I didn’t think five dollars could make a difference. I put a pair of baby shoes from a flea market on my son’s feet and heard a tiny crackle. That was the moment my whole life changed.
I’m Claire, 31 years old, and I work in a restaurant at night and take care of my sick mother and my three-year-old son Stan during the day. Most weeks seem like we’re walking a tightrope over a canyon: one late bill and we’re going to fall. Mason kept the house and moved in with his fiancée after the divorce. I stayed in the flat with the mold, the heater that produced noise, and the grief of what could have been.
It was so overcast on Saturday morning that it felt like the world was holding its breath. I had a crumpled five-dollar bill in my wallet and a kid whose toes were curling up against his socks. A parking lot was used for the flea market. There were old vinyl records, cardboard crates, and the smell of wet paper from someone else’s life.
My hand was warm in Stan’s. “Is it a dinosaur?” he asked with excitement.
“First, buddy, shoes,” I said softly, even though I felt bad about it.
That’s when I saw them: small brown leather shoes that weren’t too worn. The kind of shoes that make you feel silly when you’re in love. The woman selling it, who had on a knit scarf, said, “Six.”
I answered, “I only have five,” and gave her the bill as an apology.
She looked at me and nodded. “No child should have cold feet.”
Stan sat at home with his blocks and elevated his feet, appearing like a little king ready for his crown. It was if the shoes had been waiting for him. After that, there was a crackle. I pulled off the left shoe, touched the insole, and there was paper again.
I made the cushioning higher. A folded note was buried like a pulse. The writing was small and tight, and the paper was thin.
To the person who sees this:
These sneakers belonged to my son Jacob. He died of cancer when he was four. When the debts got too much for my spouse to handle, he left. Cancer couldn’t do that. Jacob never wore them because they were too fresh. There are a lot of emotional wounds in my house. If you’re reading this, please remember that he was here. Don’t forget that I was his mother. I loved him no matter what.
—Anna
The room shifted. Stan’s fingers wrapped around my leg. “Mommy?” he murmured in a quiet voice.
I said, “Just dust,” but my vision grew fuzzy anyway. The fridge produced a humming noise like it does when the flat is quiet. I laid awake with the note on my chest, feeling like someone had given me their misery and told me not to drop it.
I knew I had to find her before the light came up.
“A man brought a bag from his neighbor,” the merchant who wore a scarf said. She told me her name was Anna. It wasn’t a lot, but it was a thread. I pulled. I asked at the restaurant. I browsed through Facebook groups and obituaries until the names all started to sound the same. Anna Collins, who was in her late thirties, was living in a house that was falling down a week later.
When she opened the door, I thought for a second that anguish had a face. Eyes that look empty, hair that looks dull, and a body that is so thin that you can’t tell if someone is eating or merely living. “Yes?” she said, sounding a little scared.
I held out the note and said, “I found something that belongs to you.”
She couldn’t breathe well. She shook her fingers as she took it. “I wrote this when I thought I was…” she continued, and then she fell apart on my doorway. I reached for her without thinking. She came into my arms like a stranger and a sister at the same time.
I said, “You’re still here” in a soft voice. “That’s important.”
Then I brought coffee. The first time, she tried to return it.
“You don’t have to,” she said. “I don’t deserve friends.”
I said, “Maybe we don’t choose who cares about us.” “Maybe they just do.”
We started to walk around the block, two people and a tired sun. She told me about Jacob, how he was crazy with dinosaurs, how they had pancake Sundays, and how he called her “Supermom” even while she was crying in the bathroom with the water running. I told her about Mason and my mom and how being weary makes your shoulders feel heavy.
“You kept moving,” she said in shock once.
I told her, “Crawling counts.”
The first time she went to the children’s hospital to read to kids, she called on her way home. She was astonished and said, “One hugged me.” “He called me Auntie Anna.”
“Because you are,” I said. “To more people than you think.”
Her voice began to regain its color. She started eating again. She started buying flowers from the store and putting them in jelly jars next to her sink. One day, she came over with a modest, wrapped gift and her eyes were brighter than I’d ever seen them.
She said, “It was my grandmother’s,” when I unlocked the warm gold locket. “She told me to give it to the woman who saved me,” she said. I believed she was telling a story.
I murmured, “I didn’t save you,” and my throat hurt. “We held on to one another.”
She put the chain on my neck. “Same thing.”
When she tried to hand me a cheque for an overdue inheritance, I pushed back.
“I won’t take your money,” I said.
She stared me right in the eye. “You’re not taking. You let me love you like a family member should.
I cried so much that my ribs hurt.
Two years later, I stood in a small church with a bunch of flowers and a heart that seemed too big for my chest. Anna walked up to a man named Andrew. He was a calm, steady nurse who looked at her like he had found something very special. There was light in her face again. Not a floodlight or the bright white of denial, but the sun. The kind that keeps you toasty without dazzling you.
At the front desk, she gave me a bundle. “Claire,” she said. “Say hi to Olivia.”
Her black eyes glimpsed the world for the first time when she blinked at me. I said, “She’s great.”
Anna said, “Her name is Olivia Claire.” “After the sister I didn’t know I had.”
Sometimes, something you didn’t expect might change your life. For example, five dollars can open doors, sharing your pain can help you deal with it, and love can come back in ways you never imagined imaginable.
Today, Stan scuffs those same soft shoes on our kitchen floor. They are a little more worn and a little more ours. My mom is sleeping in the next room. There is noise coming from the heater. The fridge makes a low noise. The locket on my chest is hot when I touch it. I have a picture of Anna at the hospital on my phone. There is a dinosaur sticker on her cheek, and a little kid is sitting on her lap. We’re all still alive.
I thought I was receiving shoes. I was really buying a story that was rolled up and hidden under an insole, begging to be carried. I took it. It brought me back.
