A Bowl of Soup a Day

There was no way that I would have seen a future for myself without my wife. She was the peace that gave me hope; she made our house a home. When we learned of her diagnosis, I didn't ever think that it would end with her buried in the plots we had bought together, a mountain of debt, and a home on the concrete as I moved about the city on crutches. I had spent my life working as hard as I could to give my wife the life that she deserved, and now, it takes me half an hour to shuffle down a single block. There is no home without her.

I will not beg if I can avoid it. You won't find me sitting on the ground holding a cardboard sign to tell my story, hoping that you'll drop a few coins into a cup. On the days when my wizened, stiffened knees won't work, you won't find me dragging myself along the ground. I won't plead for your sympathies. I won't ask for your help. I will make my way for as long as I can survive.

Instead, I use my crutches to spend my day reaching the resources that I need. I ignore the jeers and shouts. I am not the alcoholic or drug addict that people claim that I am. I am not the drain on society that people think of when they see people like me unhoused and wandering. I will walk through the day if that's what it takes so that I don't need to ask and plead to be seen as a human being.

It started in the summer. A young woman would watch my slow, steady commute from one center to the next. She approached me once, and asked for my name. I quietly answered her, and when she asked me how my day was going, I gave her a smile and let her know that I was above ground with a beating heart; I'd had better days in my life, but it was still a life I could claim as my own. As she put out her cigarette to return to her shift, she gave me a small touch on the shoulder before telling me to come in any time, and that she would look after me if I needed the support. I smiled at her before continuing on my way.

I never did enter the bar. That didn't stop her from reaching out to me.

Each day that she would spot me on my commute, she would come out with a sandwich and a bowl of soup. She would bring a bottle of water, sometimes a glass of juice, no matter how busy the bar was that day. She pointed out a space to leave any dishes so that she could clear them away after I'd finished eating. She placed a chair for me to eat peacefully. When I would tell her she didn't have to care for me, she would shake her head; she'd been in my position before. For a woman so young, she had suffered so much already. Not once did she ask anything more from me than to take a moment to rest with warm food.

When the snow began to fall, she would insist that I come in to warm myself; I would still refuse. She would ask how I liked my coffee or tea, and no matter how I refused, she would bring me a tray with a coffee, a tea, and sugars and creamers stuffed into the empty spaces of the tray. She would bring me a blanket and trade it with the wet, frigid blanket I had wrapped around my shoulders. The next day, she would trade the blanket again. When I would unfold the blanket, small, easy-to-carry snacks would be tucked into the folds. Sometimes I would find a pack of cigarettes tucked into the blankets; I had told her that I didn't smoke, but would sometimes sell cigarettes to others who were unhoused so that I could pick up a coffee or food. She held on to every detail I had let slip.

As the spring brought dry ground and warm skies, I noticed that her belly had begun to round. I no longer saw her outside smoking. She kept her eye on the windows regardless, ready to waddle outside after me with food and drink. Finally, a day came when she approached with a new backpack and tears in her eyes. Although she had never made more physical contact than a hand on my shoulder, she hugged me. She told me about how she would be leaving the city, returning to her home province so that she could have her child surrounded by her family. She thanked me for my company. She hoped that I would be safe, and told me that she would miss me.

When I opened the backpack, I found an empty space in one pocket for me to put my belongings. In another, there were snacks and other foods, and a water bottle that I could refill. In a smaller pocket, there was ibuprofen, several packs of cigarettes, and a handful of scratch tickets. There were gift cards to my favorite restaurants, to the local stores, and a pack of transit tickets. There were homemade meals that I could eat without needing to reheat, that I could carry with me without spoiling. Among the items she had lovingly packed, there was a letter. She wrote about her life up to that point, and the reasons that it had become necessary for her to flee.

She told me how much I reminded her of her family and how hearing how I had come to this stage of my life had torn her heart in half. She listed as many resources as she could that she thought might be able to offer me care. She told me how she wished she could afford to give me a home I could call my own so that I could rest until I could next see my wife.

I never did see her again. For all she knows, I may be sitting with my wife on our heavenly front porch steps, invigorated by the youth I had grown out of, no longer feeling the pain in my legs and spine. Without a doubt in my mind, I know that since she's returned to the city, there isn't a day when she's not scanning the streets for my slow shuffle.