AZRAEL

Each smile you gave touched my heart.

The thought of you lingers in me.

I close my eyes because I don’t want to see you go.

I ask myself: how could you hurt me so?

The laughter and kisses we shared

Are now shattered into pieces.

How could you do this to me?

You left me nothing but my insanity.

I closed my notebook and set my pen down. I looked around, taking one last glance at the home that had sheltered me for twenty-six years. By tomorrow, I’d be leaving it behind with nothing but my father and myself.

I stood up, grabbed the last brandy from the fridge, and poured it into a glass. Sitting on the couch, I closed my eyes, still clinging to the good memories that barely kept me afloat. But what is left for me, anyway? I lost my wife and with her, the business I built with blood and sweat over nearly twenty-eight years. She left me with nothing. I don’t even know where to start now because I feel completely broken.

Frustrated, I kicked the table. Her photo frame toppled and shattered on the floor. I stared at the broken glass and the image of the woman I had trusted most. She cheated on me and left me with nothing but pain and empty pockets.

“Hahaha!” I laughed madly. The woman I loved is the woman I built my life around, the same woman who destroyed it. WHO RUINED EVERYTHING? I gave her everything, even my life.

I hurled the glass in my hand against the wall, hearing it shatter into countless pieces. The pain inside me was worse than any broken glass. And just like the glass, I couldn’t fix it. I couldn’t piece it back together, and it was killing me. All I had now was a miserable life.

I shook my head every time the memories crept in. I was full of pain and regret and had no idea where to begin again. I couldn’t even think straight; the anger and agony in my heart drowned out every rational thought in my mind.

“Are you alright, son?” my dad asked gently while peeling a banana he had bought at the market.

I didn’t answer. I didn’t want to tell him what had happened. I didn’t want him to know how depressed and frustrated I was. I didn’t want to burden his quiet, peaceful life with my problems.

My dad is blind, and he can barely walk anymore. He’s eighty-four years old now. From this point on, I knew I would have to lean on him to keep going, even though I had no clue where to start. Oh, wait. I do know where to start. From scratch. From zero, and that’s the hardest part. I am lower than rock bottom.

I watched as my dad made his way to his room. His foot stepped on the broken glass scattered on the floor. I quickly stood up and rushed to him, asking if he was okay. He simply smiled and said it was nothing that the broken glass didn’t hurt him.

“I hope you’re okay with letting me go,” he whispered. His words echoed in my ears.

The glass didn’t cut him. He turned and slowly made his way upstairs, closing his door behind him.

I didn’t understand what he meant by “letting him go.”I know he’s old and weak, but I’m willing to take care of him. He’s all I have left, and I don’t want to lose him.

I’m so proud of my dad. I’ve loved him deeply since I was a child. He’s the only one I’ve had long before that woman ever came into my life. I grew up without a mother, and it was hard. But my father never gave up on me, even when life was hard on him. That’s why I could never send him to a care home. No way. That’s not even an option.

I sat back on the couch as the brandy started to hit harder. My thoughts drifted back to her. The woman who crushed my life and stole ₱48,800,000 from me. Now she’s happy with the bastard she left me for.

I wished them every ounce of bad luck and karma for what they did to me.

I laughed again, forcing the tears back. Of course, that woman wasn’t worth my tears anymore. I knew I could go on with life without her, but not without the ₱48,800,000 that vanished into thin air.

I still have my dad, and he’s what matters most. Even if I don’t know how I’ll support his needs: his medication, nutritious food, and vitamins, I’ll figure it out somehow.

I took a deep breath as my head throbbed from the stress and pain. The happiness I once shared with her had turned into pure sadness.

I remembered how we exchanged vows twenty-five years ago. I thought she was the one. She stood by me when I had nothing. I trusted her. I was wrong.

Now she’s the one who made me nothing. She shattered my trust and left me hating everything.

“Hahaha,” I laughed again, louder this time, to ease the pain that clawed at me every time I thought about what happened. I was stupid. Stupid to trust her. Stupid to give her everything. I worked hard with sweat and blood. She knew my bank accounts, the passcodes to my vault, everything about me and every weakness, every secret.

I closed my eyes and felt my mind spiral. The brandy I’d finished had finally hit me hard. Thoughts and memories flashed through my head like violent sparks. It felt like my skull would explode any second… because my heart had already been shattered in an instant by that woman.

