“It’s a great picture, Dad.” He looks like himself in the photo, cradling a book in one hand and his grandson in the other. Like he used to do with me.
I squeeze his shoulder. He grips my hand. Hard.
Tears crawl down his wrinkled face. “Can you…” he trails off, his words skittering away.
“Save it? Sure.” My throat catches as I hit “ctrl + s.”
His grasp slackens. The memory switch flips back to “off.”
My heart cracks.
His cataract-clouded eyes swivel up to me and he asks, politely, for the fifth time that day, “who are you?”
......
Originally submitted to the 100-word NYC Midnight Microfiction Challenge 2020, Round 2 as "Who Are You?"
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