At first, the requests seemed harmless.
A pickle jar she couldn’t open.
A smoke detector battery she couldn’t reach.
A cabinet handle that had come loose.
Then she needed a shelf moved.
Two days later, she wanted it moved back.
Irvin was naturally helpful.
He was the kind of person who stopped for stranded drivers and carried groceries for elderly neighbors without being asked.
To him, Vanessa was simply someone adjusting to life alone.
To me, it looked different.
I noticed the way she watched him.
One afternoon, I was carrying a casserole into her kitchen while Irvin tightened a cabinet hinge.
Vanessa looked at his arms and smiled.
“Look at those forearms. Claire is the luckiest woman on the street. Though I bet she’s too busy with all that baking to notice.”
I ran a small bakery from our converted garage.
I had spent six years building that business from nothing.
