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I looked at her suspiciously.
“Doing what?”
She folded her arms and leaned on her cane.
“My garden is trying to kill me.”
I blinked.
“What?”
“The weeds are winning. My knees retired years ago, but the flowers didn’t get the memo.”
I laughed before I could stop myself.
“There it is,” she said, pointing at me. “You can smile.”
That Saturday, I showed up at her house expecting an hour or two of yard work.
Instead, she handed me a pair of gloves, a shovel, and a list that seemed long enough to renovate the entire property.
By sunset, my back ached.
Mrs. Rhode walked outside carrying two glasses of lemonade.
“You missed a weed.”
I looked around.
“Where?”
She pointed to a tiny blade of grass growing beside the porch.
“I was joking,” she said with a grin. “Relax.”
That became our routine.
Every Saturday I mowed her lawn, repaired loose fence boards, changed light bulbs, cleaned gutters, and carried groceries inside.
Eventually Tuesdays and Thursdays became grocery days.
Fridays became doctor’s appointments.
When winter arrived, I shoveled her driveway before work.
She insisted on paying me every time.
Sometimes twenty dollars.
Sometimes fifty.
Sometimes she’d slip homemade cookies into my backpack.
As the months passed, the work mattered less than the conversations.
She told me stories about growing up during difficult times.
About falling in love with her husband, Arthur.
About losing him nearly twenty years earlier.
“I thought loneliness would get easier,” she admitted one evening while we sat on her porch.
“It doesn’t.”
I didn’t know what to say.
So I simply sat beside her.
Sometimes silence is enough.
One afternoon she asked about my family.
I hesitated.
“I don’t really have one.”
She looked at me carefully.
“Everyone has a story.”
So I told her.
About foster homes.
About moving every few months.
About birthdays nobody remembered.
About leaving the system with nothing but two trash bags and a bus ticket.
She listened without interrupting.
When I finished, she quietly reached across the table and squeezed my hand.
“No child should have to grow up believing they’re unwanted.”
It was the closest thing I’d ever had to hearing someone say they cared.
From then on, holidays changed.
Instead of eating microwave dinners alone, I spent Thanksgiving at Mrs. Rhode’s house.
Christmas too.
She insisted on buying me a sweater every year.
“They’re practical,” she’d say.
“They’re ugly,” I’d answer.
“They’re warm.”
She always won.
Years passed.
Joe’s Diner promoted me to manager.
Mrs. Rhode’s health slowly declined.
Her eyesight weakened.
Walking became more difficult.
Eventually she needed someone to organize her medications, help with paperwork, and drive her almost everywhere.
I never minded.
Neighbors occasionally asked why I spent so much time helping.
Some hinted that I expected something in return.
I ignored them.
Truthfully, somewhere along the way, she had become family.
One rainy afternoon, while sorting old photographs, she looked up suddenly.
“James.”
“Yes?”
“When I’m gone, don’t disappear.”
I frowned.
“What do you mean?”
“I mean don’t go back to believing you’re alone.”
I laughed awkwardly.
“You aren’t going anywhere.”
She smiled sadly.
“Everyone goes somewhere eventually.”
Six months later, she passed away peacefully in her sleep.
The funeral filled the little church.
People I had never met spoke about her generosity.
Her niece flew in from another state.
She barely looked at me.
Then came the will reading.
And my name…
Never appeared.
By the time I reached home, I felt foolish.
Maybe everyone had been right.
Maybe I had imagined our bond.
Maybe I had mistaken gratitude for love.
I barely slept.
Early the next morning, someone knocked on my front door.