He's not doing great, but at ninety-one he's had an adventurous life. Seeing him in the bed scares me; he looks so vulnerable hooked up to machines, which at this point are merely prolonging his agony. I try to ignore his muttering. I know it's not the dementia telling me it's over, that he's finished. In his last moments of lucidity, he's asking me to help him. I know what he's asking, and it breaks my heart that I can't. I remind him of when he faced a tiger in the Malayan jungle, and that he's still braver than me.
Andrew Anderson (he/him) is a writer of fiction from Bathgate, Scotland. Twitter: @soorploom