The Sunday Chair
The next Sunday, Wade came back.
No gifts this time. No parade of motorcycles. No loud engines.
Just Wade, one folding chair, a thermos of coffee, and a paperback book.
He sat outside the fence at half past one and waited.
Lila came out twenty minutes later.
She stood far away at first.
Wade didn’t push her. He didn’t ask personal questions. He simply opened his book and began reading quietly.
After nearly an hour, Lila stepped closer.
“What book is that?” she asked.
Wade looked up.
“A story about a girl who finds a place where she belongs,” he said. “Want to hear a little?”
Lila nodded.
So he read through the fence.
The cold wind moved across the yard. Children’s voices drifted from inside the building. But Lila sat down in the grass and listened.
From that Sunday on, Wade returned every week.
Rain, cold, wind, or sun — he came.
By spring, Lila was waiting for him before he arrived.
By summer, she was sitting beside the fence with a book of her own.
