The Blue and Yellow House

I never missed a day walking past the blue and yellow house on Sycamore Lane. From the day I started kindergarten, holding my lunchbox with nervous hands, to the last morning I walked to high school graduation, that house was always there. Faded blue paint, bright yellow shutters, and a porch swing that creaked in the morning breeze. But more than the house, it was Ms. Geneva who made it feel like something out of a dream.

She was an elderly Black woman, tall and graceful, with long straight white hair that flowed down her back like silk. She wore all white, every single day. Loose-fitting blouses, long skirts, soft shawls. Her presence felt peaceful, like quiet music you didn’t realize was playing until it stopped.

Every morning she’d be out on that porch swing when I passed. It started in kindergarten. I was shy and small, afraid of the older kids. She greeted me with a soft “Good morning, baby” and a kind smile. Some mornings she handed me a slice of orange or a cup of juice in a paper cup. Over time, I stopped just walking by. I started to sit beside her.

We’d talk before school. Sometimes just five minutes, sometimes longer if I was early. She never rushed me. We talked about whatever was on my mind. Dreams I had. Arguments at home. Books I read in class. She listened like everything I said mattered. Sometimes she’d tell me stories from her life. Other times, she’d hum as we rocked together on the swing.

As I got older, our mornings became our routine. Some days I brought her little things from school. A flower I’d drawn. A bookmark I made. She always acted like it was the best gift she’d ever received. There was something about her that made the world feel slower and softer.

I spent years sitting on that porch. She watched me grow up. When I got my first bad grade, I cried on her swing. When my parents fought loud enough for the neighbors to hear, she made me laugh until I forgot why I was upset. When I started getting college letters in the mail, she was the first person I told.

The morning I left for college, she handed me a folded note. “Don’t forget to look up,” it read. “The sky is always waiting.”

When I came back four years later, the house wasn’t the same. The blue had turned dull. The yellow shutters were peeling. The porch swing was broken, one chain snapped. The grass had grown high, covering the flower beds. Vines covered the windows. It looked like no one had been there in years.

I went straight home, confused. I asked my parents what happened to Ms. Geneva.

They exchanged glances. My mother finally said, gently, “Sweetheart, that house has been empty for a long time. No one has lived there since the original owner passed away. That was over thirty years ago.”

I shook my head. “No. She lived there. Every morning. I sat on that porch swing with her. She gave me fruit. Juice. We talked. She was real.”

But my father was shaking his head. “That house has been boarded up since before you were born.”

I ran up to my room, tore through old notebooks and photo albums. Nothing. No photos of her. Not a single mention of her in my journals, which I used to write in every night. I searched online. Nothing. It was like she never existed.

Except I still had the note. The one she gave me the morning I left. It was in the desk drawer where I had kept it for years. Still folded. Still smelling faintly like oranges. “Don’t forget to look up.”

That night, I went back. The gate creaked when I opened it. The porch groaned beneath my feet. The swing was gone, but I stood where it had been. The air smelled sweet, like it used to. Like citrus and something old. I closed my eyes.

I could hear it. The soft creak of the swing. The rustle of her skirt. The way she sighed before telling a story. My heart beat louder than the crickets.

I don’t know what Ms. Geneva was. A spirit. A dream. A memory passed down in my bones. Maybe she was never real in the way the world demands proof. But I knew her. I remember her voice, her laughter, the warmth of her hands. She gave me comfort. She made me feel seen.

And every time I walk past that house, I still look up. Just in case.