“I’d prefer to make sure you don’t ruin the marble.”

Even now, my heart aches with shame when I remember how cruelly I spoke to him.

The old man stepped into the warm water, and almost instantly, the clear bath turned a dark, murky brown.

I took a soft sponge, and forcing myself to swallow my disgust, I began washing his right shoulder.

As years of dirt lifted away, something caught my eye.

A tiny, crescent-shaped birthmark.