Manuel's hair has snowed in with the time, the rims of his black eyes are now a senile shade of blue, his trembling hands shake as he rises from his rickety armchair. He walks at his slow pace until he reaches a bedroom that he contemplates with tenderness, on one of the walls there is a poster of a successful musical group, not from his own time, but from a later one, it was his son's room.
When his son left home he was already over twenty years old, Manuel was overcome with soft memories of a beginner father, the first day he didn't even know how to hold the newborn, before doing so his wife had given him a little explanation.
"Love, you must hold his head and neck with one hand and support his body with the other"
When he held him in his arms, the baby began to cry, and as he held him close to his body, he calmed quietly, the young father could feel how his son, fragile and defenceless, felt safe in his rough, overburdened hands, then he remembered other times when the boy was six years old, those days when together they collected crabs and seashells on the shore of the beach until the sun languished on the horizon that looked like a golden pearl tucked into the ocean.
He sat up in bed, it was inevitable for him to remember his late wife's youth, how he dedicated his whole life to take care of her too and every day he worked so hard to bring them health and sustenance, in those times it was his wife who filled him with energy, a sun that rehabilitated him day by day with thousands of kisses as a reward, but now he was alone and only an empty house was left to him.
A fly flew to the bedside table next to the bed where he was resting, when he saw it he rolled up a piece of paper and was about to kill it but his hand stopped when he saw that the insect did not escape, "It is a fly that dies of old age" said Manuel, stopping his execution.
Manuel knows that, after emerging from their pupa, houseflies only live for eighteen days, he thought, in all the time he had been flying around the house. and that meant that the fly had known him all his insect life and was now dying by his side like an old friend.
"I will accompany you on your descent so that you will not die alone as I will die"
Life was long and generous with Manuel, many of his best friends and siblings were gone, but it broke his heart to remember the day of the death of his dear companion who had grown old with him. He looked at the insect and said
"Elsewhere they are all, if on your arrival they ask for me, take this message to them; I miss them all, I have never forgotten them especially my wife who gave me as many memories as stars in the universe."
A car horn interrupted his words, but it didn't matter, the fly had been dead for a few minutes. When he reached the door he was met by his son and his son's wife, who greeted him with a big hug.
"Dad, I've come to get you, I don't want you to be here alone, I've already extended my house so that you can live with us"
Manuel let out a slight laugh of irony and said:
"Don't do that to your family, I'm a burden now, I'm fine here, nothing's wrong"
Then his son's wife spoke:
"Come on Manuel, don't be stubborn, you are not a burden at all, you are part of my family"
"Dad, how can he ask us to leave you if you took such good care of me, come on, old man"
So Manuel accepted, but before packing his bags, he took the fly and buried it in a flowerpot to go with his son and live happily the few years he had left to live.
The drawing is from my own source