“I called Riccardo Minghetti to wish him a Happy New Year. It’s impossible that he died at Le Constellation: we still had so many things left to say to each other.”
— Ludovica, 15, speaking about her friend, the Roman teenager killed in the Swiss tragedy

“I called him a few days before New Year’s to exchange greetings. Like always between us, it was a long phone call. We told each other a thousand things. And yet, there was still so much more we wanted to say.” Ludovica is 15 years old, her eyes red from crying, but she wants to remember her friend Riccardo Minghetti, the 16-year-old from Rome who died in the New Year’s Eve fire at Le Constellation in Crans-Montana, Switzerland.

Riccardo and Ludovica met when she was 10 years old, playing hide-and-seek. They shared many passions, from school to sports—especially swimming, which Riccardo had given up for his first love. “He preferred spending time with her, which is normal at our age. But whenever I called him, he told me he wanted to start swimming again.

One day he showed up at the pool and said to me, a bit sadly, ‘We broke up, but at least I’ll start swimming again.’ Then he dove in,” she told Corriere della Sera.

During their phone call a few days before New Year’s, the two talked at length. “He told me about his vacation—he was having fun. Then we talked about our future plans. When he came back, there was going to be a school assembly. We planned what we would say. Then we moved on to talking about our great shared passion: swimming.”

On Wednesday, January 7, Ludovica, together with family and friends, will say goodbye to him for the last time at the Basilica of Saints Peter and Paul in the EUR district of Rome. She remembers him like this: “He loved to talk, he was a sensitive, thoughtful boy. He was never reckless. He was mature. The fact that he was always smiling didn’t make him superficial—on the contrary, he was very deep. He understood me, I never felt embarrassed confiding in him. I would start telling him about one of my problems, and he would continue by putting his own on the table. A person like that is irreplaceable; his absence will be an unfillable void.”