The Man I Married
I drove home with the envelope sitting in the passenger seat like it might disappear if I looked away. When I pulled into our driveway, Lydia was in the kitchen making sandwiches for the kids’ lunches. She looked up when I came in, and I guess something in my face worried her because she put down the knife right away.
“Ross, what’s wrong? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I handed her the envelope without saying anything. She pulled out the check, looked at it, and her hand flew up to cover her mouth.
“Oh my God,” she whispered. “Ross, what is this? Where did this come from?”
So I told her everything. About the woman and her sleeping boy, the four dollars, and about how she’d looked so desperate and tired. Lydia read the note twice, then set it down on the counter and looked at me with tears in her eyes.
“Ross, you have to go on Sunday,” she said firmly. “And honey, I need you to hear me. I’m so proud of you. What you did for that woman, not expecting anything back, just being decent when she needed it most... that’s who you are. That’s the man I married.”
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“I didn’t do it for this, Lydia. I didn’t want anything back.”
“I know you didn’t,” she said, pulling me into a hug. “That’s exactly why you deserve it.”
