My name is Greta, and I am 30 years old. I live in a quiet neighborhood on the edge of town, where the streets become empty soon after sunset, and most people know the names of everyone within three houses of their own.
It was the kind of place where nothing dramatic ever seemed to happen.
At least, that was what I had always believed.
My next-door neighbor, Dorothy, was an 83-year-old widow who had lived in the same pale yellow house for as long as I could remember.
Her husband had passed away more than a decade earlier, and they had never had children. After his death, Dorothy rarely traveled farther than the grocery store, the pharmacy, or the little church on the corner.
She was more than a neighbor to me.
When I was a child, Dorothy often helped my mother look after me. She watched me when my mother worked late, made grilled cheese sandwiches when I refused to eat anything else, and sat beside me during thunderstorms because I was terrified of the sound.
“You count the seconds after the lightning,” she used to tell me. “That way, the thunder doesn’t get to surprise you.”
Even after I became an adult, Dorothy still treated me like the little girl who used to run through her kitchen with scraped knees and tangled hair.
“Greta, you’re too thin,” she would say whenever I visited. “Sit down. I have soup.”
“I came to bring you groceries,” I would remind her.
“And I am trying to keep you alive,” she would reply.
As she grew older, I began returning the kindness she had shown me. I brought groceries, cleaned the rooms she struggled to manage, took out her trash, and checked on her several times a week.
Dorothy hated admitting that she needed help.
“I can still carry my own laundry,” she insisted one afternoon as I took the basket from her hands.
“You nearly tripped over the rug last week.”
“That rug has always had a personal grudge against me.”
“Then let me protect you from it.”
She gave me a look of exaggerated annoyance, but I saw the gratitude behind it.
Our routine continued for years.
I visited after work, usually carrying a bag of groceries or a container of something I had cooked. Sometimes we talked for an hour. Other times, Dorothy complained about her knees while I wiped down the kitchen counters.
Then, a month ago, everything changed.
I had stopped by on a Tuesday evening with bread, fruit, and the tea she liked. Dorothy opened the door only halfway.
That alone surprised me. She usually invited me inside before I had both feet on the porch.
“I brought your groceries,” I said, lifting the bag slightly.
She glanced over her shoulder before looking back at me.
“You didn’t have to do that.”
“I always do.”
Dorothy hesitated.
There was color in her cheeks, and her gray hair looked freshly brushed.
Then she smiled in a way I had not seen before.
“You don’t need to visit anymore,” she told me. “I have Alex now.”
I stared at her. “Who is Alex?”
Her smile widened.
“He’s a delivery driver. He brought me a package one day, and we fell in love.”
For a moment, I waited for her to laugh.
Dorothy had a dry sense of humor and occasionally enjoyed saying outrageous things just to watch me react. I assumed this was another one of those moments.
“Very funny,” I said.
“I’m not joking, Greta.”
“Dorothy, what do you mean you fell in love?”
She straightened her shoulders. “Exactly what I said.”
“How old is he?”
“Old enough.”
That answer made something tighten in my stomach.
Before I could ask anything else, she reached for the grocery bag.
“Thank you, Greta. Alex will help me put these away.”
The door closed before I could respond.
I stood on the porch for several seconds, confused and slightly embarrassed. Part of me wondered whether I had insulted her by questioning her. Dorothy was elderly, but she was not helpless. She had every right to make her own decisions.
Still, something about the conversation bothered me.
Two days later, I saw Alex for the first time.
I was leaving for work when Dorothy’s front door opened. A young man stepped outside and pulled the door shut behind him.
He looked about 20 years old.
He wore faded jeans, a plain gray sweatshirt, and worn sneakers. His dark hair was messy, and his thin frame made him look even younger. He did not resemble a charming con man from some crime show. He looked like an ordinary young man barely making a living.
When he noticed me watching, he paused.
“Good morning,” he said.
“Morning.”
His eyes moved toward my house, then back to me.
“You must be Greta.”
The fact that he knew my name unsettled me.
“And you’re Alex.”
