He never got that chance. A truck on Route 9, a rain-slick road, a Tuesday.
After the funeral, Hazel stopped eating. Then she ate too much. Then she stopped leaving the house.
Eli was the only person she allowed close. The quiet boy two houses away, her best friend since sixth grade, came by after school with her homework tucked beneath his arm.
He never knocked too hard. He never pushed her to talk.
Some afternoons, I found them sitting on the porch in silence, Hazel leaning her head against the railing while Eli drew in a notebook.
“Mrs. Mave,” he said one afternoon, glancing up at me. He had called me that since he was twelve, when he decided my first name felt too familiar and anything formal felt too distant. “She ate half a sandwich today.”
“Thank you, Eli.”
“For what?”
“For sitting with her.”
He shrugged as if it meant nothing. To him, maybe it didn’t.
