Minor Family's Life ~ Venice' Future

chapter one

L e o

I couldn't believe that the day I had tried to prepare for so long had come. Everyone knew that it would happen at some point, but neither Grandma nor I expected it to go so fast.
She had been sick for so long, had always had her low phases and I had always suffered with her. But now I couldn't let her go. I didn't want to live without her.

"Never forget what I told you, Leo," my mother whispered quietly, more to herself than to me, into the dimly lit bedroom. She didn't want to die in the hospital, she had literally begged the doctors to take her home before it was too late. Now she was lying in the bed where Grandma and I had also slept for the last ten years. But for tonight it would be her alone.

Breathing heavily, Ma grabbed my hand and pressed it so hard that I was sure that she had to use all her remaining strength on it. Hot tears ran out of my eyes when I noticed how a shiny one came loose in the corner of her eye. I didn't want her to leave. I just wanted to keep her with me for a few more days.
She meant everything to me.

„Never let yourself be persuaded who you ... who you have to be. You are ... perfect."
Ma finished her sentence and each of the words came out of her mouth so powerlessly that I had to pull myself together not interrupt her. She should save her words, maybe she would only endure it a little longer.

"Ma ... I can't live without you.", I cried loudly and put my head on her stomach, which now rose and sank in hectic breaths. Her thin hand gently ran through my thick hair and I was more than just aware at that moment that I would feel her warmth for the last time.

"You will have it good ... in the future. I promise you ...", she started gasping for air and now I felt Grandma getting a little closer to us. Parents should never see their children die before them. It had to be even more painful for her than for me to lose her only daughter so early.

"It's all good, my child. You can go.", Grandma talked to her well, but I knew that she also wished that Ma could stay in this world a little longer. Just a little longer.

For a moment it seemed as if my mother wanted to say something else, but her shortness of breath prevented her from doing so. And without seeing it, I knew that she now closed her eyes powerlessly. Forever.