When they ask about the framed money, I tell them the truth.
I tell them that a long time ago, on the worst night of my life, I spent my last ten dollars on a stranger, and I thought it was the stupidest thing I ever did.
I tell them it turned out to be the smartest.
And then, because they are fourteen and they always ask, they want to know what the man’s name was.
And every single time, it undoes me a little, in the best way, to get to say it out loud in a bright room full of kids who are going to be okay.
“His name,” I tell them, “was Samuel.”
“And he was not who I thought he was at all.”
May you like
“He was better.”
THE END