He nodded.
“How is Dorothy?” I asked.
“She’s good.”
“I haven’t seen her outside lately.”
“She’s been tired.”
His tone remained polite, but there was something guarded about him. Before I could continue, he walked toward an old car parked near the curb and drove away.
Over the next two weeks, I never saw Dorothy outside.
Not once.
I saw Alex coming and going almost every day.
Sometimes he arrived in the morning and stayed for hours. Other times, his car remained in Dorothy’s driveway overnight.
Soon, he was letting himself into her house with his own key.
Each time I saw him unlock the door, my concern grew.
I tried to tell myself that Dorothy was happy. Maybe she enjoyed the attention. Maybe Alex helped with the chores I had once done. Maybe I was being judgmental because of the age difference.
But Dorothy had stopped calling me.
She no longer waved from the window or came outside to check her mailbox. Whenever I called her, she ignored the phone.
Instead, she sent short messages.
“I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.”
The first time, I accepted it.
The second time, I stared at the words for several minutes.
Dorothy usually wrote long messages full of unnecessary details. She added greetings, questions, and reminders that I should wear a coat. She never wrote like that.
I called again.
No answer.
A few minutes later, another message appeared.
“I’m fine. Don’t worry about me.”
It was exactly the same.
Something about those messages didn’t feel right.
Then, one afternoon, a package meant for Dorothy was delivered to my porch.
I picked it up and carried it next door.
I knocked several times, but no one answered.
“Dorothy?” I called. “It’s Greta.”
Silence.
I knocked harder.
Still nothing.
Growing increasingly worried, I went home and retrieved the emergency key Dorothy had given me years earlier.
My hands shook as I unlocked her door.
The house was perfectly clean.
Too clean.
There were no dirty dishes, no newspapers on the table, and no blanket draped over Dorothy’s chair.
Everything looked arranged and untouched.
Neither Dorothy nor Alex was anywhere to be found.
“Dorothy?” I called again.
Then I heard it.
A faint knocking sound coming from the basement.
My blood ran cold, and I rushed down the stairs.
The knocking came again as I reached the bottom step.
“Dorothy?” I shouted.
A weak voice answered from behind the storage-room door.
“Greta?”
I rushed across the basement and grabbed the handle. It would not turn.
“I’m here,” I said. “Step away from the door.”
I threw my shoulder against it once, then twice. The old wood groaned but held. On the third attempt, the latch tore free, and the door flew inward.
Dorothy sat on the floor beside a stack of cardboard boxes. Her face was pale, and one hand rested against her ankle. An overturned wooden stool lay nearby.
“Oh, my God.”
I dropped beside her. “Are you hurt?”
“My ankle,” she whispered. “I fell when I tried to reach that top shelf. The door swung shut, and the lock jammed.”
“How long have you been down here?”
“Perhaps an hour.”
Anger and relief crashed through me at once.
“Where is Alex?”
“He went to the pharmacy.”
“And he left you alone?”
Dorothy frowned. “He didn’t know I came down here.”
I helped her sit more comfortably, then pulled out my phone. Before I could call for an ambulance, the front door slammed upstairs.
“Dorothy?” Alex yelled.
His footsteps pounded through the house.
When he appeared at the bottom of the stairs, his face went white. A paper pharmacy bag slipped from his hand.
“What happened?”
“You left an 83-year-old woman alone in a house where she could fall,” I snapped.
He stared at Dorothy, then rushed toward us.
“I was gone for 20 minutes.”
“That was enough.”
“Greta,” Dorothy warned.
Alex knelt beside her. His hands trembled as he checked her ankle.
“I’m so sorry,” he said. “I should have told you not to come down here.”
“You did tell me,” Dorothy admitted. “Several times.”
He closed his eyes briefly, as though blaming himself anyway.
I called for help. While we waited, Alex placed a folded blanket beneath Dorothy’s leg and spoke to her in a quiet, steady voice.
“Stay with me, Dot. The paramedics are coming.”
“I am not dying,” she muttered.
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