“In this quiet and dark four-walled space, you are making me hate myself. Remembering the love that I gave you, because I didn’t know how contagious you are.”

Her face kept flashing in my mind. She was happy now, with her new man. Why did she cheat on me? Why did she throw everything away?

Tomorrow, I have to leave this house with nothing but my blind father.“How could she do this to me?” I kept asking myself. Even if she didn’t care about me anymore… Didn’t she think of my father? He treated her like his own daughter. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t find an answer. She’s just a plain bitch. That’s it.

“My Maria is a bitch,” I muttered to myself, laughing bitterly.

I stood up and headed to the fridge, hoping to numb my cold, aching night. I opened it and found three bottles of beer left—my last small comfort. Grabbing the opener, I cracked one open and took a long drink.

Then— A loud thud echoed from the stairs.

My heart skipped. I dropped the beer bottle onto the counter and bolted toward the stairs, panic surging through me. Please, not Dad. Please not again. It would be the third time today that he’d fallen on those stairs.

I raced around the corner and looked.

It was nothing. Not my dad. Nothing.

Maybe it was just the alcohol messing with me, but I didn’t care. Alcohol helped dull the pain, even if only for one night.

“Stop drinking now, son,” my dad’s voice echoed behind me.

I froze. When I turned around, I saw him sitting on the couch. I blinked in confusion. How did he get there? I didn’t see him come down the stairs. He laughed softly and looked straight at me.

“Did you forget already? Or is it that you just don’t want to accept it?” he asked, his voice gentle but unsettling.

“My son,” he called again. He stood up slowly and walked toward me. He smiled—calm, warm—and placed his cold hand on my cheek. His touch soothed me instantly, melting away all the anger and sorrow inside me.

“I’m sorry,” I whispered, my voice cracking. Tears spilt from my eyes, and I broke down in front of him.“I’m sorry for not listening to you. I’m sorry for being your prodigal son. That’s why it’s so hard for me to let you go.”

He kept his hand on my face, like I was seven years old again. His touch was cold. His eyes were dull, like glass with no light behind them.

“Do you remember now?” he asked quietly.

I didn’t speak, but I nodded slowly.

Yes.

Yes, I remembered everything now. The day I lost control. The day I shattered completely after discovering the truth about Maria. I drank to escape the pain. I drank too much. I crashed my car.

When I woke up, they told me the news. My dad was dead.

Wait. Dead? No… no way. He’s right here. With me. Smiling. Talking. Alive.

I shook my head, refusing to believe it. I didn’t want to remember. I didn’t want to accept it. He’s here. That’s all that matters.

I looked at him silently, my eyes begging for answers. Without words, my stare asked the question burning inside me:

What happened to my father?

“Remember that day?” he asked softly, then paused. He seemed to hesitate, gauging whether I was ready to hear the rest. Then, gently, he continued.

“I heard you screaming that day… screaming in rage when you caught Maria in your bed, with another man.”His voice was steady, but there was a weight in it that pressed on my chest.“I ran to you. I was scared. Scared you might do something you’d never come back from.”He looked down, then back up at me, his dull eyes locking with mine.

“You ran at them with a pistol in your hand. I knew… because I never heard you drop it.”His hand fell from my cheek.

“I chased after you to stop you. I didn’t want to lose you, son.”

He swallowed hard.

“But I fell. On the stairs.”

My tears fell faster, hot and bitter, and I couldn’t stop them now. He didn’t want to lose me, but I lost him.

He tried to follow me. He fell trying to save me, and I never even knew.

I had chased Maria and her lover that night, blinded by fury, pistol shaking in my grip. I drove after them recklessly, and that was when it happened, the crash.

When I woke up, I was in a hospital bed. And the first words I heard were the ones that destroyed me: My father was dead.

I clenched my fists so tightly my nails cut into my palms. A scream tore from my throat, raw and guttural. Pain pulsed through me like fire. I wanted to die right now. I deserved nothing less but no.

No, I couldn’t. My dad would never want that. He believed he raised a fighter, and I wouldn’t fail him, not in this. Not now.

“I didn’t want to lose my only son,” he whispered. The words echoed in my mind, fracturing what little sanity I had left. I had lost him. Because of my carelessness, I knew deep down. I would never forgive myself.

