Hector Keres' family never had much of a lifespan. Actually, given their tendency to die within less than a quarter of a century, it almost seemed like a miracle that they had managed to keep their bloodline until our days. Although, if you think about it, flies also manage to survive and they hardly have a few days to procreate.
Furthermore, deaths in Hector's family were rarely accidental. There was no war in which a Keres hadn't died, no tribunal which hadn't sentenced them to the capital punishment. Burned alive by the inquisition, guillotined during the french revolution, hanged in texas. Their obituaries could as well be used by a historian as a catalogue of violent deaths.
Thus, being barely twenty years old, Hector was the last survivor of a doomed saga, and he was painfully aware of it. When he was a little kid, his father had been murdered by his downstair neighbour, who went crazy because of a water leakage nobody could find. About twenty five years earlier, his grandfather had left this world in similar circumstances, after a slightly overprotective general found out his daughter was pregnant. Just as his great-grandfather had ended up in a common grave, after not-so-pleasant transgressions.
All of this, Hector had known since he was a child, becoming a timid lad who feared breaking any rule, with an almost servile kindness with which he tried to avoid at all cost being disliked by anyone, thus triggering any unexpected chain of events that could make him reunite with the rest of his predecessors. Every risk was thoroughly calculated, every social interaction meticulously planned.
Maybe that's the reason Hector studied Psichology, and maybe also why, when his classmate insisted, for the third time, in inviting him to dinner, he was afraid of turning her down again. Only when he found himself naked at her side, did he thought that maybe he was taking more risks than he had thought.
"So, what does your family do?" asked Hector, remembering the tale about his grandfather. Damage control was important.
"Don't freak out, but they have owned a funeral parlor for generations"
"It's a pity they can't meet mine" Hector smiled. "I think our families would have got along just fine".
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Photo & text by Aitor Villafranca
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Furthermore, deaths in Hector's family were rarely accidental. There was no war in which a Keres hadn't died, no tribunal which hadn't sentenced them to the capital punishment. Burned alive by the inquisition, guillotined during the french revolution, hanged in texas. Their obituaries could as well be used by a historian as a catalogue of violent deaths.
Thus, being barely twenty years old, Hector was the last survivor of a doomed saga, and he was painfully aware of it. When he was a little kid, his father had been murdered by his downstair neighbour, who went crazy because of a water leakage nobody could find. About twenty five years earlier, his grandfather had left this world in similar circumstances, after a slightly overprotective general found out his daughter was pregnant. Just as his great-grandfather had ended up in a common grave, after not-so-pleasant transgressions.
All of this, Hector had known since he was a child, becoming a timid lad who feared breaking any rule, with an almost servile kindness with which he tried to avoid at all cost being disliked by anyone, thus triggering any unexpected chain of events that could make him reunite with the rest of his predecessors. Every risk was thoroughly calculated, every social interaction meticulously planned.
Maybe that's the reason Hector studied Psichology, and maybe also why, when his classmate insisted, for the third time, in inviting him to dinner, he was afraid of turning her down again. Only when he found himself naked at her side, did he thought that maybe he was taking more risks than he had thought.
"So, what does your family do?" asked Hector, remembering the tale about his grandfather. Damage control was important.
"Don't freak out, but they have owned a funeral parlor for generations"
"It's a pity they can't meet mine" Hector smiled. "I think our families would have got along just fine".
----
Photo & text by Aitor Villafranca
