Stormy filicide

It was just another night in our little restaurant when a homeless man shuffled in.

His clothes were in tatters and his appearance was scruffy, but his eyes sparkled with genuine appreciation as we served him a succulent steak.

He devoured each mouthful greedily, as if he hadn't had a decent meal in years.

We smiled politely when he thanked us, but in our hearts we harboured nothing but coldness.

We had set out on a dark path, putting an end to the misery of the homeless who crossed our path.

One by one, those souls in pain were silenced forever, far from the suffering of the streets.

That night, however, something changed. When that homeless man vanished after ingesting the poison hidden in his food, we decided to turn ourselves in to the authorities. We could no longer carry the burden of our actions.

It was then that we discovered a heartbreaking truth: that homeless man was none other than our son, whom we had believed to be dead in the war years before.

The military dog tag around his neck was the irrefutable proof.

Amnesia brought on by an accident had condemned him to a life of deprivation on the streets, and we, his own parents, had put him out of his misery in the most cruel and unthinkable way.

Now, locked in a cold cell, we languish in the remorse and agony of having murdered our own son with our own hands, without even acknowledging it.

A brutal mystery that we can never solve, a never-ending nightmare from which we will never wake up.