Nobody told Rosa Delgado what the check was.

She thought it was a gift. Everyone in that living room thought it was a gift, including me, including — I have to believe — my grandmother, who was a formidable woman and not a tax attorney.

Rosa deposited five million dollars, paid off her brother’s truck, bought a two-bedroom in Athmar Park with a lemon tree in a pot on the back step, and went on cleaning three other houses because she liked the work and did not know what else to do with a Tuesday.

Fourteen months later she got a letter.

A distribution from an employer’s trust to a long-serving employee is not, in the eyes of the Internal Revenue Service, a gift. It is compensation for services.

It is ordinary income. It is subject to federal tax, state tax, and — because it is compensation — self-employment tax on top.