Every Thursday, at the Curb
Every Thursday morning, I’d settle into the corner booth of the café, nursing a lukewarm cappuccino and pretending to journal. It had become a quiet ritual since I’d moved to this sleepy coastal town on the edge of Oregon. Not much happened here—and that was exactly what I needed. After six noisy years in Seattle, I craved a place where the chaos couldn’t reach me.
The market opened late. The air always smelled like salt and warm bread. People minded their own business. Peace had a pulse here.
But I couldn’t stop watching them.
Every Thursday at nine sharp, a silver Ford Crown Victoria would glide to a stop across the street. The driver, always in a tweed jacket—even in August—sat tall behind the wheel. His white hair was combed neatly back, like he still had somewhere important to be.
But he never got out.
He just waited. Hands folded neatly on the steering wheel. Eyes scanning the sidewalk.
And then she’d arrive.
Slow steps. A cane. But she carried herself with a kind of grace that made time feel irrelevant. Always in a pink cardigan, always clutching a black tote. Her lips, painted the softest rose, would part into the faintest smile as she leaned into the open window, kissed him—cheek or lips, depending on the day—and whispered something that made his face bloom into a smile reserved for people who share secrets no one else will ever understand.
Then, she’d walk into the market like she hadn’t just rewired my entire morning.
I didn’t know their names. Never waved. Never said hello. Just sat there pretending to write while quietly waiting for that kiss.
It made the world feel lighter. As if love, real love, didn’t have an expiration date.
Until one Thursday… the car didn’t come.
I noticed right away. No silver glint. No blinking hazards. Just an empty curb and a cooling cappuccino between my hands. I tried to reason it away—maybe they were late. Maybe he forgot. Maybe the car broke down.
Then I saw her.
She was slower that day. Her cane tapped unevenly along the sidewalk. She stopped where the car always parked, eyes scanning the road like she’d misplaced something vital.
Or someone.
I didn’t think. I just crossed the street.
“Ma’am?” I said gently. “Are you alright? Do you need help?”
She turned, her gaze landing fully on me—eyes more water than blue.
“He passed on Monday,” she said softly. Like it was a line she’d practiced, the only one she could trust herself to say.
I had no words. But I offered to walk her to the market. Just that day.
She nodded, her hand light on my arm—like holding too tight might cause the memory to slip away.
Her name was Lillian. She was eighty-six. Widowed once before. She’d met Frank—the Frank—at a library event fifteen years ago. They never married.
“Didn’t see the need,” she said with a smile. “But every Thursday, he’d drive me to the market and wait like a gentleman.”
I asked what she used to whisper through the window.
“Oh, nothing serious,” she said. “Just told him what I was going to buy. He always guessed something ridiculous. Caviar. Fireworks.”
That day, she taught me how to pick ripe plums. She told me the butcher never remembered her name but always called her darlin’.
I thought it was just a sweet, fleeting moment. Something to write about.
But the next Thursday, I parked my car in his old spot. Hazards blinking.
I didn’t plan it. Maybe it was instinct. Maybe it was the way she’d looked at that empty curb. Maybe I just didn’t want the story to end there.
She stepped onto the sidewalk, pink cardigan fluttering in the breeze. And when she saw me, she laughed.
“You even parked crooked,” she said. “Just like him.”
We walked together. It wasn’t the same—I wasn’t Frank, and she wasn’t kissing anyone—but it became ours.
A new ritual.
She told me stories about rooftop dances in Boston, almost-moves to Paris, and a soldier who changed her plans. She spoke about love not as something permanent, but something rhythmic. “You just have to know when to catch the beat,” she said.
I shared my story too. How I’d left a job that crushed me. How I got out of a relationship that muted my joy. How I felt like I’d been floating, untethered.
“You’re grounded now,” she told me one Thursday, holding a bunch of daisies like they were pirate gold. “You just didn’t notice when it happened.”
She started calling me kid, even though I was thirty-three.
“I’ve got a grandson older than you,” she’d joke. “But he doesn’t know the first thing about plums.”
One day, I asked why she didn’t just call a cab.
She shrugged. “We all wait for something that feels familiar. Even when it’s gone.”
Eventually, I started driving her more places. Her book club. Doctor’s appointments. Her favorite diner—the one with a jukebox that only worked if you hit it twice.
I wasn’t replacing Frank. I couldn’t. But I was showing up. And she was letting me.
One day, she handed me a folded letter.
“If I forget, or if I go first, give this to him,” she said.
“To who?”
“To the man who parks for you.”
I laughed nervously. “I don’t think there’s going to be—”
“You don’t get to decide when someone parks for you,” she said, tapping my hand with her cane. “But when they do, notice it. And leave the hazards on.”
It’s been a year.
Every Thursday, I still park in that spot. Hazards blinking.
Some weeks, Lillian doesn’t feel up to the walk, but I go anyway. I bring her groceries. I sit with her. I’ve met her grandson—Grant. He works in software in Minneapolis. Blushes when she calls him out for forgetting her birthday.
We’ve gone out a few times, actually.
Once, he said to me, “I haven’t seen her smile like that in years. I think you brought something back.”
But I didn’t.
I just waited at the curb.
And now, every Thursday, she waits for me.
If this story touched you, if it reminded you of someone you love or miss—share it. Maybe someone out there needs to remember that love doesn’t vanish. Sometimes, it just changes cars.
