Your life is over. That message was etched into my memory as I got up to start the day.
Grandmother always said that if you’re going out, you must be neatly dressed. You never know if you’ll have an accident or if death will strike. As a child, I’d just nodded. I’d never understood what she meant. Did it really matter what I was wearing at the moment I died?
I hesitated and decided, for the first time since my childhood, to do what my grandmother called ‘dressing neatly and decently’.
When I looked in the mirror in my Sunday best, as opposed to the general’s uniform with medals, it felt as though she was standing behind me, nodding approvingly.

It promised to be a sunny day. Sun is better than rain. Nobody wants to lie in the mud to die, I thought as I paused for a moment to take in the street. Would this be my last walk?

Barely 300 metres further on, I felt a tap on my shoulder and when I turned around, there stood a man grinning at me. I looked at him in surprise. No, I had no desire to ask or beg. That dream I’d had had told me that my final hour had struck today.
I felt a sharp stab and saw more men coming towards me. No cry came from my lips. Why should I defend myself? My life had been no different from anyone else’s. I felt the weariness of the past years slowly slip away from me. The shouting voices did nothing to me.
No, it wasn’t my whole life that flashed before my eyes as I felt the life ebbing from me, but the image of those two men standing with their backs to the violence, chatting happily about football, which had been etched into my memory.

_{Painting: Assassination of General Venancio Flores (n.d.) - public domain
Painter: Juan Manuel Blanes
5-5-2026
May 5th - Liberation Day in the Netherlands...well..
The contest Art & Writing is hosted by @solperez}