Theresa opened the door before my hand could fall from it.
“I suppose you came to admire the mud.”
“I heard it was exceptional,” I replied.
We sat together listening to rain drum against the gutters.
That quiet morning finally revealed something I should have understood years earlier.
I had never come because the lawn needed mowing.
Still, neither of us ever said it aloud.
Three weeks ago, Olive walked next door early one morning to borrow Theresa’s chicken pot pie recipe.
Only minutes later, she called me from Theresa’s kitchen.
Theresa was sitting peacefully in her favorite chair.
She had passed away sometime during the night.
There had been no warning.
No lingering illness.
Her heart had simply stopped between turning off the porch light and sunrise.
The following Saturday, I stood behind my mower while silence filled her yard.
Roger walked outside carrying a small plastic cup.
“Miss Theresa’s flowers need water, Daddy,” he said.
Together we crossed the driveway.
Fanny watered the two sunflowers.
Olive stood quietly on the porch holding a pie she had baked out of habit.
None of us knew where it belonged.
At the funeral, Theresa’s distant relatives occupied the front rows.
They were kind enough.
They knew where she had been born and the year she married Harold.
But when the minister spoke about her laughter, they lowered their eyes to the programs in their hands.
I knew that laugh.
I knew she claimed cinnamon belonged in coffee only because Harold loved it.
I knew she always read the final page of every mystery novel before the first.
I knew she saved the pie crust until the very last bite.
By law, I was simply the neighbor next door.
After the burial, Olive led the children toward the car while I remained beside Theresa’s grave, staring at a small bouquet of sunflowers.
A man in a dark suit walked over.
“Justin?”
“Yes.”
“I’m Mr. Thorne. I handled Theresa’s affairs.”
He reached inside his coat and handed me a sealed cream-colored envelope.
My name was written across it in Theresa’s neat handwriting.
As it settled into my hand, something small and solid shifted inside.
I looked at him.
“What is this?”
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