“I see me in you,” he said, looking at me from the hospital bed. His eyes were yellowish and his lips chapped. I hardly recognized the man who gave me life.

I think he thought I should smile at that, as if it were something sentimental. Being like him was the worst thing I could imagine. I was nothing like him; had made sure, over the years, to become less and less like him.

There was a reason nobody else was in this room visiting him. He had cut all ties.

He seemed to read my mind. “This world . . . Loves you. I love you, son,” my father gasped through ragged breaths.

“If only this world had shown me a little more mercy,” I said, staring into his eyes. They grew wider as he watched me reach to his bedside table, hold the plug in my hand, and cut off his oxygen.

The sound of flatlining never felt so good.