She walked in with swollen eyes and twelve crumpled dollars—ten and two ones—clutched in her hand.

“My son’s wedding is in a few hours,” she whispered. “I don’t want to embarrass him. I have twelve dollars.”

His cardigan was threadbare, his shoes worn, but his gaze was steady. I put the money aside and pulled out a chair.
“You won’t embarrass anyone,” I said. “Sit down. I’ll take care of you.”

I curled her gray hair into soft waves, shaped her eyebrows, applied a light gloss, and dusted her lips with a hint of pink. When I turned her toward the mirror, her mouth trembled.
“Please don’t let me be invisible today,” she’d said at the beginning.
Now she smiled as if the sun had found her.

She tried to leave the twelve dollars on my counter. I pushed them away.
“Go enjoy your son.”

The next morning, I opened the living room and stopped dead in my tracks. Flowers everywhere. Tulips, roses, lilies, baby’s breath… ribboned and arranged in every corner as if a florist had moved in overnight. No note, just a small card under a vase:
Thank you for having me.

It didn’t add up to twelve dollars. I hesitated all day, until the hotel where the wedding was taking place the day before called.
“The groom and his bride are inviting you to a small dinner on Friday, to thank them.”

I had worn my best blouse. The bride was radiant, the room was modest and warm. The woman’s name was Mirela. When she saw me, she stood up and hugged me like family.
“My son and daughter-in-law told me what they did,” she said, her eyes moist. “They pooled the money for the wedding gifts. The flowers were theirs. They said a card wasn’t enough.”

We talked for almost an hour. Young widow. Two jobs. No fuss. Nothing but love.
“He didn’t know how I was going to do it,” she said, touching her hair as if she was still surprised it was so beautiful. “When he saw me, he cried. He said, ‘She deserves this day, too.’”