The Anniversary

On May 1, 1994, Quinn takes a train to the remote Italian village of Recanati to meet the parents of Giuseppe, an Italian soldier he befriended while stationed in Somalia. Though the US was on a humanitarian mission, the situation evolved into a military conflict in which many US soldiers and local Somalis died. Quinn and Giuseppe, an Army-assigned translator, bonded over being the youngest in their encampment. He fondly remembers Giuseppe’s humor, his pride in his hometown, and his love for the poet Giacomo Leopardi. Quinn travels to Recanati to deliver Giuseppe’s last letter to his parents and to pay his respects to the man who saved his life in the city of Kismayu.

In Milan, Jules feels increasingly disillusioned with her modeling career. A crude English photographer, Alastair Essex, dismissively calls her “Stadium Girl”—referencing a viral video of her at a college football game kissing a student who had just been publicly humiliated on the televised Kiss Cam. Stung, Jules insists he use her actual name. After the photo shoot, Jules finds an American newspaper and reads a headline about the “May Day Killer. The article triggers intense anxiety. She’s haunted by the question of why he let her live.