She said nothing.
The following afternoon, I was sitting in the grocery store café nursing another cheap coffee when Evelyn appeared beside my table.
“You again.”
I looked up, embarrassed. “Small town.”
She held up two paper bags. “I bought too much soup.”
I knew immediately that she was lying.
Still, I took the food.
That was how it began.
Evelyn lived in a modest two-story house about ten minutes away, on a street lined with maple trees and trimmed hedges. It was not a mansion, but to me it looked like paradise. The porch was painted white. The kitchen always smelled faintly of cinnamon and coffee. There was a fireplace in the living room and framed photographs covering almost every shelf.
Her husband, Thomas, had died eight years earlier.
They had never had children.
Her niece lived in another state and visited twice a year.
At first, Evelyn asked me to do small jobs around the property. Clean the gutters. Replace a broken porch board. Carry boxes down from the attic. She always paid more than I asked, and she always insisted that I stay for dinner.
I learned quickly that she hated eating alone.
One evening, after I repaired the kitchen faucet, she placed a plate of roast chicken in front of me and sat across the table.
“You don’t have to keep pretending.”
My fork stopped halfway to my mouth.
“Pretending what?”
“That you have somewhere to go afterward.”
