Total pages in book: 39
Estimated words: 37164 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 186(@200wpm)___ 149(@250wpm)___ 124(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 37164 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 186(@200wpm)___ 149(@250wpm)___ 124(@300wpm)
Then my mom lets go of one of her hands and reaches into her coat pocket.
My chest tightens.
I know what she’s about to do.
She pulls out the photographs, small and worn, corners softened from years of being carried, and presses them into Savannah’s palm with a certainty that makes my throat burn. This part has always been inevitable. We’ve both known it.
Savannah looks down. “It’s… photos.”
The room feels like it’s holding its breath, like everything is waiting on what happens next. I hear my mom turn toward me before I fully register the sound of my own pulse in my ears.
“Erik,” she says, gentle but firm. “I think it’s time.”
My jaw tightens. My chest feels too full, like there isn’t room for the truth and my lungs at the same time. I force a slow breath through my nose, steadying myself the way I’ve practiced for years.
“Time for what?” Savannah asks, but I can hear it in her voice. She already knows this is something big.
No one answers.
The photographs shake in her hands as she stares down at them, and I see it all at once, every year layered on top of the next. Her mom kneeling in front of me, explaining that accepting help wasn’t weakness. The first box we packed together. The way the drive grew because people believed in it. In her. In us.
I want to tell her everything.
I want to tell her how her mother changed the shape of my life. How I stayed because leaving felt like erasing something sacred.
I want to tell her so much, but this moment isn’t about what I need to say. It’s about what Savannah is ready to hear.
14
Savannah
The photograph is older than I am. Its edges have been worn soft, thinned by time and by careful hands that understood it mattered. The colors have faded into something close to sepia, as if the world itself was quieter then, less certain, more tentative.
I recognize the place immediately.
Levin’s Toys.
Not as it is now, bright and crowded and humming with December life, but smaller. Sparer. The shelves are too bare to feel festive, the space still learning what it will one day become. Behind the counter stands a younger Ruth Levin, her hair darker, her posture already sharp, her eyes already kind.
And standing in front of her
my mother.
Diane.
She’s young here, unsettlingly so, younger than I’ve ever seen her in any photograph. My mother never shared much about her childhood, and I learned early not to ask. She stands awkwardly, hands clasped in front of her as if she doesn’t know where they belong, where she belongs. Her coat looks too thin for the season, and her smile is cautious, tentative.
Ruth Levin is handing her something.
A toy.
A small stuffed bear.
The breath rushes out of me so fast it hurts, like my body understands the meaning of it before my mind can catch up. “What is this?”
“That,” Ruth says, her voice breaking softly through the quiet, “is the first Christmas your mother ever received a gift.”
I look up at her, shaking my head, the denial instinctive. “That’s not… she never, she never talked about…”
“And she never would have,” Ruth says gently as she steps closer, her gaze dropping back to the photograph so we can take it in together. “Diane grew up too fast, the way some children do when life isn’t kind to them. Christmas was inconsistent for her. Some years there was something. Some years there was nothing. Most years, there was only silence and cold.”
My fingers curl tighter around the photograph, my knuckles going white as if holding it is the only thing keeping me upright.
“My father owned the store then,” Ruth continues, eyes distant now, anchored in memory. “Your mother used to come in after school. She ever asked for anything. She never bought anything either. She just looked. She’d wander the aisles, getting lost in a dream. I started keeping small toys behind the counter. You know, small things I could wrap quickly. Quietly.”
My throat tightens.
“She never asked for anything, but she always said thank you. I think the gesture of kindness mattered more to her than the gift.” Ruth tenderly places her hand on my shoulder, squeezing it.
I press the photo to my chest, the image burning its way into me.
Erik’s mother steps closer, her voice soft but unshakable. “Your mother carried that kindness with her,” she says gently. “She carried it always, and then she passed it along.”
She places another photograph into my hands, and this one I recognize immediately. I saw it just the other night. My mother is beaming, kneeling beside a small boy clutching a red truck.
My heart stutters.
“I…” My voice breaks, and I have to stop and clear my throat before trying again. “I found this the other night. At the house. I didn’t know who it was.”