The street where I raised my son, Joe, was the kind of place where everyone waved, but nobody really looked.
We had modest houses, trimmed lawns, and, at the end of the block, Mrs. Whitaker’s big white colonial home sat like a museum nobody visited.
I’d lived next door to her for almost 11 years, and ever since my husband passed away, it had been just my boy and me. In all that time, my rich neighbor had been cordial but private: a wave from the porch, a few words about the weather at the mailbox, a plate of cookies left on my step at Christmas with a note signed only “E.W.” Nothing more, nothing less.
I’d lived next door to her for almost 11 years.
Mrs. Whitaker’s sons, Richard and Daniel, came only on holidays.
They spent 15 minutes, tops, visiting. They’d park in her driveway, leave the engine running, kiss her on the cheek, check their watches, and be gone before the porch light blinked on.
That afternoon, the rain came down in sheets, and I looked through the kitchen window and saw a familiar gray hoodie crouched by my neighbor’s mailbox.
“Honey, are you here again?” I called, pulling my jacket over my head as I crossed the wet grass.
Joe glanced up.
They spent 15 minutes, tops.
My son’s hair was plastered to his forehead, and his sneakers sank into the mud. He was twisting a screwdriver into the rotted post, trying to hold the mailbox steady with one hand.
“It was tilting,” Joe said. “The mail carrier almost dropped a package yesterday.”
“Mrs. Whitaker didn’t ask,” I told him.
He wiped a streak of mud from his cheek with the back of his wrist.