For twenty years, my mother made sure the homeless boy living behind our house never went hungry. After her funeral, he took both my hands in his and told me, “Before she d:ie:d, she BEGGED ME TO KEEP HER SECRET FROM YOU.”

Mom’s face was engulfed in such a sudden fury that I instantly stopped crying out of pure shock.

“Never say that about Gabriel again, and never make me hear it ever again,” Mom snapped sternly.

She left through the back door with the pie, leaving me alone in our dim kitchen, feeling ashamed, furious, and entirely certain that Gabriel had replaced me in her heart.

After that terrible afternoon, I hated him with the intense focus only a heartbroken child can manage.

Whenever I walked past the dump after school, Gabriel tried waving at me to show friendliness. Once, he carved me a small wooden songbird and offered it to me with a shy smile.

I deliberately dropped the wooden bird beside his worn shoes and kept my head held high.

“You do not have to like me,” Gabriel said softly as he picked up the carving. “But your mother worries whenever you walk too close to traffic after school.”