Chapter 1 - The Encounter

It was a mid-morning Friday in Palermo, The screaming of a woman seemed to put the local tourists on guard, it wasn't a scream filled with fear or anger, it was a scream filled with pain. The screaming went on for three to four hours but followed with something strange, it was followed with laughter, not the laughter of a psychopath who took enjoyment of the suffering of their victims, no, this was the laughter of a woman who had given birth. That mid-morning, that particular Friday was the day that I was born, My mother gave me her Grandfather's name, Luca, and my Father gave me his last name Nilsson.

My family wasn't very rich growing up and by the age of six my father left, I don't even remember that Swedish bastard's name. With no source of income my Mother gave herself to prostitution, This was easy for her because, one, She was a young, beautiful, Italian woman and, two, Italy was discouraged from their loss in World War 2 so one of the ways Italian men could feel like men again was taking control of a situation and paying a woman to sleep with them. So from 1946 - 1954, she gave herself to men willingly. I didn't pay much attention to it but I did notice she came home later and later every day. On my fifteenth birthday, in 1955, she just didn't come home.

I had no one to care for me and I ended up on the streets. The first night was new to me. The quiet dead night felt odd, and fittingly so, this group of drunks came and, Ironically, robbed me for what I begged that day and money I took from my home. They left me with a black eye and bruises and insulted my Mother's name but I took no offence to that, she's the one who left me for dead. The next two months passed without me noticing them go by. Each day felt the same, wake up, beg, eat something my money could afford, beg, sleep. I then noticed the rich passing by In their expensive cars, I envied them and, even though they did nothing to me, I hated them, I later called this the "Street boy syndrome". I noticed they all went the same place, this nightclub down the road, its booming music could be heard throughout the cold, wet streets and all the street boys groaned at its music. I had this thought, "Go beg there, Luca". It felt like my mother's voice speaking to me, telling me to go to the rich and beg. It angered me, even after death she haunted me, but I had no better option.

That night I went to the club through the pouring rain and, unsurprisingly, I wasn't the only one who thought to go there and beg, it was riddled with the stench of dirt, you could thank the beggars for that. The club had this huge patio looking thing in the front of it. The amber lights shone on the marble pillars that held the patio up. The dark brick roof gave refuge to those rich coming from the rain as well as the beggars trying to shield themselves.

I came close to the far end of the patio, next to an alley, and tried to sit and beg but the eyes from the beggars insinuated that they really didn't want fresh meat there. After a less than okay yield and lots of threatening eyes, I wanted to retire for the night. "Excuse me, Sir, could you spare a euro?" I asked this man with my broken Italian. He rushed passed me into the alley. He was about two times my height, wore a black jacket atop a white shirt with grey pants and had a maroon scarf around his neck. He was fairly fit with blonde hair same shade as mine.

I heard the man muttering to himself in Swedish "My God, I-I can't believe him!" he kept saying over and over with increasing anger. " 'Scuse me Sir but are you okay?" I asked. He turned to me, his eyes fuming with anger then, changing to fear. He grabbed me by my shirt and tossed me to the back end to the alleyway and with my fall I heard a loud bang, a gunshot. He collapsed on the floor, groaning in pain. I saw this black silhouette walking towards him, gun in his hand. "You thought you could pass by unnoticed, huh?" he said, his voice was calm and aged, strangely it was calming "Now, I need to ask you something, okay?" he pulled the man by his collar toward his face "Who's the little shitter who's ratting us out, hm?" The man muttered "I don't know" but the older man just asked again "Who. Is. It" "I don't know, okay?" "Last chance" The swede gulped "It's the busboy! Just don't hurt me!" There was a moment of silence "So you won't cooperate, unfortunate for you." It was at this moment I realised that they were both speaking different languages.

The swede started getting desperate and started speaking in uncoherent Swedish while the older man kept trying to Interrogate him in Italian. The older man eventually gave up and put the gun to the swede's head. "IT'S THE BUSBOY! PLEASE LISTEN! PLEASE, GOD, MAKE HIM UNDERSTAND!" The swede started yelling and for the first time in my life, I thanked my father for teaching me Swedish. "He says it's the busboy! Don't kill him!" I interjected. The older man froze, I don't think he knew I was there till I spoke. "So it's that little bastard, Ravelli's, doing," he said softly "Impressive" He then put the gun to his brain and shot