There are no words to convey how much I loved my husband, Elias. We met when he was 52 and I was 39. He was nice and caring, and he made you feel like you mattered. We fell in love swiftly and deeply, and we got married within a year. Life seemed great.
But a few years later, everything shifted. Elias was told that he had stage 4 pancreatic cancer.
For two years, I took care of him all the time. I bathed him, fed him, and sat next to him through every wave of pain, holding his hand through the worst of it. Jordan and Maya, his kids, didn’t come around very much. They just did it for a short period. They would say, “This is too hard to see Dad like this.” And it could have been. But I stayed because I loved him. I couldn’t imagine not being there for him.
Elias was gone one day.
The next morning, Jordan and Maya came to our house, which was the same one that Elias and I had lived in. No hugs, no comforting words. “Dad left the house to us,” said a voice with cold eyes. We’re throwing it away. You have until the end of the week to go.
I couldn’t believe it. No room for sadness. They didn’t get what I had been through with their dad. Just cheating.
Four days later, I was at the end of the driveway with two big bags. There was more than just clothes in each one. They contained memories, pain, and the burden of being abandoned by people who should have cared.
I didn’t have a place to go. No plan. I felt pain in my heart.
My phone rang after that. Someone I don’t know sent me a text that said, “Check the Fremont storage unit.” 112th locker. Elias wants you to have it.
I read the message and wasn’t sure if it was a nasty joke. But a voice inside me told me to keep going.
When I got to the building, the manager looked at my ID and gave me a key. He smiled knowingly and said, “Now you own locker 112.”
My hands shook as I opened the door. There was a little chamber inside with sealed boxes, a wooden chest, and a pile of letters that were all for me.
Elias had planned for this.
He knew what was going to happen. He knew how his kids would treat me. He made sure I was okay in his calm, caring way.
The letters said how much he loved me, how sad he was, and what he wanted for me. There was a box with a lot of jewels in it, maybe from his dead wife. The biggest diamond ring I had ever seen was inside the chest, nestled in a soft purple casing.
There were also several papers. Three vacation homes in different locations of the country. It’s all mine.
I cried.
Elias loved more than only me. He had protected me even after he died.
A few months later, I moved into one of those homes in the Colorado Rockies, which was a tranquil place to get away from it all. I slowly rebuilt my life, surrounded by the peaceful beauty of nature and the memory of a man who always loved me.
Elias’s kids may have kicked me out of the house we shared, but they couldn’t change the fact that we were together. Real love leaves more than simply possessions behind. It leaves behind a legacy, safety, and peace.
And I finally got all three.