The Parking Ticket

Two hundred dollars. Erin stared at the gleaming orange slip taped to her windshield wiper as though it would somehow transform if she glared hard enough. But no, still two hundred f**king dollars for parking violations.

"Mommy, what's that paper?" Lily trotted alongside her, balancing a half-melted popsicle already dripping purple on her shirt.

"Nothing baby, just grown-up stuff." Erin crumpled the ticket and shoved it in her back pocket. Two hundred dollars might as well have been two million. She had exactly thirty-seven dollars in her checking account and rent was due in five days.

The third ticket within two weeks. All because of the same thing; parking her dented Honda in front of the big house at the end of their street. The one with the beautiful lawn and the man who had probably spent more on his sprinkler system than Erin made in three months working at the diner.

"Can we play outside when we get home?" Lily asked, skipping ahead toward their apartment complex.

"Okay sweetie." Erin watched her braids bouncing as she sprinted. At least one of them was happy.

But later that night, after Lily was asleep, Erin sat at her kitchen table with the three tickets spread out before her. All with the same address. All turned in by someone named "T. Keller, 1247 Elm Street." The fancy house guy.

She'd been there for months with no problem. Her own building barely had room enough to park half the residents there, so she'd started parking in the street outside the nicer houses. Nobody had ever given it a second glance, until two weeks ago.

Erin whipped out her laptop and verified the address. Yes, a ginormous two-story colonial with a circular driveway and one of those pesky decorative mailboxes that probably cost more than her car. The Google Street View showed impeccable hedges and no weeds in sight.

"A-hole," she muttered, and then felt bad because Lily was sleeping in the next room and she was trying so hard to cuss less.

The following morning after leaving Lily at daycare, Erin drove straight to 1247 Elm Street instead of going to work. She'd called in sick; which wasn't technically a lie because the stress had caused an upset stomach.

She pulled right up to the house and walked up the brick walkway. The doorbell played some classical tune that lasted like a full fifteen seconds.

A man in his sixties answered, wearing clean khakis and a polo shirt that had clearly never heard the washing machine. His silver hair was perfectly styled and he wore one of those high-end mustaches that rich guys always have.

"Can I help you?" he inquired, addressing Erin as if she were a door-to-door salesman.

"Yeah, you can help me." Erin produced the wrinkled tickets from her pocket. "Thomas Keller, right? You're the one who's been issuing parking violations on my vehicle."

His complexion paled. "I… how did you…"

"It's right there on the ticket, genius. Listen, I don't know what your problem is that I parked on a public road, but I couldn't afford these tickets. I'm a single mother working double shifts just to get the rent paid, and you're out here calling up the police because you don't want to have to see my car?"

Thomas stepped back. "Please, let me explain--"

"Explain what? Poor people can't live in your neighborhood? My old Honda's depressing your property values?"

"No, no, that's not -- come on inside. I need to tell you something"

Erin froze where she stood. This wasn't going the way she'd predicted. She'd thought he’d be defensive, perhaps tell her to get out. She hadn't predicted him looking guilty and ashamed.

"I'm not going with you. Just tell me why you're doing this over and over."

Thomas glanced back over his shoulder at his house, and then he stepped outside and closed the door behind him. "It's about my wife. Ellen. She's… she's dying."

Some of Erin's anger seeped out, but she still didn't move. "I'm sorry, but that doesn't tell me--"

"She has pancreatic cancer. The doctors say perhaps a month." His voice cracked slightly. "For the past year, she's been too weak to go outside. Mostly she just sits by the window in our front room. That's where she passes her days now."

Erin shifted uncomfortably. This discussion was going somewhere she hadn't expected.

"Three months or so ago, she started talking about this little girl who played outside every afternoon at four o'clock. Your daughter, I assume. Ellen would park her chair just so so she could watch her. She'd tell me about the girl dancing around on the sidewalk, or doing cartwheels, or just sitting and drawing with chalk."

"Lily," Erin whispered.

"Ellen started calling her 'her little sunshine.' She'd wait all day till four o'clock. It was the only thing that could get her to smile anymore."

