The protagonists are a father, his daughter, and a male nurse. The setting is a city in the south of Italy. 　　Following the sudden illness of his father Antonio, the twenty-year-old Adriana is compelled to face reality. 　　She immediately realizes she’s not able to take care of his father because of an unnatural awkwardness. Too many years have passed and too many lies have been told. 　　They live on meaningless dialogues, and apparently insignificant questions. 　　Rocco is a nurse, a lonely, mysterious man who lives for his job. He looks after Antonio with obsessive manners and tender affection – almost as a son would do – proving that a stranger can succeed in doing the things a family cannot do. 　　The young Adriana watches helplessly while she tries to look for some answers as to why a father and a daughter can be so distant. Her mother’s death, the secret she’s hiding, is one of the reasons. 　　His father is tired, he just wants to die. He has got a request as irrational as Camus’ essay (The Wrong Side and The Right Side) which Adriana is studying at University. 　　“The surprise” is in the story and in its unfolding, in the inner micro-plots. It’s a call for freedom.