Photoshop

Photoshop
As I walked the same dreary road up to the villa yet one more time, I felt as if the camera strap were eating the skin on the back of my neck. The weight of these Friday afternoon shots was becoming unbearable. I knew I had to carry on with this repetitive ordeal, since the pantry was just about empty and I had to make the money for the rent. How I longed to go back to the job at the paper, the very same job I had considered to be below me when it was mine.
It’s not that I regret having taken his handsome offer, but the whole idea behind it was getting to me. Depressing me, really. I felt like I was documenting his demise. Very slowly. Which I was, since that was his intention: to be photographed every Friday afternoon, to record the slow ebb of life from his body as he stared into the camera, his eyes hard as ice. Surely, it had to be easy enough, all I had to do was press the button. One click. Done. Back next week.
As I entered the lavishly decorated study, I realized he was not there. In his armchair, a letter. Addressed to me. I opened it and saw the thick bundle of cash and a sheet of paper. Carefully folded.
It read: “If you have found this envelope it is because I have been freed from the prison that was my body. You watched it decay and recorded it, every week. Now I instruct you to do away with all the images, whether you will just delete or burn I don’t know. These are new times, certainly not mine. They are yours, as is everything of mine. Lose my footsteps .
Love, Dad.