"Oh God!" Erin exclaimed.

"Two weeks ago you stopped parking there. I watched Ellen stand at the window, but the little girl never came. Ellen would ask me every day if I had seen her. She was so scared something had happened."

"My car got towed," Erin replied. "I couldn't pay to get it unstuck for a week, and then when I could, I started parking closer to home because…" She trailed off.

"Because parking tickets are expensive and you couldn't risk it."

"Yeah."

Thomas rubbed a hand through his sleek hair. "I thought… I know this is ridiculous, but I thought that if I reported violations each time I saw your car somewhere else, you'd be forced to come back to parking here. I know it's foolish, but I was desperate. Ellen is inquiring after her little sunshine, and I didn't know what else to do."

Erin glared at him. "You've been giving me tickets to have me park here so that your wife can watch my daughter play?"

"I know how it sounds. I know it was wrong. I was going to pay the tickets myself, I just-- I didn't know how to go about it without seeming some creep old man. Ellen doesn't have much time left, and watching Lily was the only joy she had."

Erin felt a tear rising and blinked it away. "Why didn't you just ask me?"

"Would you have believed me? Some guy coming up to you and telling you his dying wife enjoys watching your child?"

He was right. If some rich man had come up to her with that story, she would have suspected he was lying or something a lot worse.

" Is she really dying?"

Thomas nodded. "Pancreatic cancer. Stage four. We learned about it ten months ago."

Erin gazed at the house, picturing some woman sitting in the window, hoping to catch a glimpse of a little girl who never appeared. "I can't pay for these tickets. I work at a diner and only make enough to cover rent and daycare."

"I'll pay them. All of them. And I'll pay you, if you'd be willing to take Lily by every now and then. Not daily, just… when you can. Ellen doesn't know I've been doing this. She thinks you stopped visiting."

"You'd pay me to let my daughter play on the sidewalk?"

"I'd pay you because I'm asking you to go out of your way for a dying woman who just wants to see a child be happy. And because I already had you shell out cash with my harebrained plan."

Erin thought about it. It made her feel odd, but somehow nice in a perverse sort of way. "How long does she have?"

"The doctors estimate weeks. Maybe a month if we're really fortunate."

"And does she actually get enjoyment out of watching Lily?"

"She lights up when she sees her. Yesterday she told me that she thinks Lily's going to be a dancer from the way she dances when she's joyful."

Erin smiled despite herself. Lily did have this way of dancing when she was joyful, like her whole body couldn't contain the happiness.

"Okay," she said. "But I'm not accepting money from you. Just… pay the tickets and we'll call it even. I'll bring Lily by a few times a week. After four, right?"

Thomas's smile became big, the first one she'd seen from him. "Really? You'd do that?"

"Your wife is dying and my kid delights her. Of course I'll do that."

"Thank you. I can't tell you what this means."

Erin turned to walk back to her car, then paused. "Thomas? The next time you want something, just ask. The entire ticketing debacle was insane."

He grinned, and for a moment, he looked like a regular person instead of some intimidating rich guy. "I'll try. I'm not great with people."

"Yeah, figured."

That day, Erin stopped to pick Lily up from daycare and drove to Elm Street. She pulled right up in front of the big house and had her daughter out of the vehicle.

"Why are we here, Mommy?"

"There's a nice lady who loves to see children play. Want to show her your cartwheels?"

(Image was generated with Google ImageFX)

Lily grinned and soon started spinning around on the pavement. Erin glanced at the front window and saw a thin woman with a scarf wrapped around her forehead, sitting in a chair pushed up against the glass. Erin could see that even from where she stood across the street, she was smiling.

Thomas arrived at the window beside his wife and raised his hand in a small wave. Erin waved back.

"Mommy, look!" Lily had scooped up some chalk that had been abandoned on the sidewalk and was already well on her way to drawing a rainbow.

"I see you, baby. That's beautiful."

Erin sat on the curb and let her daughter play, knowing that behind the window, a dying woman was watching too, and for a few minutes at least, everyone was exactly where they needed to be.