Any day
Manuel gets up in the morning and
wakes the kids up. He makes coffee and has breakfast with his wife. Later he
affectionately says goodbye to his children as he drops them off at school.
When he gets to work, he greets all his coworkers with a friendly good morning.
He’s been there a long time. He calls his clients, eats from the lunch box
Aurora prepared for him and throws out all his invoices. Later, he jokes around
while saying goodbye to each of his coworkers.
He
takes advantage of the down time between the end of the work day and picking up
the kids from the pool to go buy groceries at the supermarket. With a trunk
full of food and the car flooded with children’s laughter, he heads home. She
still hasn’t arrived. When she finally does, a delicious, steaming hot dinner waits
for him in the kitchen. He kisses her, cuddles her, tells her how pretty she
is, how lucky he is. He puts the kids to bed, giving them a kiss goodnight
after reading them a story. He goes to his bedroom and sees his wife asleep
with a book in her hands. He takes off her glasses and puts the book on the
nightstand. He sits next to her on the bed and fixes the covers around her.
Then, he opens a drawer in the nightstand and takes out a revolver. Aurora
shifts a little and turns. He looks straight into the barrel. He sticks it so
far into his mouth that the pain causes him to shed a few tears. He pulls the
trigger. She clears her throat. Manuel inspects his brain splattered all over
the headboard with his fingertips, as if it were the first time he’d seen it.
He’s tired. He turns off the light. Tomorrow he has to stop by the IRS before
going to the office.