“Don’t feel guilty, son. Don’t regret it… It was just an accident. If anything, it was my fault. I wasn’t careful,” he said softly, trying to ease the weight pressing on my chest.

But his words couldn’t lift it. They only made it heavier. This feeling was more than regret; it was a hollowed-out ache that words couldn’t fill, and even though I tried to hide it from him, he could see it. He always could.

My dad is gone.

“You need to go on with your life, son,” he advised gently.

I shook my head hard, forcing the memories away.

No.

No... he wasn’t dead. It was just the alcohol. Just the drink is messing with my mind, twisting reality into nightmares. Weird, yes, but believable enough for me to cling to.

“I love you,” I finally managed to say.

There were so many things I wanted to tell him. So many confessions. So many apologies, but those three words were all my mouth could manage, and somehow, they said everything.

He nodded and smiled at me. That same smile, the one that had always made the world seem safe. It pulled me back into memories. When I was young, we played basketball together in the street. He’d walk miles to pick me up from school because we barely had enough money for food and my education. He made a life out of scraps and sweat. And me? I had rebelled against him, and I hated him for not giving me what I wanted, but I was wrong. God, I was so wrong.

Now, in just a snap, everything was gone. I realized, too late, that he had given me everything that truly mattered. Even when we had nothing, he never failed to keep me in school. Never failed to put food on the table. Even when it broke him.

“Don’t be sad, kid,” he said quietly.

I didn’t know how he could say that, standing here, when everything inside me was crumbling. Now, it was just me. Just me and the space he left behind.

I was back to square one. I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to start again.

“All is well. You’ll find the real you soon,” he added, his grey eyes locking onto mine. There was something in his gaze that was steady, calm, almost glowing with hope, that tried to patch the cracks in me.

I shook my head, unwilling to be comforted.“Stop that, Dad… I love you. You need to get some sleep now.”

I reached up and touched the hand that was resting gently on my face, and in that instant, A blinding light flashed. Memories came rushing back, unstoppable and sharp.

I had just come home…And there she was. My wife. In our bed with another man.

He bolted for the door, naked and scrambling. My wife… she cried, she apologized and somehow, she blamed me. Blamed me.

I remember stumbling to the cabinet, pulling out my pistol with shaking hands, rage hotter than anything I’d ever felt. I wanted to end it. End her.

But Dad... Dad stopped me. He had been sleeping in the next room. He heard everything, and somehow, even in his old age, he got to me in time.

He saved her life.

She ran. She escaped because he held me back, and instead of seeing his protection as a mercy, I only felt betrayal. Blinded by fury, I shoved him aside and chased after her. I didn’t think about him. I didn’t think about anything but revenge.

I remember speeding off in the car, fists white-knuckled on the wheel, gun still in my lap, and I remember nothing after that.

Until I woke up a week later in the hospital and the news hit me harder than any crash ever could: Dad was dead.

He had tried to follow me, and he tried to save me again, and in his panic, he had fallen down the stairs. His body, already frail, couldn’t take the fall. He died because of me, because he didn’t want to lose me…But I lost him.

The tears rolled down, silent but endless, as the full weight of the truth suffocated me. He had chosen me over everything, even over his own safety. And I had thrown that away because I couldn’t see past my anger.

I was so foolish. So blind. All this time, I had let myself believe it was someone else’s fault, but deep down, I knew. It was mine.

I forgot to consider his pain. I forgot the sacrifices buried in his silence. He lost his sight… because of me. He worked himself to the bone, day and night, in that factory for me. To feed me, clothe me, and send me to school, and this is how I repaid him? By blaming him… For something he never caused? For something none of us could have foreseen?

Maria cheated on me. She stole everything I owned and I… I turned my anger onto the one man who had always stood by me.

“I’m so sorry, Father,” I choked, the words breaking out of me like shattered glass, but he only looked at me, calm, unshaken. As if he carried no resentment. He wiped my tears with his rough, calloused thumb, pulled me into his chest, and whispered into my ear.

“Just let me go.”

But I shook my head violently. I could not. I would not let him go. He was all I had left. The friends I thought I had? Gone. They vanished the moment my money disappeared. Like ghosts. They had fed on my wealth and status, and when it dried up, so did they. But my father? He was real, and he was all I had.

