Chapter 2 - The Mother on the Curb
The woman stood by the open door of the minivan, clutching a faded canvas purse to her chest. She looked as though she hadn't slept in weeks. Her hair was pulled back into a hasty, messy bun, and her oversized cardigan swallowed her thin frame. But the moment her gaze locked onto Jane, her entire face softened with an expression of profound, tearful reverence.
""Jane,"" the woman called out softly across the manicured lawn.
Jane turned around quickly, wiping the dampness from her cheeks with the sleeve of my oversized hoodie. ""Sarah... what are you doing here? You should be home resting.""
""I couldn't sleep,"" the woman named Sarah said, walking slowly up our paved driveway. She glanced briefly at me, offering a polite, subdued nod before looking down at the hundreds of blooms blanketing our porch. ""I see the delivery driver actually managed to get all of them here. I was worried they wouldn't fit.""
I stood entirely frozen, my hand hovering awkwardly by my side. ""You... you sent these?""
Sarah looked at me, realizing who I was. ""You must be Mark. Jane talked about you often. Yes, I ordered them. Well, not just me. The families of the entire pediatric oncology unit pooled money together. The nurses chipped in. Even the hospital janitors put money into the envelope.""
""Why?"" I asked, my voice cracking under the sheer absurdity and weight of the situation. ""Why so many?""
""Because your wife is an angel on earth, Mr. Miller,"" Sarah said, a tear finally escaping her lower eyelid and tracing a quiet path down her cheek. ""When Toby's tumor returned in February, his school told us he had to be unenrolled. They said they couldn't accommodate a child who spent five days a week hooked up to an IV drip. They basically threw his education away and treated him like he was already gone.""
Sarah took another step closer, reaching out to grasp Jane’s hands. Jane didn't pull away; she gripped the grieving mother's fingers tightly, as if anchoring her to the ground.
""Jane found out,"" Sarah continued, looking directly at me so I couldn't look away. ""She’s not even his school district teacher. She heard about Toby through a mutual friend at the church community center. For six straight months, three days a week after finishing her normal school shift, she drove forty miles to the children's wing. She brought books. She brought science experiments. She brought art supplies. She taught my son how to read chapter books while chemotherapy burned through his veins.""
My stomach lurched with sudden, violent nausea. Not from disgust, but from shame. Pure, unadulterated shame.
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I thought about the last six months. I remembered coming home from Chicago, complaining that the house felt messy. I remembered grumbling that dinner wasn't on the table because I had been in meetings all day. I remembered asking her why she seemed so exhausted and emotionally disconnected, secretly wondering if she had fallen out of love with me or had started texting an old college boyfriend.
""Toby made a pact with the other kids on the floor,"" Sarah said, her voice dropping to a fragile hush. ""He told them that when he turned eight, he was going to buy Mrs. Miller one hundred roses because she made him feel like a normal little boy instead of a hospital room patient. He didn't make it to eight. His birthday would have been next Tuesday. So the ward decided that Toby’s promise wasn't going to die with him.""
