Leo, my son, has the kindest heart of anyone I know.
He notices the small things—the ones most people overlook. So when he overheard our elderly neighbor, Mrs. Patterson, casually mentioning her upcoming birthday to the mailman, he turned to me with urgency in his eyes.
“We have to do something for her,” he insisted.
I hesitated. We weren’t particularly close to Mrs. Patterson. She mostly kept to herself, and I wasn’t sure if she’d even want a surprise. But Leo was resolute. “Mom, everyone deserves a birthday cake.”
We baked as a result. A straightforward chocolate cake, a little off-center yet lovingly made. Leo created a birthday card and decorated it with stick figures of the three of us and a beautiful sun. We knocked on her door right before dinner.
Initially, there was no answer. Leo looked dissatisfied and shuffled. However, the door creaked open just as we were ready to turn around. Mrs. Patterson’s big glasses looked at us.
Leo smiled. Exclaiming, “Happy Birthday!” he held up the cake.
For a while, she just gazed. Then her eyes filled with tears.
She took the cake with shaking hands, holding on to it as though it were the most valuable gift she had ever received.
“You’re not understanding… I haven’t had a birthday cake like this in more than 40 years.
“Birthdays simply ceased being important when my hubby passed away. I reasoned that perhaps I shouldn’t recall if no one else did.
I got a lump in my throat. We had never realized how lonely she was, even though she had lived a few feet away from us for years. How many times had I seen her, always courteous but aloof, in her little yard? Nevertheless, she was there—always had been.
Leo, in his sweet way, didn’t dwell on the sadness. He took her hand, his small fingers wrapping around her wrinkled palm. “Well, you have to matter now. Because we’re your birthday people.”
That night, she invited us in. Her home was tidy but sparse, as if she had stopped decorating long ago. A single, faded photo of a younger Mrs. Patterson and a man I assumed was her late husband rested on the mantel.
We placed the cake on her table, and she lit a simple candle she had tucked away. She closed her eyes before blowing it out.
After that, everything was different.
In the mornings, Mrs. Patterson started to wave from her porch. Leo said that the cookies she made for us one evening were “the best cookies ever.” She told us about her background, including falling in love and her son who had moved away and hardly contacted, in exchange for our more frequent check-ins.
Then the unexpected turn of events occurred.
Leo was so excited that he rushed home from school one afternoon. “Mom! My school assignment involves conducting an interview with a person from a different generation. Can Mrs. Patterson be the subject of mine?
I grinned. “I believe she would adore that.”
Leo listened intently to everything she said, cherishing her tales. I had never seen her so enthusiastic in my life.
My phone rang out of the blue a week later.
“Mrs. Patterson?” I replied.
Her voice shook with anticipation. “I got a call from my son today.”
He viewed Leo’s interview, which his teacher had uploaded to the internet. He discovered it after it was circulated on social media. He dialed. He admitted to me that he was unaware of the passage of time. He desires to come visit.
Her voice cracked with passion.
Her son came a week later. With gray strands in his hair, he appeared uncertain as he got out of the automobile. Years of separation vanished as soon as he saw his mother, though, and they just hugged each other.
Mrs. Patterson didn’t require a surprise the next year. Together with her kid and us, she organized her small birthday celebration. After that, we celebrated together annually, becoming more than just neighbors but more like family.