One day, in a Facebook group where they post job offers, I found an ad looking for someone to clean the house of Doña Carmen, an elderly woman who lived alone in a small alley near the city center.

That morning I had gone to his house as usual. He carried a bag of warm tortillas, some chicken, and vegetables to make a broth. The sea wind blew hard in the alley, kicking up dust between the worn walls of the houses.

I knocked on the wooden door.

“Doña Carmen… it’s me, Diego.

No one answered.

I thought maybe he was sleeping. I gently pushed open the door, which as always was unlocked.

The house was too quiet.

A strange silence… heavy.

“Doña Carmen…”

I slowly advanced to the small room where his bed was.

And there I saw her.

She was lying down, her hands on her chest. Her face was calm, as if she were fast asleep.

But something in my chest immediately told me that he was gone.

I felt the world stop for an instant.

“Doña Carmen…”

I walked over and took his hand.

It was cold.

Very cold.

My eyes filled with tears without me being able to help it.

That small room, which he had seen so many times filled with the smell of hot soup and simple conversations, now seemed empty and strange.

I called an ambulance.

Minutes later the paramedics arrived and confirmed what I already knew.

Doña Carmen had died during the night.

Cardiac arrest.

The neighbors began to gather at the door of the house. Some were murmuring among themselves.

“Poor thing… she was always alone.”
“That boy is the only one who came to see her.

An older woman from the alley approached me.

“Son… you were like his family.

Those words made me cry even more.

I was just a student who had gone to clean his house.

But at some point… she had become something more.

Something similar to a grandmother.

The funeral was simple.

Very simple.

In reality, there was almost no one there.

Only me… and some neighbors who barely knew her.