She had, I imagine, spent years watching people arrive when they wanted something and vanish when they did not.

And here was a young man who kept coming back, who brought her chocolates on days no one was paying him to, who sat with her while she slept.

Of course she wept when I left.

She was not afraid of being alone.

She was afraid that this, too, the one good and unpaid thing, might turn out to be temporary like all the rest.

It never occurred to me, in those months, that I could reassure her.