His arm was around my waist.
We were both laughing.
Behind the photograph, in Thomas’s handwriting, were seven words:
“Told you I’d get you that ring.”
I sat on the floor and cried until sunset.
But I never moved back into the mansion.
I couldn’t.
The rooms were too quiet without him.
Instead, I sold it the following year.
I kept enough money to live comfortably.
Then I used a large portion of the rest to create a community fund in Thomas’s name for elderly widows and widowers struggling with housing.
His children eventually came to see me.
There were no dramatic apologies.
No hugs.
Just a long, uncomfortable conversation.
But before his daughter left, she placed Thomas’s old high school yearbook on my kitchen table.
