When I was thirteen, I learned to hide both hunger and embarrassment.
We were so tight on cash that most mornings I trudged off to school on an empty stomach.
During breaks, while the other kids fished out apples, biscuits and hamandcheese sarnies from their bags, I pretended to be engrossed in a textbook, bowed my head, and hoped no one heard my stomachs quiet protest.
But the real ache wasnt the lack of food; it was the loneliness.
One day a little girl noticed. She didnt say a word; she simply placed half of her lunch on my desk.
I flushed, ready to refuse, but she only gave me a shy smile.
The next day she did it again, and the day after that, and so on.
Sometimes it was a slice of cake, sometimes an apple, occasionally a fresh roll.
To me, it felt like the whole world had been handed over.
For the first time I sensed that someone saw me, not just my poverty.
Then, just as quickly as shed appeared, she vanished. Her family moved away and she never returned to our school.
Every morning I lingered by the classroom door, halfexpecting her to pop in, set herself down next to me and say, Here you go.
The door stayed empty.
Her kindness didnt go with her; it lodged itself inside me.
Years rolled on, I grew up, and occasionally Id think back to that little miracle that once rescued a drab day.
Just yesterday time seemed to pause. My daughter, Emily, came home from primary school and asked,
Dad, could you make me two sandwiches tomorrow?
Two? I blinked. You usually cant even finish one.
She looked at me seriously and said, Ones for a boy in my class. He didnt get anything for lunch today.
I handed over my own packed cheese toast. I stood frozen.
In that tiny act I saw Ethel againthe girl whod shared her bread with me when the world was quiet.
Her generosity had not faded. It had threaded itself through the years, through me, and now lived on in my child.
I stepped out onto the balcony, gazed up at the grey English sky, and a tear slipped down on its own. In that moment I felt everythinghunger, gratitude, pain and loveall at once.
Perhaps Ethel has long forgotten me, or perhaps shell never know how she changed my life.
But Ill remember forever: one kind deed can echo through generations.
And now Im certain that as long as Emily shares her sandwich with another child, kindness will keep on living.
