"The hermit" [fiction]

Dad was lying in a bed with his boots on the floor, abandoned from the shelter where his body rested. I remained silent watching him for a few moments until he opened his eyes and looked at me and cleaned them. Then he stopped and picked up his oil lamp and threw light across the room. Before it was not that there was darkness, only two timid candles that attenuated a brightness at the distance of the enclosure of my father.

"Boy," he said, clearing his throat, "do you remember what an old man with a lamp means?" I chuckled.

"Yes, I do, it means a trip, dad; but it does not have to be just an old man or a male, it can be a schoolgirl. The meaning does not change as long as the lamp is held and the journey for enlightenment is given". My dad looked for his boots and put them on without saying a word.

"Right. You have always been very smart, even though that mean some reckless" he said and put on a winter vest and a hat. I was still sitting.

"Too bad I can not go along with you" I said breaking the silence.

"No, you're wrong, it would be a pity if you had to accompany me, boy," he pointed out. "You still do not believe in God?" He asked.

"I never believed in God, dad..."

"And you don't need to do it so. His existence or nonexistence do not matter at all" he said pointing the light of lamp at me, and with that gesture I got up and accompanied him out of the room to the door of the house. "What a surprise that today is the coldest winters night. It's always my luck that way" he said jokingly and we both laughed. "Are you afraid of death, son?"

"No, but I desire her".

"All men desire her, son, as if she were a beautiful woman. Life is a condition of death, every day people are more and more dead with every breath. It is natural to wish to return to the genesis that is that nothingness. I do not want you to pray for me, my boy. Instead, you need to learn to love, life is the orgasm of Eros over Gaia's body, and only lasts an orgasm for the gods. Thanatos, on the other hand, is perennial. That is what we known as Abraxas".

"Praying is useless, dad. People who die only vanish from the road when we forget it. From then on there is neither heaven nor hell".

"Ah, but when the worms eat me," he said putting his hand on the doorknob.

"Well, when that happens, as long as I remember you, you will still live, but when the same thing happens to me, in that moment you will die because I will not be able to remember you anymore". He opened the door and pointed to the thick darkness with the lamp.

"I think this last conversation has made this lamp shine a little more. No doubt my trip will be more comfortable that way. I'm happy you think so. Farewell, my son".

"Farewell, dad" Isaid kissing his face. He left the house smiling, and walked like a shooting star in the infinite darkness until he lost himself on it. When I woke up, he was smiling in bed and gone forever.