Hi everyone! Thanks so much for taking a look at this first little piece of Gallico, a project I've been dreaming of bringing to fruition for years. This prologue is a bit strange; a memory from the past, accompanied by an intimate letter from ten years in the future. The letter reads:
Matthew—
I just remembered: I first saw you in Rome, not at Gallico. You were with a priest called O’Brien whom I was observing. I was considering a job that I had been offered. I need not explain what job, not to you. Maybe I thought it was a shame that you were there, because you looked so young, and because you had an excitement and a conviction that showed on your face. But I don’t know, really. My memory is coloured by the way I feel now. But we need not rely on memory. I have kept a detailed account of these past ten years. Forgive the callousness with which I have written these first entries. Or forgive my failure to maintain that callousness. Or don’t.
I don’t know if you will ever choose to read this note or the rest of the journal. Part of me hopes you won’t. The part that is afraid of your knowing my thoughts, or the part that doesn’t wish to hurt you. Let me say one thing: you may find this hard to believe, but I am not so cruel or lacking in general sense as to say that I love you out loud. But I have written it down many times in this journal, perhaps to keep my sanity. I am sorry. I love you.
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Please take the time to read the entire synopsis and content warnings in the description. Thank you!
Italy, 1944: in the shadow of World War II, psychiatrist Dr. Giovanni Rossi has found more lucrative wartime work as a hired interrogator. However, when Giovanni is hired to extract information from an Irish priest named Matthew Callaghan, a compromise between duty and humanity seems impossible. Giovanni must set his growing feelings for Matthew aside and finish the job, with both their lives hanging in the balance; but is saving someone worth breaking them?
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Gallico is not suitable for readers under 18. Gallico also contains themes which may be upsetting or disturbing for some readers such as torture, rape, domestic abuse, mental illness, and the obvious implications of a WWII setting. I do not personally align myself with any reprehensible themes or ideologies herein.
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