She looked at me over her reading glasses.
“I called your references”,
she said. “Your former dental office boss said you once drove forty minutes to return a patient’s wallet he left in the waiting room. Your neighbor said you were watching his dog for two weeks and you wouldn’t take any money.” She crossed her hands on the table. “And you cried in a parking lot and apologized for it. People who are going to steal from you usually don’t apologize for crying.”
I didn’t know what to say. So I said, “Thank you, Mrs. Whitaker.”
“Thursday”, she said. “Nine o’clock.”
That first Thursday, I was so nervous that I arrived at 8:40 a.m. and sat in my car on the sidewalk for twenty minutes so as not to be early.
Mrs. Whitaker had left a note on the kitchen counter. It was written on thick cream-colored paper in perfect cursive.
Carly —
The supplies are under the sink. Please