“I know you love me, son,” he said gently.“I love you more than you’ll ever understand, but you need to let me go… and take me where I need to be.”

I frowned. I didn’t understand. He wasn’t going anywhere. He would live. He had to live. He would stay right here with me because I needed him more than I needed air.

He hugged me again. And I clung to him with everything I had, but in a blink... He was gone.

No.

No.

“My dad is here. He’s here,” I muttered under my breath, desperate to anchor myself in reality.

I bolted upstairs to his room, and there he was sleeping soundly, peacefully. His chest rising and falling slowly, his face calm.

I crept closer, careful not to disturb him, and sat on the edge of his bed. My chest ached, and tears stung my eyes.

“I love you so much, Dad. Thank you for everything…”I bent forward and kissed his forehead, gently pulling the blanket up around him so he wouldn’t get cold.

I slipped out of his room, switched off the light, and closed his door softly behind me.

Downstairs, I grabbed another beer from the fridge, twisted the cap off, and swallowed nearly half the bottle in one breath. I wiped my mouth with the back of my hand and exhaled sharply. The sadness hit again, heavier this time, like a weight on my chest. Even with my father still here, I felt hollow. My life was in ruins. Maria had destroyed everything, and no matter how much I wanted to go back, I couldn’t. What’s done is done, and there’s no rewinding the clock.

“Isaac,” I heard my dad’s voice.

I spun around. He was sitting on the couch again. I froze, startled.

“I thought you were asleep…” I said, eyes narrowing. I hadn’t heard him come down. With his blindness, he usually moved slowly, but there he was. Sitting tall and sitting straight with a soft smile on his lips.

“How did you get down here so fast?” I asked quietly.

He chuckled, a light, boyish sound.

“I can go wherever I want, son,” he said and then…He glided—Yes, glided—across the floor, spinning lightly in my office chair like a carefree child.

“Stop that, Dad,” I said softly, the corner of my mouth twitching despite the heaviness in my chest. A part of me wanted to laugh. Seeing him spin in my office chair like a boy, smiling, carefree. For a moment, he looked lighter than I had ever seen him. Free of worry. Free of the burden I knew he always carried.

“Are you enjoying it?” I asked, forcing a grin. He didn’t answer. He just smiled. That same gentle smile that always told me, everything will be okay, even when nothing ever was.

Then—His eyes locked on mine. Calm. Clear, and he asked.

“When are you going to let me go?”

My breath caught. I couldn’t answer. I didn’t know how to answer. I didn’t even know what he truly meant.

“When are you going to bring me to the other side?” His voice was soft. No anger. No urgency. Just… understanding.

I stared deep into his gray eyes, confused until, like glass shattering in my mind, everything came rushing back. The hospital.The nurse’s trembling voice.

The accident.My accident.

After chasing Maria and her lover, blinded by rage and betrayal, I crashed my car. The nurse told me when I woke up.

Told me about Dad. He had fallen on the stairs. He had hit his head. He died trying to stop me. Trying to save me from myself.

A sob crawled up my throat. Tears blurred my vision as he kept smiling at me.

How could he smile? How could he act like it was fine? Everything was not fine. I was ruined. No wife. No money. No business. No home. Tomorrow… tomorrow the bank would take the house. We’d have nowhere to go.

Where will we go, Dad? Where do people like us go when there’s nothing left?

I clenched my jaw, shaking as the tears spilt freely down my cheeks. He had told me once. You are all I have, son. That’s why I work so hard and now… Now, he was all I had, and I couldn’t, I wouldn’t let him go.

“You’re not dead… right?” I whispered, voice cracking. He just sat there. Watching me with quiet, endless patience. No words. No movement. Just presence.

“You’re not dead,” I said again, firmer this time, a broken kind of defiance hardening inside me. I wiped my face with the sleeve of my shirt and whispered like a prayer, “Yes… You’re not dead.”

I looked him straight in the eyes. “No. You’re not.”

I kept telling myself. Convincing myself. Because how could he be gone? I could see him. I could hear him. I could touch him. I could still kiss his forehead and feel the roughness of his hands.

“I love you so much,” I whispered, my voice collapsing into a sob, and I crumpled like a child. The kind of crying that comes from the bones. From a place you didn’t even know existed inside you.

He sat still. Smiling. A patient, eternal love radiates from him.