”
Oh. Fugo frowns. He doesn’t know any twins but he can imagine the psychological strain two children who shared the same womb must feel to be apart like this. Now that he really looks at the mother and daughter, he realizes that they aren’t as finely dressed as the other people on the bus.
It never really occurred to him until now how two people from vastly different backgrounds could end up on the same bus. Fugo may have been cut off from his family but his work in the Mafia enables him to substantial amounts of money when the day is up.
His time on the street when he was thirteen was about the only time he’d ever felt the pinch of financial hardship.
Fugo reaches into his pocket as he sees the final stop in Caserta highlighted on the top panel inside the bus. From here, he has to take one more bus that will bring him straight to Napoli.
The sun is long gone replaced by the scarcely visible moon, but it’s enough. He has another hour and a half left. He can make it.
Fugo slips something into the baby’s tiny fingers as he hands her back over to her mother. She whines at the loss of contact, fussing even more and Fugo is almost struck by a wave of regret.
The mother bounces the child on her hip and then notices what she has in her hands. Eyes wide, she looks up at Fugo. “Signore, I can’t accept—”
He waves a hand dismissively, cutting her off. “Use it for a taxi. It's nighttime and...” He directs his gaze to the baby who watches him with wide brown eyes. “You never know. Don’t worry about it.” The money he'd given her would cover more than one taxi trip and that's all he can hope for. Even if he is in the Mafia, he intends to do good for the people in the city.
Tears shining in her eyes, the woman clears her throat, “Thank you. You’re too kind.”
Fugo heaves a breath and gets off the bus. Despite his bitter mood, he finds himself smiling as the baby babbles out nearly unintelligible goodbyes directed at his back.
His watch ticks on.
Fugo has Giorno’s personal number, the one that connects straight to the phone in his office, memorized. Forward, backwards, numerical – the point is… he knows it well.
With fifteen minutes before the next bus, Fugo stands a few feet from the bus stop at a payphone. The call connects after what feels like an eternity.
He expects the rich tone of Giorno’s voice but is met with a terse one instead. “He ain’t in.”
“Mista–?” Fugo stops himself. It’s not unusual for Mista to answer his phone, what with his near-permanent place beside him. “Where is he?”
“He went out about an hour ago, I dunno,” Mista replies nonchalantly. “Took Sheila E with him… so probably business.”
Fugo coils the wire around his finger, the cold sting of regret sinking deep, deep inside of him. What if Giorno was so disappointed that he just… left? He thought he’d give him the benefit of the doubt, but what if Giorno was not so forgiving this time?
“I – I see,” Fugo says, voice wobbly as he stares at his watch. “Thanks.”
Mista hums, thinking. “Where are you?”
“Close.” He responds, “Be there soon.”
“Alright, man.” Mista says simply and hangs up.
Fugo scrubs a hand through his hair, taking a moment to gather his thoughts as he puts the phone back on its hook. A woman clears her throat behind him and he moves aside for her to use the payphone, still numb.
He has faith that Giorno hasn’t given up on him entirely. Maybe business is keeping him away right now, but there’s still an hour to go.
The bus to Napoles Centrale arrives, its headlights like a beacon in the darkness. As Fugo gets on, he remembers his late grandmother’s words. At a time like this, she would take his hand and tell him to pray.
Fugo is not a religious person, not anymore – but still, he finds himself praying.
Giorno holds a bunch of violet-pink flowers in his hands, scrutinizing them with a smile as he places them into his vase. He cycles through flowers that fit his mood on a bi-weekly basis, seemingly never out of a new kind.
Fugo watches him, wordless, his heart feels like glass.
“These are asters,” Giorno says gently, as if not to disturb the flowers. “A bit late for them to still be blooming but it makes sense… considering what they mean.”
Fugo frowns, brows knitted. “What do they mean?”
“Patience.” He answers. “But also trust – and love.”
It’s fitting for Giorno to be so taken with such a flower that harbours all of the benevolent characteristics that he has. Trust and patience are what led Fugo back to Giorno, after all.
(Trust and patience are what roots him to Passione, even after all this time.)
Giorno tears his gaze from the flowers on his desk and tilts his head as he regards Fugo, his eyes sweeping across his frozen visage. “Do you like them?”
Fugo speaks and his voice is thick with yearning.
See me, he thinks, see me.
“Yes.” He whispers.
By the time the bus pulls into Napoles Centrale, there are three minutes to midnight.
Fugo has already resigned himself to his fate. He’s let Giorno down. It will be a long and taxing road to forgiving himself for this blunder, much less Giorno.
He steps into the empty terminal, the inky darkness surrounding him like a cloak and his heart thunders when he sees the clear imprint of someone standing in the middle of the platform.
Fugo has no way of describing the all-encompassing relief that spreads inside of him when he sees him. The immaculate appearance of one Giorno Giovanna who waits, a knowing smile etched across his face.
On the side, obscured by a lone streetlight, Sheila E taps her watch hastily. There is one minute left to midnight. 'Hurry' she mouths.
Fugo takes one step, then another, and then breaks out into a run towards Giorno, all but throwing himself into the arms he's been longing for, day and night.
Some people have been missing their loved ones for months, years, decades even – but this is the longest Fugo has ever been apart from Giorno. He lets himself be selfish, even for one fleeting moment.
Fugo pulls back and kisses him like a man starved for air and Giorno is his salvation. He's shaking and he knows that he is – a fortnight's worth of pure exhaustion finally catching up to him.
Giorno pushes his hair back, brushing a thumb across his cheekbone where a cut from the explosion earlier lingers. It’s so dark in the station that they can barely see the shadows of each other’s faces. But it’s enough for him to notice.
“Happy anniversary,” Giorno smiles, tilting their foreheads together.
As if on cue, a clock chimes in the distance, signalling the start of a new day. The comedic timing is enough to cause them both to chuckle.
Fugo had made it within an inch of his life. To think, even one more minute and he would have missed it entirely.
"I called… and you weren't in the office. I thought you gave up." He says hoarsely, arms tightening around Giorno.
The green-eyed boy shakes his head. “Don’t you remember what I told you – back then?”
Fugo holds his breath. He waits.
“If you can’t take the step forward...” Giorno says, hands moving to the nape of his neck. “I’ll step halfway to you.” His breath ghosts against his cheek. “Sound familiar?”
He exhales a laugh, “Let’s go home, Giogio…”
Giorno kisses him this time, tender and gentle; a promise for one more year’s worth of love and then some.